“This is good.” I’m grateful. “You said you know a place?”
She studies me. Her eyes are wetandfierce.
“Nectar.”
The strip club!
“The owner’s crude, but not dangerous.”
“Georgia, I can’t…I can’t dothat.” Not gonna whore myself, not for anything.
“You’re nothing but a whore, Faith. Nothing but a goddamn whore.”I can still hear Jamie screaming the words at me.
Georgia’s expression softens. “I’d never suggest that, Faith. They need someone to clean.”
I’ve worked in restaurants, diners, Denny’s, and at Jamie’s nightclub. Oh, when I got that job, I thought bigger and better things were on their way. I was so naïve. But I’ve never worked in a strip club, never really even stepped into one.
“Okay. But…I haven’t cleaned…not like that. Usually just where I served.”
“If I say it, they’ll hire you,” Georgia asserts confidently.
My brows knit in confusion and some irritation.
But before I can tell her that I don’t need favors, she says, “You’re not a charity case, Faith. You’re someone who’s been done wrong. And I’m sorry about that. I can’t change that. But if you’ll take this one thing from me—I think it’ll get you through the worst of it.”
“Faith, sometimes it’s okay to accept help,” the ER doctor says to me, his voice kind, his eyes merciful. “If you won’t press charges, then…you need to get out of where you are. I can help you.”
“I can take care of myself, doc,” I reply, patting him on his shoulder. “I got a plan.”
My plan was to steal some money, three hundred dollars, which is what it ended up being, from Jamie and run.
Maybe I should’ve listened to the doctor and gone to a women’s shelter, gotten help both emotionally and physically.
“Thanks, Georgia.”
“I’ll take you.”
When she drops me off at Nectar, she pulls out three folded twenty-dollar bills.
I stare at it.
“I can’t,” I whisper.
“You can,” she insists. “Please.”
I take her money, grateful. She kisses my forehead.
She leaves me at the entrance, nodding at the bouncer. “Ricky’s expecting her.”
“You got it, Georgia.” He looks at me, gives me a kind smile. “Come on, we’ll take care of you.”
9
A STURDY ROCK BOTTOM
FAITH
Ricky leans back in his cracked leather chair, chewing on a toothpick, eyes half-lidded. There’s a stack of receipts to his left, a bottle of something cheap and half-finished to his right.
