        Live Nude Girls - Written By: The Stranger/SAZ

     The sky had just turned dark with the night and I was feeling
restless and awake as I drove around town looking for anything to
keep me from having to go home, to have to go back to my dirt bag
apartment and sleep until morning when I could awaken and go to my
shitty job and work my ass off for enough pay to buy a decent meal
for that nights dinner.  I get in these moods sometimes, you know,
where I just start hating everything my life has become and it just
takes a night out to get me back on my feet.  Sometimes I wish I
could just forget everything and just leave in my car and head out
west, make a new start of my life, kiss all the bad memories of the
first half of my life away.  But bills and the emptiness of my
stomach make me realize that I just can't walk away.
     But some nights when it gets this bad I do get away.  Not far, 
not out west in California where I would rather be, only down to 
the heart of the city, down to the lonely man bars and the all
night strip clubs that service losers like me.  It isn't much but
sometimes I think its all I've got.  
     So its in my car and with the tunes playing loud enough so I
can't here the awful squeal of my car telling me it needs another
fixer upper that I can't afford, I'm off to the filthy part of town
looking to get lost in the pool of down and out guys so maybe my
problems won't stick out so much.  I can already taste that first
drop of death as I think of all the beers I'll be looking to drink
tonight, that is if someone else is buying.
     A long dirty strip of town that ever city has lays out before
me in a shower of bright signs and the sounds of cheap country
blaring against tired blues.  I stroll my car down the line of bars
looking to see which place will welcome me as I try to make the
night go by a little bit faster by numbing my thoughts away.      
     The signs all read "Cold Beer" or "No Cover Charge" as I
search over the joints looking for one that's crowded but not
overly crowded.  Just enough people so I'm not noticed.  The bar up
ahead is called the Fast Kitty and I don't mind saying I've been
there enough in my time to know the waitresses by name and the 
strippers by breast size.  The large neon sign with those three
words that say welcome, "Live Nude Girls".  
     So I throw the car into park and head out towards the bar with
my head low, kicking the rocks that are in my path, and feeling
just a little bit lost in a place I know so well.  Loneliness can
sometimes be like a buzz without the alcohol, making you feel like
someone had kicked you in the stomach a few times and left you to
rot with the bitter taste of your own blood licking at your lips.
     I go in, sit down at a table just far enough away from the
stage so that the lights aren't showering over me, order a beer,
drink it like it might be the only one I have tonight, since in
fact it could be since I don't see too many bills in my wallet, and
turn my head towards the main attraction.  Naked breasts dancing on
a big stage lit up by two spotlights that rarely catch the girls
faces.  The music screaming in my ears as if the beer wasn't loud
enough in my head.  Pretty girls prancing back and forth waving
their valuables at the men who sit with that dazed look that too
many beers can give you and that awful grin on a mans face that
comes when ever there are naked woman to be seen.
     I think to myself about these beautiful girls.  Not too much
you understand because it would ruin the atmosphere or the fantasy
of the place but every know and then I think of these poor girls. 
Some of them couldn't be a day over sixteen and some of them are
obviously only teenagers and look to be about forty.  What the hell
are they doing in a neighborhood like this?  They should be out
with the high-school quarterback hopping around in the back seat of
a car but instead their here dancing for minimum wage naked for a
bunch of tired looking old men.  But hell, it's not my problem.
     The show goes on for most of the night and I'm able to make
two beers last throughout as five or six girls take turns dancing
for the pleasure of myself and about twenty or thirty other guys. 
A blond girl is on stage in nothing but a g-string and a smile as
I notice a man looking at me from across the stage and as I turn my
attention to him he gets up and starts coming my way.  Big guy, six
foot-six easy, looks like he's seen too many fights from the long
scars that seem to wrap around his face.  Slowly he walks towards
my table, he takes turns looking up at the girl on stage and
looking at me with every few steps.
     "Seat taken?" he asks as he points to the seat next to mine
and I shake my head not saying a word and he sits down with a soft
grunt as a reply.  I don't mind telling you that this shakes me up
a little.  I came here to be alone and now I'm feeling pretty
uneasy about this guy and I can already see in the back of my head
that this could turn ugly and if we have to fight I don't think I 
have to tell you who I see ending up on the ground kissing the
wooden floor.
     "Names Jake, Jake Sampson" he says leaning his body towards me
but keeping his face straight ahead staring at the girl on stage.
     "Mike Dylan" I say back to him hearing just the faintest sound
of fear in my voice.  I take a final shot from my mug hoping the
beer will silence my feelings.
     "I see your enjoying yourself.  I also see your alone."
     He still doesn't look at me and I don't look at him.  We both
keep watching the girl.  She straddles a metal bar and with long
strokes she goes up and down on that thing like she was riding on
a merry go round.  "Yes to both" I say back.
     He looks at me and I turn and look at him and he smiles pretty
big and I smile too and we both laugh a little for no good reason. 
"Pretty girl" he says and I nod my head.  "They have a lot of
pretty girls here" he says.
     "Yeah they sure do" I say.  I'm still pretty tense because I'm
trying to figure out what this guys line is, is he looking for me
to buy him a beer or is he looking for some strange sex thing or
what.
     "Lucy" he yells to a dark haired waitress, "bring me a beer
and one for my friend too."
     "I don't think I have enough for another beer" I say thinking
he's trying to get me to pay for both.
