She Wouldn't Say Goodbye. (Guns N' Roses)

Thirty Four

A pink light pulsed shining across the small stage.

An unfamiliar song was pouring through the speakers, a guitar solo ensued. Kat drug her body across the stage. arching her back and tossing her hair.

A pretty large group of men had gathered at the front of the stage, sipping drinks and giving most of the dancers pretty hefty tips. Kat was using her body to her advantage. Shaking and moving trying to impress her admirers. As each night went by she became a better dancer, making sure to watch the other dancers and pick-up tips from them.

Her legs circled the silver beam, she spun around the best of her abilities- being a beginner. Two men stood at separate intervals putting good sums into her underwear. After excepting her cash she walked back over towards the middle of the stage. Her hands held tightly to the dancing pole, hips swiveling slowly in time with the song.

She tossed her hair to the side, biting her lip as she slid down the pole.

Crawling on all fours towards the front of the stage, where she continued working her magic, shaking her hips. Showing off her assets.

She rolled around on the floor, before a middle-aged man, stuck some bills into the edge of her fishnet tights.

Kat couldn't help but feel completely different than her normal self, as she danced on stage her mind drifted. She didn't feel like her normal boring self, she felt like a sex symbol.

She saw a man stagger towards the front, lights barely showing his scruffy face and unwashed hair.

Piercing green eyes catching glimpse of her shimmering body. He reminded her of someone.

This man looked so much like her father, she could barely believe it wasn't him. The only problem was her father had died before she came to Los Angeles.

Kat continued to dance trying to pay no attention to this stranger. Her last song of the night came to a close, pulling her mind towards a dark place as she started to exit the dim stage, after having collected any tips the men wanted to give her. She passed a curly headed blonde on the way back towards the dressing room. The veteran dancer shooting her a nasty look, as she made her way to the second stage.

Kat basically collapsed at her dressing table, taking a good look at herself in the mirror. She hugged herself tightly, bringing her arms around her torso. She kind of wished she had Axl here to hold her, sweep away her nasty fears. Kat remembered to closely the last memory she had of her dad.

She was young, she couldn't have been much older than twelve or thirteen. Her mother had dragged her around looking for her excuse of a father. Even after the horrible things that had happened to both of them at his hands.

There he was laying out cold, in an abandoned hotel. The decrepit building decaying as it sat vacantly. Of course, this traumatized her, naturally. His body surrounded by Pills, and booze and powders. Almost as if he wanted to die, surrounded by what he truly loved. Only he didn't die then, Her mother called an ambulance and he was sentenced to prison.

A tear had rolled down her heavily make-up coated cheek, as she thought of Izzy and his addictions. Sticking needles in his arms, selling drugs, running drugs. He was probably out on the streets right now selling Smack. And herself having partaken in the very activities that had plagued her childhood; drinking, drugging, dancing. And Axl never really did anything too bad, he was smarter than that she guessed. She began the task of taking her make-up off, using the removers to take the cakey foundation and over done blush off of her face. After cleaning her face, she changed from her sparkling stage clothes into her street wear. Simple Bell-bottom jeans and Rolling Stones top made into a belly shirt. She paid her dues, thanked the house mother and went on her way. She took the usual bus back towards Selma and Highland where the gang had been held up recently. For once she actually had some money in her pocket.