11.12.2001
Shelly always drove herself to work. It became a matter of pride after her husband left her. They had only been married for two years - the two years right after high school - but he always insisted on driving her to work, dropping her off at a high-rise office building in "historic" Dallas where she was employed as a typist, and then picking her up at the end of each day. She could only guess that the reason was because he didn't trust her and wanted to keep tabs on her every move. The irony, she laughed when she thought about it, was that it was him the watchful eye needed to be kept on.
Bobby was her high school sweetheart. He wasn't the quarterback and she was not captain of the cheerleading team. When she thought about him, Bobby was just another loser, but he was a loser who was a senior when she was a freshman and he had a really great car. She now drove herself to work everyday in that car, the single prize won from him in the divorce made possible by a friend of a friend of her father's who happened to be a lawyer.
The car was a classic Chevy Impala and it roared up I35, breezing past everyone else in their Honda hatch-backs and Toyota 4Runners. Bobby had equipped it with a nice stereo system that included a six-CD changer in the trunk that had taken her six weeks to earn the money for. All of her money was deposited into the common account while Bobby kept half of his money private. She didn't know it at the time – those facts came out during the proceedings – but he used his money to take other girls out to dinner, drinks, and sometimes a hotel later. It never showed up on their common statement, so as far as he was concerned, it never happened. It was only fair that she kept the car.
Bobby left her with something else that he didn't fight about nearly as much as he did the Impala; he left her with a daughter. Bobby was supposed to send a monthly check to Shelly to help out with food and clothing but the money was usually under the amount required by the court when it came at all. She lost the typist job during the divorce because they had only one car and the public transportation in Dallas was meant really for the tourists so they could get themselves from their motels down to the Grassy Knoll and, as such, was unable to make it in to work on time. For the first month no bills got paid and even rent was late on the hovel of a house she rented with the court's backing in Lancaster. She was desperate for work by the time her current employer appeared.
Shelly was a pretty girl. She wasn't a cheerleader, but she still had looks that said "girl next door." Really attractive girls didn't work where she went for her interview. Really attractive girls had a lot of baggage. They were prom queens or wannabe models. They wanted to be cared for and treated like princesses and paid more money than anyone was willing to pay. The people where Shelly interviewed were usually single mothers or drug addicts or both and just wanted something that would cover the bills and require no skills. Shelly applied as a waitress and was quickly hired.
She would have loved to have seen Bobby's face at the sight of his car parked in front of a building with a long legged neon cowgirl on top. She knew what he would have thought and that made it all the more fun. She wasn't embarrassed about working at a strip club because she wasn't stripping. She walked around in a tight black leotard and charged guys ten bucks for a beer that in a six-pack would have cost five. She was tipped well because she was comely and she finally had enough to pay for almost everything she and her little girl needed. Shelly only wished that she had enough to pay for everything they wanted.
The managers, since the first day she started, each inquired daily as to whether or not she had any interest in "dancing." There were over five managers per shift so, to her, it seemed like she was being asked almost hourly. There was good money to be made in it, they said. The girls up there were just like her, they hinted. It was nothing to be afraid of, they soothed. But, above all, there was a lot of money to be made, they would always repeat. Shelly was a good mother and she worried, even at her daughter's young age, how it would reflect were the other mothers or children to find out that she was a stripper. She saw what some of the dancers did in the dark corners of the club to earn extra money and didn't want to be associated with such. It was for that reason that she always declined the offer, though politely which was her way, but this also led the managers to believe that there was a possibility she might change her mind at some point.
She went out to drinks with some of the girls, giving them a ride in her ex-husband's car, and liked to listen to them. The more she was around them, the more she started to believe that they were just like her. They were all just dancers and, regardless of their money problems, didn't like the same aspects of the club that she found offensive. Shelly grew to respect them though she still didn't want to join them.
After a few months of waitressing at the club and getting her bills under control, just when things seemed to be going the way she had been hoping they would, the Impala broke down. She called in sick to work and had the car towed to a garage to have it looked at. Looking back on what they told her, she wasn't sure of what was wrong with the car except that because it was a classic, it was going to cost her five hundred dollars. Five hundred dollars was equal to the amount she had managed to squirrel away into a low interest savings account at the bank and whatever was in her checking account. It was all the money she had in the world and left nothing for bills or food, putting her right back into the same position as before. Since the car was undriveable without the repairs and she figured that there was no way she could buy another for less, she had no choice but to write the garage a check and feel a sense of hopelessness drift over her. She got the car back the next day minus two CD's she'd left in the changer and fell crying on her bed. Shelly had no idea what to do.
