Chapter 2

 

Barry

 

"Strip down to your underwear and get up on stage."

 

I took a deep breath and tried to brace myself. This was the moment I'd been preparing for - the reason I'd bought the black jockstrap.  Rebecca was the dancer manager responsible for hiring the strippers of Executioners upmarket "gentlemen's club" in the red-light district.

 

This was the first time I'd ever been in a strip club. No music was playing and an eerie silence filled the space around me, along with the smell of stale beer and cigarette smoke.

 

She flicked a few switches and the club transformed into a mystical dark pit, with sparkling red and pink lights that cast beautiful, swirling patterns across the stage. The poles gleamed and music flowed out of speakers in the ceiling. It was time.

 

"You should probably go to an actual dance store," a male stripper who identified himself as "D," said to me.

 

"I did."

 

I'm lying.  I got these at a fucking sports store.  The kind of stores actual athletes went into.  I hot glued some fucking studs on it and right there while talking to D, the fucking studs were coming up.  He looks down.

 

"I wear this underwear because they have a great butt on them, see?" D explained, jumping to his feet and turning around. His butt looked very nice indeed.

 

"Michaelsons?"

 

I recognized the brand. I was going to buy them but they were way too expensive.

 

"How did you know that?" he asked, looking impressed. "Do you wear Michaelsons?"

 

And so it began. Me making friends again.  It has been almost half a year since I had the courage to do this.  I'd been living with my sister Roxana.  We'd moved to Vegas and she was doing odd jobs.  Luckily for us, she was a halfway decent singer.  I didn't work.  What happened with Emory 6 months ago had fuckin' left me in tatters.  Roxana never complained but I knew she needed me to go out there.  She needed me to make money.  She was getting closer to having her baby and she wasn't going to be able to work.

 

I needed to be here.  Ready or not.

 

D was sexy but then again most of these guys in here were that night.   He had a smile on that whole time but he didn't seem to trust me completely.  Every answer to my questions would end with him asking a question about me.

 

"What about you?" he'd ask, looking sincerely into my eyes. "What do you think?"

 

I was backstage at Executioners.  D was the only one who seemed to give a damn about having a conversation, even if it was half-assed.  The other guys were all straight most likely,  far more focused on impressing Roxana and the other female judges here tonight making their female judges happy, which involves lavishing them with attention, affirmation, and smooth, fragrant abs — not impressing them with good taste in underwear. Still, they answered my questions well. On several occasions, when I asked about their preference in underwear, they unbuttoned their pants to check the brand.

 

"Let's see," they'd say earnestly, slipping their thumbs beneath their waistbands and offering their chiseled groins.

 

"Now," said Rebecca. I looked around, completely stricken. It had been so long and this wasn't Ohio.  I had no idea what to do.

 

The other guys in my group were undressing and climbing onto the different stages. I took a deep breath, and clambered up, gripping the pole tightly with both hands and beginning to sway my hips to the beat. It's some pop shit maybe by Bruno Mars or something. I dunno. The guy nearest to me, D, clearly had worked as a stripper before, so I watched him closely, trying my best to emulate how he moved.

 

"When you feel ready, take your underwear off so we can see your dicks."

 

Aware I was being judged, but not entirely sure under what criteria, I waited until D "felt ready", took his underwear off and revealed the D.  It was impressive.  It made sense now why he came up with the name.   He had a great looking penis has a thick base, a thick trunk, and a thick tip, about 9 inches long, no curves, uncut. He began gently rubbing one off on stage stroking his uncut dick until the head emerged out of the skin like a blossoming flower.

 

Feeling awkward and unsure, I took off my sports retail store underwear and did my best to copy what he was doing.

 

A couple of minutes later, it was over.

 

The lights back on, we dressed and lined up in front of Rebecca for our evaluation.

 

"Too short," she says to one guy and then goes down the line picking them off "Too fat.  Too skinny.  Your dick is too small.  Ugly face.  You---you're ok, but you need to go get your teeth fixed before you work for us.    Now you. You're sexy. Uncut---that's a fetish..."

