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bunch of pee-hole warts to boot.”
    “First, you don’t sound like a criminal. Second, you don’t have genital warts. Third, I’m married and fourth, you’re not my type.”
    “You’ve got me all figured out, haven’t you?” He raised his arms. “But I’ll bet you rose oil to catheter fluid I’m not the good guy you think I am. Once upon a time, I might have been. It might have been the only thing I ever wanted to be.”
    Then he slumped his head into the deep pillow. “And Sylvya?” he said, “Please, call me Colton.”

eighteen days till defiance day (8
    Colton wandered in, alone and sober, past the frosted glass entrance. Then the human bark hit him. “Where to, chief?” A shaven head attached to an overweight torso, no neck in-between, unpacked itself from the check-in booth. “It’s a hundred to get in.”
    “Didn’t know about the cover,” Colton said. “Sorry.” Music blaring from the inside and around a corner drowned out his words before they had made it to the shaved head’s ears. The ears would not have cared, regardless. “Here’s an ID, too.” Colton handed a one-hundred-dollar bill folded around his driver’s license, like he was ashamed of how his DMV picture had come out.
    “I just need the cash,” the bouncer said, ripped a crumpled receipt from the cash register and shoved it in Colton’s hand. “And, welcome to Déjà Vu.”
    A sanitizer smell with a sweet aftertaste hit Colton’s face. The smell of sweat and semen hit him a second later. He stopped after taking a few steps in, as the dark corridor spilled into a large room. What was his plan for the night? Hire a stripper and have her read him Hemingway? The cheap sanitizer drilled deeper inside his nostrils. Colton exhaled, how could anything associated with this type of smell even begin to replace his Sarah?
    “Move, dude,” he was shoved to one side as a group of men poured inside the joint. He looked around the room – several rows of chairs, lined with librarian-like precision, faced a beige stage. A black female, wearing nothing but her skin was hurling herself at an aluminum pole. Countless neon dots, like butterflies, bathed her supple tattooed body.
    Was it ten years? He couldn’t place the last time he was at a place like this.  The tattooed girl molesting the aluminum pole had to be in physical pain from the exertion, but she didn’t look it. On the other hand, what did he know? Maybe the current generation of strip-club goers required athleticism from their dancers or maybe he wasn’t in the right frame of mind to appreciate tonight’s performance and accompanying sweat. A waitress materialized, invisible until she got within inches of his nose. Her uninvited palm rested on his shoulder. “What would you like to drink, honey?”
    “Do you have Sprite?”
    “Yes, honey, we do.” The palm caressed his cheek and twirled away.
    “Hey, hey - come on fellas,” a DJ’s voice rose from beside the stage. The black dancer scurried off, arms cradling oversized breasts. Another stripper took over and struck a pose, expecting a cue to allow her to move. “It’s three dances for the price of one, guys. Our lovely ladies will ride you senseless, if you know what I mean… here they come. On your right, you have the lovely Fiona…” The pole-bashing black dancer had returned, now wearing a white bikini. “…and on the left? Yes, the lovely Melody.” Fiona and Melody waved with enthusiasm fitting for an Independence Day rally. “Come on, you, guys. Six hundred bucks gives you three songs with a gorgeous lovely lady.” The women stepped down and two different dancers jumped onstage. “And the lovely Amber comes purring on your left then the lovely Summer is on your –” The humid line of female nudity filed on, with each pair taking stage for less than a minute, a quick break before returning to their next lap-dance. The DJ’s barrage of “lovelies,” the same word describing all girls, annoyed