Boyfriend Material by Ilsa Madden-Mills

You know you’ve hit rock-bottom when you’re allowing yourself to be groped in an alley by a guy in a vomit-covered shirt.

Even worse, a Kappa shirt.

I play nice. Vomit boy has been my best customer of the night, laying an endless supply of dollars at my feet.

It’s not enough. Not nearly enough. But it will be.

If it isn’t, I might be dead by sunrise.

More likely hurt or disfigured, but none of those options are on my to-do list.

I need more money tonight . . . or this morning . . . or whatever is chronologically correct.

Sweat dots my face. It’s the end of August in Sparrow Lake, Minnesota, so the temperature is dropping, but humidity lingers. Kappa-guy swims in sweat.

He pulls me to him and runs his tongue down my neck. It leaves a wet trail on my throat like a wriggling worm.

Shuddering in revulsion, I push him away. “Private dance only, remember? Nothing below the belt and no kissing—or licking.”

Inside the club all they can do is look. Even during the lap dances in the VIP room they have to keep their hands on the couch. Those rules are told to them by a huge-ass bouncer and written in neon letters on a sign in the room. Not that I get many requests for private dances—until tonight.

Only it wasn’t for a dance inside the VIP room. He wanted me to meet him in the alley.

When I started working at Platinum Nights, I drew a line in the sand. Some of the girls bring the guys out to the alley for “more” while the manager looks the other way.

I swore I’d never do it.

Guys like this, if you give them an inch, they take a mile. Every one of them thinks the world should bow before them.

They can be dangerous.

Especially when they’re drunk.

I swallow down my disgust.

And morals.

Don’t think about it, I tell myself.

Think about butterflies. The smell of daffodils. A sunrise over the lake.

When that doesn’t work, I close my eyes and concentrate on the several hundred-dollar-bills he flashed at me as my shift was ending. Sure, I recognized him. We had a sociology class together this summer and he seemed manageable, even nice. He flirted with me but never took it too far—for good reason. Last semester I dated Parker Cavendish, the current Kappa president. You can guess what happened next. The frat black-balled me after we broke up.

Not that I care. Those parties aren’t my scene anymore.

I thought doing a dance for him out here would be easy, but that’s desperation talking. It’s been a slow month as students migrate back to school, and I’ve run out of time.

“Lean back,” I coo, nudging him back against the wall. Get as far away from me as possible.

“What if I don’t want to?” He slurs as his gaze roams my body.

“Those are the rules.”

“Show me your tits then,” he demands.

Fine. I abandon all seductive de-clothing and pull off my shirt and bikini bra. In the club I wear pasties over my nipples, but those are in the trash already. He’s getting his money’s worth. A guy hasn’t seen all of my boobs since, well, Parker.

I look around the alley. We’re alone. Good. I think.

He licks his lips. “Yeah, baby, nice. Now get those shorts off.”

Anxiety spikes higher as blood rushes through my veins. “I said topless only.”

“For three hundred? And I can’t kiss you? I might as well watch porn.” He reaches for me again, and I rear back, laughing nervously.

“But a porn video can’t say your name. Do you want this or not . . . Scott?” I bat my eyelashes as I make my voice sound breathless.

His eyes narrow. “All right. Get on with it.”

My jaw clenches. He’s rude and disrespectful. He makes my skin crawl.

“Let me dance. I promise, you’ll be happy.” I do a twirl and run my hands through my long brown hair as I shimmy my hips, doing a routine from Madonna’s “Like a Virgin”.

She croons about being touched for the very first time while I’m just praying Vomit Boy keeps his hands to himself. Singing the song in my head, I stare at a point over his shoulder and move my body from muscle memory. I end with a big, fake smile.

He jumps at me. His hands wrap around my waist as he whips me around so that I’m the one up against the wall.

“Your dance sucked, babe. You lacked enthusiasm.” His hands move to my throat. “I expected more.”

Fear slams into my skull. My heart beats like a snare drum. “Easy now. Play nice.” I tug at his fingers and they loosen. A little.

