Part II: How Did We Get Here Anyway?
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A short multi-part story of how a man meets a figure from his past and how it impacts every aspect of his life. Part II gets more adult.
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Catching up and a Few Sparks
I easily found the coffee shop Amber had texted me she would meet me at. It was a typical Starbucks, and Amber looked like a typical twenty-something customer. She had on a long-sleeved skin-tight top, that showed off her slender body and cute breasts very nicely.
Of course, the seemingly mandatory yoga pants and a pair of cute pink running shoes completed the College student look. I had to admit her ass and legs in those legging type pants would probably stop traffic. It was hard to believe that she had been rocking it in a strip club less than twelve hours ago.
And with her blondish hair tied back in a loose pony tail, much more the cute coed than hot stripper today. We found a table and I bought the first round of skinny lattes. Amber looked sweet, and her perfume was frankly, almost bewitching. Even without meeting in that strip club, this was a hot woman, not my cute young babysitter anymore.
We talked for almost four hours, but it didn't seem nearly that long. Amber gave me her story on how she went totally off the rails and then managed to get herself back right again. It was a mix of sadness, craziness, and recovery.
She had in fact started five years ago at ASU here in Tempe, but hadn't lasted. It turned out she wasn't really ready to act like an adult. She partied really hard and flunked out after her freshman year.
It was a lot of drinking, but more importantly a habit of all-night Raves with copious amounts of E. When she tried to return home, her father let her back but read her the riot act. Clearly her parents had not expected Amber to turn into a drug loving party girl!
But Amber wasn't ready to change yet, and after a week and three more Raves and wildness around the house, her dad kicked her out. She told him to fuck off and pawned a bunch of his stuff to get the money to return to Phoenix.
Over the next two years she got herself under control, with a lot of two steps forward and several steps backward. She also made the transition to a full-time dancing career. What else was a girl with no degree and no skills to do, she asked me. The best paying work was in the strip clubs, it wasn't even a matter for discussion.
She told me she could take on any of five or six personas, depending on the crowd in the club. That focus, and ability to transform herself into personas that customers adored allowed her to clear around 90K a year. She told me she was the top earner most weeks at her club.
To partly explain it, she also recounted how, encouraged by the club owner she went full on blonde and then made sure she was always sporting a dark tan. She had refused a boob job, but as she matured her nice pert 34B at least grew to the beautiful 34Cs I had seen last night. Amber laughed, she called that tanned blonde look the Phoenix stripper standard.
But her ability to almost shape-shift she said was what set her apart. Of course, her tight hot body didn't hurt her. In fact, she told me, that depending on the time of the month, she actually found her C cup bras a bit tight.
But still she was never going to be that stereotypical stripper with big fake DDs with big hair and standing well over six feet in her stripper heels. Amber told me she had to establish another approach to make sure she made the money she needed.
She was of course still thin as I remembered, but after five years it wasn't a teenage thinness, but something Amber called 'dancer-thin'. She also said she worked out during her days. That gave her that hard, hot body, but also helped to keep that deep golden tan.
Last year she had felt she was finally in control again. She applied and had been readmitted to the University, in a probationary status. She was moving slowly, this was all on her dime now, but was up to two or three courses a term. Amber was very proud that in two semesters she had only As this time.
I of course had to give her my story. I had to tell her how my marriage had exploded and that I was now a single guy again. We talked and I showed pictures of the twins she had babysat for from the time they were only six months old.
She was amazed they both were in Kindergarten. She was sympathetic, but smartly didn't pick hard at the scabs that were still healing from my failed marriage. For the first time though I was talking about it without feeling this big void inside.
It was amazing that we didn't even know the afternoon was gone and were sitting almost on top of each other, very much inside each other's personal space, but not feeling awkward at all. I had the feeling that we weren't done when we finally got done with our coffee.
I also didn't push hard about her parents; they were more in Janet's circle than mine. Amber said she had not heard from them in the last four years. She laughed and said pawning a bunch of her mom's jewelry and her dad's electronics probably hadn't made them too happy.
As the sun was setting, we agreed to meet for dinner in a nice place in Scottsdale, my treat, Amber didn't have to work tonight for once. I wasn't sure where this was going, but Amber was funny, and smart, and of course totally hot.
I got cleaned up and dressed for a smart-casual dinner look. Phoenix was clearly a lot more casual than Chicago. And even nicer, in the winter you didn't have to dress up like an Eskimo, or worry about freezing to death in the walk to your car in a parking lot.
The restaurant, a kind of Asian Fusion place that Yelp liked, was actually in a big fancy mall. I guess in the summer that made it easier here. I agreed to meet Amber there, I wanted to not be too pushy. After the afternoon I was pretty sure she would show up, and figured I'd get an idea where we were at when I saw how she looked and acted at dinner.
I saw her as I came down the hall from the parking structure. She was looking down towards an escalator, as she faced the restaurant. Wow, she cleaned up nicely. She wasn't dressed like a student, and not like a stripper, this was more simply a super-hot twenty-something woman.
She went with a look that was sexy and fashionable at the same time. It was a simple but effective combo, with a skin-tight spandex looking red minidress grabbing your attention. If she'd had an ounce of fat it would have shown, but of course there was none of that to show.
