Dragonfly by Jax Hill 

One day Tawny turned up for Story Hour with another stripper. She was young, I don’t even know if she was 18. She was trying to look tough, smoking a cigarette and wearing these crazy high heels, but she looked like a kid playing dress-up. We got a renewal of interest in Story Hour from the bums and drunks in the park when she turned up. But Franz seemed pretty nervous.

While Tawny was reading the story, he told me, “Nikolai ain’t gonna like this. Tawny wants Mari to move in with us, to stop stripping. Nikolai, he’s a businessman, and he knows he’s gonna lose strippers from time to time, so he didn’t pay too much attention when Tawny quit  — but now, this kid? She’s new. She’s only been on the stage a few nights. He hasn’t pimped her out yet, and he’s planning on getting top dollar for her. This ain’t good.”

I didn’t want to know this. To tell you the truth, I’d never been in a strip club at all. Pete and me, we grew up in a pretty strict Catholic household, and our old man never showed any interest in stuff like that ... I guess it was Franz’s business to know this stuff, but it wasn’t mine. All I could think to say to him was, “I guess it’s the girl’s choice, isn’t it?”

“Sure, sure,” he said. “It’s her choice. But what does she know? She comes here from Podunk Idaho thinks she’s gonna be some big deal in the city, but instead she’s starving until she goes to work in the club. She doesn’t like doing it, but she’s got no place to go and nothing to eat if she don’t. Tawny screws up the mix if she takes her in. And it’s my place. I’m the one who’s gonna take the heat if anyone finds out. And someone’ll find out. Nikolai’s not that interested in Torstein and what’s going on down here right now. He’s curious, but he’s got other more important stuff. But if it gets back to him that Tawny and Marigold both are hanging out here telling stories to the homeless ... and that they’re living in my pad ... it’s gonna be trouble for me.”

“Did you tell Tawny this?”

“She don’t care. She says if they can’t live with me, they’ll get a place of their own.”

“Why don’t you let them do that, then?”

“One, how they gonna afford it? And two, look at Tawny, man. I don’t wanna lose that.”

“You got a problem then.”

“Don’t I know it.”

The new girl, Marigold, she was staring at Tawny as she read the story. Today it was The Giving Tree. That’s a good story, even for adults. But Marigold was, you could say, enchanted. She had stubbed out her cigarette, and she was sitting cross-legged with her hands in her lap, leaning toward Tawny with a smile on her face, her mouth hanging a little open, like a kid absorbed in a story. At the end of it she clapped her hands and said, “I remember that story! I read that book a long time ago!”

There were only three other little kids that day; the rest of the Story Hour audience was grown men, and I don’t know if any of them even heard the story. They were all staring at Marigold. She had on shorts and a halter top with her crazy high heels, and she looked like that youngest babe in the Victoria’s Secret catalog, but only dressed more like the Frederick’s catalog.

One of the homeless guys got up and walked up behind her and started running his hands through her hair. Franz was off like a shot — he was a little guy, but he had this energy like a bantam rooster. He shoved the guy away, pretty hard, but the guy didn’t fall down. He backed up a few steps, holding out his hands, palms up, and saying, “Easy now — I didn’t mean nothing...”

“Right you didn’t,” Franz said. “You leave these ladies alone. All you guys, you don’t touch them!”

The regulars at Story Hour knew Franz, and they didn’t make any response at all. The guys who had come just to get a look at Marigold backed off, mumbling. Torstein said to Marigold, “He didn’t scare you, did he?”

She shook her head, and lit a new cigarette. She wanted to be tough again. She said to Franz, “I could have handled it.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said. “I know. Look, Mari, you wanna come here and tell stories with Tawny, you’re gonna have to dress like she does.”

“Whatever,” said Marigold, waving her cigarette at him.

“It’s all right Franz,” Torstein said. “No one will hurt the ladies.”