 

She's talking about D.  He confidently looks up at us.

 

"Actually this is how a man's dick was made to look like," he states.

 

She doesn't seem convinced, "---If you want to collect to bacteria.  I don't want a smelly dick in my clients' faces."

 

"I clean well," he states.

 

She grunts, "Fine.  We'll have to work with it.  This batch is just awful.  Move aside.  Go on hurry up.  Now, who's next.  Ah...you..."

 

She stops in front of me.  She eyes me up and down.

 

"What do you want to be called?"

 

Deciding on your stripper name is a rite of passage. Once you pick one, you are pretty much stuck with it for your entire career, because you develop a following of loyal customers who ask after you by name.  I realize no one is coming here from Ohio.  I could change my name right now.  I could become a whole different person.

 

But I stick with the old name, "The Wall."

 

She nods, "Nice body."

 

Lucky that I'd taken to working out in the last six months as a way to get over things.  I kept this photo of Zac Efron in Baywatch on my laptop as motivation.  It required a diet overhaul and trading couch time for gym time, but with enough dedication, that body was attained.  Of course I was a slimmer version of it but still, I had crunched and curled my way to torso glory.

 

"Thanks."

 

"Your In but not with that name," Rebecca said, "we already have a Wall."

 

Undeterred, I tried my second choice, "The Great Wall---like of China."

 

"You're not even Chinese."

 

"So."

 

"So why call yourself the Great Wall of China if you're not Chinese?"

 

Shocked I tried my real name, "Barry."

 

"Nope, we have a Barry."

 

What? I couldn't even use my real name?

 

"Fine," I said, giving up in frustration.

 

"You give me a name. Something strong, sexy and that you think fits."

 

Rebecca paused for a second and looked me up and down.

 

"How about ... Berlin?"

 

"I'm not German."

 

"You're the one obsessed with walls.  So I'd rather you be the German wall than the Chinese wall.  I'd seen more black Germans in my life.  Never seen a black Chinese guy."

 

Rebecca grunts nodding at herself with her own approval.  I turned the name over in my mind before nodding slowly.

 

I can work with Berlin.

 

~

 

The strippers at Executioners have two different aspects of their work. Throughout the night, they cycle through various acts onstage.  You have the sexy policeman, sexy Wall Street guy, and weirdly, even a sexy mime, all of whom disrobe with remarkable consistency to the characters that they create.   They spend the nights calling individual bachelorettes and birthday girls to come up and "participate".  That is code name to getting humped in front of the audience.

 

Meanwhile, shirtless staffers circulate around the floor, offering lap dances and showering benevolence upon anyone with a vagina.

 

"He has a nicer ass than me," I hear one lady calling out a particularly busy night as she grabs me.

 

You'd expect ladies not to be obsessed with ass but that was the opposite.  I walk over there and begin dancing.   The lap dancers all wore jeans and black shoes.  I liked to wear boots specifically and Rebecca said it was fine as long as it followed the dress code.

 

Occasionally we were allowed to pull our pants down around our ankles when the ladies wanted.  Tonight I was having it pulled down for me.

 

"What not interested?" another lady at the table asks.

 

She looks down.  I wasn't hard.

 

I sigh a little bit.  It was definitely a struggle to get hard while dancing for ladies.  Most of the guys had what they called fluffers in the back.  Those were call girls who came in and gave the guys head.  Rebecca hired them specifically to keep the guys up.  The only problem is, I didn't need a call girl.  I needed a call guy.  This wasn't doing the job.

 

When it came to underwear — which I got to see a lot of — there was a collective understanding that briefs are the way to go. D explained matter-of-factly that it's just the most flattering cut.

 

"We all wear trunks that are contoured and fitted," he said.

 

"Why no thongs?"  I ask.

