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Fortunate

Jon Minsloff

    Reed admired Jasmine’s ass as she walked over to Clevis. Her cheeks were round, and knew from plenty of practice how to bounce to the techno beat when she walked. They tensed up when she bent over and leaned into Clevis. Clevis sat in a wobbly chair with his hands in his short pockets on his chubby thighs, smacking on what Reed knew was at least his second slim-jim. Clevis stared blankly into the dark through gold colored wire-rimmed glasses. Reed watched him, hardly able to make out his eyes because of the glare from the spotlight hitting the thick lenses on Clevis’ spectacles. Reed sat there, puffing on his cigarette, since there wasn’t really much else to do with it. He held it in his hand, examining it as he exhaled a sigh of smoky air and thought about everything besides cancer, besides death.

    Reed looked around the room, checking out the crowd, looking for action. His eyes got caught on some messages that had been scratched into the old wooden table where he was sitting. GINA LOVES TODD was carved into the cheap, soft wood except TODD was exed out and TO FUCK MIDGET NINJAS was written beside it. Reed got a little excited because he took karate in second grade. But that’s probably not enough. Besides, he thought TODD would most likely get mad if he knew GINA was into him. Just in case, Reed grabbed the knife from the silverware set. The utensils were wrapped in a crimson napkin, which was folded carelessly in a trash-ass attempt at an origami flower. A pretty orchid. He wrote REED WAS NOT HERE, cutting into the glossy finish with the stainless steel blade. The S, which he found a bit hard to carve out, looked more like a lightning bolt than anything else. He moved to another table, near the back, a little farther from the stage and pervert row.
    Reed looked at the girls dancing in the room, and then he looked at the guys watching the dancers. What a bunch of sad losers, he thought. He saw all the customers drinking and looking at boobs, just trying to forget everything for a night. That’s when he realized Clevis needs that feeling. He worries too damn much.
    None of Reed’s other friends wanted to go out that night. They were all going to school and working during the summer. Reed was only working, with Clevis, 7 to 3:30 at a factory where it was hotter than a fucking sauna. It smelled bad too. But not as bad as the old men who go into the sauna, sit next to you without any clothes on, their mummified balls hanging down too low, then ask if you played highschool football.

    Reed was stuck out for the night with Clevis, bored, sipping on a White Russian, and wishing his manly friends were there so they could talk about animals. He turned to see what Jasmine was up to, if she got Clevis to pay for a lap dance. It looked like they were just talking. She was seated next to Clevis, facing him, really engaged. Reed was surprised that anyone would actually find the kid interesting. He’s probably talking about the chick in the office at work that he’s in love with but ignored by, or bragging about how many grapes he could fit into his mouth at once. 27. Or maybe he was being funny, because Jasmine was laughing and reaching out with her hand, gently touching his forearm. Techno thumped in the background and made Reed think about Morse code.
    Reed saw Jasmine get up and walk through the exit to the back room behind the stage. He went over to Clevis just to see what was going on.
    “So what the hell are you guys so chatty about?” Reed questioned Clevis.
    “Dude, Jasmine’s getting me my first lap-dance! She said she’ll bring her friends out and I can pick whichever one I want! God, you were right, this place is A-Mazing!!!”
    Clevis had a grin of excitement on his face, and a glaze of possession twinkling over his eyes. He looked like a kid in a candy store—a kid with a gun who could get whatever the hell he wanted. Reed was jealous. He’d been going there for weeks; this was Clevis’ first time.
    The girls came out from the back room with Jasmine- six tight, skinny bodies, mostly tan, but some a faded orange from the spray shit that comes in a can. They all had matching neon green thongs like Jasmine and similar hair styles, like they all came from some Matel factory assembly line. But then Reed saw one girl trailing behind. The spotlight caught her, and Reed saw the dark, sexy outline of her figure. She was a little bit thicker than the other girls, healthier looking anyway. Her auburn hair hung down, kind of curled in some parts—wavy, like in a painting. Gorgeous. She looked forward as she walked, staring confidently with blue eyes, which were dark, but beaming in the spotlight. Clevis looked up at her as she came to join the group of Barbies that stood before him. The mysterious dancer wore a dark red thong that reminded Reed of the napkin at his table. Around her chest she wore a cross that reminded Reed of, well, nothing. He wondered if the crucifix was just part of the costume, or if it was something important that she forgot to take off.
    The girls stood there, eager, not just because they really liked to dance, but because Jasmine had told them all that Clevis was a virgin, and anyone could tell just by looking at him it was true. They thought they would have some fun with him. The girls watched as Reed and Clevis whispered to one another, discussing the options. Reed told Clevis that he should go for the auburn haired one with the cross his first time because she was different from the rest. He said she would be something to remember.

