Rebeckka Black - Dance to Despair - Memoirs of an Exotic Dancer

Within minutes the waitress returned with a buxom brunette. Collectively the three of us plowed through the darkness toward the back of the room where the customer sat waiting for his surprise. I took my sexy co-worker by the hand and positioned her directly in front of the man. “Here is your surprise honey,” I said,

“her name is Diva. How do you like her?” I asked. “Not bad,” the man replied.

He immediately reached for her crotch. The dancer quickly pushed his hand away. Hold on a minute, you have to spend some money on me first. “I am not going to spend any more money in this place!” he yelled. “I can go to any god damn massage parlor and get whatever I want for $200!” the man insisted. Diva and I didn’t respond to the man’s outburst. “This place is a rip-off! If you think I am paying that $380, you have another thing coming!” he screamed. The man refused to pay his bill and demanded to talk to the manager.

The waitress, who had quite a bit of experience in handling furious customers, calmly instructed the man to follow her to the front bar. The tall gawky looking waitress guided the man through the darkness of the room with the bright yellow beam of her flashlight. When the customer approached the area of the bar where Mr. C. was sitting, I saw the waitress go over to him and whisper something in his ear. Mr. C. gave her a quick nod of acknowledgement while taking a long exaggerated sip of his coffee. Before I knew it, my customer walked over to where Mr. C. was sitting and pointed his short-stubby finger directly into his face. I couldn’t hear the conversation between the two men because the music was so loud. I did notice that Mr. C. had gotten up off his barstool and was now towering over the short-dumpy man.

The men’s voices began to escalate. I heard Mr. C. say, “We’ll see about that,” as he firmly grabbed the customer by the back of his neck and literally slammed him down on the seat of the barstool. The short man tried to resist and attempted to lunge at Mr. C. This time Mr. C. slammed him full force into the wall. I heard the customer shriek as his wide-round head met full force with the hard structure of the wall.

A few minutes later, both doormen ran into the bar area to assist Mr. C. They ripped the black wool overcoat off the man’s body. “Put the fucking slob on his stomach,” Mr. C. ordered. He then savagely searched the back pockets of the fat man’s baggy trousers and pulled out his wallet. The customer began to threaten Mr. C. with calling the police, but Mr. C. just laughed and threw the man’s wallet onto the bar. The two doormen pulled the bloody, disheveled man off the floor and slammed him back down onto the seat of the barstool. The customer began to scream something about a lawsuit. Mr. C. hauled off and backhanded the man across the face. “Now are you going to pay your bill or do I have to call your wife and explain the problem to her?” Mr. C. instructed the bartender to strip the man’s wallet of any cash, credit cards, and forms of identification.

“What are you doing?” the customer screamed as he watched the bartender tear his wallet apart. “Shut up!” Mr. C. said to the pathetic man. The bartender found about $900 in cash along with a golden American Express credit card. Mr. C.

grabbed the credit card out of the bartender’s hand and shoved it into the fat man’s perspiring face. “Be prepared to sign your worthless life away you sick son of a bitch.” Mr. C. threw the credit card up onto the bar and ordered the bartender to “run it up.”

“Put it through for $4,000, our little friend will sign it.”

The customer who by this time had no more fight left in him, agreed to sign the voucher. When Mr. C. gave his empty wallet back to him, he sheepishly slid it back inside of his jacket pocket while grabbing his black wool coat off the floor.

As he started to stagger toward the direction of the foyer, Mr. C. gave him one last shove. “It could have been a lot cheaper if you would have done it our fucking way; now get the fuck out of here!” Throughout this whole incident, some of the other dancers and I stood on the other side of the bar watching the show. The only thing missing was the popcorn.

As time passed, it had become obvious to me that this type of violent confrontation between management and the customers was a common occurrence. On weeknights, these scenes occurred two to three times a night, and on the weekends there were more. The routine was always the same; however, the intensity of the beatings would vary depending on the nature of the crime.

It was common knowledge that Mr. C. and his hired hands would make weekly visits to customers that had become indebted to the club. These men had refused to pay their debit or just spent beyond their means. Whatever the case, Friday mornings were collection time and Mr. C. and his proteges would routinely visit the customer at their workplace in order to collect monies due. If the customer didn’t make their payments, Mr. C. would threaten to inform their employer and call or visit their wives. Many of the customers owed the club thousands of dollars. Some of these men had been making payments on their bills for several years.

The dancers whose customers were making weekly payments to the club weren’t paid their commissions until the bill was paid in full. In most cases, by the time the customer finally satisfied his debt the dancer was long gone. Sixty-percent of the time, managers recovered their monies with some form of black mail. The other forty-percent was a loss and unfortunately the ones who suffered were the dancers. In spite of what everyone thought, especially the dancer’s family or friends, we worked extremely hard for the money that we made. Most people wanted to believe that all we did was party for eight hours a night and walk away with a ton of money. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Most of the time, we worked in less than humane conditions. Our employers were nothing more than glorified pimps incapable of making a living any other way. It was a rough and dangerous business to be in.

The things that went on at the Golden Show Lounge reminded me of some of the incidents portrayed in the old Hollywood mobster movies. It wasn’t uncommon for me to stand on the sidelines all decked out in a $2,000 gown watching some customer’s head get bashed open. What would seem utterly incomprehensible to the average person was nothing more than “business as usual” for the dancers.

One of the most memorable evenings took place on a very hot and humid Friday night in the latter part of July. By 11:30 p.m., there had been four violent altercations between management and customers who refused to pay their bills. Mr. C.

didn’t appear to be in an especially good mood. Instead of laughing and joking with the employees, he sat alone at the edge of the bar holding his head in his hands. Most of the time Mr. C. thoroughly enjoyed the confrontations, but that night he seemed agitated by it all.

Business wasn’t particularly good. I had already danced three times and had only made forty-five dollars. Feeling drained, I decided to go downstairs to the dressing room for a while. As I walked through the crowd, one of the men who I had spoken to earlier in the evening flagged me down. I seductively walked over to the man’s table and managed to put on a big smile. The dark-haired man looked me up and down.

“I’m ready for you now,” he said, “call the waitress.”

I quickly summoned the waitress, and to make a long story short, the customer ran up a tab of nearly $2,400. This individual was extremely grabby and demanding. I had to do a lot of talking to keep him under control. When the waitress presented the man with his final bill of $2,400 plus a 15% service charge, he blew up. The waitress didn’t argue with the man. Instead she very calmly instructed him to follow her to the bar. After the waitress left the customer with Mr. M., I walked over to the other side of the bar and waited for the show to begin. In the reflection of the mirror I could see the disgruntled customer and Mr. C. standing face to face, engaged in a heated discussion. Suddenly, I saw Mr. C. bash the man in the face with the black desk phone that was sitting at the end of the bar. The man lost his balance from the unexpected blow and fell backwards into a large, plastic-potted plant. The left side of the man’s face was bleeding profusely. He struggled to get up from the floor while covering the injury with his hand in an attempt to stop the bleeding. Amazingly enough he managed to stagger back over to where Mr. C. was standing.