The Electric Dollhouse used to be a strip club in a rural area, not far from a large university. It was far enough off-campus that not many college students went there. They'd rather drink nickel beers and stare at the coeds than pay five bucks cover charge, five more for the beer and then have to tip a few dollars an hour or get the cold shoulder from the dancers, some of whom weren't worth the trip to start with. It was in an old warehouse district, out of the way. It always sent a thrill down my spine to go there. I was about twenty-two, out of college but with the rest of the year paid for on my college apartment lease, thanks to my parents' generosity. And with no girlfriend, there were worse ways to pass a Sunday afternoon than checking out some female flesh.
I parked my junker next to the plumbing supply warehouse, so I could get out easier than if I had parked in the cramped parking lot of the Dollhouse. It was dark and threatening to snow, wind whipping as I made my way toward the muffled throbbing bass beat and faint neon glow of the painted-over glass door to the club. Opening that door and walking through was like walking into a sort of paradise, for a guy anyway. It was warm, well, warmer anyway. The howling wind was shut out. The initial darkness seemed to warm up to a shimmering glow from bar lights and the jukebox. At first all you could see was the bar area, a few sad-looking faces of the going-nowhere old men who pass chunks of their lives in bars obliviously. There was the ex-biker-looking bartender. Maybe he was a 'Nam vet, who knows? He was friendly enough, as long as he recognized you as a customer. He was only wary of strangers who could be cops or process servers.
As your eyes adjusted to the layout and lighting, it would come into focus. There, at the back, behind the bar was a cavernous room, with smoke hanging in the air. Cutting through all the smoke and the flashing lights and the silhouettes of the odd patron, there would be a nice pair of tits. Sometimes very nice. It was almost supernatural how I could zero in on tits from a mile away blindfolded. Occasionally, I'd enter the place at a moment when no dancer would be onstage or when she would be covered up. I always felt cheated in a way. I loved that you could walk in off the street and there were tits. Boom. Just there to be looked at.
The night I would always remember started like a dozen others, walking into the Electric Dollhouse and experiencing all that sensory stimulation. This particular night, there was no dancer up there when I arrived. It felt stupid to order a beer anyway. The bartender apologized for the lack of a dancer. He took his job so seriously. It was like I was his boss or something. I pretended to listen carefully, but I was really just thinking about what I was going to do with the rest of the afternoon if there wasn't going to be any titty to look at here. The phone rang and the bartender was arguing with someone. I was actually taking some interest, mostly out of boredom. It seemed that the reason there was only one dancer, who would only dance 30 minutes per hour, was that the other dancer had been told not to show up until later because there was a 'feature dancer' scheduled to be at the Dollhouse. This was news to the bartender who practically lived there. They hadn't advertised. There was no one in the place. She would be performing for an empty house, if she showed up.
Lo and behold as he hung up on whoever was booking the dancers, a woman burst in the place, jabbering about 'fucking managers' and 'dead-ass boyfriends'. She looked to be in her late thirties with a hat shoved down over a mop of dyed-red hair. She was wearing a big overcoat, a man's overcoat and carrying some kind of shopping bags and a backpack in front of her. She hardly stopped ranting long enough to find out where the changing room was and off she stormed. As she moved away, I could see she had some shape from behind, a narrower waist compared to flared hips. But she had sweatpants and boots on, so it wasn't like she was dressed to impress.
About then I heard the jukebox erupt with a too-loud top-forty teen anthem. That was about all it had, I knew from experience. Power ballads. Some oldies. Some novelty tunes. Stuff the girls could move to. From behind the jukebox stepped Shanu (her inexplicable stage name). I had seen her once before. She was my type. With tits way too big for her athletic frame. She had a mane of long dark hair and I figured she was Italian or Jewish or some kind of Mediterranean heritage.
"Gentlemen, the Electric Dollhouse apologizes for the break in our program this afternoon. But here to warm things up is our own, Shanuuuuu!" The bartender did the announcement as if there was a full house instead of me, moving to a seat at the rear of the stage, and the three half-comatose old boozers arranged at the bar facing no particular direction.
I sat at my table, back to the rear wall of the place. I chose this seat from experience. I knew that sometimes, some dancers would give you a bit more attention than the law, or the house, would allow if you were at this table because it was the only place in the bar that the mirrors didn't give the bartender a view of. If the dancer had her back to the bar and was facing me, she could flash her cooch or ass, or even touch me, if she wanted, without being seen.
Shanu, flashed me a friendly smile. She knew what was on the mind of a young man taking that seat in an otherwise empty strip bar. And she didn't mind. She enjoyed dancing for men. She loved being in good shape and the special attention that gave her. She wasn't naïve. She enjoyed the money and not having to drudge for it. She could flirt or not. With a body like hers she'd get her tips whether she went the extra mile or not. She had big tits. And big tits got big tips. Everyone knew that. Even fat girls could make out as long as they had fat tits. It was a shame, Shanu always thought, that some petite girls, who had figures that any woman would envy, would get almost no tips when they danced opposite voluptuous Shanu. The men wanted boobs.
By the time she could dance over to me, I had a dollar bill out, folded lengthwise and laying at the far side of my table, an inch or two of it hanging off. She stood directly in front of me, looking down at me, straight in the eye. "Hi, I'm Shanu." She smiled warmly. As if I wasn't already putty in her hands, I melted even further. "Hi, Shanu. I'm Steve." It sounded so weak and lame. "Nice to meet you, Steve," she extended her hand and shook mine in slightly put-on matter-of-fact manner. "Haven't I seen you here before?"
"Yes. Two weeks ago. You said you'd be back and here you are."
"You came here for me?" She pretended that it was a big deal. Then she leaned close to me, her head just beside mine. "You're about the only one, too. Could it be any deader?"
She stood up and did a few dancer moves. She was in one of those slit-up-the-side silky robe things with a tie around the waist. Hot pink. Her legs flashed and those black heels looked hot. She turned her back to me and slipped the robe off sexily. Her backside was bare except for the barely visible string of her thong and bikini top. She tossed her hair around giving it a wild appearance. She looked back over her shoulder at me. The arch in her back forced thoughts of fucking her doggie-style into my head. As she turned to face me, those full, bouncing tits swayed into view. The tiny triangles of fabric were really only serving to cover her nipples and most of her aureoles. Stretched so taut, every detail was visible. I was staring and caught myself. I tried to de-focus and take in the entirety being happily presented to me. Shanu saw my eyes ravishing her bust and then try not to stare. She almost chuckled. It was sweet, she thought, that I didn't completely dehumanize her.
"You're gorgeous. You're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen in person. It must be so mind-blowing to have you like this in private. Wow." It just came out. And I wanted to curl up and crawl away as soon as the words left my lips. She didn't say anything. Instead she took the dollar and tucked it in her g-string on her hip. She kind of danced away, toward the other side of the small stage, looking toward the bar. The bartender shrugged at her.
"Whatever you want to do," he said. "You get paid for your half of the shift. Whatever."
Shanu walked over to me and started to say something, then stopped herself and walked over and flipped off the sound on the jukebox. She walked back over to me.
"OK. You get to be the boss. Since there's no one here, Mongo says I don't have to dance for just one guy. But I don't want to disappoint you since you came to see me."
"Hey, I don't want to force you to work."