(*)(*)(*)

    “Ohh YEeaahhhah! This is awesome!!!” Clevis seemed to be enjoying his first lapdance he was getting. Reed watched from the back of the room. To him it looked like the stripper was getting into the whole thing as much as Clevis was. The girl bobbed up and down with her ass between Clevis’ thighs and tossed her hair over when she swung her head, releasing dark curls that sprang out in every direction. Her necklace spun around her neck, at times gaining dangerous speed. She then turned around and leaned over Clevis, placing her slender, toned arms around him and supporting her weight with the back of his chair. She released onto only one arm and pulled Clevis’ face into her sweaty chest with her free hand. Her necklace was left dangling between the two of them. From his seat, Reed could almost see Jesus dancing right before Clevis’ eyes.
    It was at this point in the girl’s dance routine that Reed noticed there was something unnatural about her movements. Her arm suddenly appeared to go stiff and she was falling into Clevis. She continued to dance, but not along with the music that was playing from the box speakers set up high in the corners of the room. It was like somebody sped her up, and knocked her out of sync with the DJ.
    “I Love TITTIES!” Clevis exclaimed, throwing both his hands up in fists of “hoorah” as the brunette’s breasts slapped uncontrollably across his face, nearly causing him to lose his balance even sitting down. The crucifix took flight like a G.I. Joe on a spaceshuttle, floating.
    Reed knew something was not right, but he couldn’t tell exactly what from far away. He watched the girl buckle at her knees like she had taken a tranq dart in the leg and pounded her face into Clevis’ crotch, her head tremoring violently. She bounced to the ground leaving a trail of drool from Clevis’ lap. A gooey river ran down his leg, dripping, making a small pool around her head as she lay on her side going rigid. Her body tensed then released, again and again, spasmodically on the dirty floor.
    “O God, you are CRAZY!” Clevis eagerly awaited her return to his chair.
    Reed started laughing and couldn’t stop. He was in complete disbelief. He moved closer, watching the stripper as everything became clear in the dim lighting. Her eyeballs were rolled back in their sockets, like they were hardly hanging on by a single retinal nerve. A creepy redness was in the place of her shaded blue eyes. It was a crimson that reminded Reed of the napkin, of her thong. Reed wondered how long it would take Clevis to figure it out, or if anyone else had even noticed yet.
    Reed looked around to see if anyone was witnessing the seizure taking over the girl’s body. She was on the floor still, salivating more than ever. Her fingers screwed up into her palms like the onset of rigor mortis. Clevis finally sensed something was amiss and stopped cheering. The stripper flopped around, like electricity violently ripped through her body, like some unseen force hammered the shit out of her. She kicked and moaned as if a barage of BB’s pelleted her ass from every direction. Clevis’ face went serious pretty damn fast when he looked down at the girl and realized the situation. He panicked and grabbed another stripper who was busy grinding the pants of a lawyer looking guy at the nearest table.
    Music stopped and the lights came on. Someone drinking a Bud Lite screamed. Nearly everyone froze just where they were, even the older guy picking his nose. His hand paused in mid-air and displayed a yellow and green crud hitching a ride on his pinky. Next stop: the padded armrest of his chair. Reed looked around and saw one man smacking on a chili dog as the young girl fidgeted, rolled, and gasped for air. The man neglected to wipe the mustard crusting on his chin as he sat, absorbed in the messy meal, completely unaware of his surroundings. Reed was in disbelief once again. Since when do they serve chili dogs here? How much are they? Can I get one with saurkraut, maybe some extra cheese?
    Jasmine ran to kneel down at her friends side as everyone backed away to give the stripper some flopping space. Almost everybody stood watching the girl squirming, shaking on the ground, struggling in pain to take back control of her body. Jasmine put one hand behind the girls head and cradled the weak body in her arms, holding her close.
    “Is there a doctor in the house?” she called out, throwing her head up to the audience in what Reed saw as a seemingly exaggerated state of distress.
    “I’m a doctor.” One man said, his eyebrows narrow and focused—his posture upright.
    “Well, can you help her” Jasmine asked.
    “Oh, well, actually, I mean, I’m a chiropractor,” the man reluctantly confessed. There was a pause. Then his shoulders and chest caved in as he released a breath he’d been holding in way too long.
    The man explained he had not technically graduated yet and would be in a shit load of legal trouble if he attempted to save the girl and failed. He also admitted that chiropractors are not real doctors. They’re holistic healers who can’t prescribe medicine or perform surgery. Reed thought the guy looked incredibly depressed.
    “Go sit down.” Jasmine told him, annoyed with chiropractors.
    “I’m a doctor,” another man spoke up from behind the crowd. He had just walked into the club minutes ago and gotten a vodka tonic at the bar. Apparently he couldn’t see the girl amongst the mass of people gathered around her and Reed saw a somewhat confused look on the man’s face as to what was going on—with the lights being turned on, with the mob of people, the silence in the club. The guy asked why he had to get a glass from the back shelf and pour his own drink at the bar. He said he was pissed he couldn’t figure out the register and he didn’t know where they kept the limes. The man said, “Please, could somebody assist me with the citrus?”
    Jasmine ignored his questions and complaints.
    “OK, good, so you’ve actually graduated?” She wanted to be sure this time.
    “University of Florida, Class of ‘05” The man walked closer, holding his drink in one hand, and snapping together his mimed Gator Jaws with his other. Reed thought it looked more like an angry duck. Clevis stared with his eyes fixed straight ahead, but on nothing in particular. Reed could tell he didn’t know what to think.
    “So can you save her?”
    The man pushed through the crowd, using his Gator gesture to force the unwilling to cooperate.