 

"I don't know if a woman likes looking at a guy's ass flopping out," he said, "As general aesthetics go, I think a brief looks better."

 

This made sense until the show began and we wound up with a lot of man-asses, thanks to a generous amount of waistband-tugging and ass shaking.

 

The guys' asses weren't floppy, in other news.

 

"Maybe he's not into girls,"  another girl states.

 

I'm shocked they are having this conversation with me right there.  Luckily they are distracted by D who jumps on stage and is doing a stage performance.  I hadn't gotten upgraded to that because well...I was a gay guy trying to get turned on by dancing for straight women.  Now I get why Emory never danced for guys.  It was fucking hard.

 

Almost all of the stage performances involved tear-away pants, which, to my disappointment, are not procured at some special stripper supply store crawling with barrel-chested men; instead, they're just normal pants (or in some cases, Halloween costumes) with Velcro panels added in.

 

"You can do tear-away anything," D schooled me a few months ago, "You just buy the pants a few sizes too big — the general rule is three or four sizes up from your normal size — and then take them to a tailor and have them re-do the side seams with Velcro."

 

"Why four sizes?"

 

"It's just the optimal size differential so that everything fits back to normal when the Velcro's put in."

 

D had this stripper fashion shit down to a science and even though I'd found out he was a straight guy.  He didn't seem to mind coming to the store and watching as I tried on all my different outfits.  He just so happened to be rather touchy too, making sure the feel of everything was just right.  Sure my dick got a hard a few times during one of his inspections----but that's beside the point.

 

He was a smart guy.  And I'm not talking about the fact that he said words like optimal size differential.   He just knew things.  Things that I needed to know.

 

"Is there a particular tailor who specializes in this fine art?"

 

D shrugged, "Not that I know of. I'm sure some are better than others."

 

The night was crawling to an uncomfortable start and D has me backstage.  I look at his bag of money. He's made a ton.

 

"Not a good night?" he asks.

 

"How'd you know?"

 

He was busy on stage performing.  The girls were going crazy.  I know that he wasn't paying attention to me.  D was a natural at a club like this.  He explained,  unnecessarily, given his muscular physique, that he does bodybuilding in addition to studying biology at college.  He was that kind of smart guy.  He was really interested in how the body functioned.

 

"Rebecca mentioned it," he stated, "Something about needing to be reminded never to hire a fudge packer to work here again."

 

"Fudgepacker."

 

"Think she's calling you gay, man," he states.

 

"Oh."

 

We hadn't really discussed my sexuality but he'd made jokes before.  The attractive jokes straight guys made when they knew that a gay guy was attracted to them.  Jokes like grabbing his crotch and saying "What would you do with something like that?"  I could have taken it by meaning if I had a dick as big as his but I didn't.  I took it as he meant it as a sexual joke.  D was smart, borderline geek, but he was a natural flirt.  I guess you had to be in this profession.

 

I stand there looking dumb until D puts his hands on my back, "You need to let yourself go.  At the end of the day, the women don't really care about sexuality," he grinned bashfully. "They care about the abs, the pecs, the arms, you know?"

 

I shrug, "I just don't really like dancing for women.  They aren't really INTO the strippers."

 

"This cash says differently."

 

"I'm serious D.  Really, the women look more at each other than anything else.  They're far more interested in snapping photos of themselves — sometimes with the strippers but more often just on their own with their friends."

 

D laughs,  "I guess you got a point.  A lot of women who come here aren't in a sexual mood. They're in a silly mood and they want to share something that's novel with their friends.  So that being said it shouldn't matter if you're gay right?"

 

And at the end of the night, it shouldn't matter anyway. The women were so wrapped up in their girliness, bobbing around in their penis headbands and slurping their cosmopolitans, that the strippers' sexuality seemed beside the point. I watched one woman clamber over a chair in her Kardashian heels, revealing her Spanx underneath her short skirt, to pose for a group shot with her friends, a shirtless stripper named Bobby the Body standing in their midst like a prop. Afterward, they all passed around the camera to make sure they looked good while the guys stood by smiling, making sure everyone enjoyed themselves.

