Does the woman have one nice bone in her body?
Actually, I know the answer to that.
She looks me up and down. “You can have her job if you want. We’ll have to do a full medical work-up, get you on birth control, that sort of thing. But you’ll make a hell of a lot more money working with members than you ever would cleaning up after them. That is, if youwantto.” She clicks her tongue with a huff, her day clearly ruined first by me, and then by Izzy’s audacity in moving on.
When I don’t answer right away, her face becomes defiant. Like she’s daring me to accept her offer. Like she doesn’t really want me to accept it, anyway.
“I need to know by tomorrow at noon. If you aren’t interested, I need to start looking for someone else,” she says, impatient with my silence.
“Can… can you tell me more about the job? Like what it entails and so forth?”
Oh my god. I’m asking for more information when I should tell her flat-out no. A nice girl like me doesn’t dothings like that.
The expectation I’d grown up with, which had been drilled into my head for as long as I could remember—saving myself for marriage—is in my rear-view mirror, getting further in the distance with every passing moment.
She snorts, pressing her lips together. “It’s pretty much what you just did today. The clients pay for ‘companionship,’” she says with air quotes.
She rolls her eyes again when she sees the confusion on my face. “Companionship, Luci. That means they pay for your time spent socializing. Doing whatever they want to do. You know, pretending to fuck the maid or whatever Mr. Natelli did with you.”
Oh my… does she think I…?
“B… but I didn’t—”
She waves her hand. “I don’t want to know, Luci. Or should I call youLunow?” she asks with a smirk.
She looks at the clock on the wall. “Let me know by tomorrow. Now, please get back to work, and don’t try to steal anyone else’s clients.”
“I didn’t try to steal—”
“Go, Luci,” she says, waving me away. “This is a busy night and you need to keep up.”
I pull her office door closed behind me, my heart pounding with just how insane the day had already been. I cram the five one-hundred-dollar bills inside my other sneaker and, cleaning tote in hand, head to the next room I need to clean. It’s not comfortable, the money stuffed in both my shoes, but I guess that’s the point. If I can feel it, I know it’s in there.
I like that.
And while the paper in my shoes might not exactly be cushioning, I’m lying if I don’t admit it’s put a little spring in my step, knowing I’ve somehow fallen into seven hundred dollars I never planned on having. I don’t have to sweat paying for my classes again for a while, which is a relief so massive I want to cry when I think about it.
Maybe I could even get my car radio, stolen on my first night in Chicago, replaced.
But I can’t be extravagant. That’ll surely lead to questions from Mom and Dad, who know full well what a shoestring budget I’m living on. It’s one of the ways they try to get me to come back home, their promises of free room and board, not to mention escape from the dirty, dangerous city.
Yeah, I could live with them for free, but at what cost to my happiness?
The longer I stayed in my hometown, the less likely it was that I’d ever get out. It was like a tree that once its roots are too deep, well, you know it’s there forever. It ain’t going anywhere.
And that was so not me. No matter what I had to do.
Including sin.
* * *
Charleigh looksaround the diner where we’re having burgers and lowers her voice.
“You didwhat?” she asks, her eyes bugging.
I don’t blame her. I’m still in shock myself.
“I… I guess when I took the job there, even though I didn’t knowexactlywhat went on in the place, I actually kind ofdidknow on some level, you know?” I explain.