Disappointment into Opportunity

ChrisCitizen

12/03/2001

Part 1

When is AFTSD exactly? Anyway, apologies if this is late.

First post here. A coming out of sorts...

Sat night- warm here in the Australian summer. I usually call the club beforehand to make sure that my (current) ATF is working. I debated whether I should call before I meet up with my party for dinner, or after. Call before, and she is on tonight, then dinner would be good. If she wasn't, dinner would be bad. Call after, and the news would not affect me either way during the meal. But the uncertainty...

I call before. She's not working. I worry for a bit- she has been ill lately. Just a bit- she can look after herself. I am subdued as we leave the restaurant. Sitting in the coffee shop, I'm resolved not to go home this early. Think of ways to rescue the evening. I had been looking forward to this since last week when I had hotter than usual lap from ATF. I think of the other hotties at her club who had been denied me due to her presence. I think of misbehaving without incurring her love-mad jealousy. After all, she's crazy about me right? It's shaping up to be one of those nights.

I head into the Valley to visit a club I had not been to in a while. It is affiliated with the other club so I get both clubs for one admission price. It's just as I remembered it. Very ordinary. About to leave- a young thing sits by me. We talk some. Has an unusual accent. She is new. This is her second night here, or so she says. Waitress comes to arrange a personal dance- I have heard that unscrupulous PLs can sometimes take advantage of new girls so I agree.

I am initially cynical about her professed inexperience. Maybe this is her gimmick. Five seconds in and I completely believe her. She is so green. I am taken aback by feelings of gentle amusement and embarrassment. I forget all about the unscrupulous taking advantage shit. I get the feeling that she is genuinely trying, but doesn't know how. I want to coach her, teach her about eye contact, the forced heavy breathing, running fingers through the hair, but who am I? A fucking social worker?

It reminded me ATF's story about her first time, right in this very club many years ago. It reminded me of ATF. It reminded me of ATF's colleagues at ATF's club who were gonna see some of ATF's PL's money tonight.

I left the new girl to her own devices. She'll get by. I drove to the other club, flashed the FREE ENTRY! pass and walked on in.

As usual, low dancer-customer ratio. I sat for a while watching the stage shows. Few catch my fancy. I am missing ATF. A girl sits next to me. She has a broad New-Zealand accent. Tall, good looking, fancy cigarette case. We talk some, I watch the stage show, we talk some. I would agree to a lap if she asks. She does not ask. She leaves, seemingly in a huff at my lack of attention. I feel bad, and miss ATF even more.

Sit around some more. Low dancer-customer ratio. I hope ATF is well. Tall slim blonde sits beside me, presses leg against mine. I've encountered her during a previous visit, but had to refuse her since I was après-lap dance at the time. She is all business. The topic of lap dancing comes into the conversation even before it began. I agree. She is all business. As nasty as I've had in this neck of the woods.

"An unusual tattoo." I noted on her back as she rocked on all fours before me.

"I'm an unusual lady." She retorted without missing a beat.

Yikes!

Nasty, but within the rules. High mileage. I am impressed.

I'm eager for another lap before I have to leave. It's getting late. My carriage turned back into a pumpkin hours ago. I'm sitting around again- disappointingly, there are long periods when the stage lies empty. I'm bothered by this lack of professionalism. More importantly, I'm becoming more self conscious just sitting there. A pervert, by definition, needs something to perv at. Hostess comes along, offers to fix me up. I gesture to the hottie now on stage. I had noticed her before due to her constant bright smile, and moreover, her secretary glasses. Hoo. Before, she seemed a little young for my liking, but she was dancing like she knew the ropes so I expressed interest. However, I declined to book the lap at the time. She still seemed too young for me.

As it happened, I did arrange a lap dance from her later.

She removed her heels as she straddled above me on the couch. This is my first bare feet lap. Not even ATF does that. My hands wander to her ankles and squeeze her feet. I grin like a PL getting lap from a girl in glasses and bare feet. She asks me why I am smiling. She is herself gazing at me and smiling her amazing smile at this. Her curiosity takes me aback.

