Work O(f) (Art)

I’m dancing on stage when a guy about my age with dark spiky gelled hair comes in. He appears to be either Latino or Asian, sometimes it’s hard to tell, and LA is full of mixed people. He was one of a handful of early birds hanging out through mid shift. I didn’t pay much attention to him because he hadn’t tipped me during my set. The easiest way to get a dancer’s attention is to hand her money. When I say “money” I mean more than a few stupid dollars. Give her at least enough to afford a Chipotle with guacamole, but when in doubt, round up to $20. He’s staring at me. At first I blow it off, assuming he’s scoping out the room broadly, but as I wander around, I catch his eyes on me. He turns his body to face me, at which point it’s undeniable. We communicate silently, through gestures.

Me: Me?

Him: You. Yes, you.

Me: Okay.

I sit on his lap and he immediately gathers me into his arms and rests his ear on my shoulder.

Him: I wanna take you shopping.

Me: What?

Him: I wanna take you shopping. Sorry, is that too forward?

Me: No, it’s not, I just don’t know you yet.

Him: I’m Michael. What’s your name?

Me: Selena. Nice to meet you, Michael.

Him: Where do you like to shop?

Me: Um...

Him: Let me guess, Forever 21? H&M?

I wonder if he wants to take me shopping only because he thinks I shop at cheap stores. There’s a new girl at the club who’s a bit of a veteran. She’s older, petite and blonde with shapely breast implants. She dances in black Louboutin stilettos. Red bottoms. The soles under the pads of her feet are worn. Some dancers purposely dress expensively. They believe that if you look expensive, money finds you. Another girl wears a Louis Vuitton bodysuit, but hers looks like a gilded knockoff. Does a fake work as well as the real thing?

Another issue for me is, the amount of effort required for a shopping date seldom equals the value of the items purchased, because I spend money like a poor girl. I make a strict list of utilitarian items and have no interest in luxury brands. I’m more concerned about not accumulating clutter than I am about collecting status symbols. I don’t have much of an eye for fancy tech. I also feel an immense amount of guilt when someone buys me something. I hate standing beside my sugar date waiting while they handle the money like I’m some kept woman, even if theoretically I’m down for the sugar. I’d rather just have someone hand me money, to handle as I may. I’m a compulsive saver and early payer of bills, sadly. My unfortunate burden to bear.

Me: No.

Him: Is it too soon? I just wanna take you out. We don’t have to go shopping. Have you been to Disney Land?

Me: I haven’t— here anyway.

I look away, searching for a way to not sound like a bougie privileged kid.

Me: I had a weird thing where when I was a kid, my family took us to Disney Land Paris. So, I got my Disney Land experience.

Him: That’s so cool!

Me: It was fine.

Him: Well you haven’t been to the one here! It’s decided. I’m taking you to Disney Land!

Me: I actually don’t want to go to Disney Land.

Nothing about Disney appeals to me. I don’t want to wait in lines in the sun in a place full of tourists and children. I don’t want to ride the rides or take picture with the Disney princesses. Disney Land is a slave labor camp where everyone has to smile.

Him: Well, what do you want to do in California that you haven’t done yet?

Me: I’ve done pretty much everything I’ve wanted to do, to be honest.

Him: Oh.

Me: What do you do?

Him: I’m in real estate.

People in real estate tend to be some of my favorites. They regularly handle big money. They receive large lump sums and tend to go big when they receive a substantial commission. I did stripper mental math: minus for suggesting a Forever 21 shopping date, plus for the real estate gig.

He starts kissing my shoulder. When someone kisses my shoulder, it usually means they’re attached to me. It’s a romantic gesture. It’s not the same as groping a boob or reaching for my inner thigh. When someone kisses me on the shoulder, I know it’s a kind of love.

Him: Sorry. Is it okay if I kiss your shoulder?

Me: It’s fine.

Him: What’s your mix?

Me: Black and Puerto Rican. What’s yours?

Him: I’m Filipino. Sometimes people think I’m Latino.

Me: I could see that.

Him: Have you ever dated a Filipino guy before?

Me: Oddly enough, no. Can I take you for a dance?

Him: I’ll buy some dances with you for sure a little bit later. Sit with me for a little longer and then we’ll go.

I sit with him a while longer and we chat about this and that. He clarifies that he was in real estate but now he’s studying nursing. He wants to buy some property and open up an elder care facility with his brother who is already a practicing nurse. He hugs me like a child clings to its teddy. It’s a bit overbearing, but not altogether onerous. He seems kind, if somewhat naive.

Eventually we go for a VIP set. When we enter the booth, as he sits down it stinks like a fart. He’s fear farted. Neither of us acknowledge this fact. I don’t want him to feel embarrassed and he’s likely too embarrassed to come clean. His body is hot like a radiator. His heart is beating as if he had just run a mile. He lifts his shirt to reveal his abdomen. He takes hold of my hips and forces them back and forth rapidly, like a man who’s only learned about sex through watching porn. The primary issue is that this kind of grinding is highly taxing. I try to roll with it, but it’s like doing a hundred rapid fire mini squats. He tells me to turn around. I’m sitting facing away from him and he grabs hold of my hips again. This time he’s pulling and pushing me so quickly I’m nearly forced off of his lap. He wants me to rub his stomach. He keeps whispering porny instructions I can’t hear over the music because I’m half deaf. I keep leaning back to ask him, “what?!” like I’m elderly. It’s the kind of smut he would struggle to repeat because repetition would imply cognition of the words coming out of his mouth. But it seems to be an instinctual kind of rambling, a switch flicking on.

Him: Can you feel it?

This is a question I get somewhat regularly in the heat of a dance. At first I take it to be a question of my arousal, assuming that if I feel the shape of his dick that it must mean I’m aroused. Any dick = good dick. Then I realize it could be a deeply concerning issue. “Are you able to feel my penis, or is it completely unnoticeable and unremarkable? If it is unremarkable, do I have any value?” Sometimes when men ask me this question, because my answer is less important than the cadence with which I say it, I’ll just say something like, “sure.”

I did two VIP sets with this guy. It appeared that none of his prior nervousness had dissipated by the second set, because I’m pretty sure he fear farted again. Neither of us addressed this matter. Either he didn’t smell it, or he wasn’t about to claim it. I understand this struggle. Plenty of times I’ve gone to work without taking a satisfactory dump, or maybe I simply made the mistake of consuming cheese before a shift. Farts happen, but it occurred to me that I was dancing in a fart. The second dance went essentially the same as the first. I could tell he was really getting into it. At one point, those three most heinous words erupted from his mouth:

Him: I’m gonna come.

He looked at me with heart emoji eyes as if this was his gift to me, the fruit of our combined effort ripe in his nut. I stared daggers at him and ripped through his pre orgasmic glow.

Him: Or maybe I won’t. I won’t.

He inhaled and his penis retracted into itself. We finished the dance without further issue, and afterwards he handed me a reasonable tip. It was a Honda Civic of a tip: reliable yet unremarkable. A car you have, but not the car you want to have.

Him: That’s gonna be it for today, babe. Thanks so much.

He walks out in a sweat, and that was that.