Go-Go

It’s Saturday night and I’m racing through the streets on my bike. The sky is clear and the road is smooth. 25 miles per hour is fast when it’s your body that provides the locomotion. The air is chilly because it’s winter in Los Angeles. All the same, I’ve worked up a sweat and I’m just wearing a pair of jeans and a small backpack. Electronic music is vibrating my eardrums—it will be my soundtrack for this night, but I do not know this yet.  

A traffic light turns red and I come to a stop. Typically, I can balance on my bike at a dead stop. It’s called a track stand, and it only takes a little practice to execute. You just have to balance the bike so, and shift your weight between the two pedals. I can’t find balance; my legs are shaking. I’m not too tired. In fact, my body is humming. I’m nervous.

A couple of weeks ago I was at the beach, socializing and exercising. I’d made friends with a guy who said he worked as a bartender at a club in West Hollywood, and he told me his club was always looking to hire. “Just work on your abs, like, for two weeks,” he said, “Then just come in and apply.” I asked him what kind of job required me to have a nice abs. “I work at a gay bar, and they have go-go dancers on the weekends,” he replied.

At other points in my life I might have dismissed the notion, or I might have felt disgusted at the thought of dancing for men. Now? I felt matter-of-fact about the situation. He said I could make a couple hundred dollars for a few hours of easy work. I just had to dance in my underwear. It might be undignified, but hundreds of dollars, one or two nights, and no experience necessary? How could I say no? considering my present situation, I thought. Dignity can be a luxury, not something necessary to survival. I gave dignity up a while ago. “I’ll work on my abs,” I said.

I’m biking as fast as my heart and my lungs and my legs will allow me. I have the contradictory feeling of wanting to get there as fast as possible—to get it over with—and of wanting to pedal the opposite direction, to flee far away from what I have committed to.

It’s a scary thing, to think about putting yourself out there in front of a bunch of strangers. You are vulnerable: unclothed, there for their enjoyment. What if they disapprove? What if they jeer, or insult you? What if they find your body ugly? What recourse do you have? You’ve already admitted by virtue of your attire and actions that your purpose is to please them, and if you do not, then you have failed and that failure is evident for everyone to see. Failure, I am afraid of failure. But desperation mandates that I cannot fail. I need money, success.

I arrive at the club a little earlier than I expected, so I find a café nearby and sit at a table to gather myself. I play music loudly in my earphones to drown out the cacophony of sounds that is the West Hollywood party scene. This part of town is rich—in money, in indulgence, in lust, in gluttony. The boulevard blazes and twinkles, every light designed to arrest my attention and draw me in. Shiny cars pass in both directions, some stopping for the valet, others trolling for one of the good parking spots.

Finally, the appointed time arrives. My friend has arranged for me to meet the club’s manager, but my friend will not himself be here. I walk into the club at an early hour, and it is not crowded. I find the manager. My friend set up the meeting, but he didn’t tell me what to expect. I have made the assumption I would just be asking for a job, maybe taking off my shirt or dancing to a few short songs. You know, just to give them an idea of what they might be paying for. I’m wrong to assume those things.

The manager, Brian, asks if I wanted to dance. Although I feel chary, I say “Sure,” not wanting to appear difficult. “Okay, you’ll work for tips tonight and if you work out, you’ll get the flat rate if you dance again.” I know what tips were, but I don’t know what the flat rate is. I don’t ask.

Brian leads me out the back of the club and to a detached storage/dressing room, five feet by twenty, all cinder block and painted white. The door is locked from the inside. Brian takes out a key and unlocksthe door. Opening the door, he says “These are the girls.” The first person I see is a muscular man in his mid-twenties wearing nothing but a pair of bright yellow underwear, he smiles and greets me. Then as I squeezed into the narrow hallway of a room, I see a young, buxom woman in red lingerie. She is pretty. She also greets me, but she squeezes out of the room as Brian introduces me; “This is Curtis, he’s going to dance tonight.” Then Brian leaves. I am alone in a room with a man in his underwear.