"Er, because I there is a naked girl before my very eyeballs?" I think. Instead I answer her Q with another Q.

"Why do you wear glasses?" I knew I worded that badly even before she answers.

"I have to. They're prescription."

"You don't wear contacts?"

"I choose not to."

Something about her bothered me. Her articulate speech, her manner. Her pointed questions. I felt challenged.

I'm not a dumb guy, I have a postgrad Science-Engineering degree, I've had about a year's experience as a serious PL and I've been a regular pervert for years before that. I've done my research on the internet, wrote reviews, yadda yadda. I like to think that I can handle most exotic dancers on an intellectual level, and keep control of myself at the emotional one.

Until now. I felt this girl was smarter than me, and what's more, playing the game.

The game, as I understood it, was when a dancer (or any other woman for that matter) tries to own a man by totally figuring him out- his strengths, weaknesses, desires... ATF, even with her mad lust for me wasn't even close to that (granted, she wasn't really trying), but here was a new girl, barley a year into stripping (according to her), trying it on. I was defensive, but still I was intrigued by this development.

"You seem shy." she noted. She was right.

"What can I do to be not-shy?" I responded,

Then I changed my mind.

Part 2

"You seem shy." she noted. She was right.

"What can I do to be not-shy?" I responded, sounding like a crude AI.

She looked thoughtful, then shrugged.

"It's in my nature." I concluded. I counted this a sort of victory.

She complimented on my touchy-feely skills.

"I've had lots of practice." I told her. "Many lap dances. Maybe too many."

"How do I rate?"

"Very good. Good eye contact, lot of smiling."

She seemed pleased.

After few more of these questions and answers, it suddenly dawned on me.

She wasn't doing this to manipulate you, you fucking over-suspicious bastard, she's genuinely interested!

How can this be? To my understanding, there were two kinds of strippers: The kind who don't care, and the kind who pretend to. And here was a girl who after choosing exotic dancing as a career path, was, for whatever reason, perhaps job satisfaction or just dumb goodheartedness, was interested in strip-club customers as people.

Admittedly, I don't read women well. And it's probable I've got this all wrong. But this makes for a much more interesting post than:

"PL gets fooled by exotic dancer. Again."

So let's continue.

I was astounded. She reminded me a lot of, well, me. Having been a pervert for as long as I could remember, I had always been attracted to the seamier side of society and its denizens. While I had felt my first visit to a strip club as something like a returning home, I has also known that for me, the path I had chosen would necessarily be a sad and lonely one. My life could never be normal once I had crossed that line.

My visits to various clubs ran concurrent to what can be described as research, primarily from questioning dancers and browsing the web, about the business itself. Local laws, terminology, etc. Of great interest to me was the human aspect, i.e., the dancers themselves, and I was always curious about their motivations and such. Maybe this intellectual endeavour served as an apology or justification for the physical one. Who knows, I'm no fucking psychologist.

And here was a girl who was seemingly doing the same, except from the other side. She wanted to learn about the business, and also to learn about her customers.

Here was the rub. How can any person deliberately expose themselves to the shit that goes on in the minds of men and remain undamaged? I had a terrible feeling that if she went on like this, she would end up hurt. She would find out, sooner or later, that all perverts are pretty much created equal. We're all after the same thing, and it can be primitive and base and even ugly.

Maybe she should build the walls, shield herself, do like the others, or keep searching for what's not there, trying to make sense out of a business, out of a part of human nature that has precious little, until it breaks her and she's going to be disappointed or angry or betrayed, get jaded and whatever fire she has inside now will just burn out to dull embers.

I've seen it before. In my ATF.

I have this idea that maybe I can help rekindle the spirit she once had. That's what makes me a PL.

Who knows?

Meanwhile, I'll keep paying for the lap dances. What am I? A fucking social worker?