Twas the Night

The fat slob sat, his face sweaty and ruddy, as the soft flesh of the scantily clad black girl gyrated on his lap, pressing rhythmically against his engorged cock. She straddled his thigh, the heat of her pussy leaving a damp patch on his suit pant where she rubbed him. Whenever he could get away with it, he shyly bucked against her, pressing the ridge of his cock against the top of her own thigh.

His eyes were torn between her beautiful black face, with coal black almond eyes and full, beckoning lips, and her delightfully firm, round breasts, with the tempting crescents of the edges of dark nipples peeking out above the lacy lavender bra she wore, with nothing more than that and matching lavender lace panties to cover her smooth, creamy coffee skin.

His eyes settled on those nipples for a long moment, as another bead of sweat rolled down his temple. A moan from the girl to his right, giving a lap dance to his business partner Sal, elicited an unexpected and embarrassing grunt of his own. He almost came then. He licked his lips, imagining the tender feel of those bittersweet, dark chocolate nipples against his tongue.

The girl placed a long, delicate finger gently under his chin, lifting his eyes to meet hers. Once she held his gaze, she reached behind her with both hands, while arching her back, thrusting her pert, full breasts forward towards him. There was a snap as the clasp of her bra came free. She curved her shoulders forward, letting the bra sag down, not off, but far enough. He looked down, salivating, to see the protruding nubs of long, hard nipples poking out above the purple lace.

She gyrated slowly and sensuously again, while pushing her breasts almost into his face. One delicate coffee hand drifted down to firmly brush the fabric covering the length of his shaft. With a barely stifled moan, the fat man came in his pants, as Sal, having come already himself, laughed heartily. He looked at his friend, his own face burning with embarrassment. He nervously, ashamedly laughed with him.

"She's always good, every time she's so fucking good. But you won't do more, sweetie? Just for Uncle Harry, for just a little more cash? No? I have to keep asking. You're too sweet to not even ask."

She smiled down at him in silence.

He gave the girl a very healthy tip. She was his favorite. His only constant disappointment was that, unlike most of the other girls, she wouldn't take the lap dance a step further, into the back room. He pay anything to put his mouth on those nipples, and his cock in where it belonged.

Still, a lap dance with her was better than an hour of privacy with any of the other girls.

* * *

Al sat on the bus, staring blankly, straight ahead and unseeing, as blackness drifted by outside, decorated by the yellow orange lights of apartment windows and street lamps. If the bus didn't rock and jerk and growl and wheeze, he could think that it was the world that was moving by, instead of him moving through it. He never seemed to be getting anywhere, while the world always seemed to be moving on.

He very definitely did not look at the two small black children across the aisle, staring wide eyed at him in calm silence. They didn't see him anyway, he thought. They just saw the bright red and white suit, and the fake beard, and his own massive bulk, and whatever it was they expected was underneath it all.

They flanked their overweight mother, leaning tightly into her as if they were all conjoined triplets. The woman's thick thighs, covered by taut, brown, sweat pants, spread out over her plastic seat like double chocolate chip cookies spreading on a baking sheet.

Al grimaced, then looked away, just as the bus lurched to an abrupt halt. He rose slowly, wearily, and lazily, his back aching from the strain of getting his own overlarge belly up, and then upright, and then steady under tired legs. The late hour didn't help matters, after a morning of walking blocks and blocks looking for odd jobs with no result, followed by a double shift of sitting with miscreant children crushing his lap and begging for things. The four stale donuts he'd had for dinner, scavenged from the trash can in the employee's cafeteria, settled deeply into his stomach and taunted him from there.

He half stumbled out of the bus into the dirty slush covering the sidewalk. He hated that part of city life. The most beautiful white blanket of snow was quickly churned into a frozen chocolate murk by feet and cars and buses, into something cold and solid enough to sit uncomfortably in the seam of a shoe or boot, yet fluid enough to get in there, and then penetrate more deeply. The high, black Santa boots would have served him well here, had the store manager allowed him to wear them outside the store. Instead, the cold wet slush quickly infiltrated the holes in his torn, old sneakers.

Al trudged on, wondering if Dahlia was home yet. She should be, but you never knew. The girl was always out and about. She said she was working three jobs, and she probably was. She was a good kid.

