FR: 11-13-12 Chicago (Carol Stream)

[_Hunter_]

November 13th, 2012
Carol Stream, IL

The following night began early. Big D and I got off of work early around 4:30pm. From there we headed to the gym for chest/tri’s in an attempt to get the best pump we could prior to that night’s jaunt. Big D was excited to see what my interaction would be with the two HB’s that he knew would be working the front door. Knowing this, I had a feeling he would preface me with something like “wait till you meet this guy!” which he had. I just smiled as we entered, paying the HB7 only slight courtesy with a big smile, and ignoring the HB8 altogether. For our workout we met another coworker at the gym. He was perhaps one of the most pretentious AFC’s I’ve ever come across, not hesitating to share every opinion he had ever possessed about what he thought girls really wanted. I had to leave; I cut my workout short. In our discussions we had yammered about the age of the two HBs at the front desk. A rivalry had brewed between Big D and our other coworker. “She’s at least 18!” “There is NO WAY! She 17 tops!” This was my entrance and my exit. I approached the two directly, albeit my body-language indicated that I was about to head out the door. “I have to know something. These two guys can’t stop talking something and I have to be the one to come over and break the ice. How old are you two? They’re debating between 17 and 18, but I’d have to say you look closer to 19 or 20, you seem to mature for that.” This started a 10 minute set that ended up going nowhere fast. The girls were so thrilled by the idea that an out-of-stater thought they were so mature for their age that their shrill giggles caught the attention of the manager in the back room. He eventually diverted the set by requiring them to start some vestigial tasks nearby. Only a small amount of charm was left to memory. Oh well, on to the next scene.

There were a lot of things that Big D had never experienced in his 21 years of life. Among the two were strip clubs and Hookah. These were our plans for the night. He had told me that his manager had warned him of a nearby strip club, called “Girls Girls Girls”. He said it was run by the Mafia, and that while he had seen a few people go in, he had never seen anyone come out. This was far too intriguing to pass up. Upon arriving we noticed that there were only 3 cars in the lot, but thought nothing of it as it was still only 6:30. The overly-bright neon sign out front flashed “OPEN”, so we pressed on. We walked in the door and there was an open counter in the center of the corridor and two long black draped curtains, one on either side. No one greeted us. We waited expectantly for someone to come for a good 45 seconds or so before silently and mutually turning back toward the door. Just then, “Hi guys” said a voice from the back room. A short, Asian-Hispanic HB4 emerged from the back. “What do you guys need?” Neither of us knew how to answer the question. “We uh…. How much to get in?” I finally answered. “$80 cover, each.” “Whoa… whoa, for a strip club?” I asked. She ignored me altogether. “How did you guys hear about us?” “We drove past…” I lied. “Oh, well this isn’t a strip club, it’s better.” “How is that? What makes this any better than a strip club?” I prodded playfully. “In strip clubs they’re not allowed to touch you.” By the suggestiveness of her tone, combined with the flat inaccuracy of her statement, it was easy to deduce her implications. “It’s just me and my girl, $80 each, are you guys in or no.” It wasn’t a question, but Big D started to answer anyways, “I think we are just uhh…” I interrupted, I wanted to feel this out. “Bring your girlfriend out here, I want to see her too before we jump off the deep end.” She summoned her companion. At first glance (in the shadows) she was a solid HB9. At second glance, however, she was a man. Big D and I didn’t have to exchange glances, we understood now, and we each understood that the other understood. A “broment” if you will. A brief exchange of glances took place between the four of us. I calmly said “Give us 30 seconds of privacy to discuss this please.” They obliged, and we headed out the door to further shield our conversation. As soon as we were out of eyesight, we ran, as if communicated telepathically as we walked out the door. No doubt was the mafia involved, no doubt were we getting the hell out as fast as we could.

Hookah was next on the to-do list. We found a hole-in-the-wall lounge with a sign that had recently been removed, leaving the entire shopping center parking lot a dark abyss. Due to proximity, this would have to do. There were only two other guys smoking at the time of our arrival. They seemed disinterested, each reading text books while smoking their own respective Hookahs, so we let them be and chose a booth closer to the back of the room. This later proved to be a mistake. We each got a Hookah so that Big D could try multiple flavors and we split a bottle of water into two open-topped Styrofoam cups. Shortly after, an HB9 comes in for her shift. She’s our new waitress. We immediately shifted our body language to reflect presence. She was friendly, but not beyond the norm. We each playfully prodded her, sharing that we were both from out of town and were experiencing the things to do in the area since Big D had just turned 21. She asked if he had ever seen smoke bubbles, he hadn’t. She brought a dish of soap out with another Styrofoam cup that had a hole punched out of the bottom. She demonstrated how to blow a smoke bubble, poorly. We prodded more, the mood was lightening up. I started with “Hey I want to demonstrate a personality test for my friend, stay a minute.” She agreed, I started “You have to be creative and don’t spare any details, the more you tell me the better this works. Now, imagine an empty landscape…” “I’ve already heard this one” she interrupted. “We haven’t even started, are you sure?” “Well maybe not, keep going.” Hesitantly, I proceeded “Now in this landscape, put a cube. It can be…” She stood up. “Yeah, I’ve heard this before.” I struggled to regain my composure. “Really? It has become quite popular. I’ve never seen it be wrong. Who showed it to you?” “Just a friend that I met a while back.” “Where is he from?” I had to know more. Maybe there was a community in Chicago somewhere that I had missed online. “London.” She quickly returned to work. The conversation was over. I dismissed the failure; I should have gone over-the-top with something funny, but the smoke had relaxed me to the point of dimming my wit. I decided to pass the time by showing Big D my finesse in smoke bubble craftsmanship. He was impressed, but it was more just solitary amusement. The smoke had caused dry mouth by this time. I picked up my cup of water and chugged the entire glass at once. Mistake. While showing off my bubble-blowing skills I had been accidentally dripping the dish soap from the bubble cup into my drinking cup. It was too late. I spent the next solid hour in the bathroom recovering from what I knew to be a sure-fire way to induce vomiting. I pushed to leave after that, Big D had no objections (waiting for me wasn’t very entertaining). On our way out the door, we noticed that the bar had slowly begun to fill up. The two guys that looked so disinterested earlier were now very interested, as three HB8’s had joined them. There was a new bad taste in my mouth, and it wasn’t blueberry, keylime mint, soap, or vomit.

