Love Her Madly by M. Elizabeth Lee

poured in around us after the word left her lips. In the fading light, I saw Cyn had a strange look on her face. I should have seen what was coming next, but I didn’t.

    She dropped the bomb on me the next afternoon when we were out for a sunset jog.
    â€œSo, I found a solution to my new economic crisis,” she said, the words pulsing out unevenly under the strain of our exertions. I hated to run and had only come along because Cyn didn’t often get it into her head to do any real exercise. Her muscles magically required little more than a few hours of weekend party dancing to appear lean and sculpted.
    â€œAwesome,” I exhaled. “What?”
    â€œI’m working at Ecstasy II. Dancing.”
    I stopped running. “Ecstasy II? That dumpy adult store that we make fun of every time we pass it? Are you serious?”
    She kept jogging in place as I labored to speak, which annoyed the shit out of me.
    â€œKelly hooked me up with it. She says when she worked there last summer, she made four hundred dollars on a typical Sunday afternoon.”
    â€œYeah, doing what? Sucking old man cock?”
    A small smile of amusement spread across her face. “I knew you’d be upset.”
    I started jogging, and she easily matched my pace. She was right, I was upset. That also annoyed me. It wasn’t any of my business how Cyn made her money, but I hated the thought of her demeaning herself in front of creeps who would only see her as a shimmying tower of T & A. We rounded a corner, and a sharp pain in my side forced me to stop. I leaned on a mailbox for support.
    â€œSide cramp?” Cyn asked.
    â€œYeah.” She waited patiently, not jogging, as I caught my breath. “Okay. Sorry. It creeps me out. But if you can do it and you’ll make a lot of money, good for you.”
    â€œI hope I will. I made two hundred today, but I had to spend seventy on wardrobe.” I caught the perverse twinkle in her eye.
    â€œOh god, what does that mean?”
    She giggled. “G-string and star-shaped pasties, of course. Oh, and platform heels. Ridiculous. I chose this magenta number, on the advice of Gabe, the manager. He says the Barbie look goes over well down here.”
    â€œTwo hundred is good, I guess. What do you have to do?”
    â€œNothing too terrible. Nobody gets to touch me, at least. I’m going to be a private booth dancer. The client sits in this little cubicle with me, and I do a strip tease to cheesy pop music. Gabe or some other clerk is always keeping an eye on the situation through a two-way mirror, so I don’t think things can go too horribly wrong.”
    â€œThat’s good. And the guys, they just touch themselves?”
    She shrugged. “It was half and half today. Two did, two didn’t.”
    â€œI see.” I was feeling light-headed and nauseated. I think it was from running in the heat, but it could have been blood loss from the bruising of my delicate sensibilities. I sat down in thegrass in front of someone’s house. The cramp in my side refused to loosen.
    â€œWhat if your professors see you there?”
    â€œI think confetti would fall, and we’d both get an award for being big clichés. Seriously, Glo, I don’t care. I know I’m commodifying myself, but that happens at any job. The only difference here is that exactly what I’m commodifying and why is plainly obvious and not accepted in polite society, yet because it’s not polite, I get to make more money and work fewer hours. In my thinking, it’s the most elegant solution wrapped in a cloak of total seediness.”
    â€œWell, if you’re okay with it, then I guess it is a good solution. I didn’t know you just inherently knew how to perform a strip tease.”
    â€œI didn’t. The spirit of Grant possessed me and did all the work.”
    â€œGrant?” I asked, finally feeling like I might not throw up.
    â€œDead President on the