“Suck my cock and I will.”

“Not happening.” I place my hands on his chest and push, but the guy’s built like a linebacker, thick but compact. I may as well be shoving a tractor.

He leans in to nuzzle at my hair, pressing closer. His hand gropes my body, and I flinch. My gaze darts down the alleyway to the street as college girls hurry by and frat-hop without a care in the world.

I wish I could be one of them.

I was one of them.

I try to jerk away as he puts pressure on my shoulders, nudging me down. The brick of the wall scratches my back as his fingers dig into my skin.

“No . . .” I protest, but he cuts me off.

“Yeah, baby . . .” His hand moves between us as he pulls down his zipper. I fight the rising bile in my throat and beat at him.

I never should have agreed to this.

Even if I am at the end of my rope.

Disappointment in myself, mixed with anger for him, bubbles up inside me like lava.

I angle my head up and hold his bleary eyes as I grit my words out. “You asshole! I don’t have sex with clients.”

He reaches into the confines of his pants. I smell his rankness, loosely veiled by too much body spray.

I try to jab him in the nuts, when . . .

“That you, Scott?” a male voice calls from the street.

He lets go so fast that I fall to the side and land on the asphalt.

He’s spared the pain in his crotch, but I get it screaming up both of my elbows. My backside is covered with bits of crumbled concrete. Blood blooms on my knees.

These damn shoes. With hands that tremble, I undo the gold stilettos from my feet. Scratches line the shiny plastic coating and one of the heels has broken off.

Cheap. Useless. A metaphor for my life.

I toss them in front of me as I crawl towards a dumpster.

“Yeah, it’s me. Hold the fuck on. Be there in a minute,” Scott mumbles to his friend, then looks back at me. “Hey! Where are you going? We’re having fun, baby.”

I stare at him. At his flushed face and vomit-covered shirt.

How did I get here?

When I was a kid, I dreamed of college. Of being my own person.

But this? This is a joke.

Taylor’s voice sounds in my head: You are your own universe, Julia. You’re made up of black holes and glittering galaxies. You are beautiful. Vast. Limitless.

He tells me this when I get low. I’m pretty low now.

Clenching my hands, I rise up.

“Give me my money,” I say as I snatch my bra and strap it on.

“What? Come on. Let’s try this again, yeah?” He puts on his friendly face, and I start at the way he switches from jerk to nice guy.

“No,” I mutter.

The voice comes again. “Scott! Get your ass out of the alley. Your girlfriend just showed at the frat house.”

He blinks hard. “Fuck.” He tucks his dick in his pants and zips, then gives me a smirk. “Catch you later, baby.”

He wanders towards the street as I wipe the asphalt from my skin.

You need his money, keeps running through my head. Yeah, but am I willing to get close to him again?

Moving fast, I tug on my flowy t-shirt.

Just ask him for what I’m owed. Plus, his girlfriend is here; he won’t be forcing me to my knees in front of her.

“Scott,” I call out. “You got what we agreed to, so—”

His eyes thin as he looks at me from over his shoulder. “Get lost. You’re not even that hot.”

He turns away, adjusting his shirt and running both hands through his longish dirty-blond hair.

I stand there for a beat, then follow. When he reaches the edge of the alley, I catch up with him.

“I came out here with you. We made an agreement in the club. You said one private dance. I’ve never done that before. You owe me.”

He scoffs. “For what? The pleasure of your company? Why would I pay for that? I don’t owe you a damn thing.”

“Scott!” a female voice cries in excitement from the porch of the Kappa house. We’ve reached the end of the alleyway and houses sit on each side, all of them Greek at Hawthorne University.

Kappa is the biggest mansion, complete with imposing columns a la the White House. Our current dean of the university was a Kappa here. A sitting senator was a Kappa here. Whatever. Maybe those guys are okay, but now it’s home to some of the biggest pricks on campus. Most of it because Parker is their leader.

I follow the female voice to a gathering of co-eds with perfect tans after Instagram-lake-life summers. They’re drinking beers from Solo cups.