    “Oh Shit! What the hell happened? Is she dead? What am I supposed to do?” He had a look now of total astonishment and panic on his face when he saw the body.
    “Aren’t you trained to deal with these kinds of situations?”
    “No, nooo. Not like this. You see, I’m an ichthyologist. A Ph.D.” He explained, often using his hands in a swimming motion, that he knew a lot about fish, about their mating and their feeding habits. He made puppet movements with his hands and puckered his mouth. He really had a wide range of knowledge and he shared the fruits of his education with the others.
    “I like what I do,” he said.
    “I’m a taste-tester for novelty condoms,” the one woman in the bar who wasn’t flossing with neon threads or serving beer spoke out. She forced herself to step forward. “I love my job! And my life!!!”
    The ichthyologist welcomed her to speak in the circle, and began clapping slowly at first, and quietly. He looked around the room, nodding and raising his eyebrows, encouraging others to join in. Even the chiro slapped his clumsy hands together. He clapped with flat palms like no one ever taught him how to properly applaud. Reed mumbled something about a seal then just looked at Clevis, who was still terrified and was now beside Jasmine, kneeling down before the girl on the floor. Reed wondered why Clevis cared so much.
     One by one, members from the crowd of men stepped into the middle of the circle saying their name and telling more about themselves, like they had special stories to tell. Like they were all part of some kind of Homeric epic and everyone should know about their journeys. One by one, they forgot about the stripper lying on the floor. The pretty stripper who just moments before had been dancing in the spotlight, the life and energy of the room. Even Jasmine was caught up in the new atmosphere. She let the young stripper’s head slip from her grasp and plop once again onto the hard wooden, dirty floor. The girl’s arms shook at her sides. Reed stood on the inside of the circular crowd. He looked down at Clevis on the ground holding the stripper’s hand, waiting for him to start crying.
    The others kept speaking. Reed learned why they were not with their women. One man was an attorney for a large firm downtown. His wife caught him snorting a line of her birth control pills he had ground up, desperate for any kind of high since she had flushed all his coke. She left him, and took the kids with her. Another suit managed accounts at one of the banks in the city. His wife walked in on him jacking it to a history channel documentary on cannibalism. He came right when she walked through the door. She bit his arm then left. But she didn’t take a thing, not one bag. Jason was a news reporter for the local station and he didn’t really know where his wife was.
    “I haven’t really seen her in a while,” he stated, matter of factly.
    Pathetic. Everyone is so lonely. They’re all looking for someone to listen. Reed looked at the crowd and noticed how they were all connected, somehow. He looked at the young stripper and saw how blue she had become. He glanced up at the bar and saw chili dog man fixing himself another snack, this time with even more mustard. He didn’t have to pay for it.
    As the crowd spoke, people made friends. Men took time to hear things that they never would have stopped to listen to otherwise. The few women, besides Jasmine, remained outside the crowd. They talked about pedicures and make-up. Reed listened to the drunken men and wished Clevis would do the same.
    As if awoken from simply a late night nap, the previously unconscious girl pulled her hand out of Clevis’ desperate, longing grasp. She rolled over and propped herself onto her knees. The stripper looked around at the men gathered in a circle and yawned. She made eye contact with Reed. He stared at her without concern, but curious as to why she appeared so put-together and seemingly undaunted. He watched her brush off her legs when she stood up to walk away. Without a word to Clevis and nothing more than a passive glance at Reed, the girl walked through the crowd, the oblivious group, and made her way towards the exit. She strutted down the dark hallway with the only lighting coming from near the door-way at the end. Jeff saw her left hand grab hold of her necklace and adjust the charm, still intact after all the ruckus. Clevis screamed after her, still kneeling down on the floor.
    “Wait! Don’t go! I love you!!!”
     He put his head down to hide tears and a red face. He sniffled way more than Reed could handle. Clevis worried too damn much.

    Reed shook his head as he stood there lighting a cigarette. Through the dimmer of smoke he watched, squinting, as the girls body transformed into a mysterious silhouette.

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