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Chapter 9: A Typical Day, Part 3
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2022-04-29 14:01:38Related chapters
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 10: My First Real Outfit, Part 1
I quickly fell into a routine; any day that I wasn't working at the library, I danced at Lipstick, so Saturdays, Sundays, and Wednesdays were characterized by bare flesh and grimy money. Every day I was greeted with the same smell of stale beer, grease, and cigarettes. When I arrived, the kitchen staff would already be unloading cases of beer, hosing down the floors and outside area, and firing up the ovens. Rolling in around 10:30 or so, I straightened my hair, plastered on some make-up, and got dressed. (Or, undressed, I should say.) It was extremely slow-going at Lipstick. In one full hour, I would meet and greet a customer, make small talk, give them the dance, and try to get them to buy another. Sometimes two or three hours would go by where no matter how many customers I greeted or talked to, no one wanted to shell out for a lap dance. There was the occasional three-dance customer, but I rarely got more than two songs out of a single customer. I lacked both experience and a c
Last Updated : 2022-04-29Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 11: My First Real Outfit, Part 2
When I left the club to go out to the parking lot, I met up with him near my car. He suggested that we could both ride in his car, and my face must have betrayed me (as it always does). Stranger danger! Stranger danger! Stranger danger!"I promise I'm not going to kidnap you and murder you. It'll just be easier, so you won't have to follow."But that's what a murderer would say!However, my intuition said that this guy was being honest. He had treated me with respect in the club, hadn't aggressively pressured me, and didn't seem like the human-trafficking type. When I climbed into his black Audi S5, I noted the California license plates. The inside was pristinely clean, like it had just been detailed, but had a subtle yet distinct smell of weed. I took a whiff of that sweet, oily scent and shot him a smile and raised eyebrow. "Yeah, ha ha, well, I am from Cali, and you know how we roll."I grinned at him. "No worries, I totally smoke." See, I am cool. I smoke pot. See Jane smok
Last Updated : 2022-04-29Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 12: Welcome to Wonderland, Bitch, Part 1
The citrus smell of Goo-gone was invading my brain; it smelled good in a sickly sweet way, but it was making me slightly nauseated. My fingers were sticky with adhesive from peeling yellow "New" stickers off books. When new books arrived, the library kept them in a separate section for six months to promote the shiny, hot-off-the-press bestsellers or replacement copies of favorite classics. After that, they returned to the main collection. I tried wiping the glue off with a combination of Goo-gone and Clorox wipes. I couldn't wait to be a full-fledged librarian and never peel off another sticker ever. "What are you going to do this weekend, Ariel?" My coworker, Brianna, asked as she walked by with the "To Shelve" cart.My mind flashed to bare breasts, sweat-slick stages, grimy money, and men's hands. I kept my face blank as I said, "I don't know, probably just work on homework, or read. Binge-watch Star Trek, if I get done with everything." I ignored the sudden uptick in heart rat
Last Updated : 2022-04-29Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 13: Welcome to Wonderland, Bitch, Part 2
He's in the VIP, so he must want dances, right?I sauntered up to him. "Hello, my name is Rose; may I sit down with you?" He obliged, and we began talking. Pretty soon, I started dancing. I was grinding on his lap, facing away from him, when I felt the unmistakable silky texture of bare skin against bare skin. About halfway through the first song, he had pulled his dick out. Now, I had seen and handled plenty of six-inch male organs before, so I wasn't afraid of it so much as I was afraid of someone (manager, other dancer, waitress, plainclothes cop) seeing an obvious dick hanging out. I turned around and started to get up and said, "Hey man, I'm not comfortable with that. You gotta put it away. Thanks for your time." I started to walk away.He quickly tucked himself back in and said, "Wait, wait! I'll make it worth your while." As I wanted to leave right then, we bartered for a bit for how many dances I would continue with. I asked for three; If I had to deal with this creep,
Last Updated : 2022-04-29Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 14: Unfortunate Masturbation, Part 1
I opened the front door to my parents' house without using my key. My family never locked their front door, or the back for that matter. The back yard didn't even have a fence. The reasoning was, nothing ever happened in Azle, Texas. The neighborhood was safewhite, middle-class, and filled with Evangelical Christians. My own bedroom had been built without a lock. "I'm here," I called out. "Sister!" my little sister, Mariah answered from her usual spota brown faux leather recliner chair. She had our mini-dachshund, Penny, clutched tightly in her arms, and a pair of headphones around her neck. I took a deep breath and maneuvered around the piles of junk everywhere: a discarded stationary bike that had never been used, shoeboxes filled with trinkets to send to the starving, heathen children in Africa, plastic garbage bags of old childhood clothes still needing to be taken to Goodwill (and probably never would), mounds of toys for "holiday gifts." My mother was the kind of person to
Last Updated : 2022-04-29Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 15: Unfortunate Masturbation, Part 2