I look down at my pale skin from studying at the library and dancing inside a club with no windows.

It’s the first party weekend of the fall semester at a small school, but these people feel like strangers.

The girl at the front, a petite girl with red corkscrews down to her shoulders, waves at him. With her hand cocked on her hip, she’s dressed to kill in a strapless black dress and heels. “Pookie Bear, I’ve been waiting for you. What were you doing back there?” Her red lips make a pout.

Scott shrugs then jogs up the steps, meeting her on the porch. He kisses her on the mouth and I grimace.

A frat brother hands him a beer.

“Just coming back from the bars,” he says cheerfully. “Closing time.”

It’s true; two is closing time for the bars, and it sends a wave of people to this side of campus where the parties go all night.

Platinum Nights, relatively new to Sparrow Lake, is also closed. My stripping career began at the Boobie Bungalow, a decent place I liked, plus my old roommate Sugar worked there as a bartender. Unfortunately, it’s several miles off campus and requires a car. I had to sell mine for the cash. The Bungalow’s clientele was mostly older men escaping their lives. Sometimes there would be a bachelor party that included some douchebags, but the regulars knew the drill. Watch the girls, then leave.

Platinum Nights is within walking distance of campus and has an entirely different animal: frat boys. This brand of douchebag doesn’t follow any rules.

My head churns. My stomach rolls. I can’t leave empty-handed.

I have to pay Connor so his goons don’t take it out on me or my mom.

I feel eyes on me. Assessing. Mostly male. I stiffen as I smooth down my shirt. It’s sleeveless but covers my ass, something I slipped on after my last set. There’s a monarch butterfly on the front with the caption: Give up being a caterpillar and fly.

My throat tightens. I’m never going to fly at this rate.

“Hey, Scott,” I call from the front lawn of the Kappa house, feigning confidence even though I keep plenty of space between us. The bass inside the house pumps hard, mirroring my own heartbeat.

Scott must have amnesia because he stares at me like he doesn’t know who I am.

I cock my hip. “Yes, you. Asshole with the vomit on your shirt.”

Red turns to look at him, a frown on her pretty brow. “Scott. Who is she?”

I laugh bitterly. She knows me. We used to party together sophomore year. I had no idea she was dating Scott now.

He drapes an arm around her. “No one,” he says, glaring at me.

Challenge accepted. A grim smile flashes over my face.

He doesn’t get it.

I owe none of these people.

I’m at the end of my rope.

And I sure as hell don’t have a reputation to uphold.

“Who am I?” I scoff. “I’m the girl who was just dancing for your boyfriend. He wanted a little something extra in the alley. I gave it and he owes me.”

The girl’s jaw drops.

A low murmur picks up as several brothers laugh and razz Scott.

Red’s lips twist. “You’re one of those girls from Platinum Nights. What are you . . . some kind of whore?”

The word is like a fist in my gut.

“No” I want to scream. Never. How dare she?

What is the difference between me and her?

I’ve seen her dancing on a pool table in her underwear while frat boys cheered her on.

Another girl speaks, her gaze raking over me. “I think they prefer sex worker. Where are her shoes?”

The girls giggle.

“Maybe she’s so poor she doesn’t have any,” Red says.

Another round of laughter.

“I took them off in case I had to run away from Scott,” I say. “He tried to force me to do something I didn’t want to.”

“That’s what you get when you put yourself in that position,” a willowy brunette says. She was in one of my art classes freshman year, but that time period feels so distant now. “It’s your own fault, honey,” she continues. “When you act like a slut, guys don’t know what to do. It’s their hormones.”

I shake my head as disbelief rises. “You, wow, you’re female and excusing his behavior? Gross. Hormones have nothing to do with it. He has self-control; he just chose not to use it. He has zero respect for any of you.” I tick off what happened on my fingers. “He asked for a private dance. I gave it. He went too far. Then he tried to run away without paying. Scott is scum. Scott is probably a rapist.”

That gets their attention.

