Tea Leafing: A Novel Read Online Free PDF

around her
difficult at best. She was squeezed so tightly into her leopard print shirt the
buttonholes strained to keep their agreement with the buttons. There was a
puddle of soft wrinkled skin at the apex of her cleavage and a wattle dangling
under her chin, framed by several thick gold herringbone chains. A
diamond-studded crucifix surfed the waves of skin as a gauche reminder of her supposed
devotion to God. Her white clam-digger slacks fit so snuggly in the crotch, she
looked more obscene than the scantily clad twenty somethings that darted around
her. A stack of gold, rope chain ankle bracelets rested above her white patent
leather slides. Her nails were painted an orangutan red that was an almost
perfect match for her hair. A bottle tan streaked her skin with an orangish
glow creating the overall effect of an Italian pumpkin partially eaten by a
wild beast.
    Clicking her gold,
chain-link belt with long, thick acrylic nails, her heavily mascara’d beady,
dark eyes darted around the floor from girl to girl, assessing what she
perceived as her competition. The way Sam heard the story, Pietra once confided
in one of the girls, saying that she was sure her son, the night manager,
Giovanni Enzio DiFrancesco, was secretly in love with her. She felt that he had
an “Ea-da-puss Complex.” Supposedly, the girl was fired shortly thereafter for
laughing so hard she shot champagne through her nose onto Pietra Maria
Speranza’s imitation Gucci bag.
    Sam turned back to
Boise and continued her dance, praying Pietra wouldn’t decide to intrude on the
hypnotized state she’d worked so hard to lull her customer into. No one knew
why Pietra would stop by the club on random nights. Sam was boggled by the
inappropriate nature of her presence, but not surprised by the bright, summer
white she continued to wear after Labor Day. Even strippers knew the basic
rules of fashion.
    Focusing on her dance,
she gazed at Boise with a practiced sleepy, sexed up bedroom look. Rolling her
hips in an invisible figure eight, Sam looked down at her own bare body, slick
with sweat, her muscles flexed beneath her thin, tan skin, then back to Boise
in a nonverbal plea that let him think ‘ If
only we’d met somewhere else, we could have fallen in love and lived happily
ever after. ’ The ploy worked. It always worked.   
    Table dances at the
Pussycat were performed on the floor, rather than on a table. Yes, some clubs
do require a table dance to be on the table — a precarious feat in
stilettos. Sam stood just inside Boise’s knees, leaning against them at times
for support. The rules at clubs vary more than the denim selection at The Gap.
Some are nude, some topless, some bikini bars and the level of contact varies
widely. A good rule of thumb is the more clothing, more contact — less
clothing, less contact. For that reason, Sam chose a nude club with a reputation
for a high-end clientele. Customers were not allowed to touch dancers at all
when they were disrobed and limited to a hugged greeting when dressed. Lap and
friction dances, were strictly verboten. So Sam danced, table danced, for her money.
    The music pulsed, and
Sam breathed in the second hand smoke and industrial strength orange-scented
air. She learned early on that mundane matters are for real life, not for life
behind the heavy doors of a gentlemen’s club. Things like inflation, health
problems, mortgages, taxes, children, petty arguments, politics, economics,
career difficulties, relationship troubles or anything else that might detract
from the fantasy is not conducive to a festive, money-making environment. Customers want to feel special. Good dancers were well aware their
job was to give the white glove treatment the customer missed during their
nine-to-five rituals where they were stepped on, picked at and pushed around.
No matter how important they are , everyone’s got a
boss. Except maybe God and Pietra.
    So, if only for a
little while, customers want to suspend reality.