Jeanna burst into the break room. I glanced up from Pillars of the Earth, where I had been deep into medieval England, with knights battling for honor and monks building colossal cathedrals. "Someone was masturbating in the stacks!" She looked like she wanted to both laugh and vomit."Again?" I asked. "Did they catch him?"Jeanna's eyes looked as round as full moons. "Yeah, he tried running out, and he got as far as that vacant lot next to us, but one of the other patrons tackled him."I stifled a giggle and asked, "Who found him?""Me." Jeanna's face was blooming red from mortification. "He was watching some dirty video, and he had his fly undone, and he had his thing half out of his pants and he was stroking it, so I ran to go get Kraleen. But I think he must have noticed me, because he had already left when I came back."I shook my head at the antics of The Public. "Was he…?" and I made the motion for heavy-duty wanking. "No, he just had it out and was kind of flopping it a
Last Updated : 2022-04-29Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 16: Boundaries, Part 1
"What are you?" asked the customer.A woman? A librarian? A stripper?"You're very exotic looking," he continued. "What's your nationality?""American," I replied, having an inside joke with myself. "What?" he asked, confused. I rolled my third eye. Put away your tertiary liberal arts education. Trying to score a table dance is not the time to explain that nationality is the country or nation of origin and ethnicity is a sociocultural heritage. "Native American," I clarified. "My grandfather was half Ottowa""Oh I'm Indian too," interrupted the blond, blue-eyed teeny bopper before me. "I'm like one-sixteenth on my mom's side. Or was it my dad's?"Sure, but you didn't grow up with a Native name, christened with a powwow, didn't grow up learning the circle dance, the fancy dance, or the dance of the 49 Warriors. You don't have hand-sewn shawls that your mother made you or a hand-carved tomahawk.He finally asked for a table dance.I don't think this is what The Great Spirit
Last Updated : 2022-04-29Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 17, Boundaries, Part 2
"Excuse me, ma'am?" A soft country drawl pulled me from my surreptitious homework. Describe information theory and how it relates to Boolean logic. Include references to Shannon's "A Mathematical Theory of Communication." A woman in short, blonde hair and a Louis Vuitton purse stood before me. "Yes, ma'am, how can I help you?" I asked. "Look, I don't want to seem like a horrible person," she began. This sounds promising, I thought. "But I was wondering if you could ask that man to leave," she pointed at a man wearing a paint-stained t-shirt and torn sweatpants that looked like they hadn't been washed since Clinton was president. He was snoozing in a chair.I feigned ignorance. "Do you mean leave his seat?" I asked. The woman tried to not look guilty. "No, I mean leave the building." She leaned in closer. "He smells. It's bothering my daughter who's trying to read."I leveled my gaze at this woman, who wore camo chic and had fake rhinestones on her manicured nails. She
Last Updated : 2022-04-29
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Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 50: Redemption, Part 2
Although there weren't many true reference questions, the ones I did get I poured my energy into. "Can you tell me where books on fibro-myalgia are?" asked a girl no more than 13. "I want to help my grandmother." "Do you have any books on construction? I want to build a patio.""Do you have any good recommendations for historical fiction?" These types of questions I loved the most. I loved reading recommendations, because I honestly tried to give the patron my opinion but also attempted to help them branch out of what they might normally read. The toughest customer I ever had was a little girl, no more than ten years old, wanting "a good book to read." I suggested middle school stuff, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Royal Diaries, Dear America books, Captain Underpants. None of it would do; she had either read it all or thought it would be "boring." "What about A Wrinkle in Time? It's fantastic!""What's it about?"How does one explain the beauty and exquisiteness of A Wrinkle in Time?"
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 49: Redemption, Part 1
My redemption came from a place called Rowlett. The summer can be the busiest time for a public library, since many "Summer Reading Programs," generally take place to help encourage kids to read during the time away from school. The Rowlett Public Library was looking for a temporary, part-time library assistant to help ease the burden of all the excess foot traffic. Kids and their parents would come in flocks and droves to pick up books and weekly prizes for reading. The number of patrons per day doubled what it was during the winter. I didn't care that the post was only for four months, and that it was 23 miles away down I-30. It was $15 an hour for 25 hours per week, and that was a bounty compared to the previous year of fifty bucks here and there. When I interviewed, I tried to apply the lessons I had learned from some of my more disastrous interviews and tried to appear eager, competent, and intelligent. I didn't just want a job; I wanted one in a physical place, where I had a se
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 48: Pit of Thorns, Part 2
I quit stripping sometime in May. What would follow is what I call my "year of solitude," because that's essentially what it was. I had no job, and a full summer to think about the classes that I had failed. I had no idea what to do with myself. I looked for different library jobs, but only half-heartedly. I was afraid of the question that comes up on all employment applications, "Why did you leave your previous position?" "Well, you see, I was a stripper, and it was quite stressful, and made my brain think funny things, because of anxiety, so I quit, because I wasn't thinking properly, now here I am!" I also couldn't say, "Well, I just quit for no damn reason at all, because that's what it looks like." Plus, it was a dry season for library jobs. I received a steady stream of rejection notices, and I became more desperate to find a job, any job. Several months later, I tried re-applying for my old position at Garland. I even emailed my supervisor, explaining that I had been suffering
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 47: Pit of Thorns, Part 1
