Page 21 of The End of Summer

So, begrudgingly, I go into the little back office with the Jell-O shot stocked fridge and I slide my finger down the stack of shoeboxes until I find a pair my size. They’re open-toed boots with a seven inch heel, but the three inch platforms make the heels only four inches insofar as my arches are concerned. I text Jenna a picture.So, *this* is happening,I write. She texts back a mind blown emoji. I try the shoes on, and am unsurprised to find that I can’t walk in them – at least not naturally – but am delightfully bemused to learn that I can swing from the pole without much trouble. When landing, I’m careful to make sure both feet are firmly connected to the floor and I’m standing fully upright before I let go of the pole, as if it is a walker intended for a 90 year-old instead of the strip club essential that it actually is. After all, nothing’s worse than a shot girl on crutches.

I need more practice in the shoes, but not so much practice dancing as practice justwalking.“You should try wearing them tonight,” Saffron offers. “You can always change out of them if they become too much.”

I shrug. “Maybe.”

“This one’s going to be an easy party. Arrow told me there are only 15 girls coming. It would be a really good night to test them out.”

That sells me. I’ve never worked a party that small yet. Surely, if I move a little bit slower than usual, it won’t kill the vibe with so few ladies in attendance.

So, I keep my usual platforms on standby in favor of the toeless boots once the party begins at 8:00. It’s a cute little group. They’re throwing a masquerade-ball-themed shindig, so each of them has on a fancy eye mask. One’s laden with neon blue and purple feathers (reminiscent of a peacock), another’s covered in glitter. The bride is wearing a mask covered in white lace, which reminds me of something I saw on one of my mom’s old Madonna cassette tapes from back in the day. She’s got little fingerless gloves to match, but she’ll learn soon enough that you can’t use gloves on the pole. They give each of us a mask to wear also. Mine is neon green faux snakeskin – which doesn’t exactly match my mermaid-inspired outfit, but really, who cares? The only issue I have with it is that it slides a bit more than I’d like, so there are moments where it gets in the way of my actual line of sight. Which feels a little scary, given that I’m trying very consciously not to resemble the walking dead when I strut around in the dimly lit space with my trays of Jell-O.

The party progresses as usual, with rounds of shots interspersed by a dance lesson in small groups. The girls perform the choreo they’ve learned between the poles and the chairs, and I continue to work on my balance as I deliver the trays of shots and pretzel bites. While they’re dancing, I work a bit on pacing back and forth, just to keep my calf muscles moving. A part of me is concerned they might cramp up from this constant tippy-toe action.

Right on cue, when the dancing part of the night is over, we get a firm knock on the door. I’m accustomed to this now; I know the stripper has arrived with his bodyguard in tow. I wonder what kind of ridiculous treat the group has in store on this hot, summer night. Arrow sashays over to the door, dramatically pretending to wonder aloud, “Who could that be?” and when she swings the door open, she’s greeted by the bodyguard. He’s a huge man – broad shoulders, with biceps that threaten to tear through his black t-shirt. “Dude, go,” he whispers hard at the guy alongside him. The bodyguard opens a flask, hands it to the man beside him – who, from here looks like he’s wearing some kind of mask (in keeping with the theme, I suppose). The masked bandit takes an enormous swig from the flask and hands it back to the bodyguard. Then, bodyguard guy places an oversized hand on the upper back of the masked bandit, pushing him through the door.

Which is when I notice that he is wearing not only a mask, but a complete Zorro getup. Cape, vest, the whole nine. He looks… well, it’s kind of hard to say how he looks given the snake mask waging war with my fake eyelashes. But his vibe is decidedly different than our previous strippers. He seems uncomfortable, as if maybe something’s got his little Zorro whip all twisted up.

I adjust my mask and see the stripper glance back at the bodyguard, who shoots a real stern look at him like, “Don’t fuck this up, man.”

Then, the stripper turns to face Arrow and gulps once before saying, “I am Zorro, um, the outlaw?” He says this in a real shitstorm attempt at a Spanish accent, and two things run through my mind. The first is that I am immediately reminded of Puss N’ Boots, probably because Antonio Banderas is the voice of the fiery orange cartoon cat and is also the man behind the mask in the actual Zorro movie. The second is – and I assume this is because it’s become a recurring theme in my life – that the stripper looks a whole lot like Brady Hawthorne.

But thatcan’tbe.

I mean, right?

“Oh! Welcome, Zorro,” Arrow purrs.

He spins his cape around to face the group of ladies. “I, um. I’m here to… um…” Zorro looks back at the bodyguard with what appears to be real panic.

“Nobody cares!” one of the ladies screams. “Just take off your pants, Zorro!”