Go-go dancer underwear is no ordinary underwear. It’s usually silky nylon and shiny and cut in a way to expose as much as possible. “Man panties” really is the best term I can think of to describe the stuff. I don’t own underwear in general, and even if I did, I wouldn’t have anything like what I needed now. “Can I barrow a pair of those?” I ask, pointing to his rolling luggage suitcase, overflowing with nylon in all different colors. “You don’t have any drawers, honey?” He asks, admonishing me. I explain I didn’t know I’d be dancing tonight; I’m new. He picks out a pair of man panties with a black waist band and covered in a blue and purple print, “Here, you can wear these.” I’m not afraid of nudity; the Army rid me of any of that fear a long time ago. I undress in front of him and put on the “drawers” he’s given to me. I feel uncomfortable. They cling to me, and they are trying to get into places I do not want them. I look in the mirror. Dear God, how far I have come from where I started, I think. I have a nice tan, a light golden brown from the waist up, and the knees down. My thighs are immaculate white. They’re going to love this, I think to myself.

I take a deep breath, open the door and walk across the alley back to the club. A bouncer lets me in and one of the other dancers shows me a stage that I can dance on. The club is picking up, and it is beginning to get crowded. It’s about 10:30, and I am go-go dancing. The DJ’s blasting electronic music like what I had been listening to on my ride here. I just start to dance as I would with my clothes on.

At first, I am by myself, in my own world, and trying to feel comfortable. I get my first dollar from a man who comes over and watches me for a moment, a mixed drink in hand, and then he pushes a dollar into my waist band. “You’ve got a gorgeous body,” he says. I thank him and keep dancing.

The rest of the evening comes on as a crescendo, a rush that swells into frenzy. The club gets packed, the music gets louder. Smoke and lasers fill the air, which itself becomes humid and warm as men and women dance to the beats, 144 of them per minute.

I am in the moment, and I am suspended in disbelief, alternately. At once I focus on the music, and I dance and express myself, something I love to do, and can do no matter where or what the circumstances (I’m more ready to make that assertion after this experience), and in another moment I leave my body on autopilot and contemplate the fact that I am now a go-go dancer. Never would have imagined it.

Men, old and young, walk to the base of my stage and leer at me for a moment, some ask my name or if this is my first time dancing. Then they slip some money into my waistband. Most want a hug, some want to grope. I am degraded.

There are also the women who have come to a gay club for a good time, or to accompany their gay friends. A few of them eye me, but more shyly than the men. They are intimidated, I gather, and when they were encouraged to approach me, or their friends give them a dollar to give to me, they are reticent to close the distance between us. I just smile at them. They probably think I am gay, anyway.

I dance for three hours. I am pouring sweat, having danced with enthusiasm and not taking a break unless I was told to. Half-way through the night, Brian has moved me to the indoor balcony and I have danced the remainder of the evening in a “cage” of flimsy steel bars, illuminated by blue LED lights on the ceiling. I leave the cage at 1:30 in the morning, go back to the hallway dressing room, and remove wads of dollar bills—and one twenty-dollar bill—from my underwear. I made $40 in three hours, I see. The regular dancers say I should make more, and that this night has been a slow night in terms of tips. $40 is good for broke, I think.  

I get dressed and go see Brian in the back office, which is actually a storage closet under the staircase in the kitchen. It is cramped and he barely has room to sit upright under the sloping ceiling. There is no room for me to enter. I stand at the door and he tells me I have done a great job, and he’ll get me paid the flat rate for tonight. I’ve found out earlier, from the other dancers, the flat rate is $75 or $140, depending on what shift you work. I’ll end up getting $75 for my “early” shift, the other shift going until 3 A.M.

I change the ones for a twenty with the bartender and ride home to the beach. I won’t get back until 4:30 in the morning, exhausted. I don’t even have time to contemplate my day before I fall into a sound, dreamless sleep.