From my long-running series, The Littles, a story of miscommunication: ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– I been a pole dancer... well, pretty much all my life. I love it. Really, I do. I get up there and I spin and spin and spin, and the guys just look at me and... well, you know what they're thinkin', right? But I never did anything like that, no way. I mean, it's one thing to squeeze an extra twenty outa some lunk who thinks he might get a shot. It's another to actually give him that shot. Oh, I did, once. Big mistake. This one guy, he'd been comin' here for nights in a row. Sat right up front, that chair right there. I'd come on, and he'd smile at me, and I'd smile at him, and then I'd go into my dance, and when I was finished, he'd look at me like I was the most perfect woman on earth. So one night, between dances, I start talking to him — management doesnt mind; they say anything to get the customer to spend some more is fine with them — and he tells me about his life and I tell him about mine and he's really sweet. I mean, really. Then he asks me one night if we can go for coffee when I get off, and I say sure. And that's all it was, I swear. Just coffee. We were in that diner for three or four hours, talking about stuff. I told him things I aint never told anyone, like how much I loved my Mamma, even though she said I was dumber than a bag of bricks (well, she was probably right on that one, but anyway...). Then afterwards, when the sun was comin' up, I got in my car and drove home, and I was all, you know, happy about this. Here was a guy that had seen my pretty well naked and still treated me like I was, you know, a lady. And it was nice. So we went out a few more times. Nothin' big, just coffee and talkin'. And then one night, when we were in the parkin' lot, I was about to get in my car, and he asked if he could kiss me. He asked. He didnt just do it. He asked. And of course I said yes. And we did and it wasnt any big tongue wrestlin' match. It was just a kiss. But it was the nicest one I ever got. So now, I decided I was gonna put together an all-new routine, just for him. I mean, sure, the other guys would see it, but that didnt matter. This was gonna be just for him: new flips, new ways of hangin' off the bar, all kinds of neat stuff that no one had ever seen on that pole before. I spent days workin' on it, and when I was finished... well, if anything on the pole said "I love you", this was gonna be it. So the big night comes, and he's sittin' out there, just like always. And he's smilin' at me, and I'm smilin' at him, and it's all good. My third dance, I decide it's time to give him my present. So0 I give him this big major smile, and then I worked that pole like sixteen ways to Sunday. The other guys sittin' there, they know this is new, and they're watchin' me and all whoop-whoop and throwin' money at me till the stage was littered in green. Even the other girls, on their stages, slow down to watch what I'm doin'. I mean, I hate to sound all me, but it was pretty darn spectacular. And it was all for him. But... the more I did it, the more he just... glared, like he was really angry or something. So I tried even harder to make him happy, pushin' it till I'd put everything I had into spinnin' on that pole. I was concentratin' so hard on it that when I finished, it didnt matter that the whole place around my stage was yellin' and applaudin' and screamin' for more. His chair was empty. When I got back to the changin' room, the girls were all, like, "Wow, can you teach me that?" "That was so amazing!" Frank, our manager, said it was the hottest thing he'd seen in years, and that's pretty high praise from a guy who's seen a girl ride a pole for twenty years. But I never showed anyone how to do it. It wasnt for them. It was for him. He never came back. I still dont get it.