As you might be able to tell, I've been busy as heck and haven't been able to work on this much. I actually wrote this whole thing last night when I was supposed to be doing my Honors Biology homework. Fun fun. Anyway, I might have more time soon since the goddamn terms ending, meaning that they'll give us less work. Fucking idiots, piling on work in the last week. Anyway, ignore the rant and keep your eye out for Adam Pascal's butt…

And Arch of Wand… I'm scared… Should I be scared? lol!

The Smiling Game

03: Birdland

It was a year, three months and eight days into our relationship when Roger confronted me about all the men.

He stormed into my room. I was lying on my stomach in bed, chewing some peppermint gum and reading through a copy of Vogue I traded off the street for a blowjob. He was sober, first time I'd seen him like that in weeks. He was either drunk or high or some mixture of both around me.

"April, you've got to stop."

I looked up innocently, the gum snapping in my mouth. "Stop what, Rog?"

"Sleeping around, April. What else?"

I paused, looking away. "How'd you find out?"

"Word gets around. I saw you once. The man tells me you were the best fuck he'd had in weeks. April, it's dangerous!"

"Says who?" I snapped, sitting up straight. "How is it dangerous? Living my life to the fullest is a dangerous job, but I'd rather do that than sit at home and waste away like some fucking housewife! Is that what you want me to be? A fucking housewife?"

Roger pulled me up roughly and hissed right in my face, "Some of the guys you sleep with are shady guys, April. They could kill you. Plus, who knows what diseases they have?"

I wrenched myself out of his grip and grinned wildly. Arguing and fighting made me feel alive and crazy. I could wail on him, I could scream rape, I could do a number of things. But no, I'll choose to joke…. "Diseases, shmiseases. I'm not ever going to get sick. I've got a good immune system. Vitamin C! Lots of orange juice, huh?"

"That's not the only juice…" Roger muttered, running his hands through his shock of dirty blond hair.

"What's that supposed to me? You fucking hypocrite! You're on everything that I'm fucking on so don't you go calling the kettle black!"

Roger's eyes turned cold. If there was one thing he hated, it was hypocrites and to call him a hypocrite was the worst offense anyone could commit. "Get out." His voice was quiet but so cold. It caught me dead in my tracks.

I turned to face him slowly. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me. Get out. I've had enough. You sleep around, you don't pay any bills, you insult me. I've had enough of you. You're just a goddamn freeloader. A fucking parasite, April." And then his voice turned mocking. Bitter mockery is what it was. "And we all know that humans hate parasites, Cutie Pie."

My jaw dropped. I'd never, ever, heard Roger talk to anyone like that, let alone me. "Roger, I-"

"Save it." He waved me off. "Face it, April. Right now, you're a pretty fucking useless excuse for a human being. Do yourself a favor and get a job. I…I love you April, I really do." He had regret in his eyes… Please, God, please let him take me back… "If you get a job and promise me that you won't cheat, I'll take you back. I promise. Until then, you can't stay here."

It's better than nothing. There's hope, even if there's just a smidgen. But I had to leave… I hadn't been without a roof over my head since my first day in the city. I'd always had the security of a guy with an apartment that I happened to be sleeping with.

Silently, I packed a small bag. Just necessities. Clothes, some money, my day's purchase with the man, and set out to find a job.

Outside the building, I sat down and leaned against the cold concrete and sighed. I could find a job easy, right? I could dance… There wasn't a lack of strip joints in Alphabet City.

As my pervy uncle always said, I am all legs and tits. Guys like legs, guys love tits. I got nice ones. Nice legs, nice tits. I remember walking past a place near here.  The Cat Scratch Club or something… I'd seen a 'Help Wanted' sign in the window. Perhaps they needed a dancer?

I pulled myself up and headed in the direction of the club. Was I really that much of a freeloader?

A song popped into my head and I immediately smiled. "Freddie Freeloader". Excellent, excellent stuff. When I was in high school, I loved jazz. I lived for jazz. I didn't listen to all the crap that was on the radio, despite what people may have thought.

Jazz may not have been cool, but I didn't care. It made me feel like I was high before I'd ever been high. I listened to any jazz I could get my hands on. Dizzy Gillespie, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holliday, John Coltrane, Lena Horne, Count Basie, and of course Miles Davis.

