The Kindness of Strangers
By itchingmyknee
My best friend works as a stripper. She’s been doing it for a while, but yesterday was the first time that I actually saw her dance. She was working in a club in Soho, and there was the usual mix of seedy regulars and hip glitterati that run that part of town. I had gallon of Jack Daniels in my belly, (these places only serve doubles) and I’d smoked a thousand cigarettes. My hair seemed to me tobacco strands and my saliva intoxicated my tongue as I spoke.
My friends and I didn’t quite belong. There was something jaded in the hard, beautiful faces of the patrons, and their eyes flashed cherry red under the ruby strip lights. The barman flirted with me as I paid for a drink. He’d flirted with all women he’d served that night, catering his winks, nods and smiles to the age, weight and drunkenness of his prey. His attentions bounced off me like rubber and struck a dissolute blonde swaying to my left. So charmed was she in my stead that her jaw began to gape and her legs to spread. She held on to the bar to stay upright.
It was still early, not yet 2am, when we decided it was time to leave. I passed Kate Moss on the stairs. Her face was tilted away from the light, her face shimmering with Rimmel Recovery foundation she had advertised months before. We walked down the street, arms linked, under the watchful eyes of minicab drivers and hostesses in dark doorways. Then suddenly Soho spat us out into Shaftsbury Avenue, where the stragglers from the theatre crowd were fumbling in silk purses with drunken fingers, looking for bus-passes and handkerchiefs.
I heard singing. Not really anything like singing, but even more unlike shouting. There were some lads coming towards us; one commanding a cloud of silver balloons that almost seemed to bear him up with the breeze. Each of us wanted a balloon, like children at the fayre. One was acquired with a gentle smile, but Stripper lost her temper at the boy’s reluctance to part with another. I wanted one too, so I asked. The boy handed me the whole bunch. Suddenly he seemed to me an angel, gone astray from his midnight choir. He handed over the knot of strings and looked at me as though I was something quite extraordinary. Then the moment had passed, and all that remained was the feeling of having been adored for an instant, a twinkling of an eye too ephemeral to be quite real. The pavement restored itself beneath my feet.
And all that was left were the balloons, and what was I to do with so many balloons… My friends and I said our goodbyes and I negotiated my way down the street, clutching my new silver brood. And at my bus stop, a couple appeared out of nowhere, holding hands with eyes that shone as they gazed at one other. He asked if he could have a balloon for his lady, and I said, ‘Of course.’ He reached for one. I said, ‘Have them all.’
My best friend works as a stripper. She’s been doing it for a while, but yesterday was the first time that I actually saw her dance. She was working in a club in Soho, and there was the usual mix of seedy regulars and hip glitterati that run that part of town. I had gallon of Jack Daniels in my belly, (these places only serve doubles) and I’d smoked a thousand cigarettes. My hair seemed to me tobacco strands and my saliva intoxicated my tongue as I spoke.
My friends and I didn’t quite belong. There was something jaded in the hard, beautiful faces of the patrons, and their eyes flashed cherry red under the ruby strip lights. The barman flirted with me as I paid for a drink. He’d flirted with all women he’d served that night, catering his winks, nods and smiles to the age, weight and drunkenness of his prey. His attentions bounced off me like rubber and struck a dissolute blonde swaying to my left. So charmed was she in my stead that her jaw began to gape and her legs to spread. She held on to the bar to stay upright.
It was still early, not yet 2am, when we decided it was time to leave. I passed Kate Moss on the stairs. Her face was tilted away from the light, her face shimmering with Rimmel Recovery foundation she had advertised months before. We walked down the street, arms linked, under the watchful eyes of minicab drivers and hostesses in dark doorways. Then suddenly Soho spat us out into Shaftsbury Avenue, where the stragglers from the theatre crowd were fumbling in silk purses with drunken fingers, looking for bus-passes and handkerchiefs.
I heard singing. Not really anything like singing, but even more unlike shouting. There were some lads coming towards us; one commanding a cloud of silver balloons that almost seemed to bear him up with the breeze. Each of us wanted a balloon, like children at the fayre. One was acquired with a gentle smile, but Stripper lost her temper at the boy’s reluctance to part with another. I wanted one too, so I asked. The boy handed me the whole bunch. Suddenly he seemed to me an angel, gone astray from his midnight choir. He handed over the knot of strings and looked at me as though I was something quite extraordinary. Then the moment had passed, and all that remained was the feeling of having been adored for an instant, a twinkling of an eye too ephemeral to be quite real. The pavement restored itself beneath my feet.
And all that was left were the balloons, and what was I to do with so many balloons… My friends and I said our goodbyes and I negotiated my way down the street, clutching my new silver brood. And at my bus stop, a couple appeared out of nowhere, holding hands with eyes that shone as they gazed at one other. He asked if he could have a balloon for his lady, and I said, ‘Of course.’ He reached for one. I said, ‘Have them all.’
posted by bitingmylip at 3:13 AM
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