How I fell for the Future Ex-Mrs. LaRue

Some people say, “You can’t put a price on love.” But I can. For me, it was One Hundred Thirty-Eight Dollars. That’s how much it cost me to fall in love with Sabrina, one of the girls at the Paradise Palace in Las Vegas, Nevada. Now, you might be saying to yourself: “There is no Paradise Palace in Las Vegas, Nevada.” And you’d be right. I’ve skillfully changed the names and places in this story to protect the guilty. Because to fall in love with a woman you just met—having only known her for about 30 minutes—and to have paid a total of one hundred thirty-eight dollars (including drinks, of course)…well then, lovely readers, you’re gonna have to break some laws. You’re gonna have to bend the club policy just enough to make it count. You’re gonna have to take fate in your hands (among other things) and say “God Dammit! I’ve been gambling for three days, I’ve just about run out of money, I couldn’t afford a hooker if I wanted one, so I’ll be damned if I don’t squeeze every ounce of sex, sweat, and skin out of my one hundred thirty-eight dollars!”

In the 72 hours leading up to my date with destiny, money has been flying out of my wallet with an unmistakable quickness. The morning begins like any other, with my friends and I getting kicked in the nuts by every dealer we play against. The day and then night dragged on at a fiendish pace. My buddies and I are just about broke, angry and tired. So, we do what any normal Chicago guys would do: we all make a conscious and informed decision that the only thing that might possibly cheer us up is strippers. Hot, naughty strippers. And not the kind of strippers that you find in Chicago or New York. I’m talking about strippers of legend. Like Canadian strippers (Canadians have no morals) or Amsterdam strippers. But since we aren’t in Canada or Amsterdam, we have to be satisfied with Las Vegas strippers.

Now, this may be a good point in the tale to inform you that I had never been to Las Vegas. Somehow, I had lived my 29 years in Chicago, vacationing in Cancun, South Padre Island, Los Angeles, even London. But I had never gotten around to Vegas. I think I was afraid. Not afraid of Vegas itself, but afraid of me in Vegas. How would a poor Midwesterner like me survive untainted in the land of Chips and Honeys? So, in my mind, Las Vegas was a bubbling sex cauldron. Where Average Joes like me arrived with pocket lint, parlayed it into a fortune, and spent the rest of their trip in bed with porn-star-quality sex goddesses who satisfied their every whim. However after three days in the desert, I already knew better. I expected this to be just one more sucker bet, like the 11 for 11 parlay that pays 1500 to one. We’d pay a $20 cover, buy watered down cocktails for $10 a pop, and spend the rest of the night (morning) saying “not just yet, sweetie…” to half a dozen ex-showgirls with c-section scars and stretch marks. Well lemme tell ya, dear readers, I ain’t ever been so happy to be wrong.

First off, because it's 5 a.m. on a Tuesday, there is no cover. The guy at the door just cards us and lets us in. When we get inside, the club is basically a ghost town. There are about six girls left and we see two guys sitting at the bar. That’s it, in a place that’s built for 200 guys and 50–60 girls. So we sit down and all the girls come over and sit down with us. Well, actually on us. The girl who sits on me, totally at random, is Sabrina. The Future Ex-Mrs. LaRue. Now at this point, the details start to get a bit fuzzy. Drinking and gambling in the O2-enriched casinos is possible for 18 or so hours, but that doesn’t mean you’re clear-headed and aware of your surroundings. So we start the idle chit-chat that seems to be appropriate. “Are those real?” is always a good opener, just in case you’re ever in a situation that calls for idle stripper chit-chat. They aren't real, though I’m not a man who really cares one way or another. Lots of guys claim to be put off by falsies. I am not one of those guys. If a woman wants to enhance her appearance for whatever reason and I’m able to enjoy that appearance, then God bless her.

