1st Submission for Feedback- "One"
Minionette Barry is a show stopper.

Of course she’d never brag.

It’s been said that all of the dancers at Folies Bergere are phenomenal-- that they give the most dazzling, the most sensual, the most erotic performance this side of decency in the whole of Las Vegas. Draped in feathers and sequins and shimmering threads, they sing and dance and bat their eyelashes, their teeth slick with Vaseline, a golden glow painted on, adhesive the only force strong enough to hold the tit tassels where they should be.

This is a gentleman’s show. If you want the full monty, there’s room at La Femme.

Minionette is a soloist. She’s a standing ovation, an encore with baited breath. Legs to heaven and sex on high heels.

It wasn’t always so. There was a time when her knees were dimpled, a feature adored by her boyfriend and lamented by her. A bit too thick in the ankles she was, and unsteady on her toes. She had her place in the corp. It was a good one for a dancer with nice kicks but a world of insecurity. Fat where there should be none.

Minionette wants more. They call her a stripper back home, an exhibitionist shaking her goods for a cheap dollar, and she believes it might be true. She aches for fame instead. To dance and sing her way into a spotlight where she can keep her clothes on. She wants the lights to shine just for her.

Lately it seems that she’s on her way-- that her star has been snatched up from obscurity and rocketed into space.

How’d it happen? What changed her fate? Her mother wants to know. But it’s a secret. Minionette bent the rules and she doesn’t look back.

Except, of course, whenever payment is due.

She has a break between numbers. All the other girls are onstage. The bulbs around her mirror burn hot and make her nose glisten. She cakes on powder. Beside the cans of hair spray, a bottled water leaves a puddle. She sips from a straw to keep her lipstick on. When the footsteps come, she thinks it's security, and opens her mouth to ask for,

“Another bottle of water, Richie? This one’s getting war-Mmph!”

Her mouth tastes like his fingers. Cruel, tight fingers that smear her make-up and cause her teeth to cut her lip. It’s a shift that she can’t understand. The fine suit, the clean jaw, the polite way he puts his hand on her back sometimes. Where’s it gone?

“Minnie Bargman.”

Darian is sick of this one. The showgirl. She’s little better than an exotic dancer wrapping her slot around a pole. When he met her, she was about a month’s rent from considering it. But she has delusions of grandeur, and it makes her ripe for the plucking. Unfortunately it doesn’t make her good for a loan.

“How many times do we have to go over this?” He speaks to her ear in a loud, cold voice. Spittle tickles the lobe when he’s angry.

The dealmaker puts the crook of his arm around her airway. He cinches it, because it’s fun to watch her buck in the chair. The more she struggles, the harder he squeezes. He has an image of her spine snapping at the top, delicate as a spindle. That’s not what he came here for.

Uproarious applause comes to them from the audience, along with the bark of an announcer. He says her stage name to enthusiastic response. It’s a cue that they won’t be alone for long. Darian pulls her off the stool and keeps her close. “Walk.”

Backstage is like a maze. Sections are cordoned off for dressing rooms, for refreshments, for electronic equipment and wiring. They weave through it with a little trouble. Minnie’s shoulders bump into things, and Darian knows she’s trying to draw attention, so he drives her forward with his body, a battering ram going for the emergency exit. No one gets in the way.

The door emits a shrill ring and won’t shut up until it closes. Darian puts his foot in her back and kicks her out. It’s a pathetic thing. You can put a woman in the fanciest clothes that money can buy, and she still looks like a dog on her way down.

Minnie skins her knees. It runs her pantyhose, and when she crawls her knees look funny poking through. Bits of gravel stick to her. She knows she’s in trouble now, but her brain can’t figure a way to save herself, except to beg. She turns over on her ass and puts her hand up. “No... Please, I’ll give it back, I promise... Just-- I just need some more time, a little--”

“Get up.” He grabs her by the chin and pulls.

On her wobbling feet, Minnie looks hopeful.

It’s not about mercy. Darian doesn’t do forgiveness. Every move that he makes is a calculated one. He is a mock-up of a human, a demon wearing the look of a man, but inside there are parts missing. Right now the metaphysical balance of give and take is off. Minnie can’t do the former. He takes it personally.

“What I‘ve given you, I can take away.” He loves it when her eyes widen as the bat comes into view. He gets a better grip. He’s holding it like second nature, a regular sportsman with his game face on. She’s wondering where it came from.

The truth is that he pulled it from her head. A farfetched fear, but Minnie’s seen a lot of movies. A bat is rough. It plays dirty. It’s an amateur jump in a back alley. Simple but effective.

Darian swings.

It is the nature of a victim to cover her head. He’s aiming for her knees.

The first one pops like a gunshot. There’s a mess of bone sticking out, of blood running into nylon and getting sticky. When she screams, it’s an awful noise. An aural assault. A ragged garble of vocal scraping and saliva, of air being sucked back in so she can do it all over again.

Minnie’s on the ground and Darian is meticulous. Eight more swings.

Nothing but legs.