Evidence of Things Not Seen by Lindsey Lane Page B

“It’s time. Let’s go.”
    Her momma opened the bathroom door just as there was a loud knock on the motel room door. She grinned at Karla, excited. “He’s here. Your first one is here, baby.”
    Karla tried to smile but she felt a little wobbly.
    Her momma opened the door, giggling and purring. “Don’t you look handsome, George. Oh Karla, look at your date. George, I think you know Karla.”
    The man was wearing a black cowboy hat, a black shirt, and pressed jeans and boots. A toothpick stuck out the side of his mouth as he grinned at Karla.
    “Now you be good to my little girl. I’m going down to the lounge and see if I can scare up a little business myself.”
    Karla’s stomach lurched again. Her momma had said she’d stay right outside the door. She gulped some air so she wouldn’t puke.
    “There’s some liquor in the bathroom, George. She might need a little drinkie and I promised her a party.” And then her momma stepped through the door and was gone.
    “Oh, we’ll have a party, won’t we, little girl?” the man said, sliding the chain lock across the door. Then he turned to Karla and unbuttoned his shirt. “I’ll be here all night and you got a thousand dollars worth of party to give me. Now pour me a drink and get into your birthday suit. I got some cherries to pop.”
     
     
    The thousand dollars didn’t take Karla and her momma anyplace new. Her momma did get them a cheap apartment off I-45. She even enrolled Karla in a middle school and turned tricks all day long at the apartment while Karla was in school. Until a neighbor complained. Her momma said it was because she didn’t give it to him for free. Either way, they had to move to a by-the-week motel. Her momma said she made a deal with the manager, which included cheaper rent as long as she did her business (except with him) off the premises. Karla tried to keep going to school, but because her momma needed help with the men at night, Karla couldn’t wake up early enough to get to school. She didn’t really mind. She liked being with her momma. She liked helping with the men sometimes. What she liked best of all was when they got back to their room late at night and she and her momma sat up late talking. Her momma usually poured them a drink and lighted cigarettes for both of them. They’d laugh about the men, how all of them complained about their wives’ not giving them any. To Karla, it seemed like the secret to staying married was giving your husband a blowjob once a week. Karla would listen to how her momma would give certain men time limits if they were too drunk to get a hard-on. Always she told Karla, get the money first. “They get all sleepy and forgetful after they get their rocks off.” These were the times Karla felt closest to her momma, like they were sisters. Sometimes she told Karla about the nicer men, the men who were regulars and slipped her extra money. Karla knew her momma hoped they would come back for her. Take care of her. After she talked about those men, she usually fell asleep with a smile on her face.
    In the morning, though, her momma was grouchy with a hangover. The twenties didn’t seem so plentiful and the round of bars and kneeling in toilet stalls or outside on gravel loomed closer. For three years, Karla and her momma worked the dance halls and lounges up and down I-45 from Houston to Galveston. At the dance halls, her momma would go in the front door, because she was over twenty-one, and let Karla in the back door. By the time she got to the back door, her momma had six tricks ready for Karla to turn. She’d march Karla right to the men’s room and tell her to get to work. When she complained, her momma would say, “We’ve got to make a hundred and eighty dollars tonight. How do you want to do that?”
    One time Karla suggested she get a job dancing at a topless bar. Her momma shot that idea down. “First of all, men only put dollars in that G-string, not twenties. So you might wag your