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All in a Night’s Work
after Cathy Porter

Alan Catlin

If I’d ever wondered where
old strippers went when they’d
passed their prime, I had an
answer sitting right next to me
at the bar chain smoking Lucky
Strikes and drinking Rye Pres’s
one after the other, keeping
counsel only with herself,
never speaking, not even to order
another drink. When she was ready,
she’d just slide the empty high ball
glass across the wood, unwrinkled
another five-dollar bill and point
at the melting ice inside indicating
the new drink should go right on
top of the old one. Throwing her
ice away was a mistake new barkeeps
only made once. She had the vise
grip of a python that would leave
marks after it had been applied and
it wasn’t something you wanted to
make a habit of encountering if you
could help it. Rumor had it, in her
prime, those dancer’s legs could scissor
lock a man in one place past dawn,
though now, judging by the flesh
that showed on her face and arms,
the only death grip strength that remained
in her, was in that hand methodically
lifting the next drink and the last.

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