‘You don’t even dress like a woman.’
Compressing her lips, Layla looked at the floor.
‘And I just have to wonder, why is that? Do you know? Have you any idea?’ Precious went on.
Layla didn’t know. She’d never given it a moment’s thought. She’d been busy studying, then working, and her family life, the bickering between her parents, had always been going on in the background.
‘See? I have offended you,’ said Precious.
‘No, but I think we’d better drop this before you do,’ said Layla stiffly, feeling the prickle of emotional tears behind her eyes. God, she wasn’t going to cry. This was ridiculous. It was stupid to get upset over something so silly.
She stood and headed for the door.
‘And your hands, what the hell happened there?’ Precious called after her. ‘You never heard the word “manicure”?’
‘Oh shut the fuck up,’ said Layla, and left the room.
Hurt as she was by the things Precious had said to her, Layla still found herself fascinated by her – and by the other girls too. There had been a time when she’d thought: Jesus, lap dancers! But now she knew these girls weren’t fools. China was supporting her family as best she could, Destiny was holding up a faltering marriage, and Precious was paying her way through uni, plotting her escape into psychotherapy.
That night, Layla ignored Ellie’s advice and went downstairs when the club was open, to take a peek at what happened down there. It was such an opulent place, like a palace, all tricked out in acres of gilt and faux tiger skin, with dark polished wood bars, cosy banquette seating areas and chandeliers dripping with crystals and tiny droplets of gold.
Away at the back of the room, behind a gold beaded curtain, she saw people moving. The VIP rooms for the private dancing were through there. Precious had told her about the private dancing.
‘We have strict rules here,’ she’d said to Layla. ‘No touching’s the most important. The girls don’t touch the clients, and neither the clients nor the girls touch themselves. Let’s keep this all decent. The girls dance. The client watches. That’s it.’
But Ellie had warned Layla off going downstairs. ‘I don’t want you in the club, Layla. You’ll only get some lairy banker trying to chat you up, then I’ll get grief off your mum and dad. You stay up here.’
Yet here Layla was, breaking the rules. It gave her a bit of a thrill, actually. She saw Precious, long dark hair flowing, wearing a midnight-blue dress that clung to her beautiful body, go through the beaded curtain with an older man. China was at a table, chatting to a group of men and a couple of women.