 

They were just props in the female club.

 

"I want something different," I state.

 

I'm complaining.

 

"More money.  Hell.  Me too..." D admits, "School is expensive.  Executioners aren't cutting it."

 

More money would be nice.  D didn't seem like he should be complaining but then again I didn't know what his lifestyle looked like.  It wasn't about the money though.

 

"Just something different."

 

"There's a guy who was checking you out in there."

 

"What?"

 

"A guy was checking you out," he states, "In there.  He works at an elite club.  Way bigger clientele than Executioners."

 

"You mean there is more to life than bridesmaids?"

 

"Hell yeah. It's almost like the El Dorado of the Vegas scene.  They don't promote it or anything.  Just word of mouth.  They strip for elite gay closeted men."

 

It couldn't be...

 

"Is he still out there?"

 

"Come on, let's go see."

 

The pink lights, empty martini glasses, the smell of cheap perfume and slow music draft through the speakers as the club ends.  D navigates the club like a pro as though he owns the night.  He's always naked, even now with his dick switched like a whip from side to side.  He'd made a reputation for himself here already.  He was one of the only guys who take his pants all the way off when he gives lap dances. He just kicked off his shoes, strip `em off, and got comfortable.  He taught me how.  Once you've done it enough times, it's an art. I'm not as fast as he is but I make sure to tease him all the time about how proficient he is with it.  He should probably just go ahead and get his degree in getting naked quick.

 

I'm nervous even with D with me.  He doesn't even get dressed when he takes me out there.  The club is over and everyone's wrapping up for the night.  No guys staring at you trying to take you home.  The girls left, even the drunk ones who you think would want to be a slut for the evening were being dragged away by their girlfriends.

 

It was a fuckin' joke.

 

"Hey, how's it going?" D asks.

 

Fuck.  It was him.  Ainsley. He'd been looking for me all over Vegas. Or so I'd heard.  Ainsley wasn't the kind of older guy who you just turned away from.  He had this allure.  He had this real sexiness about him.  He's sitting at the table by himself and one of the last customers there.  He has on a sports jacket and what looks like straight bourbon on the rocks.  He is Italian, I believe.  Maybe not, but I like to think he is because of his deep tan and his foreign accent.  He has a full beard that has gone almost completely gray.   Even under his coat, I can see his muscular physique that leads me to believe that he was a dancer at some point.

 

"Good evening gentlemen."

 

"I know you," D states, "Tried to get into your club like 20 times.  Got turned away each time."

 

D got turned away?  If he was it had to do with his uncut dick for sure.  D was so very attractive.  He doesn't seem to take himself too serious too.  If someone turned me down that many times I  would be a little resentful but D has the biggest welcoming smile on his face.  I wish I could say the same.

 

"Your 21st chance may be your lucky one if you can bring this one with you," Ainsley states.

 

He looks at me as he says that.

 

"This is my friend---Berlin," he states.

 

"You go by Berlin now?" Ainsley asks me.

 

I am quiet.  Real Quiet.

 

D looks over at us confused, "You two know each other?"

 

I turn away, "I should go."

 

I turn and start walking away as fast as I can.  I just needed to know if it was really him.  Now that I got my confirmation I was out of here.  Lucky for me, I'm not naked like D when I go for the exit.  I'm trying to get out of there as quickly as possible.

 

I'm standing outside before I know it waiting for an Uber when I see a Maserati pull up to me in front of the entrance of the club.  I wonder what rich housewife we had at the club tonight but then realize that it's a valet.  I didn't even fucking know we had valet.

 

"You're too handsome to be taking a Lyft."

 

I turn and it's Ainsley.  He's standing there.  Suave and cool as the day I first met him - making me nervous as hell.

 

"Actually it's an Uber."

 

"Is there a difference?" he asks before reaching over, "Here."

 

"What's this?"

