“You alright, Brooke?” he asks me instead and I pinch my lips, staring at his face for a long moment before responding.
“I'm okay,” I say, but then that's how I felt when I freaked out originally. Okay. Fine. Decent. Managing it. Until I wasn't. Until I was panicking and tearing my clothes off my body like they were poisoned, throwing myself at some strange guy I met at the park. I look up at Zayden, at his modelesque face, the silver points of his lip rings, the butterfly tattoos on his throat. “Actually, I'm flipping the fuck out.”
He smiles at me and nods his head like that's the answer he was waiting for. Next to me, the baby struggles across the blanket, working her way towards Zayden with a shaky sort of intensity, like she's as fascinated by him as I am.
“Tell me about it.” He crosses his arms over his chest and looks at me with those sea glass green eyes of his. The muscles in his arms bunch with the motion and I find my gaze tracing them greedily, finding new designs in his tattoos each time I look. There's a woman bleeding from the eyes, her hands locked in prayer … right next to a smiley face emoji. Interesting. I wonder what his stories for all these things are.
I dig my fingers into the dirty beige carpet beneath my hands and take a breath.
“I think men that go to strip clubs are pathetic.”
A nod from Zayden.
“Have you ever been to a strip club before?” I ask.
Slight smile.
“Yup.”
“So then … I think you're pathetic.”
I sit up straight and lift my chin. Zayden just keeps nodding at me.
“More than likely, yeah.”
“I feel like … I don't want to give monetary value to my body.” I put my hands together over my chest, my loose red peasant top ruffling with the motion. “To me, it … there is no amount of money that's worth me. I am priceless. I am … my value is more than just dollars.”
“Exactly.” Zayden snaps his fingers and then leans forward, putting his palms against the floor, his face getting way too close to mine for comfort. My heart starts to pound and sweat trickles down my spine. “So don't think of it that way then. Stripping is a job, that's it. It doesn't define you, just like, say, working as a soulless insurance salesmen doesn't. You can either suck it up and bang it out, or you can't. Don't torture yourself, Smarty-Pants.”
“I don't exactly have a choice, Zayden.”
“That's a goddamn lie,” he says, dropping to his belly on the carpet and turning his face towards the baby. She giggles and reaches out a chubby hand to slap at his face. He sticks his tongue out and she smiles a goofy smile. “There's always a choice. Sometimes it's between a few shitty things—like pretty much every presidential election ever—but that doesn't we can't make up our own minds about it anyway. From what I figure, sometimes the “bad” choice is really the harder choice.”
“I have fifty bucks. Literally. Exactly fifty, and only because I drove over to Nelly's house and threatened to beat up her boyfriend.”
Zayden pauses, pushing himself up onto his elbows and looking up at me.
His smile's almost as goofy as the baby's.
“You go girl. Tougher than you look, huh?”
“What's that supposed to mean?” I scoot away from Zayden and drop to my tummy, so that our faces are at the same level. I tell myself I'm doing it for the baby, but really I just want to look this guy in the face. “How do I look?”
Zayden pauses and stares right at me, tilting his head to the side. I notice that today, there are stars shaved into the short side of his hair. They weren't there yesterday. Did he do that himself? Huh.
“Soft,” he says and then lifts his palms up in surrender, elbows pressed into the carpet. “Not in a bad way. You just look … I don't know, young? But maybe like you're trying too hard not to be.”
I pinch my brows together as Sadie moves in between us and starts heading for the small table against the wall. Zayden scoots back and picks her up, depositing her on the opposite side of the blanket and letting her have at it again.
“Trying too hard?” I ask, doing my best not to be offended. I asked his opinion, and now I'm getting it. I can't complain if I don't like the results. “I just want to do the right thing.”
“No such thing,” Zayden says as he puts his hands on his hips and watches Sadie in her peach and white outfit, the lavender flower headband wobbling as she starts her journey from the beginning. “The right thing, I mean. It's a myth. All we can do is try to walk our own path and not screw up anybody else's. That's life, man.”
“According to Zayden Roth,” I say as I stand up and check the time on my phone. I have a little while before I have to get Grace, so I may as well use it to get my head together. Maybe I'll put on some music and lock myself in the upstairs bedroom? Let the sweet trill of rock music wash all my pain away. “I'm not sure how valid your opinion is, based on the music you listen to.”
He swings a look my way and then winks at me.