Maria goes to Work

Within an hour Maria will be writhing on stage behind the grill of a steel cage, wearing nothing but a pair of killer heels and her killer panties. Her stomach in knots.  This heat. She’s sticky, uncomfortable.  Her swollen ankles throb with their own heartbeat. Her shoes are cement blocks.




I can’t go on I can’t go on I can’t go on.  She has to tell him tonight.

“Franco, wait up a sec. Franco.”  Her dress rips at the split as she runs to catch up with him.  

Franco turns but doesn’t break his stride.

“Franco, hang on, wait up. Franco.” Maria clutches his elbow.  Her hands are bright orange in this light, her nails and fingers the size of bear claws.

“What is it, Maria?” His breath sags with cigarettes and booze.

“It’s just – Franco.” She’s opens her palms. What does she think, that he will read her mind?  Tell her Don’t worry Doll, take the night off?  This guy? “I can’t go on,” she says.

Franco stops.  Even though she towers over him, she feels herself buckle like a shrinky dink.

His ice blue eyes narrow to slits. “The fuck?” 

“Well, I…” Maria twists her ring. “I’ve been thinking about changing…”

He stabs his middle finger into her shoulder.  “You get the fuck out there. Right. Now.”

Maria nods, hope deflating, hideous in her make-up, her sequinned frock, the itching jock, the fat ankles and blistered heels.

The lights flicker and the music starts.  It’s her cue to climb on stage.  The compere in his dirty jacket is already announcing her name.  Maria takes a deep breath and exhales. Her tears dry without leaving the dock. 

The moment she peels back the curtain, the boos go up.



Nina Couser 

This story is homage to a woman I met in Montecatini, Italy ca. 2006.  We shared the same carriage every day on the evening train.  I was on my way home.  She was on her way to work at a nightclub in a rough part of town.
Maria was tall with a deep voice.  Over the months of our commute, I learned she was saving money to complete her transition.  On my last night before leaving Italy, I walked her partway to her work and for the first time we shared the most tender parts of our lives.  That she hated her job.  That I was profoundly lonely. 
Something flowered between us that night, the budding of trust.  
I never said goodbye.  I never knew her real name.


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