They all begin to cheer and whoop and Cherry turns the music on. Through the speakers, Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee beg the ladies to “let me trespass your danger zones,” (solamente en español), and the stripper is fed to the den of hungry lionesses like a sad, lone wildebeest. The bass thumps and Saffron affixes herself to a pole and begins to swing around it, tossing her hair and moving her hips like the pole itself is a long-lost lover. Arrow pushes Zorro into the crowd of ladies and flips open a folding chair. The gagglefuck of penis-starved, masked maidens push their friend, the bride, into the chair, where I hand her a ruby red shot, which she gratefully accepts. Zorro helps himself to three of the shots on my tray and crushes them with his fist, the Jell-O dripping into his mouth. He swallows, tosses the plastic cups back onto my tray, stops to look at me as if he’s confused, and then mumbles, “Thanks.” He shakes his head quickly, as if trying to situate himself, takes a big, deep breath and approaches the chair slowly. His walk, tentative at first, morphs into a slow strut (amen for alcohol), and I cannot help but notice that through his Zorro mask, he gives me a sideways glance. Like, even though he’s walking towards the bride, his gaze is trained on me.

It’s Brady,my scrambled brain decides.But, no. It can’t be. That makes no sense at all. He’s working. It’s a Friday night! He’s definitely at the Diamond Excelsior. This is just your mind playing tricks on you.My eyelashes choose this exact moment to affix themselves to the edge of the eye-hole on my right side. I turn and carefully walk away into the tiny office, where I set down my shot tray and pull the eyelashes apart from the mask with the utmost caution. I blink several times, making sure I’m free of the glue trap that is the inner edge of this dumb snake face.

While in the office, I grab a fresh tray of shots and fluff up my hair. I emerge into the darkness of the studio to see Zorro – nowsans vest, but still with his cape on – doing something with his hips.Sweet Lord, those abs,I think. They’re like perfect little boxes, all lined up neatly, leading down to a gorgeous V-shape that dips below the waistband of his black pants. Zorro’s lower half undulates like the waves at Nauset Beach, slamming into the shore, thrusting from the dark blue ocean onto the sand. Pounding into the personal space of the bride, whose obvious enjoyment is making me feel perhaps the tiniest bit snakeface-green… with envy.

Fucking control yourself, Gretchen. It’snotBrady.

And even if itwasBrady (which it’s definitelynot), he’s your asshole neighbor, not your friend, and especially not your boyfriend. So let him fuck the air in front of this random, betrothed bachelorette. No (snake) skin off your back.

I breathe in the warring scent of plumeria body spray from the ladies and Malibu from the Jell-O, mesmerized by the angles and lines on Zorro’s hard-as-a-rock body. Until – myGod– he rips off his pants.

Wow.

The pouch of the barely-there man-thong that remains isfilledwith stripper sausage. Like,whoa.

The women screech and howl. “Fuck, yeah!” one yells, shoving dollars into his underwear. He pauses and takes a deep breath – before diving smoothly onto the floor and dry-humping the ground, putting his entire hindquarters on display for the adoring bridal bandwagon. He slithers up from the ground and – literally just centimeters away from the bride’s body – slides his torso along her silhouette, until he places his hands on her face, cupping her cheeks with his palms, leaving the poor bride to stare into the face of Zorro and wonder if she’s making a gigantic mistake by marrying anyone other than his fine ass. He runs his hands down her jaw and into her hair, smiling as he gives a gentle tug on her blonde curls before bending backwards into the ground, motioning with his finger for her to follow him, which she does, naturally. Now, with dollars raining down around them like confetti, she is basically having dry-outercourse with him on the filthy floor. Yes, her clothes are still on, and yes, her friends are all there, hollering like a feral pack of pants-burrito-craving horndogs. “Ay, papi!” the whitest girl in the crowd yells, and I laugh at the ludicrousness of it all.

At some point, Zorro makes his way over to the area where the poles are. Saffron, Cherry and Indigo are swinging away, climbing, spinning, spreading their legs in fankicks and a move called “Hello, Boys,” in which they pole-sit atop one fist while they lean back and split their legs open as wide as possible. The partygoers attack the remaining poles as Zorro takes turns grinding on each girl, making sure nobody leaves without having had the chance to slide their manicured fingers along his rippled stomach or paw at his ass cheeks like a tribe of horny circus clowns. It’s funny – well, sort of, until he begins to saunter up to yours truly.

I tend to stay out of the way during this part of the night. I mean, I’m just the shot girl. No need to interact with me. Tonight, I look like a cross between a reptile and a fish-woman, so yeah, we’re not exactly working with A-game material. Plus, poor Zorro is undoubtedly awash with every germ known to man, so it’s not like I’m trying to bathe all up in his pornflakes.

But he’s coming this way. And he’s licking his lower lip with the tip of his tongue.

Oof.

I can’t seem to look away, despite the mask sliding down my nose, trying to blind me with my own fake eyelashes. I push it back up with my forefinger as he places his hand on my waist, pulling me closer to his winding hips. Charly Black’s “Gyal You A Party Animal” blares through the speakers, the dancehall delight making it impossible not to sway my body from side to side. Then, when my knee is solidly between his legs and we are rocking together, he releases my waist and places his hands on the back of my head, lightly pulling at my hair in what is possibly the most sexual touch I’ve ever experienced before. Zorro silently runs his fingertips down my arms, starting at my bare shoulders and sliding all the way down to my hands, where he twists his digits around mine as we move in time with the music. He’s not exactly grindingintome, but if I were to push my pelvis forward even just an inch or two, I can all but guarantee that I’d accidentally bump into his massive package. In some strange way, it’s almost hotter that we’re not pressed fully up against each other.

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