At the end of the meeting, I slink back to my workstation, making eye contact with nobody.

Kallie, of course, has already heard all about my humiliation.

“Next time, run your story past me before you present it to the whole newsroom,” he advises brusquely. “I won’t spill your scoop to anyone, but I might just save you from making a tit of yourself.”

“No, thanks,” I say dejectedly. “I’m done. No more ideas for me. From now on I’m going to keep my mouth shut.”

“Nonsense. Is that any way to talk? What do you think we’re training you for?”

“I don’t know, because I obviously haven’t learnt anything.”

“Yes you have, you’ve learnt a lot. You just don’t realise it yet.”

I flop down in front of my computer and open a satellite map of Randburg.

Stupid caller.

Stupid open line.

And stupid me for thinking I might actually be getting the hang of this stuff. And what does Kallie mean that I’ve learnt a lot since I’ve been here? What have I learnt? Absolutely nothing, that’s what.

Although … if I’m honest, I suppose I didn’t know how to operate software like this when I first started out. In fact, I wasn’t much of a map-reader at all. Now I can navigate my way around the streets of Gauteng like a pro. I suppose that’s something.

And then there’s the audio equipment. That’s been pretty useful too, I guess. I’ve learnt how to make separate recordings of my voice, the voice of the person I’m interviewing, and all the background noises happening behind us. And how to mash them all together into an eight second, twelve second, or fifteen second segment that sounds seamless and spontaneous. I’ve even started thinking of twenty-five seconds as a really long time – practically a lifetime in radio terms.

But it’s all been for practice. Not one second of the many, many minutes of recordings I’ve made has actually been used. I seem to be just as far away from having my voice on the radio as I was when I started.

*****

It’s impossible to stay gloomy for long, though, because I have a really exciting evening coming up. Tonight’s the night Ajala is finally taking me to see his club.

He’s been bugging me to come and check it out for weeks now, but today is the first day we’ve managed to get our schedules into sync. Steph will have a fit when she finds out, but honestly, I can’t let that influence me. I’m an adult woman now. I’m allowed to choose my own friends.

Still, my heart sinks a bit when I see her car in its usual parking place as I arrive home. I was kind of hoping to sneak out quietly while she was gone.

Not only is she home, but she’s actually working on her thesis for once, instead of kicking back with the TV remote.

“That’s it,” I say, putting my bag down. “It’s going to snow for sure.”

“Ha ha. Very amusing.”

“Well, you must admit this is a pretty unusual sight. Is the TV broken or something?”

“Ha ha, again. If you must know, I’ve already postponed my proposal seminar twice. This time I’m going to have to face the music.”

“Make that snow and hail if you’re actually planning on making a deadline after only two postponements.”

She throws a scrunched-up paper ball at me.

“And what about you?” she asks. “Going out somewhere fabulous tonight, I suppose?”

“You suppose right, and I need to look the part. What would you wear to meet strippers?”

“Strippers?” Steph rubs her chin thoughtfully. “I guess it would depend on whether I was trying to fit in or stand out. Why, who’s meeting strippers?”

“I am. Ajala is taking me to check out his club tonight. I’ll even get to go backstage and meet the dancers.”

“Ajala?” Steph looks every bit as dismayed as I expected. “Oh, Trinity!”

“I know, I know. Don’t say it.”

“I just wish you hadn’t got so friendly with him, babe. I’ve seen some really dubious characters traipse up and down the stairs to visit him.”

“So he has some weird friends.” I shrug. “Don’t we all?”

“Friends … or clients?” Steph says darkly.

“Friends! For the last time, he is not a drug dealer.”

“But do you really have to go out with him tonight? I feel like I should call your mother or something.”

“My mother knows all about it. She thinks I should trust him unless I have good reason not to.”

“Trinity …”

Steph twists her fingers together, trying to find the right words to convince me not to go. As I watch her wrestling with herself, I’m suddenly struck by a brilliant idea.

“Why don’t you come with us?”

“Come with you?”

“Yes, why not? It would be so cool. Haven’t you always wanted to meet real exotic dancers? Well, this is your big chance. Oh, come on – it’ll be so much more fun if you’re there too.”

Steph hesitates, pulling a face. “I don’t know…”

But I can see she’s interested.

“Go on,” I coax. “Just think of it as protecting me. Ajala can’t murder both of us, right? That’s one whole extra body to dispose of. In fact, the more I think of it, it’s actually your duty to come with me.”

