Free Strip City: A Stripper's Farewell Journey Across America by Lily Burana Page B

the one in 1995, and we can see in the database that you have eight more." I've never had to register with the sheriff anyplace I've worked, and even though I've never been convicted of a crime, I'm paranoid that I won't pass muster for some reason. Then a man comes in wearing a maroon sweatshirt on his head as a do-rag, and a backward pastel seashell-print hospital gown over a grey trench coat and he gets a card, so I figure I'm in the clear. I hand over my paperwork, pay my thirty-five bucks, get a mug shot taken, and give them a full set of fingerprints. By the time I scrub off the printing ink with the citrus-scented granular hand cleanser, my laminated card is ready and I am good to go in Vegas.
    Cheetah's is literally all smoke and mirrors, and there must be at least sixty women working the floor tonight. Here's a foxy Mexican girl in hot pants, lace-up boots, a baseball cap over her luxurious ponytail, and a baby-T that says SEXY. A perky, cropped bumpkinette flounces by in a red-and-white gingham Daisy Mae bikini while two Jheri-girls mingle in rainbow-striped Day-Glo hip huggers and matching calypso tops. There are lots of implants here, some of which look lumpen and sad, others that have an admirable impudent thrust. Real breasts may have more cachet, but they're so squishy and vulnerable looking, I wonder sometimes if it wouldn't be nice to have a few inches of saline and silicone bubble-wrap as armor between me and the elements.
    There's a bacchanalian thump to this place that's irresistible. The deejay slides from techno to rap to disco to heavy metal with ease and sonic acuity. He seems to favor the metal, which I appreciate, since a lot of the upscale clubs won't play anything heavier than Van Halen. Not even Metallica, which blows. To forbid the glorious Wagnerian pomp of Metallica is a gross misread of the male libido— their songs are the most righteous manifestation of testosterone-fueled virtuosity and aggression. The guitar is presented with the same respect that an artist's brush lavishes on an odalisque, and guys go nuts when they see a pretty little girl take on a song as big and brutal as "Enter Sandman." To deprive them of that spectacle is nothing short of a shame.
    A commuter class of dancers comes from around the country to work in Vegas, especially during conventions when the city overflows with expense account money. Tonight, the dressing room is alive with out-of-towners hoping to cash in when the latest batch of corporate junketeers comes out to play. The women compare where they're from—Alaska, Washington, New Hampshire—while they curl their hair, apply their makeup, have a smoke, and in my case, read the rules.
    The house rules at Cheetah's specify no grinding, no lap humping, no touching the customer's crotch. But here, as in a lot of clubs, there are two sets of rules—those that they tell you and those that you actually work by. I wedge my way into a leopard-print dress and double-decker g-strings and bound out of the dressing room just in time to see a girl turn away from her customer, place her ankle on his shoulder, and slide her leg back until her crotch is right in his face. How am I to compete with a girl who wraps herself around a man like a jade necklace? I must be radiating nerves, because I can't get a dance to save my life, even though the club is mobbed. Finally, Paulie, a burly body-builder, catches my eye and offers to buy me a drink. I ask him where he's from. Colorado. What's he doing in town? Bachelor party. Has he been here before? No, first time. Then it's my turn. Have you worked here long? No, sure haven't. How old are you?
    Do I lie about my age? Honey, I lie about everything. Highly impolitic, I concede, but what about this profession isn't? My job is not to be who I am, but what the average strip club customer wants, and those two things are, I'm resigned to admit, quite different. Sure, some guys might find my loopy urban pedantry attractive, but they aren't