As she headed up I35 far faster than normal, thoughts raced through her mind at a speed greater than what she drove. She could hold up a bank. She'd seen that once in a movie. A bunch of girls, low paying jobs - why not? Of course, she knew that she could not do it by herself and the number of friends she could claim dropped woefully after graduation. Her solution didn't dawn until she wheeled into the gravel parking lot and parked under the not yet lit neon cowgirl.
Shelly sat in the car for a second and thought. Did she really want to do what she was thinking about doing? Would she keep doing it even once she was back on track? Would they let her go back to being a waitress? She added up the questions she was asking her self and compared it with the number of fiscal problems she had and decided there was little choice.
Instead of walking into the office and changing into her black leotard, she looked for the nearest assistant manager and nearly bowled him over. Mike was his name, and even though he had the same oafish mindset and violent nature that the rest of the management crew seemed to cultivate and reward, Mike somehow still managed to be a decent guy most of the time.
Still shocked by her approach, he stood watching her for a half minute expecting a punch. When Shelly said her piece, she might as well of hit him in the gut. The general consensus among the staff was that she had waitressed there long enough and shown so little interest in dancing that she probably never would.
"Are you sure you want to do this Shelly," he asked almost stuttering.
"Yeah. And I want to dance tonight," she said, reinforcing the point further.
"Okay," he said shaking his head. "Okay, if this is what you want to do, I've got to go over some rules, then I'll put you on the sheet."
"Fine," she said.
"First, the customer touches you, you flag us down. I don't care how much he pays."
"Got it."
"Second, no sex on the premises or otherwise. I'm sure you've seen it, and believe me, anyone we see doing it, is out of here, permanent."
"Okay."
"Third, the state of Texas doesn't allow a girl to go topless. You've got to paint your things," he said shyly with an awkward finger pointed towards her breasts. "That's it. You understand the rules."
"Yep," she said. Shelly had made up her mind but she was still nervous about it and hoped that it didn't show.
Mike took her back to the manager's office and put her on the sheet that determined in what order the girls danced on the main stage and then where to make her way around the room, dancing on the side stages and giving lap dances where the real money was made. Since she was the third girl to show up, she was put third on the list and told to go back to the dressing room to pick out something to wear.
Shelly had never seen the dressing room before and had imagined that it would look like they did in the movies with the mirrors framed by lights, directors' chairs, and lavish costumes. Instead, what she found was a room little bigger than a closet with a single mirror, a shelf with a couple small cans of latex paint of different colors and a rack on which were tossed various pairs of thongs and boas. Two bare light bulbs hung from the ceiling at opposite ends, illuminating the room just enough so she did not bump into the boxes of flyers that were crammed everywhere they could go. Upon seeing the mess that was now her working environment, Shelly could feel tears start to well up in her eyes and the confidence that had come with the decision quickly fade away.
The only thing that stopped her from starting to actually cry were the two girls who were already there, nipples painted over and thongs adorned. They had gone out to breakfast with her multiple times and knew that something was up if she was in there. They came over to her, gave her a big hug then sat her down on one of the boxes so she could settle in before striping down and changing. Shelly thanked them and they nodded, recounting the horror they felt the first time they danced and eventually she felt better, slowly unbuttoning her shirt.
As she peeled off her underwear, it occurred to her that before this moment, the only man who had ever seen her naked was Bobby. First Bobby, then the girls, the... well... the whole world.
When the girl before her left the room for the stage, Shelly hailed a waitress and ordered a stiff drink in the hope that it might bolster her, slow to return, confidence. The waitress returned right as Shelly was called so she slammed the drink and made her exit, girls cheering behind her, a room full of guys waiting ahead.