Quitting stripping was like falling into a pit of thorns. Well, maybe stripping itself was like falling into a pit of thorns, but quitting was like waking up in the pit and realizing, "Oh shit, I'm covered in fucking thorns." Over the course of the next year, I slowly but surely started to pull the thorns out one by one, and each one felt like a little blade slicing through my skin. The thing about thorns, too, is that infection spreads faster than you think. I had changed in ways that I didn't realize I had: I was more callous, more selfish, more money-obsessed. The aim of stripping was to manipulate people for money, and I didn't stop with strangers. People I loved became like money faucets in my mind: my parents, my grandparents, my friends: anyone who would give me money turned into a fixed dollar amount per month in my mind, and if they didn't give me money, it either meant that they didn't love me or I didn't care enough to bother with them. Of course, quitting, even abruptly
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 46: Quitting, Part 2
I walked in the door like it was just a normal day, said that I had already eaten dinner, and we sat down to watch the animated version of Black Panther. Going out with a black guy, I was so open-minded and socially-conscious, or so I told myself. My absent-mindedness was my ultimate undoing. "Hey, have you seen my phone?" I dug through the couch cushion. (One cushion. It was a ridiculous, circular couch that we felt oh-so-cool for having.) "No," said Tor, eating some of the freshly oven-popped popcorn we had made. "Did you leave it in your car?""I must have," and I started to get up. "Don't worry, I'll get it," he said. I was grateful that I didn't have to move from the comfort of the couch. I didn't know the unraveling was about to occur. He came back inside angry, but quietly so, which made me instantly worried. "Why are there leftovers in your car?" he asked.Goddamnit. I had forgotten about the leftovers. "Who were you with?" he demanded. "No one, I--""Stop ly
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 45: Quitting, Part 1
In the end, I stopped because the mask was becoming too real. I didn't know where it stopped and where I started anymore. We're all divided; we have a left brain and a right brain that forms a whole greater than the sum of its parts. We all have the constant inner battle of feeding two wolves, of choosing good over evil. We are all Two-Face, split between virtue and vice, logic and emotion, and loyalty and fallibility. At the end, we are only what we seem to people based on what they perceive we are. I quit because Rose and Ariel were becoming blurred; I was lying in "real" life even when I didn't have to. It could be over something as innocuous as what I had eaten for lunch. I could have had soup, but I would say "sandwich." I started lying about things that I didn't have to lie about, and the habit was so ingrained that I couldn't stop myself. I could feel the lies in my stomach, bubble up through my throat, and leave my lips without thinking why I was doing it. I hid everything
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 44, Taking the Bite, Part 2
And of course, I resisted this idea, at first. (Oh how we all resistat first.) I gave him every reason I was hesitant."Well, I appreciate the offer, but I have a boyfriend." "And I am still technically married," he said."And I'm sure your wife wouldn't mind you spending an evening alone with a young woman," I said. "Actually, she wouldn't. You see," he scooted me closer, cradling my body closer to his. "my wife and I are separated. We are not divorced, because in my culture, divorce is highly frowned on. Although we are still married on paper, we live our own lives." "But I'm not certain that my boyfriend would approve.""Does he know you dance?"I could see where this was going."No.""And you don't have to tell him about this, either.""I'm still not sure," I said. That day he gave me five hundred dollars as a parting gift. The next time he came, he sweetened the deal: he said that he would give me $1000 if we could meet in a hotel room and not the club. I still made
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 43: Taking the Bite, Part 1
It is very easy to fall. It is so easy to slide headfirst down the slippery slope, because you've already made so many concessions before the moment of truth. You've worn yourself down so much that making one more bad decision doesn't seem all that bad. It's so easy to point at Eve and say, "Look at that disgraced whore, taking the first bite." But the serpent was the most crafty of all the animals, including the dynamic duo in the garden. He knew exactly which things to say to Eve, how to persuade her, how to guide her to the edge of the cliff and take the plunge herself. All Eve ever wanted was wisdom. I've always been fascinated by the story of Dr. Faust. It seems relatively straightforward: don't sell your soul to the Devil. But how do you resist someone who promises you the very thing that you can never have and is the one thing you desire most of all? Faust, like Eve, sought knowledge. He wanted to know to understand, to see the biggest picture of all. He had already started do
Confessions of an Exotic Dancing Librarian Chapter 42: Broken Beyond Repair, Part 2
*In the end, he told Nolan that I wanted to break up with him. Nick. My friend. The person in whom I had confided, when I simply wanted advice, told Nolan behind my back that I wanted to break up with him. I suppose it's hypocritical to complain about betrayal, given that I have done so much of it. But it still hurt. Nolan, Nick, and I had signed a lease that went until June, and it was only February. I was going to wait for that long until I broke up with Nolan, seeing Tor the whole time. In hindsight, being that committed to a double-life scares me. The capacity for deceit in me is terrifying. But in the end, it was like ripping off a band-aid. Nick told Nolan my desire to break up with him, so he did it for me. The next time I came back to the apartment, it was to pack up some things for a little while. "So where will you be staying?" Nick asked. "Tauni's. I'll crash on her couch until I find a place to stay."In reality, I was sleeping with Tor in hotel rooms. "I'l
