She says, “Bitch, you crazy,” and gives me a look to match. “You don’t have a best friend.”
I want to change that. I think I want a best friend in life this go-round, or at least someone to drive to the police station with me. Maybe I’m being optimistic, but I still think Crystal is an option. “I’m sorry. I don’t know how I’m going to do it yet, but I’m going to figure out the money.”
“I really need it now. Can you borrow some from JP?”
Not if we break up…
“Did he give you this car?” she asks, making a not-so-subtle point.
“Umm. I’m borrowing it.” Come to think of it, I didn’t ask to borrow it.
She looks at me skeptically. “Is it worth it with JP?”
“Don’t know. I just met him yesterday for all I know.”
“So you were for real about the memory loss thing?”
I nod. “How did we meet?” I ask.
“Um, work.”
“Walmart?”
“No. The strip club. We’ve been through a few of them together.”
A strip club! I shoot my hand over my mouth. In a loud whisper, I say, “I was a stripper?” I’m like the old lady next door, totally shocked by strippers, except I’m the fucking stripper. I don’t know why I’m surprised. Facts have been pointing this way for a while.
“No. You only wish you were stripping. Hostesses make shit.”
I’m starting to feel lightheaded. “Is that how I got into this?”
“Uh-huh. We were like, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if some rich fucker came in here and he wasn’t an asshole and we could get married and live happily ever after?’ ”
Makes sense.
“And you were like, ‘Let’s make it happen.’ ” A sad look crosses her face. “I loved you for that, you know.”
So wewerefriends! I knew it.
“Are all the GoldRush girls strippers?” I recall the advertising language—California’s most sophisticated and elite women. I totally billed these women as actresses on the cusp of winning Oscars.
“Exotic dancers,” she corrects, and then laughs. “And some other randoms.”
“So I’m just a hostess?”
“You also do the books for the club.”
“And now I’m a freaking scam artist.”
“Or a social activist. You hooked us up.”
Sort of. I hooked her up with a drug dealer who killed a guy in front of her—accidentally, but still. Jules, though—maybe he made up for it, if anything can make up for that. “Tell me about Jules,” I say.
Crystal smiles a faraway smile like she’s reliving last night.
“He didn’t mind the Walmart apron? Did you tell him you have a kid?”
“I kept it one hundred,” she says. “Told him the truth, that I was just in it for a free meal and to pay off a favor to you.” While she’s talking she digs through her purse for makeup and starts doing her face up in the flip-down mirror.
