wasted

Taking a break from the festivities last night, I wander into the mostly quiet VIP and get a glass of water from Rocky, the back bartender. I am tucked into the far corner of a plushy couch when a patron spies me from the bar and hulloos over. "What are you doing over there in the dark?" sez he.

"Hiding," sez me.

He thinks this is pretty cute, and ambles over to bother me. Within minutes we are up in Ultra VIP settling into a cozy lapdance preamble, and the DJ calls me for stage. I tell whatsisname I'll be back in a few, and he sez OK, but warns me he's been sowing $5 tips all over the place and may be up to his neck in beaver when I get back. I tell him this is an acceptable risk.

I am on the second stage of my rotation when he wanders by, his bevy of eager lovelies not having thus far materialized. (It was a slow night, and there had been a steady attrition of angry strippers with wheely suitcases headed out the door with his tips more than likely tucked in their socks.) He divides the next several songs between tipping me and tipping the girl in rotation after me, a lovely and very young brunette with a beautiful horse's mouth and big, dazed eyes. When this girl comes to take over my stage from me, her face is weirdly rigid and she doesn't take my hand when I reach down to help her on stage. I wonder if she's really angry at something then realize hellno, she's drunk off her fucking ass. Customer-dude comes to collect me as I'm getting off stage, and we tip Miss Thing a coupla bucks and ask her to join us in the Champagne Room.

He and I hightail it back there and commence the dance-dance. He's the type who can't shut up during dances, like he feels some obligation to keep up his end of a theoretical conversation, but whatever. A slight edge of meanness to him, not unlike my boyfriend's boss, the cunt-hating gay pornograher, but I've met worse. A few songs more and the drunk girl arrives, wailing that she's been looking for us all over and where the hell were we? Customer explains that we're in CR, like we said. Girl looks confused. Girl demands a drink. Customer assures her the waitress will be right over. Girl sits down and lolls back on the couch like a beached fish while custy tells her how adorable she is. She asks for a drink again, now getting agitated. Customer leaves to fetch the waitress, demonstrating yet again that amazing power of brattiness.

"Hey, let's do like this," sez Drunk Girl, and launches herself at me. I scissor my legs obligingly with hers and pet her soft hair. She really is cuter than a speckled pup under a red wagon. Custy returns and shoos us apart to get back in the action. Waitress arrives with shot, and Drunk Girl shoots. Her eyes immediately roll back in her head and she slumps back onto my shoulder. Custy politely asks me to leave them alone.

Hell. I can't very well refuse to go, and both the girl and the custy will think my motives are avaricious if I do. On the other hand, the protective instincts honed during years of co-ed kegger parties are telling me that you don't leave a passed-out girl alone with a strange dude. On the other other hand, I could be making money somewhere else. I compromise by hunting down a waitress and telling her that Princess Sparklepony over there could use an eye on her. Waitress gives me a blank look like what the hell business is it of mine, and I feel, not for the first time, like a schoolmar'm at an orgy. Fine. I return to an earlier customer and ring up another several dances. Every time I lean over his chair, though, I can see back into the Champagne Room where Drunk Girl's legs are sticking out from behind a potted palm, strangely still.

It's only a few songs that I notice Customer Guy is back on the floor, cruising for fresh meat. Thing are winding down with my buddy right about then, and so I wander over. "How's old whatsername?" sez I.

"We didn't hit it off," he sez. I follow his stare across the room and there's our girl slumped back on a chair with some guy apparently giving her a lapdance that involves a lot of licking. Her eyes are closed, and not in an Oh-I'm-In-Ecstacy way.

"Too bad," sez I, and "Yeah, too bad," sez he, and we part, in search of other victims better suited to our tastes.