For her first night, she did well. Her first dance, she admitted to herself, was stiff, but a few drinks and dances later, no one could tell that she hadn't been doing it for years. She even made out with a solid amount of cash in her back pocket. It wasn't the return of her savings account, but it was a stride in the right direction. After she paid her twenty dollar "stage rental" fee to the club, she gave the bouncer a peck on the cheek on the way out, she was so happy, and into the parking lot. Shelly waved goodbye to the other girls then looked around for her car. She looked back and forth, feeling a little bit tipsy from the alcohol, and at first couldn't believe that she couldn't remember where she parked. Then a cold realization fell over her.
Her car was gone.
She stormed back into the club and could feel a scream rising up in her throat. The bouncer, a big, bald, fat piece of white trash with a bunny rabbit heart lept off of his stool at the sight of her and gently touched her arm.
"Shelly," he asked softly. "What's the matter? What happened?"
"Someone stole my goddamned car," she bellowed, releasing all of her frustration at the human wall in front of her. "Someone stole my car."
"That was your car," he asked quietly, looking slightly embarrassed. Shelly looked up from his belly button, the place on his body that was in her direct line of sight, and eyed him for a second.
"What do you mean, 'that was my car,'" she asked suspiciously.
The bouncer looked down at the floor and tried to avoid her fiery eyes. "This guy came in and said that he'd lost his keys and needed to call a tow truck," he mumbled almost incoherently. "I thought it looked like your car, but you know the guys that come here. I wasn't sure."
"What'd he look like," she demanded. "What the fuck did he look like!"
"I don't know Shelly," he said holding his big arms out in a gesture of innocence. "He looked like... I don't know, Mid-twenties, short brown hair, Cowboys cap, blue eyes. You know, a guy."
Even though the description fit almost everyone in the Dallas area, Shelly knew the blue eyes. It was Bobby. Bobby had taken her car, the car she'd just put all of her money into and danced topless to get out of debt from.
"I'm going to fucking kill him," she screamed as the bouncer shrunk away and out the door for a much-needed cigarette. She reached into the office for the phone and dialed her ex's number. After four rings he finally answered, sounding as though the phone had just woke him.
"Hello," he mumbled into the phone.
"I want you to come back her with my car you fucking creep," she screamed into the mouthpiece.
"Shelly," he asked surprised.
"You bring that car back here right now or I'll call the fucking cops! You know that's my car now!"
"But Shell, that's all the way on the other side of town. I've got to go to work tomorrow," he said as soothingly as possible, but she was having none of it.
"You can either bring it back or explain to your boss that you called in sick from jail," she said and he finally relented, agreeing to be there in a little more than half an hour.
Shelly, finally starting to feel a little bit less panicked than before, hung up the phone and waited for him out on the sidewalk, bumming cigarettes from the bouncer who waited with her out of sheer embarrassment and puppy dog loyalty.
Forty-five minutes later, Bobby pulled up in her classic Chevy Impala. Shelly and the bouncer stood and waited for him to exit the vehicle.
"Shell," Bobby started. "I'm sorry. I saw the car here and thought that it was stolen. I was going to give it to you this weekend."
"Fuck you Bobby. I work here," she said, holding out her palm for his key.
"You what," Bobby asked, surprised by the revelation. "You work here? Like, as a dancer?"
"Not that it's any of your business," she said motioning with her fingers that she wanted the key. "But yeah. I'm a dancer. With you not paying your part, I've got to make some money."
Bobby's eyes glazed over with shock as he worked the key off the ring and thought about the girl he had married and wondered what had happened to her. When the key was finally free, Shelly snached it from him and hopped into the car, tossing his CD cases and cigarettes onto the gravel.
"Look, Shell," Bobby said, snapping out of his trance to retrieve his things. "I need a ride home."
"You can walk," she said out the window, then started the car with a roar, tossed it into reverse, and peeled out of the lot, kicking up a cloud of dust that hung as the only reminder that she was ever there.
Bobby looked over at the bouncer who was patting the soot off of his shirt and jeans. "What about you big guy," he said. "Could you give me a ride home?"
The bouncer looked at him for a second then frowned and said, "You heard the lady. You're the reason I'm still here instead of in bed."
As the bouncer walked away to his pickup, Bobby looked around the empty strip club parking lot, listened to the sound of the freeway, then, upon deciding on a rough direction, started walking, looking for the nearest payphone, hoping he could get back to Plano in a cab on fifteen bucks.