A Half-Decent Performance

"And now, welcome on stage, the loveliest lass this side of the Irish Sea, please put your hands together for...Amelia"

As The Corrs' cover of

Dreams

started up, Bethany was in a panic. She was next but one and nowhere near ready. "Where's my bag? It was right here a moment ago. Shit, it's got all my stuff in it. Ladies, black and red sports bag, please?"

Those girls who were not currently in the middle of putting on tights or conducting complex hair operations looked around the various nooks and crannies of the backstage room.

Monique held aloft a bag matching the description and then hurled it over the heads of two girls who'd had just come off stage and were preparing to mingle at the bar.

"Thank God, you're a life-saver, that's...not it. Fuck," she said pulling out a black lace bodice that wasn't hers out of the bag.

"That's Nikita's," said Davina as she added some blusher. "She left five minutes ago."

"Carrying my black and red sports bag, I bet." sighed Bethany. "Okay, I'm officially on the scrounge. Who can help me out?"

"How about this?" said Monique pulling a long white lace chemise out of a side cupboard.

"Virgin? I was thinking more vampire," said Bethany indicating her short black hair, dark eye-shadow and blood red lipstick.

"Chooser? I was thinking more beggar," retorted Monique. "Come on, sit down and I'll see what I can do." Monique had a very special talent for make-up which could be best described as just good enough, just fast enough.

"I didn't think you were going to be in tonight," she said as she searched for the right foundation. However fast she had to work, she always seemed to have time to also make conversation. "Romantic weekend in Paris with Rob, I heard."

"Yeah, well, I ballsed that up, didn't I?" replied Bethany. "Told him about all this."

"He didn't take it well?"

"Fuck. First time I'm dating someone halfway decent and he tells me I'm indecent. Maybe I should have packed this lark in when things started to get serious, but I'm going to need all the money I can get for this Masters."

"Yeah, well if he truly loved you, he'd accept you for who you are," said Davina at the next mirror. Various shouts of 'bullshit' echoed around the changing room and someone threw a hair-brush at her.

From the stage doors, the muffled sounds of The Corrs faded and were replaced with the muffled sounds of Van Morrison. The tease had finished and the strip was beginning in earnest.

"I just didn't think he'd be so judgemental," lamented Bethany.

"So, you back on the market?" asked Monique. "If it's money in the bank you're after and you're a free agent, there's no need to be a

free

agent - if you know what I mean?"

"Thanks, but no thanks. My life is complicated enough just being a stripper." The neighbouring girls put their hands to their mouths in faux horror at the faux pas. "Sorry, exotic dancer." The room breathed a sigh of ironic relief.

"Fling?" said Monique.

"I've flung my last," sighed Bethany. "It's steady as she goes from now on. Damn, I really thought he was the one and then I go and blow it by telling him the truth."

Davina stood up from her station and crossed over to the stage door. A moment later, the music faded, and the announcer instructed the audience to thank Amelia and welcome the next performer on to the stage. He made some crack about having sweet dreams and the Eurythmics started up. As Davina left, the Irish girl entered clasping a wad of battered notes. That was a good sign for Bethany. She'd developed a theory that it went boom and bust, boom and bust, one performer after another. If she was right Davina would strike out and she'd hit payola.

"How's that?" asked Monique. Bethany checked herself in the mirror. The tones had been softened up and her face was now less of the graveyard and more of Sunday school.

"Great," said Bethany and quickly started to slip out out of her outside clothes and into the lingerie. By the time Annie gave way to Agnetha and Anni-Frid she was almost ready.

"Heels?" she cried to room. The room quickly provided and Monique handed her the final touch - a white lace veil.

"I don't..." she started.

"Dramatic reveals work just as well for your face as they do for all the other bits," said Monique. "You'd be surprised."

Bethany took it and lined up at the stage door. As she turned, she suddenly noticed the whole room was staring at her.

"Good luck," said one of the newer girls. Her stage name was Lexie or Roxy or something. One of the neighbouring girls tried to surreptitiously elbow her in the ribs. "With your new outfit. Good luck with the new outfit." she clarified.

"Err, sure," Bethany replied. She was suddenly feeling uncomfortable. The girls had all returned to their pimping and preening but it seemed put-on somehow. There was a certain expectation in the room.

Davina came off stage with only a pair of fivers.

"Wow, tough crowd," said Bethany.

"Don't worry, you'll do better. I have a feeling," said Davina giving her a mysterious smile. Bethany tried to remember if she'd offended the girl somehow. It was well known that Davina was one of the lowest earners in the club despite having worked there for years.

"And now, the girl you've been waiting for all evening. Let's make tonight special for...Bethany."

The music started up. It was wrong, a driving eighties bassline and an electric guitar running across vague arpeggios. She signalled the DJ cum announcer from the side lines. He in return signed her to go on stage. She shook her head. "Like a Virgin," she mouthed. "Like a Virgin."

The DJ shrugged. "Bethany coming on stage now," he said over the PA system.

With a scowl she walked with a default strut on to the stage. She didn't have a routine for this song.

Hey, little sister, what have you done?

