Page 2 of The Last Dance

The main room was a cross between a speakeasy and a spaceship: booths upholstered in burgundy, black lacquer tables, mirrors everywhere, but nowhere you could look straight at yourself for long.

The music was always loud enough that you had to lean in, but never so loud you couldn’t hear the register opening when someone bought a round.

I was three dances into my shift, already slick with the industrial-grade sweat that came from moving under the stage lights. Tips were light, but it was Tuesday, and Tuesday was for regulars. Regulars tipped well, but only if you remembered their names and the names of their dogs.

I didn’t even like dogs, but I had a running spreadsheet in my head: Gavin, pitbull named Frankie; Tony, beagle, not neutered, weird source of pride; Michael, a rescued labradoodle who was the emotional support animal to end all animals.

The things you did for rent money.

Between sets, I worked the floor. The manager said it was called “working the room” but it felt more like running crowd control on a sinking cruise ship. The guests never changed, just rearranged. You could see who wanted company and who wanted to watch.

There were the shouters, the touchers, and the men who sat at the bar and pretended not to look. My job was to make them all feel like they were getting their money’s worth, and that I was enjoying it. I was getting paid for the lie, so I tried to make it a good one.

Parsons arrived at 8:22, seven minutes after I called last song on the main stage. I didn’t need to look at the clock to know it. He was like the lunar cycle: precise, inexorable, unsettling even when you knew it was coming.

He chose the same booth every time, the one that had the best angle to the stage and the least direct light. He ordered a drink—never finished it. He never looked at the menu. He didn’t need to.

The other dancers called him The Deacon, not because they knew his name but because they could smell the religion on him from across the room.

I thought it was more accurate to call him The Undertaker. There was something somber about his posture, the way he folded his hands and never, ever slouched. He wore the same jacket every time, taupe corduroy with a blue button-down and khakis that looked freshly ironed.

Nothing in this club was freshly ironed except him.

I swept past his table like I didn’t see him, but of course I did. His eyes were always on me. Not in the way of a guy hoping for a peek or a number or something to jerk off to later. His look was the look of a man taking inventory. Every inch of skin, every motion, filed away. I’d felt the weight of it the first time and I’d never gotten used to it.

Tonight he was early, which put me on edge.

I did a circuit of the floor, running the small talk algorithm. Gavin asked if my classes were going well—not in school, but maybe someday. Tony wanted to know if I’d seen the news about the flooding—no, but my building had a mouse problem if he wanted to swap stories. Michael was already hammered and tried to tip me with a loyalty card to an espresso bar. I took it anyway. Someone once tipped me a two-dollar bill and I still had it.

Call it sentiment or call it hoarding, I didn’t care.

I could feel Parsons’ eyes from across the room. Every time I angled toward the bar, he adjusted in his seat. He never made a move, never smiled.

He’d wait until I passed close enough, and then—every time, like clockwork—he’d leave a folded business card under the coaster. The first time, I thought it was a joke. The third time, I started collecting them.

I did not want to be on stage when he was in the room, but that was the job.

The manager motioned me to the back hallway, where two other dancers were waiting: Carmine—giant, beautiful, with the best hair of anyone I’d ever met, and Zain—short, wired, always smelled faintly of Red Bull and armpit.

Carmine was running his hands through his hair and Zain was arguing with the DJ about his walk-on song.

The DJ was not listening.

“You see The Deacon’s back?” Carmine asked, sotto voce, like the walls might gossip if he wasn’t careful.

“His money’s green,” I said, trying for casual. “I’d take him over the bachelorette party in the corner.”

Zain laughed, and his laugh was always just a little too loud. “He tips, like, what—three dollars a night? He’s not even a perv, just a tourist. Can’t even stare right.”

“Yeah, but he’s weird,” Carmine said. “He’s got that look.”

“What look?”

“You know.” Carmine made a face, then gave up. “You know.”

I did know. The difference between a perv and a tourist was that a perv wanted something, and a tourist just wanted to say they’d been. But Parsons wasn’t either. He was something else. The kind of man who already decided what was going to happen and was just waiting for you to catch up.

Stage manager waved us forward, Carmine first, then Zain, then me.