“We-ell … when you put it that way, I suppose I could…”

“Yay!” I jump up and down excitedly.

“But I’m only coming along to protect you, okay? Not because I want to.”

“Sure, sure, absolutely. As long as you’re there, I don’t mind. Now, what are we going to wear? We need to look just right.”

We spend a happy half hour choosing our outfits. It takes us less than a second to decide that we want to blend in rather than stand out. Only, we’re not quite brave enough for nipple caps and thongs.

“How does this look?” Steph asks, after trying on a few things.

“Wow.”

She’s teamed the shortest mini-dress she owns with a pair of my black, thigh-high boots. Thanks to kickboxing classes, her thighs are slim and toned, and the effect is pretty awesome.

I, on the other hand, haven’t been to gym in weeks. Luckily, cleavage isn’t affected by exercise. I take my sparkly silver top with the deep V-shaped slash at the back, and put it on back to front.

Steph is speechless when I turn around to show her.

“What do you think?”

“I think you’d better wear a jacket until we get inside the club. You could get arrested for going out in public like that.”

“So, do you reckon we look like exotic dancers?” I join her in front of the mirror.

She stares at our reflection and shakes her head. “We look like we should be standing on a street corner in Oxford Road.”

“Are you saying we should change?”

“I’m saying we should put on our makeup. Come on, Ajala will be here any minute.”

*****

In the end, we decide not to wait for Ajala in the flat, but to try out our new image on some of the neighbours.

I SMS Ajala to let him know that we’ll be waiting in the car park for him. Then we head out into the freezing winter night.

There aren’t many people about, it’s too chilly for that, but we don’t have to wait long for the first reaction. Mr van Heerden from Block A almost hits a pillar when he catches sight of us. We give him a cheeky wave as he drives out the gate, still staring at us in his rear-view mirror.

“You’d better get in the car before you cause an accident,” says a deep voice behind us.

Steph jumps and gives a tiny squeal, and we both turn around fast.

Ajala has his car keys in one hand and his briefcase in the other. His smile flashes under the lights, as his eyes rest on Steph.

“This is how you normally dress on a Thursday night, yes? Or you were thinking of auditioning later on tonight?”

“We were just trying to fit in,” I answer for both of us, since Steph seems to have lost the power of speech.

“Well, you look very nice. It will be an honour to escort you to my club. Let me unlock the car.”

“There, isn’t he a gentleman?” I whisper in Steph’s ear as Ajala opens the door for both of us. “And see how smart he looks. He’s wearing a suit and everything.”

“Are you kidding?” Steph hisses back. “That just makes him look more like a gangster than ever. Give him a fedora and an Italian accent, and he could step right onto the set of Goodfellas.”

“Oh, nonsense, I think he looks lovely. Now behave. You promised you were going to try to be nice.”

It’s a bit of a tight squeeze to fit three of us into the two-seater convertible, but we manage, with me sitting slightly forward. I wrestle the seatbelt around Steph and me, and click it into place. We’re ready to go.

“I thought your partner might be joining us tonight,” Ajala says as we accelerate along Outspan Road towards Rivonia. “But I don’t quite know where we would have put him.”

“Partner?” I say blankly. “Oh, you mean Ethan. No, I don’t think this is his kind of scene. I didn’t even think of inviting him.”

“I would have liked to get his reaction. This, after all, is what I am trying to achieve – a dance venue that attracts couples. A place where men and women feel equally comfortable.”

“Never going to happen,” Steph says shortly. “Girls might go along to please their boyfriends, but it’s never going to be their own independent choice.”

“But …”

“But nothing. No woman in her right mind would choose to spend an evening at a strip club.”

“Yes, but as I said before, it’s not actually a …”

“Oh, please. That’s such a lame male fantasy. Hey, Trinity?”

“Um …”

“It’s not the kind of thing that a girl would ever enjoy. Especially not when she’s out with her boyfriend. She’d want him paying attention to her, not to the girls on stage.”

“Well, I think we should see it before we judge it.”

I glare at Steph as if to say Stop being such a Rottweiler, so she shuts up. I can’t understand why she’s being so confrontational.

Soon we’re out of the suburbs and into the neon glow of Rivonia’s clubland. Ajala has to slow his pace to a crawl as the traffic jostles for parking space. Steph and I don’t often come out this way at night. The clubs are a little too edgy for us. You never know when some steroidosaurus bouncer is going to go postal and start stabbing someone with a broken bottle.

