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Her chest pumps with the heaviness of her breaths, then she’s turning toward the back of the stage while the man is heaved outof there.
While the last bit of her disappears behind the curtain, I start to wonder who this Kayla really is and why I care to begin with.
CHAPTER FOUR
KAYLA
“You okay, honey?”Coco asks quietly backstage, not wanting the other girls to hear.
She’s the one person I’ve grown close to, both of us with scars of our own.
I never meant for her to find mine, but the day I came to apply to work here, she walked in on me trying to cover up my scars with makeup.
My heart jumped in my throat, and I thought that was it. I’d never get the job now. She’d tell them as soon as I went into the audition. Or they’d be able to see it because how could I cover these scars all by myself? They’d see how ugly I was, and they’d tell me to leave.
But Coco didn’t do that. Instead, she closed the door, went to the closet in the corner, and pulled out this mesh-looking thing, then helped me attach it to my panties. It had a hole for my neck,which she added a choker to.
“Makeup doesn’t work as well. But this will, honey.”
I cried. I stood there and cried as she held me and told me it was okay. Then she fixed my makeup and cheered me on as I went up on that stage and danced my heart out.
She’s a good fifteen years older than me, and kind of like a big sister now.
The girls do their makeup, glancing at me, knowing how shaken up I was when that asshole grabbed me. I was visibly trembling once I was back here, the adrenaline gone and only the memories of my past remaining.
“I’m better now,” I tell Coco. “Thank you.”
Swiping off my ruby-red lipstick, I gape at my reflection in the mirror. I don’t even recognize myself anymore.
“These men think we’re whores or something,” Coco says, louder now. “Like we’re here to do what they want, but fuck that!” She flips her blonde hair past her square shoulders, her frame thick and muscular. “Next time, you hit him in the balls, sweetie. See how he likes it.”
“She’s not trying to get arrested,” Cat remarks with a roll of her eyes from beside me, staring into a mirror while adding a new coat of red lipstick.
Cat’s been at this club for a while. Not as long as Coco, though. I’m the newbie, only been doing this for a couple of months.
I do it because I want to. But if I’m being honest, it’s because Ineedto.
One night, I passed by the club and went inside. Seeing these women bare themselves while the men watched, unable to do anything else to them, I wondered how it’d feel to have that kind of power. To show the men everything and have the upper hand. To say no, something I didn’t have the luxury to do before…
So I applied. And this sense of control, that things only happen on my terms, it’s freeing. It’s helping.
But, of course, I can’t tell anyone. If Jade or Elsie found out, forget it! They’d think I’d lost it for real. I’m sweet, innocent Kayla. Sweet, innocent girls don’t go and strip. But this one does.
I tell Coco goodbye before I head out. When I step into the dark parking lot, streetlamps illuminate across several cars there.
Wearing sneakers now, my feet barely make a sound as I tread a few yards, getting closer to my sedan, when a noise carries from the end of the lot. I can’t make it out at first.
But then I hear it: a muffled cry.
My hairs rise on both arms when I register a grunt—a man’s grunt.
The woman, though? She continues to cry.
My stomach churns, because I know what’s happening before I get the chance to see it. I’ve heard that exact sound from my own lips, from those of my friends as men took turns.
Removing my phone, I intend to call for help, and when I step near the tall dumpster, I see him. A man with his back to me, the streetlights providing enough illumination to find a woman I recognize by her ruby-red hair to be Ivy from the club.
“Ivy?” I call, flipping on the flashlight on my cell.
