"I'll take the Caesar salad please." Joy rolled her eyes at her best friend in the lunch line as she placed her order. "And a bagel too please."
"I'll take a ham and cheese sandwich and a soda please." Francine looked at her with one of those looks of hers, that 'Do you know an animal died for that sandwich?" look. Knowing damn well that Joy would make fun of her she didn't say anything though. The two of them sat at their favorite table outside on the balcony next to the railing for lunch, the same table they had shared for the last four years ever since they had met. The table overlooked the city from the fifth floor of the high-rise they both worked in. Although they worked for different high-tech firms they always managed to take lunch at the same time and so they always met here to talk about the world and whatever may have them interested at the time.
"You know, I don't get you." Joy said as Francine lit up a cigarette.
"What?" Francine asked.
"You're a vegetarian, work-out like crazy and can name every carcinogen that every fast food-restaurant laces its French fries with and yet you smoke?"
"Me? What about you miss six figure salary and moonlighter as a stripper every weekend?"
"Shhh, you want someone here to hear you? I strip cause its fun and I love the attention, not for the money what's your excuse?"
Francine blew out a long breath of smoke over the railing. "Who wants to live forever?" Joy just laughed.
"To not living forever!" she held up her bottle of juice in a toast. Francine clanked her bottle against Joy's and repeated the toast. The rest of the lunch was spent talking about the latest celebrity trash and the same three stories they had about their own encounters with fame that both of them had memorized. When all was said and done, Francine mashed out her cigarette, the two tossed their garbage and went to their separate offices.
Joy was an executive at her firm which meant she no longer really did what she was originally hired to do, program computers, now she just used them, forgot how they ran most of the time and made sure no one else did. She wondered if her popularity in the office was due to her long legs and short skirts, her smile which could light up a room or so she was told or the fact that she never got upset with anyone. She was usually so easy going it took a lot to get her upset but it did happen once in a while. Normally it had to be Jason, the one clod in the office that insisted on asking her to fuck him every day and not take no for an answer. Joy usually responded by making his life a living hell as best she could but he seemed to enjoy it, it didn't stop him one bit.
"Hey sexy..."
"Fuck off Jason." Joy responded as she walked by his cubicle on the way to her office, she didn't even look in his direction.
"Awww come on, please?" he pleaded to deaf ears. Joy just walked into her office and went over the performance assessments that she had been trying to get through for the last two days. She was almost done yesterday but something always happened, something like Jerry bursting in without knocking to announce that the system had been infected with another virus.
"Shit not again, who opened it this time?"
"We don't know, we think it was one of those auto-execute types."
"Is it one that the programs know about or is it new?"
"We're running the scans but I think it's new."
"Alright then just go through the files and see if you can figure it out the hard way, I'll tell Nikko."
"Right boss."
"And quit calling me boss." Joy walked into her former lover's office and down her nose at him with that coy look that always got him horny. He was on the phone and barely acknowledged her presence, something that always got her horny.
"I know we got infected with a new virus, I'm informing the head office now."
"People need to quit opening their e-mail attachments that come from unknown sources."
"I'll write another memo." Nikko responded sarcastically.
"It won't do any good. I think we should offer to have me strip for the male workers that don't open their e-mails."
"That won't do any good either, they've undressed you with their eyes too many times."
"Good point, I'm going to get those assessments done."
"No problem I'll take care of this one."
"Do me a favor and let me get these assessments done before you give me any more tasks, I've only got until tomorrow."
"Alright."
Joy walked back to her cubicle with a bit more bounce to her step than she'd previously had. She didn't know what it was about Nikko that got her energized, its not like he was all that attractive there was just something about him. Joy sat down in her office again and began reviewing files of the employees in her office. She had most of them done and was looking forward to finishing this last batch so that she could get to the next menial paperwork task that loomed over the horizon. She wasn't sure what is was about this new position but it just wasn't her, she lacked the enthusiasm that she had once brought to the company and just didn't look forward to coming to work anymore. That more than anything was why she danced at Grinder's Friday and Saturday nights, it was a break in the routine. Which reminded her, tonight was Friday and the day she would finally meet the stranger Heaven had been bragging about for so long. Not only that but she would also finally get wear her newest really awesome corset on stage with her matching garters. The thought of all the horny guys in the club rushing the stage while she wore that made her wet right there in the office and also made the assessments take the rest of the day.
Off work at five meant she had one hour exactly to go home, get her outfits, change into one of them and fly over to Grinders to be the first of the new shift change to dance on stage. She had complained to her boss that making her the first to dance wasn't fair because unlike most of the other girls she had a day job that didn't let her off until five. Unfortunately, she was always scheduled first and this night was no exception, poor Devon was trapped on stage dancing an extra song waiting for Joy to fly through the front door and jump up onto the stage. It was too early for the club to be crowded so she used one of the empty chairs at the stage to launch herself onto Devon.
"Sorry I'm late, again."
Devon laughed softly. "If this is my reward then be late every night I'm the last set."
Joy kissed the lesbian deeply much to the delight of the crowd who whooped and hollered at the display. "You're a doll, put my pack in my locker please, it should be open I don't leave anything in it."
"No problem love." Joy danced the rest of that song and the two she would normally have danced anyway while the other dancers filtered in and out. It was a pretty smooth changing of the guard she thought, normally three or four dancers were late but tonight only she was and only barely at that. After her last song she gathered up her pile of one-dollar bills and walked naked into the back room leaving the stage empty and the crowd waiting for the next dancer. The DJ started his rant about how the night shift was now in effect and the night was just getting started. Joy ignored it and walked up to her favorite spot in front of the mirror to redo her makeup now smeared from her mad dash to the club and dance on stage.
