Michelle waited for days, jerking every time the phone rang, but it was never him.  Her anxiousness eventually turned to anger, then hardened into a cold hatred which solidified and began to attach itself to anything convenient.  After a few weeks without a call, it began to seep over everything, covering the entire world.

She knocked on Sam’s door.  It was early, but she had nothing better to do.  “Let’s go to work!” she called.

Sam opened the door wearing men’s boxers and no shirt.  Her breasts sat impertinently staring out from her chest.  “It’s early,” she said.  “I have a guest.”

Jesus Christ how can this woman respect herself sleeping around with anything that moves.  What a slut.  I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror if I did those things she does.   “I just wanted to get going.”

Sam looked at her with an expression halfway in between annoyance and disappointment.  “I’ll be ready in fifteen minutes.  Just hang on.”

Michelle sat on the filthy hallway carpet, leaning against the wall.  After ten minutes had passed, she felt a pang of disgust as a short, dark-haired woman made her way out of Samantha’s room.  God, look at that girl.  She’s all fat and dumpy.  How can Sam find that attractive?  If I looked like that I’d lock myself in my room for a month with no food.  Sam must just fuck anything that comes along.  She probably just fucks anyone.  I bet she isn’t even careful.  I’d hate to be her gynecologist.  She probably has AIDS or something or at least syphilis.  Doesn’t syphilis drive you insane?  Maybe that’s why she thinks girls like that are hot. 

Finally, Samantha was ready, bathed and dressed, skin as white and smooth as a porcelain doll.  Michelle followed her to work, fuming silently.

In the dressing room the mirror was full.  Again, Julie was sitting doing homework when other girls stood chairless, unable to do their makeup.  Michelle went to her locker to change.  Behind her back, she could hear Bunny Lu talking. 

“He says he’ll fly me to the Dominican Republic.”  She paused, probably to snort something.  “I mean, can you believe that?  Isn’t that fucking wild?  Me in the fucking Dominican Republic!  That’s in like the Caribbean.”

“How much he paying you?” Angel asked.  Her voice had a monotonic, droning quality that came with intense drug use.

“Fifty thousand dollars!  Plus it’s like a week in the Caribbean, and the plane ticket.  This guy’s fucking loaded.  I mean, I can’t even imagine.  We’re gonna be in the lap of luxury.”

“Sounds like a pretty good deal,” another voice said, too vibrant to be Angela’s.  Michelle turned around.  Vivian was standing on the outside of the group of women with her hands on her hips.

“You’re fucking insane,” Julie’s voice came, a dry, nasal drumbeat from a few seats away.  “That is the stupidest fucking thing I’ve ever heard.  You know he’s gonna kidnap you.  Haven’t you ever heard of sex slavery?”

Bunny snarled like a lapdog.  “Who the fuck asked you, you fucking chink?”

Julie rolled her eyes.  “Insulting people who are trying to help you is a good strategy in life.  You should keep working that angle.  And I’m not Chinese.  Try something like kimchee eater next time.  I know it doesn’t have that same ring to it, but hey.”

“Whatever, gook.”  She did a line off a mirror Princess had passed to her.

“Closer, but still off.”   Julie slammed her book shut.  “Look, these guys, they prey on people like you.  Haven’t you ever seen a fucking movie?  He’s using you as chattel.  You’re not gonna be able to get back.  He’ll fucking sell you.  You think you’ll ever get back home?  You think the US government is gonna give a fuck about the fate of a whore-stripper?  They’ll say good riddance, and you’ll be trapped in a brothel somewhere while some businesscock with AIDS rapes your brains out.”

Bunny Lu did another line.  “Shut up fucking Jap.” 

Princess huffed and threw her makeup case in Julie’s direction.  It hit her notebooks piled on the counter and several of them slid to the ground with Princess’s case.  The case split open, and numerous lipsticks, eyeliners, and mascaras rolled out, as well as a clear plastic pipe, a pen, a pad of paper, and a tampon.  Princess’s face turned red and she scrambled to the ground after her belongings.  She fell to her knees next to Julie and began to shove makeup, drug paraphernalia, and menstrual products back into the bag.  Julie bent down to gather up her notebooks and picked up a hot pink lipstick from under her chair.

“This shit isn’t mine,” she said and held it out to Princess, who had started to cry.  She ignored Julie and continued madly grabbing items on the floor.  Her nose was running, and she was making a bizarre squeaking noise through her sobs.

“Just fucking take it,” Julie said.  “I’m not holding this for you.  Just take it and never fucking talk to me again.”  Princess stopped and glared up at the other dancer, her face wet with tears and snot and twisted with spastic hatred.  Looking at her, Julie realized the sting of what she had said.  “You heard me.”  A smirk crept onto her face.  “Never talk to me again, you dumb fucking blonde.”  She started laughing, her arm still extended holding Princess’s lipstick.

Princess snarled, her eyes streaming tears.  Suddenly, she leapt off the floor like a cat and caught Julie’s outstretched arm in her teeth.  Pink lipstick fell to the floor.  Growling like a rabid animal, Princess bit as hard as she could until blood dripped from her mouth in concomitance with the clear streams of tears and snot that flowed from her eyes and nose.

The noise emitted from Julie Han at that moment filled the club like a horrific siren.  Her wail, high-pitched and piercing, traveled through the body of The Caribou until it hit the eardrums of Abe and Claudia in their office.

“Babe,” Abe said, annoyed at the sound’s interference with his ability to concentrate on his crossword puzzle, “you think you could check that out?  It might be the pipes.”  He scratched his chin with his pencil lead.  “How many letters are in Connecticut?”

