Charles Bock - Beautiful Children

“Ink? I can tell it's not a tan.”

A giggle, a smile, half-amused, but plastic. “Some girls do the suntan trick,” she admitted. “Before they go to the tanning bed, you cut out a pattern on paper, lotion it up, and press it to the area you want to cover.”

“You tattooed your Venus mound?”

“Yeah, well, this way I can decorate.”

“Decorate?”

“You know, be creative.”

“So, to be creative, you shaved your pubes in the pattern of a bunch of bull's-eyes?”

She stepped backward. Her hands mechanically ran over her breasts, down toward her hips.

“You won't believe this,” Bing said, “but a few hours ago, I got caught up in this conversation, this, I don't know…”

“Mmm?”

“You know how sometimes you hear an idea and even when you are talking about it, it doesn't seem real. Like it takes on its own life outside the event, you know, a mathematical problem to work through.”

Cheri cleared her throat, glanced toward the door.

“But then to see you…I mean, to find you and the fire thing and your bull's-eye. Of all nights.”

She laughed a bit, looked toward the door a second time, longer this time, swaying in place a little, but not really dancing anymore.

The song was heading into its bridge, which meant he didn't have much time left, he knew. He was so close, ready to ask why she'd done it. Exactly what went into the planning and construction of such an activity? But her unease was obvious.

In the back of his head, Bing had been thinking that she might agree to blow him, and common sense said an intimidated and scared stripper wasn't blowing squat. Bing had already dropped a hundred and fifty dollars tonight, and to be completely honest, he couldn't afford to pay for a hummer.

Then again, could he afford not to pay for one? And was he really about to turn his back on a chance to snap the streak, because of some tattoo?

Even more than a half-assed fifty-dollar blow job, more than the end of his streak of involuntary celibacy, what Bing Beiderbixxe really wanted in this moment were the particulars that went into keeping each bull's-eye ring trimmed at a different length. The hours this stripper devoted to the care and maintenance of her pubic hair. He wanted to hear that this woman habitually perfumed and combed, trimmed and talcumed her pubes. That she got off on decorating her pubic hair, and sometimes purposefully messed up, and started the lacquering process over. Indeed, though its details may have stung and further humbled Bing Beiderbixxe, he would have loved to hear Cheri Blossom tell the story of her boyfriend — Ponyboy was his name — the story of Ponyboy lathering her pubic area for the first time, then trimming it with the straight-edge razor he sometimes kept in his right boot. Bing would have enjoyed hearing how uncertain Cheri had been about that particular endeavor, but that one of the things Ponyboy was really good at was keeping his hand steady while holding that razor. The story of the sex Ponyboy and the stripper had that night undoubtedly would have gnawed at Bing and furthered his sense of personal inadequacy with regards to matters of the flesh, but he would have listened anyway, damn straight he would have. What Bing Beiderbixxe wanted right now was the sound of this stripper's voice, this woman's voice, with her guard lowered. He wanted to hear Cheri confess that she spent long stretches in front of a full-length mirror admiring the results of her and Ponyboy's diligence, and that sensitive nipples would have added greatly to the lacquering process. He wanted her to reveal. To be revealed.

His dick was a lead pipe.

He all but demanded: What happened here?

3.7

Every day assholes came in and leered at her body, that's what mother-fucking happened. Every day these would-be hotshots and millionaires-in-waiting and bald fat fucks in their cheap-ass disco shirts came in. They asked their little questions, tried to break the ice, make conversation, get her to open up. They tried to take her away from all this, to get her into a back alley, to bend her over. Twenty-dollar bills or not, this dork had followed her clam around the room the way a trained show dog follows a treat. It was one fucked proposition. She shakes her ass and makes eye contact and giggles and these mooks decide she secretly likes them, thinks they are cool, maybe she'd fall in love with them, let them rescue her from all this, if she only got to know them. These mooks literally throw money at her for table dances and lap dances and champagne dances and when it's over she puts a hand on their thighs and gives a thank-you squeeze and moves on to the next one. And like so many before and so many that would come after, this loser was trying to be nice. He was trying to be decent. Yet his question was not phrased as a question, but as if she owed him something, as if she were his property. And Cheri Blossom burned to answer with the truth: I can buy and sell your family, she wished she could say. Fuck you. Fuck your pity. Do not kid yourself about who is using whom. I was molested as an infant. I was born into poverty and know nothing better. I am a rebellious socialite sewing my wild oats. A bored middle-class girl looking for kicks. I am that misunderstood whore looking for love that you are always hearing about. All my feelings of personal worth have been sublimated into my sexual identity. All my creative instincts have been channeled into onstage performances. I am putting myself through school. I am a baaaaad puddycat. A craven abuser of pharmaceutical substances. A habitual consumer of conspicuous products. I have been betrayed by everything I have ever placed trust in. Have betrayed everyone who ever cared. I am destined for greatness. Fated to self-destruct. I do this for kicks. For money. To meet sensitive hunks like you. Why do you ask? What's it to you? You cannot have me. You cannot learn my secrets. THERE IS NO MYSTERY. THERE ARE NO SECRETS. Life throws a curveball and you swing. Sometimes you get a hit and then sometimes you miss. I swing for the fences. You take hellacious cuts, you miss sometimes. You end up with collagen injected in your lips and a bull's-eye over your privates. You end up with silicon implanted in your breasts and fake nipples that have been purposefully hollowed out, and during the third dance of each set, you set candle nubs in the hollow points so alone and horny and generally unappealing winners such as Guess Who can pay a few bucks and blow out your tits. I ended up here like you did. EXACTLY THE SAME WAY YOU DID, BUDDY.

Her giggle must not have done the trick this time. The balding man's face remained blank. He waited, and waited. Closing his eyes for a moment, he seemed upset with himself, and his head dropped a bit, as if in defeat. But then he opened his eyes. He looked up, back at Cheri. Mumbling to himself, he began digging through his pockets, and pulled out crumpled bills, discovering a twenty, a ten, another twenty, a five, and now a few singles, which he started counting.

INT. CLASSROOM — DAY

Dusty light pours from windows onto rows of desks, which are filled with gloomy Catholic SCHOOLGIRLS. A wimpled NUN is at the front of the room. Chalk squeaking, she writes:

“The Lord gave his only son that”

CHERI (V.O.)

(from back of room)

I don't get it.

Giggles. Gasps. SCHOOLGIRLS look at one another knowingly.

NUN

Daughter Blossom?

Cheri, a teenager, arm raised, is in the back row. One hot little schoolgirl.

CHERI

(naughty)

It doesn't make sense.

The other schoolgirls titter. The nun cracks her pointer on the chalkboard, doing everything she can to remain calm.

NUN

Christ died, my child, so that we might have cause to reflect upon that which we caused.