I ran back to the “dressing room.” Though the door was closed, I knocked. Joanna opened the door, looking like a completely different character than the short girl who entered the store in leggings and a cut-up T-shirt. She was in a black latex nurse costume, with glittery red eyeshadow and lipstick. She had a stethoscope and a giant syringe that glowed in the dark, and she towered over me in incredibly high stiletto boots.
“Hey!” I said. “Is, um, everything okay?” I asked. “I got you a water!” I slyly pretended to open the bottle of water for her before I handed it over, even though it had already been opened. I turned an embarrassment into an act of magnificent chivalry.
“Thanks so much!” She took a sip. “Did you give my music to the DJ?”
“I think I’m the DJ, actually. But, I got it!” Joanna seemed annoyed, but she smiled.
“A cute, young, girl DJ—that’s a first for me!” She giggled. Then she frantically looked through her suitcase, throwing numerous thongs, open-toed, hot pink shoes, school-girl outfits, and other things across the room. “Shit,” she said. “I forgot my lotion at the other club!”
It was humorous the way she said “other” club, implying that this was also a club. But if that’s what she needed to believe to keep going that was fine. She handed me a squirt bottle that looked something like a ketchup dispenser from a 1950s diner.
“Can you fill this up with half water and half lotion please? And hand it to me on my last song.” She flipped her head upside down and sprayed it with hair spray; some of it burned my eye, as I stood in the corner holding her squirt bottle.
“Yeah, got it, sure,” I said. I admittedly enjoyed being bossed around by a latex nurse.
I ran back to the store area, looking for something reminiscent of lotion. I could have sworn we had some, though I was having a hard time finding anything but lube and massage oil. In the small bachelorette party section of the shop, we did in fact have some kind of shaving cream that was called “Coochie Creme” that several women swore was a wonderful cream that left them with no razor burn in their bikini area. I guess that would have to do. The cream was rather expensive, close to $20 a bottle, but I justified the cost; 100+ people were, albeit illegally, paying to get into the store that would make up for the loss of any products we had to use. I took it into the bathroom, dumped it out into the squirt bottle, and mixed it with water. I had no idea what this science experiment would amount to and what it had to do with being a nurse but I was excited to find out. There was no time to waste! I ran back to the stripper room, pushed through the crowd, and headed straight to the corner. A sweatpants guy was guarding the speaker and the laptop. He had some kind of headset/earpiece on and he spoke into it: “Bring her out, we’re ready,” and he looked at me and nodded. I assumed this was the go ahead to play the music, so I plugged the laptop into the speaker and hit play.
The first song on her mix was titled “Bio Music,” an in-your-face instrumental song. It filled the room like a fog, setting the stage for a sexy evening. I suddenly remembered that piece of paper with her credits she had called a bio. I had it stuffed in my pocket. I pulled it out, I looked at the screaming crowd stuffed into this room, and I looked at the sheet of paper and I listened to the guitar instrumental blasting through the speaker. Okay, maybe it wasn’t exactly blasting because the speaker really wasn’t powerful enough for this, but I could still hear it.
When I jumped up onto the platform where the stripper pole was, everyone quieted down.
“Hello everyone! Welcome to the—” I paused, “Joanna Angel special feature stripper show!”
Everyone cheered.
“She, um, she’s an AVN Hall of Fame person. She is a porn star. She is the owner of BurningAngel Entertainment. She was the first tattooed centerfold of Hustler magazine…” I continued to go through the list of accolades and I read them off in my best impression of an announcer voice. I sounded ridiculous but the crowd was so restless and rowdy no one seemed to care. One of the sweatpants men looked at me and gave me a thumbs up.
I was just about finished with the list when Joanna entered the room. The room filled with cheers and applause. She was escorted in by the original sweatpants man who first came into the store; she jumped up on the platform with ease, shaking her ass to the loud metal music. I sincerely hoped my laptop wouldn’t run out of batteries before the music ended because I didn’t bring my charger to work.
She held onto the pole like it was the love of her life, twirling around it, holding herself against it, doing anything she could to please it and earn its affection. People threw dollar bills at her. The sweatpants guy picked them up as they fell to the floor. She smiled at the men in the audience and seductively licked her teeth; this was for them, but also for herself. Her task was her ego, and it wasn’t complete until every brain in that room lit up with desire for her and only her, until all of their dicks saluted her in ultimate devotion. She head-banged to the music, using the heavy beats as an excuse for exaggerated movement, but that alone wouldn’t hold the attention she needed. Slowly she began to peel off the stretchy dress she had on, revealing her bare body inch by inch. The collective eyes below followed each pulled-back layer as it rolled down her breasts, her chests, her hips. Finally, she threw aside the dress like a shed skin, showing off a sparkly bikini top and matching thong. She had perky, natural breasts; you could see the smooth tops of them almost spilling out of the bikini top, luring people in, screaming you there, yes you, I know you want to touch me. She bounced them up and down to the beat of the music, which was impressive because the music had a ridiculously fast tempo. I had known several men in my life pretty intimately, and I never knew what they jerked off to—yet here were a bunch of strangers who practically admitted that she got them off. It was fascinating how much of themselves they would reveal in exchange for live boobs and naked skin. It was almost as if everyone in the room was stripping.
She undid the elastic in the back of her bikini top and she motioned for the crowd to yell louder if they wanted to see her top off. She wasn’t saying anything but she conveyed that message pretty clearly. One of the sweatpants men stepped up to the plate to be her interpreter.
“If you wanna see Joanna take her fucking tits out, make some noise!”
The crowd roared, almost drowning out the music. Joanna jumped around and motioned for people to get louder and louder. She aggressively threw her top off and it dropped to the ground, like it was a jailor who’d been keeping her breasts locked away from the rest of the world and she’d finally gotten their freedom and vengeance. I saw one of her fans try to run and grab the top, but I rushed over and intercepted him and saved the bikini top! Joanna looked directly at me and mouthed thank you. I smiled. I felt like I was uh, doing my job, whatever that was tonight.
The song switched, a more rock-type beat filling the room now. Joanna climbed to the top of the pole (her upper body strength must be incredible) and flipped upside down. She made a shocked, open-mouthed face, like she was saying, Oh my, how did I get up here, and what will I do now? But then she smiled, affirming her seductive control, and kicked her legs up even higher above her head. Using her feet and hips, she started to wiggle to the beat and grabbed the edge of her panties, slowly and deliberately sliding them off while suspended from the pole, flinging them off with a flourish. I instinctively knew to follow the panties’ airborne path and I grabbed them before anyone else could. If her bra was almost stolen, I could only imagine what could happen to these panties (and from having a vague knowledge of shiny panties from my brief stint of working here, these were not cheap panties).