The Lady Killers
Iwent from mailroom clerk to CEO with one swipe of a pen.
The hierarchy at Culture differs greatly from any other club I’ve worked at. Usually, bartenders are the top of the food chain. Here, they’re the bottom of the totem pole. The performers (that’s me now, in case you forgot) have full access to the entire club. The VIP rooms, the dance quarter, the B&B, and wherever else they feel like “entertaining”. Then there’s the Commons. These are the guys who can give private dances and engage with patrons on the floor. Lastly, there are the servers and bartenders. As you know, bartenders do their fair share of putting on a show. But it pales in money and comparison to what the Commons and Performers do. Daniel is VERY particular. It took a ton of convincing on my part to have Shayne promoted to Common. But once Daniel gave him a shot, there was no looking back. Shayne became one of the most sought-after dancers in the club.
Next to me, of course.
I’ve been working at Culture for seven months. Here, I’m Jack. And I’m free. Jack never went to prison. Jack isn’t estranged from his family. Jack never destroyed love. Jack has no regrets.
Now, being Jack hasn’t exactly been a cake walk. It’s fun. It’s liberating. But it is also humbling. Especially when your first private dance is an epic fail. I don’t know what happened. I think I psyched myself out. My moves were awkward and robotic. My heart wasn’t in it, and I scolded myself every chance I got. Luckily for me, the girl I was dancing for was one of the coolest chicks on the planet. She giggled the whole time. She even tried to coach me, but nothing helped. We ended up just talking, and it connected us somehow.
“When you said you were working at a nightclub, this is not what I imagined.” I know that voice. It’s the carbon copy of mine. I turn around to find Sean standing behind me. I haven’t seen my brother since the day I punched him in the face. We text every now and again, but I’ve kept my distance. I guess not even Jack is immune to Ryan’s problems.
“Well, what did you imagine?”
“Not this.” He eyes one of the guys walking past us dressed in nothing but tiny blue shorts.
“It pays the bills.” I turn toward the bar and ask one the bartenders for a shot.Something strong.
I down the brown alcohol. Jack Daniels, yuck. “What are you doing here?” I cut to the quick with Sean. I’m not too happy to see him, but I’m not all that upset either. I fucking hate admitting this, but as much shit as my family’s put me through, there are still times I miss him and my mom.
“I wanted to check on you.” He throws a ten on the bar and orders a beer. “It’s been too long. I miss my brother.”
“Did you miss me while I was doing time?”Your time?
“You at least talked to me then. This silence shit sucks.” He swigs his beer.
“I’m angry, Sean.” No reason to beat around the bush.
“I know. We both know.” He takes another sip. There’s a long pause. Nothing is said as the music pounds and people loiter around us.
“She isn’t drinking as much as you think,” Sean finally pronounces as he picks at the label on his beer bottle.
“Oh really? Cause when I came home that day, it looked like she bought out an entire liquor store.”
“She was nervous.”
“Stop defending her.”
“I’m not.”
“Of course, you are. You always have. You have a connection with her I’ll never have.”
“And I have a connection with you she’ll never have!”
“She changed for you. Not me, you. She made a choice, and it was you.”God that stings like a son of a bitch.
“She would have done the same thing if the roles were reversed.” He tries to argue.
“I don’t think so.”
“She loves you, Ryan. It’s just different than the way she loves me. You’re not fucked-up. You’ve always been the stable one.”
“I’ve always been the crutch.”
“You’ve always been the glue.”
“I can’t be that anymore, Sean.” I look away. It feels like I just turned my back on my brother. Something I swore I would never do.