So, Sabrina and I talk and talk. Talk about me, mostly. What I do ("That’s REALLY cool!") where I live ("WOW! I’ve always wanted to go there!") and other such nonsense. I start drinking beers, $4 a bottle, to fuel the small fire that’s started somewhere inside my pants. We don’t say anything of substance, it’s all just air. If you read back the text of our conversation, it would sound like two people sitting next to each other, both on the phone with other people. But the SUB-text has the making of a Harlequin Novel. I can’t explain it. Sabrina has tapped into my brain with the expertise of a KGB operative (granted, not a difficult task) and slipped perfectly into the role of my lifelong soul mate. My very hot, dirty, blonde, stripper soul mate with a huge fuckin’ rack. I was knocked for a loop! It’s hard, now, to recall any specifics in the chain of events. It’s more like an empathetic tapestry woven into my brain. Like remembering a day as “blue” or a person as “soft.” You don’t need the specifics to remember the feeling you had at the time, or the extent of those feelings. Having said that, I can honestly say I fell in love.

It was a sucker bet, and I put up that pink chip without even blinking. But to me, this wasn’t a sucker bet anymore; it was a sure thing. The rest of the club was gone, now. Black. Devoid of anyone save Sabrina and I. We stare into each other’s eyes and talked about something. Who cares what it was. She might as well have been making words up, or reading out of a fuckin’ phone book. “Adams, James… Adams, James F… Adams, Jennifer…” Her voice is the siren song, leading my one-hundred thirty-eight dollars to the rocky shoals of her silky thighs. When we adjourn to the ‘semi-private’ booth-type area for my lap dances, I damn near lose consciousness. It’s a blur to this day, but I do know during that time, I would have ripped another man's head from his neck had he tried to interrupt us. I was completely in love. Utterly, hopelessly, helplessly in love. Not Lust. I didn’t want to have sex; I wanted to buy her a car. I wanted to be the guy to rescue her from all this. If I had a checkbook with me, or (God forbid) a credit card, I would have handed over everything I could. Rent, food, bills—these things meant nothing because I would have Sabrina.

Six songs do not last long in the state I was in. $20 a song, and I had already had 3 beers (plus tip) which put me a dollar or two away from the dreaded $138 mark. Six songs. And Strip Club songs to boot. That’s like 12 minutes, tops. Twelve minutes of passionate ecstasy is still only twelve fuckin minutes! I was out of money before I knew it. But Sabrina knew it. She was already giving me a hug goodbye and heading towards the back to pay out and go home. I was delusional. My mind reeled with schemes to rob a liquor store, or roll some drunk from Eau Claire who just won at Keno. It can’t just end! This is REAL. This means something! Sadly, in the end, I guess it’s that 138 bucks that saved me. Tapped out and insane, with more wood in my pants than Pinocchio, I stumbled out of the Paradise Palace at 6:30am like a kicked dog. I knew I’d never get over it. And I vowed, privately, silently, that I’d be back for her. I’d come back in a month or so, flush with cash, and take her away. We’d buy a place in Little Town, USA, where she could raise a family (which is what she surely wanted) and live happily ever after.

Well, that same mysterious gas that keeps you playing blackjack from sundown to sunup did its magic again when I was sleeping. So when I woke up 4 or 5 hours later, fresh as a spring breeze, Sabrina was all but a distant reverie. Throughout the day, my mind wandered to remember her smell, her shape. Like a heady dream, the details slipped away as the hours passed. By the time I boarded the plane for home, she was just a footnote to a happy and chaotic vacation away from the world. In a way, I think Vegas itself is a lot like Sabrina. The fantasy is real: you see her, you can touch her, and you think that you deserve her, and that she wants you. But she doesn’t want anyone. She wants everyone. And her eye is always on the door, waiting for the next mark to come in so she can whisper in his ear and become the best thing he’s ever had, for a price. And my price was $138. Some may say 138 bucks is a lot of money, and it is. But I can say this with complete and utter confidence: I got off cheap.