– With pleasure, – I expressed my consent in a soft voice full of good nature.
When I was going to Israel, there wasn’t even a hint in my mind that I would strip for money. But now everything is so conventional, to nauseating extremes. Yes, I easily managed to turn my appearance into a source of income. It would seem that all you need is to take off your dress, smile believably, dance sexually, congratulate the birthday boy on the birthday, bring variety to a lonely man’s night, or leave the groom pleasant memories of a stag party. But everything is not so easy. One after another, sleepless nights spent under the influence of alcohol exhaust and undermine the psyche. And the clients are finishing it off. Not like these cute young boys. Today I was lucky. They are the kind of personalities that it’s a wonder the earth allows them to simply walk on him. And paradoxically, their life is full of luck, they are given many opportunities, and that is why the money flows like water into their hands. Devilish perverts and drug addicts, most of whom are also the main levers in the management of society.
A politician who is expected to bring about some changes (the one so zealously proclaiming clever slogans), a writer whose stupefied inspiration leads to new deep thoughts, a popular singer calling to actions in his songs lyrics, the judge decides who must be isolated, and who must be granted freedom, all of them keep their secrets and secretly lend themselves to vices. For themselves, they think (entrusting me their secrets) that one should not be shy with girls like me. With us chippies, the “representatives of the elite” become who they really are, because we do not limit their behavior, it is limited only by the size of the tip. And such customers have plenty of cash.
When I was only starting my career in this, as it turned out, so necessary service sector, I didn’t assume that I would face similar circumstances. And after a few years, I learned not to pay much attention to them. I thought only about money, “fast money”. My “invisible friend” didn’t particularly like this variant of earning money, but still he supported me, that’s why he is a friend.
He knew all that was required, about each interlocutor – their thoughts, background, weaknesses, had subtle knowledge of their inner world. Should my attractive appearance, genius to acting be added here – and we have everything that is needed in order to win the interest of the right person and get what you want. That was the success of conquering their hearts. The ability to speak properly, to see the interlocutor’s through, pulling the strings of his soul. With ease, he became a slave puppet in the skilful hands of a puppeteer. It’s a good job, where I could use my friend’s and my own talents with good benefit.
The clients were satisfied and I played my part, acting the joy of the time spent with them. When I was leaving, I thanked them for the tip and returned to the car to the driver.
– Are we going anywhere else? – I took an interest having lit a cigarette. The familiar taste of tobacco smoke filled my lungs.
– Yes, there is an order in Herzelia.3
– Great.
Blowing smoke through the half-open window, I immediately caught the association caused by just one mention of this city. Money.
Dani typed the address on the navigator screen and started off, driving the car towards Herzelia.
Well, six years spent in the Holy Land, destroyed my teenage dreams completely. They scattered like annoying frogs together with grasshoppers in my imagination, which nagged me with their songs during Siberian summer nights, torn to pieces with the birdshot of a double-barreled shotgun. Their pitiful remains drowned in the river and never surfaced. Shot after shot, one by one, and after six years there was no one left. Silence… You get used to this silent period and already forget about the fact that they even once existed.
Three years ago I met a good and really honest guy (and the honesty of people was tested with the abilities of my “invisible friend”) called Alexey, aka Alex. Accidental acquaintance in a shopping center cafe. At first, he seemed to be suitable for the role of a person who you can live quite a wonderful life with. A handsome, attractive, caring, understanding and self-confident intelligent programmer. But a few months was enough to realize my mistakes. Not in the It’s not that he was not at all so caring and good. There was something different. It began to seem to me that I did not live my own life and that what was happening around did not correspond to the reality in which I should be. Although my “invisible friend” claimed that my choice was right, for the first time doubts about the correctness of his words visited me.
Alex and I had lived together for almost a year. But it often seemed to me that there should have been another guy in his place. The one that seemed to be close by was so close, I could just extend my arm, but at the same time he was so far away. So far that it does not make sense to measure the distance in kilometers. I did not see him, but this circumstance did not mean that he actually did not exist.
Alex happened to notice my conversations “with myself” (in the bathroom or in the kitchen, for example, when I forgot about his presence in the apartment), I think it is clear that in fact the conversations were held not with myself, but with my “invisible friend”. Or the way I look thoughtfully for a long time through the objects around me, and in most cases I prefer time spent alone. In fact, of course, not alone.
Alex responded to my words about the splitting up, in my understanding, not in the way that a sane person would do. He took me to a psychotherapist. The doctor explained that the “invisible friend” is a product of my own brain, none other than a character created by my sick imagination. Like, I had been lonely, so I made it up.
I was sitting opposite to the doctor who was in his fifties and it did not came up in mind in any way why I had to tell him everything. My “invisible friend” insisted on doing that, but did not explain the reason for it.
“Just do as I say. It is necessary "– It was his only argument.
I was telling the doctor about the events related to my friend. My friend was telling me about the doctor. The doctor was listening to me and making comments asking about my friend. My friend laughed at the doctor, the doctor mentally laughed at me, having already decided on the diagnosis at the back of his mind. I laughed at the doctor and at how quickly came to a medical conclusion, which, of course, was wrong.
Of course, I felt a keen desire to pin on the doctor, knowing his hidden thoughts and desires, but did not do it on the request of my “invisible friend”. I was aware that every day, going to work, the doctor passed by his neighbor’s door with the memory of the hours spent in Nina’s bed and waiting for the next suitable occasion to repeat everything. Or about a bank account secretly opened abroad. He transfers money to the account for a trip to Ukraine under the excuse of a seminar. And the search for young and beautiful, flesh peddlers who, for his money, would agree to fulfill all his whims, was the real motive of the fictional business trip.
Well, actually, he is a good doctor, in terms of attitude to his professional activities. He has helped lots of mentally ill people for many years of his practice. Although I actually was not a mental patient.
The doctor prescribed antidepressants and tranquilizers (the latter, according to him, were supposed to block hearing voices), at first I was not even going to take them. But Alex thoughtfully insisted on treatment. And my “invisible friend” strangely supported him.
I could not realize the moment when the world lost its colors, and the days got filled with the routine of life slowly dragging on one by one. My “invisible friend” was not present in them and sometimes it seemed that he had never existed at all.
Dani and I went up to the twenty-seventh and last floor of a recently built hotel in Herzliya. The door to the room was opened by a man of about forty, of medium height and build. Immediately