He wished she were out looking for a man, someone better to spend her sparse free time with than her burnt out failure of a father, but their lifestyle probably didn't leave her any chance to meet someone of interest. He kept hoping, for her sake, but it never seemed to happen.

She was certainly good looking enough, better than good looking enough. She'd been gawky and rather homely in high school, and her psyche bore the scars from how she'd been treated. But somehow, somewhen the girl had suddenly and unexpectedly blossomed with age. Now, at twenty five, she had mysteriously grown into a sensuous beauty that would have embarrassed her mother, had her mother stuck around.

Al wondered where she'd gotten her looks. Not from him, certainly, and not from the tortured shrew that left him, and her, to fend for themselves. Her mother had had her charms, and was a wild, unrelenting animal in bed, but she was not the most attractive of women, even during any too rare pleasant moods.

He stopped to look at his dim reflection in a storefront window. His face was old, and fat, and haggard, and tired. He could just make out the five o'clock shadow, too thick and unkempt, peppered with black and gray, peaking out around the fake gray beard. There were canyons and crevices around his eyes, and in his jowls. He realized that if he weren't a hundred pounds overweight, he'd probably look like he was ninety. His face looked pale and colorless in the dark reflection, masking what he knew were cheeks that were an insultingly apropos Santa rosy red, from the cold and the extreme exertion of hauling his useless bulk along just three blocks of sidewalk. Nine more blocks to go.

Fifty seven years had not been kind to him, and he hadn't been kind to himself.

Al moved on, burrowing through snow that thickened as he moved further from the main thoroughfare. He worked his way, panting and wheezing, past small old houses, proudly decorated with strings of glowing colored lights and three foot high plastic candy canes and toy solders, and with wire reindeer that bobbed their heads robotically up and down as if snacking on mouthfuls of snow.

* * *

He got to the top of the fifth flight, where he had to sit and catch his breath again. He'd already stopped once, on the third floor, both to rest, and to hide part of the cash. He'd been paid today, but he couldn't let his daughter see it all. She'd want to spend it on something they needed, like food, or proper clothes, or a real apartment or, God forbid, Christmas presents.

He had other plans for the money.

He was sweating profusely beneath the Santa suit. He wished he could have gotten the electricity and the heat working in an apartment on a lower floor, but he was lucky to have found this, and done what he had. When he'd lost their last real apartment, finding a place to squat had been frightening. He and Dahlia had spent three long nights on the streets. Thank God it had been summer.

Al heard the door open. Dahlia came out, and down to meet him, her black hair shining, her brown eyes gleaming, with a bright white smile behind her dark, caramel colored skin. She looked nothing like her mother. Her mother had had skin almost as black as coal, and the only expression he could remember on her face was one of scorn and dismissal.

Not that Al hadn't earned it. He'd never been good enough at anything. He was handy with things, with plumbing and electricity, but never with people. No one ever seemed to notice how good he was with things. Someone else always took the credit for what he did, while he eventually took the blame for something someone else had done. Sooner or later, no matter what he did, he lost a job, and then the next, and then the next.

The day came when there were no more jobs. Department store Santa was now the best that he could do, and in three weeks that would end, too.

Dahlia kissed him on the forehead.

"Merry Christmas, Santa," she said.

Her voice was soft, almost the whisper of a frightened child. She helped him up.

"Let's get you inside, Santa. It's time for you to take a load off of those weary feet."

He tried not to let her help him. He was far too big. She wasn't petite, but she wasn't a big girl, either, and she wasn't strong. The fact that she had marvelous curves didn't translate into muscle and strength. There wasn't an ounce of extra weight on her, except for the delightfully perfect padding she enjoyed on her full,perky breasts and smooth, round butt. That was his fault, he knew. Between the two of them, they made enough money now to get by, but he couldn't be accused of fattening her up.

He wondered, for a moment, how he'd gained so much weight himself.

Trash can donuts, he thought sourly, and trash can Chinese food and trash can pizza.

* * *

Dahlia did her best to help him up the stairs.

"How was work?" he asked. "Did those tight clothes earn you some good tips?"