When I was fifteen, I'd gotten a hold of 'Kind of Blue' on vinyl and listened to it so much that it wore out. I especially loved jazz vocalists, but up until then, I couldn't sing a note. I taught myself though, but my voice was always raspy and weird. But Roger liked it, said it sounded like Janis Joplin's. He just couldn't see what I saw in jazz.

I couldn't explain it. It was like heroin, you know? It made me feel good. If I stopped listening to it, I felt as if I could die.

I loved 'Freddie Freeloader'. I just hadn't realized in all the times I'd listened to Kind of Blue, that I'd melted myself into the song.

It was true. I was just another goddamn freeloader. But that's all going to change. For I stood in front of the Cat Scratch Club in the early afternoon on a cold winter morning. Little Miss April was going to be a working girl.

Several hours later, I had a job. I was on stage, dancing my ass off. I was handcuffed to a pole and during my elaborate coked out dance, my dancing partner would spank me hard.

Humiliating, but I had a job.

I went back to Roger later that night with a purse full of tips. I'd made five hundred dollars that night.

I buzzed his from down on the street. There was a pause, but then he bid me come up.

Roger met me at the door, taking in my clothes and elaborate makeup.

"I got a job," I said quietly.

He nodded, motioning me in. I was sure I'd woken him up. Mark sat at the table writing, and Collins and Benny were playing chess in the corner.

Mark looked up and scoffed. "Jeez, what? A hooker?"

I scowled at him. "No, a dancer."

Roger didn't smile, but he looked a bit relieved that I wasn't a hooker. "How much did you make?"

"Five hundred."

He whistled. "I'm proud, April."

"Proud of her actually doing something to support her own sorry ass?" Mark shook his head in disgust, throwing down his pencil. "A dancer, huh? I guess I can see it. Guys like half-naked girls who are all legs and tits."

I froze up. "Don't say that you fucker!" I screamed at him, backing against the closed door, my bag dropping to the floor.

"Shut up, Mark!" Roger said harshly. "You say that again and I'll beat the living shit out of you."

I was beginning to cry. Memories came rushing back. He'd backed me up against the door, held my arms up over my head, pinning me in place as his dirty mustache tickled my neck. I leaped off from against the door. No where was safe…

"What? It was practically a compliment!" Mark protested, his eyes wide and uncertain.

All four of them were staring at me, confused as to why I was reacting the way I was.

First against the door, then on the couch, and then he'd dragged me to his room and onto his dirty bare mattress.

"My pervy uncle used to say that…" I whispered so quietly, my eyes still darting around everywhere.

I'd never told any of them before. They thought I was some random slut that got beat up at home. No, it was so much more than that.

Roger immediately understood. I'm sure the others did too, but Roger grabbed my hand and pulled me into his room - our room.

"You look like you need a fix."

I nodded, so grateful.

"I guessed, you know," He remarked. "It was pretty obvious. I recognized the signs. My sister's the same way. Molested by my step dad. You should really consider therapy."

"No money."

"Now there is." He offered me a small smile. I winced as he slid the needle under my skin, but it felt so good.

I leaned in close to him and whispered, my lips against his ear, "Kiss me sweet and we'll go flying high in birdland. High in the sky up above, all because we're in love."

"That's pretty," He whispered. "Did you make it up?"

"Lord no. I heard Ella Fitzgerald sing it. It's our Lullaby of Birdland, Rog. Take me to Birdland and I'll cover your back. We'll fly on our great feathered wings up with the birds in the clouds. Follow me?"

"Anywhere you go," He winced. "Oh, that feels good."

"Exquisite pain. Self-destruction never felt better, eh?" I dropped the shared needle absently on the floor next to the bed and kissed him tenderly. "That's the kind of magic, music we make when we kiss." I laced my fingers through his, mine thin with the nails painted bright red, his long and thick with the nails bitten and angry-looking. "Lullaby of birdland, that's what I always hear when you sigh. Never in my wordland can there be ways to reveal in a phrase how I feel."

"April, you're my muse. Be my owl and I'll be your canary."

I pulled him back on the bed and began laughing. "Oh, silly. We'd never see each other. Owls are nocturnal and canaries are in cages. I could never eat mice and you could never be stuck in a cage."

Roger lay next to me, laughing harder. "No one could ever cage me. I'll always be in charge, deciding where I go and when I go. Hell, I'm not going to die until I'm damn well ready to, when I'm an old man and you're my little old lady."