Dressing Room Drama

Yesterday was the strangest day yet at the strip club and is partly what prompted me to start this blog in the first place. The rest of the impulse is a direct result of the fact I now know I'm not aloud to write about the club. A woman from the club was fired three days ago after our General Manager who religiously googles our club's name and location  discovered her dominatrix website which made reference to the club. Uncermoniously she was told to come to the club on her day off and clear out her locker. She explained  what had happened while shoving shoes and outfits into her carry-all her face void of any emotion.

After Diablo Cody's big hit with her memoir (and once daily blog) CANDY GIRL "A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper" and her even bigger Academy Award winning screenplay JUNO stripper blogs have been popping up on the internet like U.S. military bases in the Middle East. Two of my personal favorites being River City Kitty and Hobo Stripper. Both are thought provoking and racy reads. 

I've been at this club for three weeks and already four girls have been fired. That's not including the ones who have auditioned, worked one day and asked to leave. I witnessed one girl from Atlanta, GA get tossed after she took her top off during a lap dance. She was too intoxicated to remember the rules. Dancers have to have an inch wide thong and bra on at all times. Our breasts are only revealed on stage for one full song and always the last song of the set. Even then our breasts can only remain bare between the pole and the back wall. If we step in front of the pole we have to be within reaching distance of it at all times. When a customer wants to tip from the tip rail (meaning the front of the stage, there isn't an actual rail at our club) we have to cover our breasts before we approach them. To be frank it's a pain in the ass. Men from Georgia, Texas and Washigton are astounded at how prudent we are in the most liberal city in California. No clothes no booze. If the guys are that hard up to have tits in their face and stare at some twenty-one year old brazilian waxed poonany they have to give up their $8 beer and  go sip on a $12 sprite at the clubs on Broadway. Not that I'm judgmental in anyway mind you. To me there's little difference between giving an all nude air dance to grinding on a dude's hard-on fully clothed for three minutes.

These last three days I've been at the club the same dancer, we'll refer to her as boney, has been napalming my love jungle. She has worked at the club for a few years and is a great hustler. The problem is she deems every guy she has ever danced with as her regular if they approach me or I them. I'm the new girl and it's been pitifully slow this week. I'll be in the middle of a conversation, chatting up a customer for ten minutes and she'll run up screaming and jump in his lap while he winces in pain, his eardrums rattling from her super sonic mating call while her boney ass slams into his crotch. She's a problem because 1. She's always drunk 2. She talks shit and can't remember the next day. Already there has been more than one instance of her cursing me one evening and greeting me sweetly the next day. I couldn't take it anymore and yesterday after she pulled the squealing into my customers lap move I did it right back to her. I waited for her to sit down with some one and I hoped right into the man's lap shoving by breasts high (mine are big only in comparison, she's a member of the itty bitty titty committee) into his face. 

"Hey stranger! It's been weeks." I giggle. The boney drunk's eyes narrow suspisiously. She had made so much money this week from me being too polite letting her walk all over me and I hadn't sold one dance that day. 

"I don't know what you mean but I like where this is going." said the man and with that she stood up and stormed off walking straight to the house mom. The funny part is I tip the house mom and she doesn't. I was told by a dancer sitting with them the house mom suggested to boney that she switch to water. That did it. Boney went back to the dressing room to wait for me telling anyone who would listen that I gave head for a hundred dollars and let guys finger me in the champagne room. I guess she was waiting to get in my face and try to fight me, to bad I was giving dances to that guy I stole from her. Boney threw all my stuff on my dressing room table, make-up, accessories and curling iron on to the floor and left early. House mom told me boney would receive a warning for it and told to stay away from me. I don't care at this point. She's on my last nerve. It's on.

The Audition

I'm a closet peeler. The only people that know are my boyfriend and close friends and family. I.E. those who are on a need to know bases. Why cause needless worry? Family drama is already unavoidable in my upper middle class liberal bubble. Don't burst the bubble man! I already have the reputation of the family bubble burster. If I told them all at Thanks Giving I'm a peeler I doubt they would bat an eyelash. Why do I strip? Money. duh.

        

 I auditioned for the day shift manager who said he’d ‘take me on’. I had never stripped before. The day shift manager said since I lacked experience he would only commit to giving me three shifts a week. Two slow days and one really good day. I was hoping the situation wouldn't last long and I could prove myself as a competent sales person quickly. I’d heard some real nasty rumors about the day shift girls and the day shift clientele from the night shift girls. Ah, well…I have to start some where and dancing is where the money is.

My audition went by so fast. Getting ready in the dressing room I felt like I was going to throw up. The day shift house mom wasn’t that supportive either. I think she kept forgetting that I already worked at the club since I never worked a dayshift as a cocktail waitress. She went over the rules of my audition briefly and then ignored me leaving me shaking infront of my dressing room mirror until it was time to approach the main stage. She walked me up to the DJ Booth and made a hand gesture to go up and talk to him.

“What kind of music do you like?" He asked.

“Can you play something fast by Nelly Fertado for the first song and the second song can you play Heartbeats by The Knife.” The second song was important to me because that was the song I had to dance topless to.

“I can’t do any more Nelly today but Heartbeats hasn’t been played yet so you’re in luck.”

The house mom then walked me up to the stage entrance and instructed me to meet her on the other side after I was finished. 

“Remember, she said, do not leave the stage until the next girl has arrived and do not except tips from the tip rail without putting your top back on.” Then she left me standing there alone waiting my turn watching the amazing dancer before me spin around the stage and crawl up and down the pole showing off her amazing boob job. I was hoping there wouldn’t be many customers that early but for 6pm on a Tuesday the house was packed.

“Everybody put down your drink and clap your hands for our newest auditioning dancer, the lovely Ruby!” 

At least the DJ thinks I’m lovely, I thought miserably as a took a shaky step onto the stage in my dangerously high strappy heels.

It was over before I knew it. You know how people say time just stops when your nervous? Well, once I got on stage and strutted around the pole I just had fun. Erotic dancing is just real slow with your body weight centered around your ass and your pelvis. It's not hard to do. Men aren't that complicated. They just want you to bend over until your top comes off. All the butterflies in my stomach  managed to fly away and before I knew it my last song was over. One more week as a cocktail server and it was official. I was Ruby.