I remember the night when Mom finally passed away. I say finally because she was suffering so bad that I couldn’t bare to even look at her face or into her sunken eyes.
It was Christmas Eve and I was sitting on a customers lap in my neon/fluorescent orange outfit with the Swarovski crystals all over it, the top had really cute short sleeves and fit my fairly new Double D breast to a T. This was my moneymaker outfit. Whenever I was having a slow night, all I had to do was throw on this outfit and the money would start to flow. I always worked the holidays because a lot of girls took them off and a lot of guys came in on the holidays after spending time with their families. I was guaranteed at least $800 on a night like this and I wouldn’t have too work too hard or do too much for it either.
I was sitting on one of my regular’s laps and was getting paid just to sit there and do nothing. His name was Kevin. Kevin was in love with me and would always come in to see me and bring me flowers or jewelry and pay me just to sit there and talk to him. Kevin was one of the reasons I loved working in the black clubs versus the white clubs. He had piles of money, was smart, looked good, smelled good, dressed well, was in shape and didn’t act like a pervert. All he wanted was someone to tell his stories too. He never touched or tried to touch me inappropriately – if there is a thing such as inappropriately in the strip club.
I was drinking and trying to forget about how sick my mother was. The doctors said she should have died 3 months earlier. She looked like she had already died the last time I went to see her. Her face looked like something out of a zombie movie and she was totally incoherent. She had always told me that if she was ever to get like this and they had to make a decision to please pull the plug. I never thought that this would even be a factor at her age of 45. I always thought that if I ever had to make this type of decision that it would be when she was at least 80 plus.
While sitting there talking to Kevin I heard the DJ say, “Blaze please come to the office”, “Blaze please come to the office”, you have a phone call. Blaze – that was me. At least it was me in the strip club. I got off Kevin’s lap and went to the office to see what was going on I had mastered the art of denial and somehow convinced myself that as long as I didn’t pay attention to my mother dying that it would just all go away and I wouldn’t need to deal with it. I got a rude awakening tonight. When I walked into the office Dollar Bill (our clubs manager) handed me the phone. I knew something was wrong but had no idea what it was. I said hello and then I heard my sister crying and trying to get the words out that Mom was dead. I didn’t know what to say to her. I just sat there for a moment in a daze and then said, “I’m on my way”.
I ran into the dressing room and threw on my clothes and raced out the club. Kevin saw me headed towards the exit and asked me what happened. I told him that my mother had passed and that I had to go. He told me to call him if I needed anything. It was about 12am. When I reached the hospital all I could think of was what was I doing and where was I going. There was nothing I could do so why was I rushing there. If she was really gone, what could I do? The funny thing is that I think I’ve cried more writing this than when she actually died.