I was still bitter. Big D suggested doing something else, but noted that it was cool if not because I had been sick. I wasn’t going to let this night go south for him just because I wasn’t paying attention to my drinking water. I had to press on. “We are going to a real strip club” I rebutted. We Googled the nearest three star club in Chicago and took off. The 35-minute drive was just enough to sober me back up. Stepping foot in the parking lot of the only thriving place in the entire area lit me back up. Game on. Since I had begun ‘The Game’ I had yet to visit a strip club. I was determined to make an impression here.

We entered the club, checked our jackets, and scouted the area. It wasn’t the nicest establishment, but it would do. It ranged from HB5’s to HB8’s with one HB10 thrown in the mix. The bottom floor was only subject to a $10 cover, while the top floor was $160/hour. Bottom floor covered, top floor full nude. We stayed on the bottom floor and experimented with some body language tactics. Any time that we presented ourselves in an “alpha” manner, we were ignored entirely. It blew my mind. So we played the reverse gambit, sealing off our smiles and closing our bodies to the point of scared little teenagers while separating into two different locations in the club. Nearly every girl in the bar approached us thereafter. It was interesting, but grew tiring over time. Numbers game finished, we resumed back to alpha-confident and just decided to talk to people in the club. We pulled in groups of people we were sitting near, grabbing waitresses to join us (not strippers) and genuinely just enjoyed all of the company. Then something interesting happened. The strippers were running out of selectable targets, Big D and I were gaming the entire club. They were forced to start picking into our group. This opened up endless opportunities. “You can’t take my friends away like that!” “If they wanted to talk to you guys they wouldn’t be smiling so big at us!” yada yada… And so the attraction-building began. While talking to the different strippers we found out how the dance payment process worked. Two 2.5 minute songs cost the buyer $25, and cost the stripper $15, resulting in $10 profit per dance. Big D and I had never had a lap dance before. So we agreed before we entered that we would each by just one dance, just so we could say we’d done it. All of the time we had spent gaming the club, we were secretly identifying which of the girls we felt deserved our money and attention. When I made my selection I started “talking” to Big D in conspicuous conversation. As my target walked by I said out loud “Like that one right there!” while pointing directly at her, objectifying her. “What about me?!” she instantly intruded. “Nothing, you go have your fun... I’m sure you’ve got lots of work to do.” I prodded. She fought. “NO, tell me what you’re talking about! (almost laughingly)” “I was just saying that you are probably one of the few that aren’t anything like the others here. You seem deeper, just by the way that you carry yourself.” “You’re right, ya know?” I did know, I had been watching her carefully for a while. “I had a feeling, and my feelings are usually right. So tell me, besides your looks what do you have going for you?” She wasn’t interesting, not even a little. She was a recent graduate of a nearby hair and makeup school. I told her she was the second one of those we had met here tonight, which was true. I started “I can tell you’re busy, so let’s not waste any more time. I want a lap dance from you, because you’re the only here that’s even come close to keeping me interested. You seem to have wit about you. Want to play a game? If you win, I promise I’ll buy a dance from you, and if I win…” “I’ll buy you a drink” she finished. I proceeded with the 5 questions game. She lost on question 4. Since she couldn’t technically buy me a drink from the bar, she handed me $5 cash at which point I added $20 and told her that she was an awesome loser and I wanted the dance anyways. She gleamed, so I carried her back to the VIP lounge. The attraction was definitely there. Nearby patrons were getting slow, sensual dances. I was being thrown into the wall. It was more fun than I had expected. When it was over we went back to the bottom floor area. I made fun of her unusually tone arms. She challenged me to an arm-wrestling contest. I won. She was called up to stage, and we smirked at one another the entire time she was dancing. The whole room could feel it. When she was done we reengaged in conversation. She told me about how she had come to Jesus, and I glared accusingly. I am well aware that there are three things that should never be brought up in conversation: money, politics, and religion. But she wouldn’t drop it. She was qualifying herself. I took this as a real indicator of interest (IOI). I told her I was going back to Dallas in a couple days, at which she followed up with “Then we HAVE to hang out tomorrow”. Logistically, this wouldn’t work out, but the intent was clear. She took my phone into the bathroom and added herself on Facebook and instructed to message her that night. Our work schedules that next day were perfectly opposite, so I didn’t. Big D got his dance from a third HB10 that showed up. We called it a night, both ecstatic from the nights activities.

_Hunter_