 

"Keys.  Take my car home.  I'll catch public transportation.

 

"You serious?"

 

"Dead serious.  Just bring it back to when you are ready to come work for me at the Rum and Monkey."

 

"Who says I want to come work for you?"

 

Ainsley sighs, "I know what happened that night was weird.  We have no idea why your friend would run off like that."

 

"Emory didn't run off.  Something happened to him."

 

"The police found no proof of any crimes.  Lux said that he left on his own terms.  Lux said that he told him that he needed to go find himself.

 

I shake my head, "Lux is a fucking liar."

 

"A bus ticket was purchased with his credit card.  The cops looked into it."

 

One bus ticket and then random purchases all over the country.  It didn't make sense.  I knew Emory.  He didn't even like to travel like that.  Every time we tracked him down in one city, we got news that his credit card was used in another city.  The cops just blew it off.  No one cared.  No one believed me.

 

"I know my brother."

 

"Except that isn't really your brother.  He had a real brother.  They weren't that close.  And his real brother told the cops that Emory wasn't the most stable person."

 

Did they contact his birth brother?

 

What the fuck?

 

"They never got along.  Emory said they stopped talking years ago."

 

"You're making up excuses now.   You said a lot was changing in Emory's life.  He was brought to a new city.  His wife was pregnant.  Have you checked back in Ohio."

 

"Maybe you're not fucking understanding me Ainsley," I state giving him a hard look, "Emory loved my sister more than anything in this fucking world.  He loved me like his brother.  He wouldn't just get up and leave us like that.  Something happened with those fucking Saudi royals and you're the one who put us in that position.  So no... I'm not going to come work for you.  Not now.  Not ever."

 

"Barry."

 

"Fuck off."

 

Luckily the Uber arrives.  I don't hesitate to get in.  Ainsley was the reason that I had moved to Vegas in the first place.   That night had changed everything though.   It's been 6 months and it still feels like yesterday.

 

Maybe that's why I spend the rest of my ride home tearing up.

 

I pull up to the house trying to dry my ears.   I'll have to explain to Roxana that I wasn't crying about Emory again.  She'd given up herself.  It's not because she didn't love Emory.  She felt like she had to be strong for her baby and couldn't live in agony over the husband that just up and disappeared one night without a trace.

 

As I get to the house, something seems different.

 

Usually, all the lights are off except for Roxana's bedroom.  She barely came out anymore.  Today, however, all the lights were on.

 

"Roxana?"

 

I get closer.  I'm confused as all hell as I get closer.  Roxana is standing there in the kitchen with a smile on her face.

 

"Stay right there," she states.

 

I'm confused, "Roxana I don't like surprises."

 

Roxana shakes her head, "You'll like this one..."

 

"Roxana...what's going on?" I ask.

 

That's when I see my sister come out of the kitchen.  She has a smile on her face and I know why.  My mouth drops open when I see the person standing there.

 

He looks different.  He's more muscular.  He's just as dark though.  Just as tall.  His face is clearer and it looks like he's cut all of his facial hair to have a very clean shave.  My mind looks at him as though this is some sort of joke.  I keep thinking that is my mind playing something on me.  But it isn't.  He's here in the kitchen and he's looking at me.

 

My mouth drops.

 

"Emory?"

 

~

 

Emory

 

"Emory?"

 

The boy with these almost mesmerizing green bubbly eyes and a dark chocolate skin tone walks into the room.  He's looking at me and I'm looking back at him.  He's a nice looking guy, tall with a nice body on him and a tank top on.  He's a little slimmer than I am but just as tall.  He's younger than me.  I can see it in his face.  Not by much though, but definitely younger.  Not as young as he's acting at this moment either.  His face bubbles up like a kid on Christmas.  His face bubbles like he's 4 feet tall. And then he runs towards me.  He pushes Roxana away and wraps his hands around me.  The hug is real love.  It's something that I haven't felt in a long time.