She smiled at him. He knew it came out wrong, but she didn't have to hear it wrong. She knew he didn't at all mean it the way it sounded. They both knew they needed any edge they could get. There was no harm in providing the customer with a little show of sex appeal while waiting tables. That was the least of it, actually.

He didn't know that she'd quit one of her waitressing jobs to work at the club, doing considerably more than just wearing tight pants.

"It was good, the tips were good," she said.

She felt guilty about the unspoken lie. The tips were good, better than good. That part was true. Tips for giving lap dances were very, very good.

She had so many secrets she kept from him now. That was okay, she told herself. She wasn't a kid anymore. She didn't have to tell him everything. But she felt guilty none the less.

"How was the store?" she asked.

He rolled his eyes as he wheezed out his response.

"Same. Whiny, spoiled brats, cute as can be, but spoiled and whiny. And they ask me for things, and I tell them they'll get them, when I have really no idea. I must be breaking a hundred hearts a day. It sucks."

"You used to like doing Santa. You're good at it, and you said it made you feel good."

"Not much feels good these days," he said as they staggered up the next two flights together.

He looked so tired. Dahlia felt like crying, but she kept the joy and smile in her face, for him. She knew he had nothing left to live for but her. If she left him, if she weren't there for him, she was certain that he would simply stop. As it was, even for her, she wasn't sure how much further the man could go.

She thought back to the happy days. They'd never been well off, but they once had one side of an old two family on Elm St. They even had a small yard, and Dad had religiously kept the meager grass cut and the one lone hedge well trimmed. She rode a small bicycle up and down the street with Gonzi, her buddy Alberto Gonzales, while he watched from the stairs, a tall, powerful figure of a father watching over her all the time.

Her dad always said that they lived inside a rainbow. They had every race and nationality on their street, Brazilians and Jamaicans and Vietnamese, hispanic and black and asian, all scraping to get by, hoping some day to make more of themselves. In fact, her dad was the only white person on the street, something that Dahlia never really even recognized until later in life.

Then her mother would come out and shrilly demand something else of him, as if he never gave enough. She tore him down, day after day, except the only way you could see it was by the weight he gained. The more she ripped him up, the bigger and slower he got, and the more things went wrong.

She looked down at her small hand in his, pinkish white and meaty, almost puffy. His hands were huge compared to hers. Her fingers were delicate and smooth, perfect, caramel flesh against his cragged, calloused pasty skin. His fingers were cold. She squeezed his hand tightly, then brought it up to cup it in both of hers, rubbing vigorously.

She smiled at him again, hoping to give him warmth in any way she could, inside and out.

* * *

When he got inside, Al noticed it immediately. They didn't have much to begin with, only what they could scavenge from what others had tried to throw away, that they could get to before the trash collectors got there. A low table, a torn couch, a torn easy chair with a broken foot rest, a mattress on the bare floor in Dahlia's room for her. Al usually slept on the couch or the easy chair, depending on which he suspected would hurt his back less that particular night.

Sitting on the table was a glass, and a quarter of a bottle of brandy.

Al never drank. He said they couldn't afford it, either the money spent, or the time wasted. Anyone else in the world, everyone else in the world, if put into their position would drink themselves silly. Not Al. He knew they just couldn't afford it. He stared at the bottle, and the already poured glass beside it.

"It's an early Christmas present," she said. "From me, to Santa."

Al smiled at her uncomfortably. He didn't want to make her feel bad, but they just couldn't afford this.

"Where?"

"A guy gave it to me, at work. He said he wasn't going to finish it, and he couldn't bring it home. He said his wife would have a shit fit."

Al let her lead him to his chair, where he plopped down, really too tired to even lean forward to pick up the glass. As if she sensed it, she bent over to pick up the glass for him.

* * *

She could feel him glancing at her ass. He did that some times. It wasn't lecherous or anything. He'd never given any signs that she inspired sexual urges in him. He was nothing like the rich scum at the Tiger Club, like the guy she gave the special to earlier in the day. He was a good father, a great father, and he'd sacrificed so much for her.

But he thought she was beautiful, and he hadn't had a woman in his life for ten years. So when she could, she put a show on for him. Tonight, she wore tight fitting black stirrup pants, below a tight knit red turtleneck covering her almost completely while still pronouncing her curves.

