Shrugging, I sat silently. There was nothing anyone could do. “I don’t think so. I mean I have two jobs now, and it’s barely making ends meet. I can’t ask Benny to do much. He’s just a kid.”
“Yeah, but he’s a good kid. You know he’llwant to help.” I agreed as he answered a text. “Look, I gotta run. But give me a few days. Maybe I can come up with something.”
As I closed the door behind him, I let out a deep exhale. Scanning the apartment, I chuckled, more out of frustration and sadness than actual humor. Someone was going to have to come up with something because there was no way in hell I could go on like this much longer.
“I’m not sure if I trust you,” I said to Gavin as he drove down the highway. He smirked at my unease, making me trust him even less. Nothing about my situation had changed in the last two weeks. They’d probably gotten worse, but I tried my best to block out that idea. I kept on my brave face for Benny and ignored the gnawing hunger and hollow sadness in my gut at theidea that I was failing miserably at taking care of myself. Of Benny.
The only part of my life that had gotten better was my friendship with Gavin. In addition to coming over most nights to keep me and Benny company, and sometimes takeout, he tried to give me money on more than one occasion.
I didn’t take it. I simply couldn’t. But my pride wasn’t going to feed us for much longer. There wasgoing to come a time that I would actually need to rely on Gavin’s help. It was either that or find some kind of dream job. You know, the kind that didn’t exist for college dropouts.
Gavin laughed, cutting through my irritation. “I already told you, if I would’ve let you know where I was taking you, then you wouldn’t have come with me.”
“Exactly,” I blurted. “That’s why I don’t trust you. Wherethe hell are you taking me?” It was my only night off this week and I didn’t want to spend it out drinking with Gavin and his friends. I wanted to be at home, waiting for Benny to get home from his part-time job.
But if I was being honest, which was something that was becoming a foreign concept for me, it had more to do with wanting to sit at home and wallow in my own misery. Hell, most nightsI was so anxious the only way I could fall asleep was to rub one out real quick and wait for the drowsiness to follow. It was becoming my addiction, and sitting in Gavin’s car just reminded me of what I’d rather be doing.
Voicing my protests at him proved pointless, and we both sat silently in the car as he continued driving. It didn’t take me too long to recognize my surroundings. “Downtown?This isn’t your vibe,” I stated flatly, trying my best to keep my nervous energy to myself.
“Nope, definitely not.” His cryptic response pissed me off even more.
Seething in my own annoyance, I barely paid attention to the buildings as we passed them. And if the car hadn’t lurched so hard that I’d almost fallen out of my seat, I might not have noticed we’d even stopped. Craning my neck up tothe hot pink, fluorescent lights flashing above the building, I actually blinked hard to make sure I was reading the word correctly.
“Studs?” I hadn’t meant for it to raise an octave, but my voice clearly had a mind of its own. “Are you fucking serious?” I asked, my voice somewhat returning to normal as I punched him on the arm.
And all the bastard had the sense to do was laugh hysterically.“Well,” he said as he pulled the key from the ignition. “Now you know why I didn’t tell you before.”
“If you think I’m going in there—” Before I could even finish my sentence, he was slamming the door and walking into the hottest male strip club downtown. Fuck, it was probably the most popular strip joint in the entire fucking state.
“What’s that?” he asked over the hood of his car. The flashinglights from the club illuminated his huge-ass smirk, and I hated him for being so damn good-looking, even when I hated his fucking guts.
“I said—” And just like that, he walked away from me, heading toward the club. When he stopped in front of the three-hundred-and-fifty-pound bouncer, I felt a momentary glimmer of hope we’d be turned away. But when they did some dumbass handshake before thebouncer crossed what I assumed were our names off his list, all hope was lost. “Gavin.” I ground out his name through teeth clenched so hard my jaw hurt.
“Huh?” He turned around as if I hadn’t been trying to get a word in since the car stopped.
Grabbing for his arm, I needed to stop him from walking away from me again. “I can’t go in there.” I didn’t know why I said it. It wasn’t true. Therewere gorgeous men everywhere, in all stages of undress.
Gavin caught my distraction and laughed. “Can’t?” he asked rhetorically. “Sure.” Dragging out the word, he began to walk away from me once again before I spun him around on the spot.
“Tell me what the hell is going on before I walk right out of here,” I demanded, only to be met with more laughter.
“Are you going to hold your breath andstomp your feet, too?” Something in the cold, hard stare I shot him made him cut his shit. “Okay, okay.” He held his hands up. “Let me buy you a drink.” I didn’t even bother protesting because a drink, or four, sounded like the perfect fix.
By the time I’d made it to the bar, some of my sarcasm returned, displacing my petulant whininess. “You know, if you wanted to take me out on a date, dinnerwould have been nice.” He rolled his eyes and ordered four shots of whiskey. “That’s a lot even for you.”
When the bartender turned back around with the bottle in his hand, Gavin said, “They’re for you actually. There’s no way in hell you’ll get up there—” He paused, tipping his head to the stage where some body-builder type was gyrating all over the place. “Without a little liquid courage,”he continued, but I hardly heard him. Between the guy’s ass and the money flying all over the place, my head was swirling with far too much information.
“Up there?” I choked out.
“Yep,” he retorted, sliding me a shot.
“You’re out of your fucking mind,” I spat, unable to pull my eyes away from the stage.
Gavin’s response was a short burst of laughter. “Nope, you are,” he decided. “Look,” hesaid, pulling my attention away from the guy dancing. “You’re attractive and you’ve got a good body. You’re tall and built. Tall, dark, and handsome. Women eat that shit up,” he explained. “And believe me, I know.”
His compliments caught me off guard, but it wasn’t lost on me that they didn’t have the same effect on me that I once hoped they’d have. Scared out of my mind, and in desperate needof the fire the whiskey would burn in my chest, I let the shot slide down my throat. Like a teenager downing his first shot, I shook in my seat, nearly choking on the alcohol. Following my lead, Gavin drank his down with the sexy ease I wish I had. He caught me staring, and I almost didn’t care. As he slid me the second shot, he said, “You ready?”
With the glass poised at my lips, I stopped andwatchedthe scene unfolding on the stage. There was a woman wearing a plastic tiara and a cheap veil sitting on a chair in the middle of the stage. Mr. Body Builder was done, and there was a dancer on stage who looked far more similar to me than the last guy. He was tall and muscular. Lean but not skinny. I didn’t think much of him physically—he didn’t do much for me—but I couldn’t peel my eyesaway from what he was doing. He moved around the stage, exuding sex, and getting paid for it.
The thought of dancing mostly naked on stage for a bunch of drunken women celebrating an upcoming wedding wasn’t all that appealing. But as I watched the money literally fly in the air before landing on stage, I knew I had to at least give it a try.
In a swift move, I downed the second shot and stoodfrom my seat. “Let’s do this,” I announced.
“Hmm, only two,” Gavin said as he stood next to me and slapped me on my shoulder. “I had my money on it taking at least five shots before I had to pick you up out of your seat to meet the manager. And at least another two or three before I could get you on stage.”
I couldn’t argue with him, so I didn’t. It definitely wasn’t a job interview I’d haveset up on my own, but at the end of the day, it was money. I wasn’t too proud to do what I needed to get by—at least I didn’t think I was.
And if I was lucky enough to land it, this job might just be the change I needed.
