She Blew the Lads (A Kiss)

“Girls will be boys and boys will be girls

It’s a mixed up muddled up shook up world.”

Lola, The Kinks.

Those lyrics spun in circles in her head. They danced with the other - the perfect couplet. She smiled a pretty smile and drew on her eyebrows. In front of her was an array of beauty products but she didn’t need any of them. Her face was gentle but well drawn, her lips pouted when needed, and elegant when in repose.

She pushed her hair into the shape that she wanted. It was long and brown, the colour of dairy milk chocolate. She had spent years grooming until now finally she was happy. She pushed her tits together and blew a kiss at the mirror. On her hands she pulled long white gloves and on her feet she slipped sparkling white high-heeled shoes. She stood, twirled, and looked over as someone knocked at the door.

“Five minute warning.”

She walked towards the door and opened it. A man was knocking on other doors, doors with stars on. Her door had the biggest star of all. She tucked, tweaked, and straightened up. She was ready for the lights.

The stage was empty. It was waiting for her long leggy legs to strut and stride. Eager men waited in the shadows sipping hard liquor. Most come alone because they are bent but straight. No one can know of their predilections. But late at night no one judges because everyone is to busy being themselves.

Booze loosens tongues and zips. It leads to groping in the toilets and later head holding in the wee hours. It leads to pissing on walls, car door handles, and on unwary trouser legs. It leaves you where you really want to be and that’s the bitterest pill to swallow. But in the dimly light corners, in the dark secluded recesses, the men sat and watched the empty stage. They were waiting for her.

And on the stage she appeared. The lights dazzling just like her smile. She thrust, she splayed, and she seduced in equal measure. This was the kind of place where you could look but not touch, you could lust but not fuck. The men were free to fuck one another but they didn’t. Most were after breasts, most were after an illusion, and all knew where they would find it. She was on the stage.

Her name was never something they asked. They wanted no link between their day-to-day lives and her. She was their dirty pleasure, their secretive escape, and she was the only thing that made these men a group. In life they came from ever corner of society. That’s the thing about late night strip clubs. There is no class. Just eyes and naked flesh – an illusion, not honesty.

But she was special. In her dark brown voice she sang love songs. She could sing ‘em fast, she could sing ’em slow, and she moved her hips with a rock and a roll. Her dress came off easily and she glided around the poll. She took dollar bills in her thong’s waistband and she batted off the hands that were too curious. In her head she was somewhere else, dancing for more than just money for the bills, but in reality she was in a sweaty strip club dancing with the worst truth – she was the star.

She finished her performance and left the stage. She went back to her dressing room. She removed her wig, her makeup, and her high heels. In their place she put on her clothes, the clothes that she felt she could walk home in. A subtle dress, a long overcoat, and a bob cut wig.

Outside of the bar she stood. The pink lit triple X sign blinked from a busted fuse and rain dripped on her face making her makeup run. Streaks of water were like chinks in her armour. She lit a cigarette and walked off into the nigh, her low heels providing a sombre clack clack.

The rain formed tiny rivers in the drains and slowly they flooded and overflowed. She pulled her overcoat in tighter and sucked the last of the smoke from her hissing cigarette. She threw it into the drain and the current battered, twisted, and overcame the filter tip. Pieces of spent tobacco and paper mingled in a deconstructed mess and then were sucked down, their essence destroyed.

She walked on. Dark alleyways and forgotten city corners twisted and turned as she made her way home. Ahead of her a group of lads stood drinking cheap cider and smoking marijuana. She moved into the gutter to walk around them.

“Faggot.”

One of the young men called after her with a word that physically hurt her. She tried to pass them but they pushed her over. There were lots of them and only one of her.

She tried to stand up, her breathing heavy but not as heavy as theirs. They were hunters, children bored and left up far too late. A boy picked her up and looked straight in her face. Her makeup was all but gone, her wig was hanging haphazardly, and she had lipstick on her teeth.

They stared at each other, both, in that moment, in their own way, honest.

“I’m not a faggot.”

She said it with defiance but defiance is always dangerous to those who feel challenged. The young man pushed her to the floor.

They hit her. She tried to cower in a ball, she tried to ride out the violence but she was overcome. They threw words like punches.

“You like dick in your ass?”

“You’re disgusting, you make me sick.”

But not one of them had ever been brave like she was now. They were showing the depth of hatred, they were showing what it meant to be a Nazi, to be a fascist, to be a racist. Her makeup was running but she wasn’t.

“Yeah I've been fucked,” she cried. “So what?”

They kicked her over and over and over again. They hit her, they spat at her, but she would never be broken.

She blew the lads (a kiss).