Claudia was already on her way out the door.  She had long since come to the conclusion that for a person with any sort of compassion for fellow human beings at all, no job in the world was more taxing than managing a strip club.  Though her skin had hardened over the years, she had never been able to fully dispel her childhood belief that deep down, everyone had a speck of good in her and deserved a chance. 

This belief was severely tested as she walked into the dressing room and saw Princess’s jaws locked on Julie’s forearm, blood smeared onto the floor, and Julie punching the blonde woman in the head lamely with her free hand, shrieking with the intensity and scope of all three furies. 

The sight halted her for only a moment, however.  “Everyone… settle… the FUCK… DOWN!” she boomed.  She learned this technique from her tenth grade History teacher never imagining how useful it would one day be in her adult life.  Princess and Julie froze, as did everyone else in the dressing room.  Their gazes shifted in unison from the two fighting dancers to the figure standing in the doorway.

“Let go of each other,” she said to the two women on the floor.  They did as they were told.  Julie took some paper towels from the makeup counter and pressed them into her wound.  Princess sat cross legged where she was on the floor, blood still staining her lips and chin.

Claudia stepped into the dressing room.  “Will somebody tell me what the fuck is going on here?”

“I’ll tell you,” Julie said, wincing as she blotted the last bit of blood from her clotting lesion.  “That psycho bitch attacked me!  She fucking bit me like a fucking animal!  Fucking bitch probably has AIDS, and look what she fucking did to me!”  She pulled back the paper towels to reveal a perfect red glistening bite mark.

Princess was shaking her head violently on the floor.  She dug into her bag for pen and paper. 

“That ain’t all that happened,” injected Angel as Princess tried to express herself.  “That Chinese bitch called Princess dumb.  That was just rude.  You don’t go callin’ a girl as sweet as Princess stupid.  She ain’t stupid, she just mute.”

Claudia looked at Angel out of the corner of her eye and sighed to herself.  She then crossed her arms peered at Julie, one hip cocked to the side. 

Julie shifted in her seat.  “I called her dumb, yeah, but you should have heard the ignorant, racist shit they were saying to me first!”  She gestured wildly at the other dancers with her uninjured arm.  “Stupid bitches called me a fucking gook.  That isn’t even fucking accurate!  That isn’t even fucking current.”

The other girls scowled and grumbled.  The one and only thing that most of the dancers could agree on was that they all hated Julie Han. 

Claudia raised an eyebrow and pursed her lips.  “Alright, everyone go back to doing what you were doing.  You two, come with me.” 

Princess and Julie stood and walked out of the room.  They kept their eyes lowered, raising them only to glare or to mouth a threatening remark at the other.

Michelle had watched everything in a fog of disinterest and distain.  She was starting to see Willy’s point.  “They’re like animals,” she said without realizing she was speaking aloud.

Sam was standing a few feet away.  While the other dancers were gawking at the drama, she had continued to change quietly.  “They are animals,” she said.  “And so are you.  Don’t be so judgmental, Michelle.”  Michelle glowered.  And who the fuck are you to tell me how to live my life?  What can a slut like you say about anything?  Who the fuck do you think you are to tell me how to be?  Bitch.

With Princess and Julie gone, two spaces were opened at the mirror.  She quickly gathered her makeup and sat in front of Julie’s text books, still opened and piled with homework.  She shoved them to the side.

She was still doing her makeup when Julie tore back in.  She went to her locker, gathered her bag, and returned to the mirror like a forest fire.  Huffing and muttering, she began to thrust her books, pens and notebooks into the bag.

“…Did you get fired?” Michelle ventured as Julie bent down to collect a notebook from the floor.

“None of your fucking business.”  She stuffed the last book in sight into her bag and stood up.  “No, we didn’t get fired,” she said.  “I didn’t, and neither did she.  I’m going home for the night, and she’s going home for a week.”  A deep purple bruise was already beginning to form around the bite mark on Julie’s arm.  “Suspended.  Like we’re in fucking school.”  Before turning to walk away, she extended her arm and presented it to Michelle.  “How the fuck am I supposed to make any money with this on my arm?  That bitch should have been fired.  I fucking hate stripping.”  Michelle thought she saw Julie’s eyes start to water, but she turned away quickly and walked out the door.

As soon as she left, Princess came in and gathered her things.  She made her way silently out of the dressing room, her face lowered, still wet with tears.

Michelle walked out into The Caribou.  It was a Friday night, and now, with two of the most popular dancers gone, she would have no trouble making a lot of money. 

John’s voice echoed through the club.

“Carmilla’s up next.  Carmilla, could you make your way to the stage, please?  I want to see every man in this club get themselves up to that stage and show this lady some love.  What do you say, guys?  Show her what you’ve got.”

Michelle watched as the tall, pale woman slunk her way through the crowd and up to the stage.  She fell into each step, her body forming contrasting S’s like a bipedal serpent.  Her lips were red, her hair black as the tattoos that followed her torso organically as vines on the trunk of a tree.  As she took the stage, she glanced over and shot a smile at the former ballerina. 

She moved like she had the first night Michelle ventured into The Caribou.  The crowd was drawn to her as if she held their eyes with invisible thread as she turned like a leaf in the wind onstage.  Her whole body pulsed with the beat of the music.  She was the music, and Michelle felt herself drawn with the rest of them toward this phenomenal being.

Then she realized it, and the spell broke.  She turned away from the stage, hating herself for wanting a part of this woman, and hating this woman for making her want it.  Above all, she knew she’d never be as good at anything as Samantha was at dancing.  She glared at the people who sat around her entranced and headed back to the bar.

Filed under: Julie Han, Michelle, Princess, Samantha, The Caribou by Jade