Chapter 2

The taxi dropped her off at the front door of a rather plain-looking building in a part of town she didn’t go to very often. In fact she didn’t even realize they had “these kinds of places” in town. She paid the cab fare with a few dollars she was able to scrimp from the grocery money. She walked up to the door and sucked in a deep breath.

“Well here goes nothing!” she thought to herself. She pushed the door open and immediately in front of her she saw a big burly guy behind what appeared to be a glass partition like you would see in a movie theater ticket counter.

“We have a five dollar cover charge and a two drink minimum here!” he said monotonously, like he had said it ten thousand times before.

“Oh no, I am here to see Rachael. Are you Mike?” she said.

“Oh, Okay. Yeah she is inside, go on in,” he said. Then Donna heard the door buzz and she pulled the door open and stepped inside.

Donna stepped inside the darkened room and had to stand there in the entry for a few moment to let her eyes adjust to the lower light level. Slowly she made out the stage the tables and then the bar. She made her way through the maze of tables to the bar.

“What can I get ya darlin’?” he asked Donna.

“I’m here to see Rachael?” she said.

“I was wondering ... we don’t get a lot of single women coming in here!” he said with a grin. He waved over one of the two waitresses and said something in her ear. The waitress went off in the general direction of the back of the building.

“Do you want something to drink while you wait?” the bartender asked.

“Oh no thank you. I’m just here to see Rachael,” she said. She would have loved something to settle her nerves but she was too embarrassed to admit she didn’t have any money for a drink. The bartender shrugged his shoulders and went off to wipe down the bar. Donna turned around and looked the place over now that her eyes were adjusted.

It wasn’t a bad place she figured. It wasn’t real busy at this hour, with only a handful of patrons scattered about the place. There was a DJ up at what she guessed was the music control booth and a long center stage. She looked around and saw two other smaller “satellite” stages. There was probably 30 or 40 small four person tables and there was a bunch of stools lining the edges of the long center stage. The place was a neon nightmare with different color neon lights everywhere. There was a smokey haze throughout the bar – partly from the smoking patrons but also from the bar’s smoke machine. The music was louder than she would have liked but she figured it was about normal for a place like this. The Dj would announce each girl as she came out and Donna watched a couple girls dance as she waited for Rachael.

“Here you go honey ... it’s on the house. You look like you could use a little courage,” the bartender said, handing her a shot of Peppermint Schnapps.

“Thank you,” she said smiling sheepishly. It must be painfully obvious that she was nervous if the bartender could see it in the darkness with her back turned!

“Don’t worry hon ... being a bartender for as long as I have been you get tuned into your customers!” he said.

Donna downed about half the shot in the first swallow and once she got that down, she finished the drink off.

“Don’t worry, if you get the job, you’ll get better at that!” he said.

“How did you know I was here for a job?” she asked.

“Well like I said not too many single women come in here. Plus you are nervous as a cat in a dog pen. It’s kinda obvious that you aren’t here for the entertainment!” he said with a wink.

“Would you quit hitting on her Rick? She hasn’t even started here yet!” a woman came up behind Donna. “Hi I’m Rachael – you must be Donna?”

“Yes, that’s right. Nice to meet you Rachael,” Donna said.

“Well let’s start with the grand tour. You’ve already met Rick our resident womanizer! Over there we have David our DJ and then there’s Paul and Tom our bouncers. They are a girl’s best friends,” she said, pointing everyone out. “Follow me and I’ll show you behind the scenes.”

The girls walked over to the center stage by the sound booth and up the steps onto the center stage. They walked back behind the curtain to the dressing room. “This is the dressing room. Each girl gets a locker where she keeps her outfits and whatever accessories she uses in her acts. She also gets one of these makeup tables. There’s a little break area where you can get away from the craziness but while you are back here you aren’t making any money in tips so it isn’t used much. The girls here all get along real well and will let you borrow something if you need it – with a few exceptions. Most of us have a signature something that we don’t loan out.” Rachael explained. “Now I am sure you have a million questions so let’s have a seat and we’ll go through them.” Rachael took her hand and led her over to the sofa in the break area and they sat down.

“Okay now what questions do you have?” Rachael asked.

Donna drew a deep breath. “Well, first off how do you do this? I mean how do you take your clothes off in front of strange men and let them look at you?” she asked.