She bent just so, to accentuate the curve of her ass, then stood up and arched her back, turning at the waist, to accentuate the profile of her breasts. On a whim, she spun and fell into his lap, holding the glass just out of his reach.

She took a sip of it herself.

"Which list am I on this year, Santa? Have I been naughty or nice? Or a little of both?"

"Only nice, Dahlia. You don't know how to be naughty."

To that she stuck one full lip out in a pout.

"I do, too, Santa. I can be very naught. Very."

With that said, she took another, deeper swig of the brandy. It burned in her mouth, and then her throat, filling her with warmth, as she smiled into her father's twinkling eyes.

* * *

He'd unconsciously placed a hand on the curve of her hip, almost on her ass, when he felt his cock begin to stir. It shocked him into confused self recrimination, so that he removed the hand with a jerk. With both hands he reached out to take the glass, while hoping that she didn't notice his growing reaction to her beauty.

Liar. Sex appeal, he told himself. Not just beauty, but sex appeal. The girl had it all. He'd tried not to notice when she was younger, and he tried to ignore it now, but it was undeniable, and unavoidable. He'd never known such a desirable woman, but he never once let himself even think about those desires, not even to play them out in fantasy. She was everything to him, everything but that.

He was her father.

He took the glass from her unresisting hands. She stared at him, dark eyes twinkling. Her gaze dropped to his lips as he took a deep swig of the brandy himself, while he kept his own eyes locked on hers. He closed them to enjoy the warmth that filled his body.

Once his eyes closed, they were hard to open again. Blindly, he took another long sip. As he rolled the liquid within his mouth, savoring it, he felt Dahlia place a soft kiss on his nose.

"I love you, Dad."

The words floated into his blind consciousness, forcing a tight lipped, easy smile instantly to his face. She was a good kid.

* * *

Dahlia tried to study, but she couldn't concentrate. She'd changed into her flannel pajamas and slippers. The top was white and too big, the bottoms forrest green and a size too small, and both had assorted tears and holes. The slippers fit well enough, and were simple and warm. All in all, they were comfortable, and granted her some level of modesty at night around her father.

But comfort now turned toward sleepiness, as her own long day, another in a string of many, seeped into her bones and muscles. She stifled a yawn, struggling to make herself read more. She glanced at her father, then forced her eyes back to the page.

It was hard to keep the books hidden, and to squeeze the studying in so that he wouldn't know. She needed to do it whenever she could, but she couldn't tonight. She felt funny. Maybe it was the brandy, or how worked up she'd gotten at the Tiger Club. She almost enjoyed the dances she gave tonight. A part, a big part of her had wanted to give in to their extended advances, and not only for the extra money.

She glanced at her father again.

He'd fallen asleep in the chair after barely more than a glass. The poor man was at his end. He'd worked ceaselessly when she was young, but never getting ahead, only the have her mother abandon them and leave him with even more to do.

Still, he put everything out there, every penny he'd saved, to send her to college, where she'd blown it. She hadn't studied hard enough, she enjoyed the parties and boys too much, even though she knew they couldn't afford it. In the end she'd flunked out, and too late she'd realized that she'd ruined both of their lives.

And still he worked. Still, as they lost first the house, then their apartment, and one job after another. He got sick, and that cost them a bunch more. It was a lot of the reason that he didn't drink often, because he couldn't. His body couldn't take it.

Finally, too late, she'd realized how much help he needed. She got one job, and then another, but it wasn't enough. She kept one waitressing job, but left the job at the Q-Mart for the sleazy club, moving from erotic dancing to lap dances, to let lonely, needy, salivating men gawk and paw at her, for the extra cash it brought in.

It disgusted her, usually, but she did it. She'd been refusing to go the next step, to spread her legs for them and get that last, great payoff.

She feared that she had to. If she didn't do something soon, her father would fail, totally and completely.

She moved to the easy chair, where she balanced on the arm beside him, feeling like a little girl next to his substantial girth. She leaned forward to kiss him on the nose. He'd fallen asleep in the silly costume, hat, beard and all, taking time only to undo the suspenders and loosen the uncomfortably constricting, confining belt that held in his belly.