“She’s a lying bitch,” Scott sneers. “She came out of that strip place on Easton Street, and I just walked her back from the bars to be nice because she was alone. And this is the thanks I get?”

My blood boils.

That Strip Place Back on Easton Street is where he’s been spending most of daddy’s hefty allowance this summer.

I lift my hands in exasperation. “I just want to collect what’s owed me.”

He laughs. “You’re owed jack. Get out of here.”

“Yeah,” his girlfriend mutters. “Before we call the cops and tell them you’re soliciting.”

“Go on, now,” the brunette calls in a haughty voice. “We don’t want your kind here. This is a decent place. Kappa doesn’t tolerate sluts.”

Frustration hits as my predicament slowly dawns. What cop is going to believe me over him? Over the girls?

Scott was easily tossing dollars at me in the club, but now I’ll have to pry the money he promised me out of his slimy hands.

Connor is going to be livid.

And with that horrible realization, I panic. I rub the scar on my wrist as my vision swims. A cold-sweat breaks out on my forehead. My anger ebbs into fear.

“Don’t come back to my place of work, Scott,” I yell as I back away. “The boys will toss you out.”

I turn to leave and the second my bare feet hit the curb, a black, tricked out Toyota Tundra pulls right in front of me. It’s one of those trucks with every upgrade and modification to make it look like it was used to cross the Sahara, but it’s never been off-road. I stumble and reach out to steady myself against one of the big tires.

The driver’s side door opens, and out steps a six-foot-four-inch wall of perfection—and he knows it. Eric Hansen.

He’s clearly been hitting the gym during the offseason, but it doesn’t look like he had time to shop. His arms burst against the gray Henley stretched across his chest, and his thighs strain against his black jeans. He truly is built like his nickname, Eric the Everest. He’s broad-shouldered with a rugged face and wavy dark red hair. Long ago, I used to run my fingers through those unruly curls.

Whoa. His beard is gone. I’m able to see the chiseled lines of his jaw, the skyscraper cheekbones, the fullness of his lips.

I try to step around him but he stops, recognition sparking.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Julia? Hey . . . I haven’t seen you in a while. You going in? Looks like the party is in full swing.”

This might be the most we’ve said to each other in years.

He tucks his big hand in the pocket of his jeans, a movement so smooth and sexy it appears choreographed. Confidence surrounds him. He’s rich. Beautiful. Popular.

That’s right.

He’s charming up until the last moment, then he pulls your heart out and rips it to pieces.

He’s speaking in that easygoing way of his, playing Mr. Nice now, but just wait . . .

“No, I was just leaving,” I mumble, my voice drowned out by the music wafting out of the mansion.

“Are you okay?” he asks, pivoting with me as I move around his truck.

I cut a look at him, and I mean to glance away, but his topaz eyes hold mine. They aren’t regular topaz; they’re a brilliant gold with layers of gray, green, and blue as if his creator didn’t know what color to give him. They’re the softest part of him. I used to think they reflected a deep person, someone vulnerable, someone who had a side to him no one knew.

I was wrong.

He glances at my feet, and I lift my hands and heave out a sigh. “Nothing to see here. I lost my shoes.”

“Ah.” He frowns, looking back at the Kappa house, then again at me. “Did someone take them?”

“No.” I huff out a laugh and shake my head. “They weren’t worth stealing.”

“You seem upset,” he says and moves closer until there’s only a foot between us.

The tension sizzles—or at least it does for me.

He’s staring at me, hard, and I swallow thickly as the silence builds between us.

For three years, every time we’ve seen each other on campus, we’ve purposely avoided one another. He’d see me coming and turn the corner. I’d see him in the cafeteria and choose a table on the other side—behind a plant. Even when our roommates, Z and Sugar, started dating, we kept our distance.

You should keep it that way, a voice says.

I whirl to leave.

“Bye, slut,” one of the girls from the porch calls behind me.

“If you ask me, Eric should’ve hit her with his truck,” another says as they burst into laughter.

Tears sting my eyes.

If I don’t get some money soon, I’ll be in for a lot worse.