Who even was this? Not Bowie, it didn't have the characteristic cockney twang and it was darker. Not dark enough to be the Sisters of Mercy but not dissimilar even if a bit more poppy. She tried to match the tempo and hoped there were no rhythmic surprises.

The stage was surrounded by four rows of seats. The place was sparsely populated and, unusually, the entire first row was empty. That was a problem - you worked the front. They were the ones who wanted to interact with you and give you tips. Sure, you could put both arms on the back of the first seat and give the second row a good look at your assets, but, ultimately, if a guy was too chicken to sit at the front, they'd be way to scared to slip a five pound note into your garter. Had a party just left? How had Amelia managed to make out so well not five minutes ago?

She began to work the pole, but gently. It wasn't obvious how vigorously she could move and still keep the veil in place, so she used it mainly for support. First walking round it and then slowly moving into her spin, her right arm and her legs forming a right-angled triangle with the pole.

Hey, little sister, whose your superman?

The music cut out suddenly and the announcer came on. "It's now eight o'clock and, as promised, our special offer is just starting -- seventy-percent off all drinks for the next half-an-hour -- available at the bar upstairs."

The music faded back in having had a large part of the chorus cut off and Bethany had to adjust her step to match the disturbed tempo. What the hell? The bar never had sales -- that was where the money was. They had a captive and thirsty audience. To a man, the audience was now getting up and wandering to the staircase at the back of the room. She just kept going round the pole, as there didn't seem much point in transitioning into a new pose. Just as the last of the customers was nearly out, the side door opened and the girls from the club came streaming into the room -- Monique, Davina, Amelia, Maybe Lexie and all the others. Even Nikita had come back it seemed. They were all wearing long purple dresses that flowed around their figures. These were almost but not quite formal and, crucially, they were simple enough that they could and clearly had been thrown on at a moment's notice. Each girl also had a single white rose in their hands. They took seats in the fourth and final row of the basement stage.

There was no rule about the other dancers watching a performance, though they tended to do it surreptitiously from backstage. It was accepted that you didn't do anything to distract from another girl's money making time and most of the usual patrons would find one of the girls sitting next to them very distracting.

It's a nice day for a white wedding,

proclaimed Billy Idol.

Bethany found she suddenly had butterflies in her stomach. The missing bag, the wrong music, the emptying of the room -- she was clearly being set-up. Very well. If they wanted her on stage, she'd perform. She threw herself at the pole and let the momentum carry her up. Halfway through the rotation she flipped her lower half up, her legs pointing outwards in a V. Her head was now upside down and the veil no longer covered her face. She came to a sudden halt facing forwards towards the audience of her peers.

That was when she saw him -- Robert. He'd been standing by the door waiting for the right moment to enter and this was clearly it. He was dressed in a formal suit with a red carnation in his breast pocket. He moved with deliberately slowness into the room and down the aisle, letting her hang there until he finally found his seat right at the front and in the middle.

The music had faded out the moment he'd made his move. It was immediately replaced by a slow and sad piano playing descending minor chords. This one she recognized immediately -

Sorry seems to be the Hardest Word

.

She was going to have to forgive him, wasn't she? She'd always been a sucker for the grand gesture.

She swung herself upright and then slowly slid down the pole ending on her knees. The backing track was not something any exotic dancer would willingly choose and she didn't even attempt to match her movements to it. Instead she crawled along the floor, seductive and cat-like until she was face-to-face with him.

Wordlessly he reached into his pocket and pulled something out of his trouser pocket. She was relieved to see it was a white piece of folded paper. For a moment, she'd worried it was money, which would have been strange. She put a stockinged foot on the side of his chair, giving him a look all the way up her long, long legs. He pulled aside her garter belt and slipped the paper inside.

Then she was off again, strutting back to the pole. It was bad practice to linger too long on one single customer and old habits died hard. With her back to him, she removed the paper and tried to unfold it while still matching the expected motions of a sexy dancer. It was a printed boarding pass -- Paris. If they left immediately they'd be able to catch it comfortably. He must have rearranged the flight they were originally supposed to have been on yesterday. She flung the paper on the floor so it wouldn't interfere with the rest of the performance. She was still operating with an auto-pilot which assumed this was an ordinary dance.

It wasn't though. She wasn't even really the one performing any more. It was a show for her benefit and she wasn't sure what she was supposed to do next. She suddenly realized that she was half-way through the second and final song and she hadn't removed anything yet. Should she? Their break-up had been over the fact she was a stripper. Him coming to her strip-club and her not actually stripping felt wrong. With more trepidation even than on the night of her first performance, she gracefully unzipped the back of her chemise and let it fall the floor.

It was only when she was standing there, naked in front of him apart from the veil which again covered her face, that he reached into his pocket and took out a small black jewellery box. Even before he'd opened it, she lost control of herself, running across the stage and into his arms.

The borough council, of course, had very strict rules about physical contact in the club, including all kinds of touching, hugging and kissing. On this occasion, they were overlooked.

The next day he proposed again under the Eiffel Tower so they'd have something acceptable to post on Facebook.