 

When I'd arrived at the house Roxana had just been in tears.  She was so shocked.  This guy though.  The way he grabs me.  The way he just holds onto me felt as though some fairytale had come true for him.  I didn't think someone could bring another person so much happiness.  Not like this.

 

"I...uh..."

 

"Where were you?" he asks me, "Where have you been?"

 

"I----"

 

He asks me, "I kept telling everyone something wasn't right.  I kept telling everyone that you wouldn't just leave us.  No one believed me.  No one."

 

Not even Roxana---my wife?

 

"I..."

 

He gives me a hard look, "Somethings not right."

 

He says it as though he can read my thoughts.  He says it as though he can see right through me.  I'm nervous as hell.  He keeps looking at me in a way that not even Roxana, my wife, looked at me.  He takes a step back and examines me.

 

"What?" I ask.

 

"Somethings off about you."

 

I'm speechless.  This kid was good.  He was really good.  It's better not to say something at least now.  It's better not to speak to him directly.

 

Luckily his sister steps in, "There's something you need to know, Barry."

 

Barry.  That was his name.

 

Barry looks at me and shakes.  Tears are in his eyes but his cheek is already stained as though he was crying before he got here.  For some reason, I hate seeing him like this...even though I have no idea who this guy really is.

 

"What's wrong with him?" Barry asks.

 

"He doesn't remember anything," she explains.

 

"Like what happened the night he went missing or..."

 

She shakes her head, "Like anything.  He doesn't know who you are."

 

I look over at Barry.  It's as though his whole world is rocked at that moment when she tells him the same thing I told her when I showed up at her doorstep.  His mouth hangs open for a moment.  He looks at her as though wanting to argue but then realizing he has no knowledge of what his arguing points are, he closes his mouth again.  Then he looks over at me.  Without saying a word I can see his pain.

 

Why does it hurt so much to see him like this?  I don't even know this guy.

 

That's when he takes a step back again and again as though distancing himself from me, "I have to go to the bathroom, I'll be right back."

 

He leaves.  I don't know why I do it but I take a few steps towards him.  I'm fucking following him.  I literally get towards the threshold of the next room when I feel Roxana pull me back.

 

"He just needs space," Roxana states.

 

"Sorry...I didn't mean to upset anyone," I state.

 

"It's OK," Roxana explains, "You two were really close.  Inseparable.  I always joked and said I was your wife and he was your boyfriend."

 

She laughs oddly about it but I can't even force myself to laugh.  I just felt like I brought someone some real pain just now.

 

"Do you have another bathroom I can use?" I ask, "This all is...a lot."

 

"Sure...it's upstairs."

 

I go upstairs as quickly as I can.  I didn't expect the emotion when I arrived in Las Vegas.  I should have known it was going to be like this.  This was a bad fucking idea.  It was a really bad idea but it was something that I had to do.

 

I felt bad for Roxana, the pregnant wife.

 

I felt bad for the emotional best friend who seemed to know almost immediately something was off with me within a matter of seconds.

 

I get in the bathroom and I wash my face.  I slap the water up against my face a few times.  I was already here.  I had to calm down.  I had to stop thinking with my fucking emotions.  For all I knew,  Roxana or the best friend could have been involved with a crime.  For all, I know they were acting.  They could have been in on it.  I didn't trust anyone.

 

Anyone here at least.

 

I pick up the phone.

 

"Baby?  Is it you?"

 

His voice is deep.  His sexy Latino accent always gets to me.  He'd been sleeping.  My boyfriend is on the other line.  Yes, boyfriend.  I was gay.  Andreas was always supportive.  Even when I told him I was coming here.  Even when I told him why I was coming here.

 

"Yeah.  I'm in."

 

"Good luck Everett.  I hope you find out what really happened to your brother."

 

He'd been supportive even when I found out that my brother had been missing.  Even when I decided to come to Sin City myself to find out what happened to him.

 

To read the next chapter go to www.crushedcrown.com