     He reaches into his pants and pulls out his wallet and says
"Relax, its on me," and he tosses a ten dollar bill onto the table.
     Our beers come in time and we sit together drinking and
watching the titties fly before us and he gets up every know and
then and places a dollar bill in the g-string of a girl and then
pats her on the rear as she begins dancing again.
     "Mike" he says "how about me and you getting out of this place
and going to a little club that I know of that very few people know
of.  It's a small place but believe me the action is better than
this dump.  I think you would really enjoy it."
     I lean over to him and say "The girls are better looking over
there?"
     "Yeah, you could say that.  It's like nothing you've ever
seen.  Trust me."  He sees the hesitant in my face and says "C'mon,
I'm buying the beer."
     I don't know what it was but something about this guy made me
like him.  You can say it was the fact that he was waving money
around all night and you'd be partly right but there was something
else too.  He just kind of had an attitude like I know I'm here in
shitsville but I kindof like it.  So I said "Sure, lets go" and 
away we went, him in his car and me following him from behind.
     I'll say it was about five miles away from the strip, hidden
in a lower class neighborhood between two broken down shacks that
were called homes around here.  The only way you could tell is was
a bar from the street was a sign on the window that said beer and
a tall neon sign that had once read "Live Nude Girls" but now the
lights around the word "Live" had blown out so only "Nude Girls"
appeared.  
     We went to the front door where Jake knocked two quick knocks
and then three really soft knocks and then the door was open
slightly.  A big black man with dark grey lips and puffy eyes stood
in the doorway.  He looked at Jake and then turned his attention to 
me and then he looked back at Jake and Jake nodded his head and the
door opened as the black man stepped back in the shadows of the
dark club.  
     Blaring music, lights that were only dim, a smell like
corrosion, and the soft whimpers of men.  All of that hit you at
once as you stepped in through the doorway of the club that was
called "Hell's Waiting Room" according to a small chalkboard sign. 
I followed behind Jake closely not seeing anything but his back as
we walked deeper into the bar looking for a place to sit.  We found
a table that was really close to the stage and we sat down.
     I looked up at the stage and felt the vile of my stomach
immediately rise to my mouth.  A dead naked woman with empty black
eyes stared down at me from above as her body shook to the sounds
of screaming music.  I could see that there were five dead naked
woman on the stage, all suspended up on meat hooks as they were
spun around the stage on a large metal convener belt.  The hooks
were pierced into their backs and came out right through the front
where the hook was jabbing out of their stomachs.  Their pale 
white bodies were shaking back and forth on the rickety machine
which made them look as if they were dancing.  
     I was watching these dead girls who all looked to be under
twenty when Jake leaned over and said "So what do you think?  Never
saw nothing like this before, I bet."  And he said it with a slight
smile as if it was a funny question.
     "What the hell is this?" I asked  "Is this some kindof sick
joke?"  My temper was rising and I knew I should stand up and walk
directly out the exit.  But I didn't.
     "No.  Just keep watching.  It's going to get real good soon." 
He turned his head back to the stage.
     So did I.  I couldn't believe these corpses were being paraded
around on meat hooks and they were suppose to be sexy.  I looked
around wanting to look at the faces of the men who were watching 
but they were only shadows in the dark.  The rotating machine
brought the bodies behind a red curtain and for a moment I thought
the show was over.  But it only got worse.
     A man stepped out from behind the curtains.  He stood under
the shine of the spotlights wearing a black mask over his head and
nothing else.  Looked like some kindof Pagan ritual I thought to
myself.  He carried a large meat hook that was empty of any dead
corpse.  She stepped out from behind the curtain.  A woman, a girl,
naked, covered only by the blushing redness of her skin.  And I
watched, feeling my emotions running wild inside.  Feeling utter
disgust and feeling completely aroused at the same time.  
     He yelled at her, smacked her on the back with the hook until
she fell to the floor on all fours.  He rubbed the point of the
meat hook between her legs.  She cried and screamed.  The men in
the audience began to softly whimper.  Inside I yelled at myself,
do something, do something, but I knew I wouldn't because that
wasn't who I was.  The man on stage raised the hook and with all
his muscles stretching inside his skin he brought down the hook
until it went through her back, through her spine, and plunged out
of her stomach.  She screamed until she could no longer make a
sound as her back exploded in a crimson river of blood.  I could
feel my shorts become wet with my own semen, wishing at the same 
time that I could take my eyes off her.  Her body twitched for a
few moments and then her eyes went away and she was gone.
     "Unbelievable" Jake whispered to me.
     I couldn't say a thing.  I was sick and I was also worn out
because of my exhilaration.  I had seen something so unbelievably
vile and yet a part of me had enjoyed it.  It wasn't the girl that
I saw up on stage, it was only the symbol of women, women who had
made fun of me and taunted me everyday of my life, and made me into
who I am today.  I wanted to hate myself for enjoying it but I
hated myself for who I was so much already that I knew it wouldn't
make a difference.
     And it's a year later and I still visit the club often.  The
men who go there are my family though I have only talked to a few
of them and only for short amounts of time.  I feel I share a
common bond with them as we are all lonely men who can't seem to
fit into this world.  But I am overly excited.  Because it is my
turn in the circle of the men.  It is my turn to go out and find
the girl who will become our newest star.  It is my turn to wear
the mask and stand in the spotlight for the first time in my life.

"Live Nude Girls" - 1994, The Stranger/SAZ