“Well, Donna you get used to it. It’s not all that hard. You just don’t take it personally. To start with, pick one guy out there in the audience and dance for him. Make eye contact with him and hold his gaze. Here like this. Pretend you are a guy in here after a hard days work.” Rachael stood up and began dancing. She looked at Donna and once Donna looked at her she held her gaze and she danced for her. She didn’t get undressed, but she moved as if she was. “See what I mean. You play to one man just as if you were an actor on stage. Because you are ... you are just naked.”

I see. Okay, one thing my husband said about me working was that I would have to be home when he got home. So I can work from the time he goes to work at 9:00 to about 4:00 pm. No later than that ever. Is that possible?” Donna asked.

“Sure we can put you on the day shift if that’s what you want. It doesn’t pay like the evening shifts because not that many people are in here, so tips aren’t that great. But it will get your feet wet, at least. Then you may want to move to nights at least a couple nights a week. But that’s up to you,” Rachael said.

“Well while we are on the subject, how much can I expect to make with my day schedule?” Donna said.

“I would think you could turn at least $1250 to $1500 a month pretty easily. Depending on tips and how good you are at talking our customers into table dances!” she said smiling.

“Okay, all this sounds wonderful but honestly ... do you think I could do this?” Donna asked, showing herself to Rachael.

Rachael looked at Donna and then took her hand. “Honey once you get used to it, you will have these bums eating out of your hands!”

“Thank you Rachael, I would like to give it a try. But there one thing ... I ... I don’t have any money – you know, for clothes or outfits or stuff,” she said, dropping her head and looking at her feet.

“Don’t worry about that, sweetie. A lot of girls who come to this field do so because they are financially in trouble. The club can give you an advance on your first paycheck so you can buy a couple outfits at least to get you started. Plus you can borrow something from one of the girls once you meet them. We are all happy to see new blood here. As you work more you can increase your wardrobe a little each paycheck,” Rachael said.

“Okay how do I get started. Money is really tight at home and we are in a bind,” Donna said.

“Well, first we need to get you something you can wear,” Rachael said. She got up and offered Donna her hand. She led Donna into another room where the offices for the club were.

“Donna this is Thomas Hawkins, the owner of the club. Mr. Hawkins, this is Donna ... I’m sorry I don’t even know your last name!” Rachael said.

“Anderson, Mr. Hawkins, Donna Anderson,” Donna said sticking out her hand.

“It’s nice to meet you Ms Anderson,” Mr. Hawkins said.

“Donna here would like to apply for a job here as a dancer. We have been talking about it a bit, and she would like to come work with us here at The Dollhouse,” Rachael told Mr. Hawkins.

“Is that so? Well I think we can arrange that. How soon would you like to start Ms. Anderson?” he asked.

“Well as soon as possible ... I kinda need the money,” Donna said. “And please, call me Donna ... Ms. Anderson sounds so formal!”

“Very well, Donna. Have you got a stage name picked out speaking of names?”

“A stage name?”

“Yeah we don’t all use our real names on stage – some just use their first names but most of us have stage names. My stage name for example is Honey,” Rachael said.

“Oh, I don’t know ... I hadn’t really thought about it,” Donna said.

“Well how about Lexus. I always liked that name. It sounds expensive and exotic and it would work for you with that dark hair!” Rachael said.

“Ooh, I like that. Okay I’d like to be Lexus,” Donna said.

“Okay Lexus it is then. How does Thursday sound? You can come in and Rachael here can give you the low down on how we do things – how to dance, how to treat the guests, the rules of the house, that sort of thing. Then Friday is the end of the pay period, so it will be a good time to start actually working, “ Mr Hawkins said.

“That would be fine,” Donna said.

“Mr. Hawkins, Donna had a couple concerns she brought up in our talk. First off, she says she needs to work the day shift. She has to be home by 4:00 in the afternoon was it Donna?” Rachael said.

“Yes, that’s right. My husband’s condition on getting a job was that I was always home by 4:00 so when he got home I was there for him. I can work the hours between 9:00 am and 4:00 pm. And please, my husband can never know I work here – he would completely flip out if he knew I was stripping!” Donna said.

“Donna, we here at The Dollhouse understand all too well that our line of work isn’t acceptable to a lot of people. Discretion is very important to us. No one here talks about their job outside of work except to others who work here. And if they do, they use fictitious names and things. And when we advertise, we do not show the girls on our advertisements, only the club name. We are all very cautious about things like that. And we can work around your hours easily enough,” Mr. Hawkins said.