Don't Touch
Annie Reed
Published by Thunder Valley Press at Smashwords
Copyright 2012 by Annie Reed
Image licensed by http://www.depositphotos.com/Innervision
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Don't Touch
Annie Reed
You lift the curtain with the tip of one finger and peer out at the customers ringing the edge of the bar. That's all you can see through the glare of the stage lights. Emma's up now, dancing around the pole like it could rub her back and pay her mortgage and put her kids through school, and maybe it can because no man's ever gonna do those things for her, like no one's ever gonna do them for you, but it's all you got, and you take what you can get.
The customers look the same as last night's and the night before. Middle-age losers, their mouths slack, hands cupped around their drinks, staring up at Emma with so much naked want in their faces, it makes you sick. Cigarette smoke curls around Emma's ankles like so many fingers pulling at her. That'll be you out there in five minutes once Emma's done with her routine and she goes out on the floor so the men beyond the bar can stuff dollar bills under the elastic of her G-string and pretend that fleeting touch is enough.
How many of them would want to touch her if they knew she went home with you? Would it matter, or would they pay more to watch?
Seeing Emma on stage shouldn't get you hot and bothered, but it does. You run your tongue over your dry lips, and your breasts swell without conscious thought. You can make yourself into anything, anyone, and right now you want to be the person Emma loves to touch. She knows you as you really are and loves you anyway. You try to tell yourself that's good enough, but sometimes you make yourself into a man just so Emma can remember what it's like to have a man inside her who loves her, not one who uses her for a punching bag.
You don't stay a man long, though, because to you, men are the things that stare up at you while you dance and whirl on that pole, who'd pay extra to put their hands on the parts of you that belong to Emma alone.
Emma's music finishes and so does she, stretched out on her belly on the bar, her ass in the air, and you don' t have to see the predatory gleam in her eyes as she looks out over her audience to know that it's there. Emma likes turning men on, tells you she feeds off the electricity of all that pent-up want. You love her, so you believe her, even though you're jealous of every man who's ever seen that look on her face and thought it was meant for him.
The spotlights swing off Emma and toward the crack in the curtains where you wait. You stay safe behind the heavy black fabric until you hear the opening bars of your music. You take a deep breath, paste on the sultry smile that's become your trademark, and stride on stage like you own it. The energy you've stored watching Emma dance invigorates your step, accentuates the sway of your hips, and you toss your hair that was blonde this morning but now shines raven black under the harsh stage lights.