Worth Saving(66)
“Are you out of your f*cking mind?” he finally says as he snaps his eyes up to me. “Other than the day we met, please tell me when the hell would’ve been the right time to tell me that you’re a prostitute?”
Once again, I feel hot all over. This time, there’s no breeze from outside to keep me cool.
“Umm, I don’t know,” I reply.
“Right. Exactly. So, now that the real you is out in the open, I’d like to know how much of what you told me was a complete lie. So, how long have you been doing this?”
I take another deep breath to steady myself.
“Nearly everything I told you about me is true,” I start to say. “I really did run away from my father’s house when I was seventeen, for all the reasons I told you I did. The only thing you didn’t know was that when I ran away, it didn’t take long for me to realize I was in over my head. I had two hundred dollars, which I’d stolen from my dad as I left, no car, and no place to stay. I spent the first night sleeping on the floor of McCarran Airport. I hunched up underneath some seats where there weren’t any people, and I slept there until the next morning when I took a cab down to Summerlin, and when the cab dropped me off, I stiffed the driver and he chased me for two blocks before I finally lost him. I spent the next night at a friend’s house—the only friend I had left from my school—but I couldn’t stay there more than one night. So, on the third day, I found Red Pony Gentlemen’s Club, and they hired me on the spot. I thought I was going to be a stripper. I thought Red Pony was just a strip club, and I knew strippers made fast cash, so I went there, and all I did for my first three months was strip. My first night I made over a thousand dollars, and I was able to rent a hotel room. After I turned eighteen, Damien started making me do things with the customers. I didn’t want to do any of it, and I resisted at first, but Damien has a way of making you do what he tells you to do, and a person can only stand so much of that. I meant what I said about him being violent. So, once I started to do it, my pay went up a lot, and the truth is that I needed the money.”
“I don’t want to hear that shit, Layla,” he snips, scrunching his forehead. “Don’t tell me it was all about the money. On some level, you must’ve enjoyed it, because you’ve been doing it ever since. I mean, you just turned f*cking twenty-two for god’s sake! It’s been four years, and you want to convince me you kept at it for the money? You liked it.”
“No, I didn’t like it!” I snap back, even though I know I shouldn’t be defensive. “It may be hard for you to believe because you never had to worry about anything like this. Your parents were there for you. Your father was a pilot and your mom was awesome, and you never had to run away from home and do anything you could to survive. You can’t relate to this, so I don’t expect you to understand how I could do something so disgusting for so long, but whether you believe it or not, I kept doing it because I was making money. I bought a car, and an apartment, and clothes, and food, and a life. I lived in a hotel for a month, because I wasn’t old enough to sign a lease yet, so when I turned eighteen, that’s when I got my apartment, and I can’t tell you how good it felt knowing I wasn’t gonna have to go back to my father. All I wanted was to not have to go back to him, so yes, I did something I didn’t want to do so I could keep making money.”
“So why didn’t you stop after you’d made enough?” Austin asks.
“And do what? I dropped out of school when I was in the tenth grade. I’m working on it now, but I still don’t have my high school diploma, so who the hell was gonna hire me?”
The tightness in Austin’s face finally relents, but only a little.
“That’s the point I’m trying to make, Austin,” I continue. “I had to do it to make money. I didn’t have anything else I could do. At this exact moment, I still don’t, really. But, that’s not an excuse for not telling you the truth. Regardless of the circumstances that led me to Red Pony, I should’ve told you, and I’m so very sorry for that. I truly am, and I’m begging you to forgive me. If not that, then at least to understand.”
There’s silence for a while. Austin doesn’t reply, choosing to stare down at the floor instead, and I’m not sure what else to say, so I wait for him to speak. In my head, I’m hoping he’s deciding to forgive me. I’m wishing he’ll just get up, walk over here and kiss me. I’m hoping he’ll hold me and tell me it’s okay. But, that’s a dumb thing to hope right now.
“This is too much,” Austin finally says, breaking the silence. “You’ve been sleeping with countless guys for four years, and you just slept with me a couple of days ago. How do I even know you’re clean? You made me wait to be with you. Why? Is it because you only sleep with guys who pay for it?”
I have to close my eyes and let that one sink in too, even though it hurt more than the first insult.
“That’s not it at all,” I reply. “We get tested every week, and we make everyone use protection. Look, I was contemplating what I was gonna do. I wasn’t sure of what was gonna happen between us, and the only thing I knew was if and when you and I had sex, I wanted it to be special. I wanted it to be different from what I get paid to do. I wanted it to mean something. So, I waited until I knew it did mean something. It meant everything to me, Austin. I know you felt that, too.”