“Do you think this is it?” Steph whispers in my ear, as Ajala slows down in front of a gaudy strip club.

“ I hope not,” I mutter.

We can hear the music pumping from here. Four big bouncers are lined up at the door, roughly frisking everyone who goes in. It looks like the entrance to a high-security bank vault. Above, there’s an enormous flashing neon sign showing the silhouette of a woman doing a table dance.

“That’s Le Club,” I say. “See the logo?”

Steph frowns enquiringly as she points at yet another strip club with scary bouncers and pounding music. It’s called Daisy Dukes, and there’s a huge neon silhouette of a pole dancer.

I shake my head.

The bumper-to-bumper traffic begins to clear as we come to a slightly quieter part of the road. And this is where Ajala turns off.

Steph pinches my thigh.

We turn into a small, boomed parking lot. The guard waves us through with a smile. The club, if that’s what it is, is in an old, double-storeyed house. The exterior decor is black and white checkerboard, and a sign saying “Glitter” is designed to look like old newsprint. Nothing about it suggests that any dancing – exotic or otherwise – might be going on inside.

In fact, what it reminds me of is some of the clubs we went to in London. They were so discreet that you’d often walk right past without realising they were clubs.

“Here we are.”

Ajala jumps out to open the car door for us, and does a quick survey of the parking lot.

“Not bad for a Thursday night.”

It’s nine o’clock in the evening and there are only a couple of parking spots empty. It’s not exactly swarming with cars like some of the other places we passed, but it looks busy and inviting.

“Where are the bouncers?” Steph asks, echoing my thoughts.

Ajala looks at her quizzically. “You were hoping to see some?”

“No, not exactly. I was just wondering where they were. And don’t say you don’t have any, because I won’t believe you. Even normal clubs have bouncers.”

I wince. She’s back in Rottweiler mode.

“We do have security personnel, but we don’t keep them standing outside. We find it puts the customers off, especially the ladies. Our club is not soft on security, however. Look up there …and there …”

Steph and I see two discreet cameras homing in on us. They’re so well camouflaged by the decor that I would never have spotted them.

“Security is watching us from a control room upstairs,” Ajala explains. “We have cameras scattered all over the club. If there’s trouble, a guard arrives to break it up in seconds. But we don’t keep bouncers on the floor. They cause more trouble than they’re worth, in my opinion, and their presence actually encourages bad behaviour among the patrons.”

“That’s what we always say,” I nod. “Don’t we, Steph? The club with the most bouncers is the one where fights break out first.”

“Mmm.”

Steph still refuses to be impressed. But I notice her eyes widen as we step through the door. The multilevel dance floors are all black-and-white checkerboard, but the rest of the décor has accents of pink, silver and pearl. The lighting is high-tech – in varying shades of rose pink. The eating area is the focal point, with black, high-backed chairs and round tables draped in white floor-length tablecloths. There are multiple bar access points, all with shiny granite counters.

Ajala rests his hand lightly on my elbow and steers me towards one of the few empty tables.

“I reserved this one especially for us,” he smiles. “You’ll have the best view of the club from here.” He pulls out our chairs and we sit down. “Will you please excuse me for a moment? I need to catch up with my staff and see if there’s any troubleshooting to be done.”

“No problem.” I smile back at him. “Take your time.”

As he disappears through a private door at the back of the club, I turn to Steph.

“Isn’t this amazing? Check out the attention to detail. I wonder who did the interior design. And just look at those dancers. This must be what it feels like to be on the set of a music video.”

There are raised platforms all over the club, but instead of girls taking their clothes off, both male and female performers dance to the beat of the music. It’s sexy and edgy, not sleazy at all.

“And have you noticed the waiters?” I clutch Steph’s arm as one shimmies past us. “Have you ever seen so many hot guys in one place?”

The waiters are all wearing fitted tuxedos with bowties, and no shirts. And they all have killer bods. The waitresses have similar outfits, but with bikini tops under their jackets.

“They even have cocktail menus and everything,” I say happily.

“You can get cocktails anywhere,” Steph shrugs grumpily. “You don’t need to come to a strip club to find a cocktail menu.”

I give an exasperated sigh. “Why are you being so cross? You can see this isn’t really a strip club. It’s just like a normal club with a bit of a bite to it.”

“Yes, but did you hear what that guy said to me when we walked in?”

“No, what did he say?”

“He said, ‘Is there anything else I can get you?’”

I suck my breath in sharply. “That bastard! How dare he?”

“You know what he meant by that.”

“Um … that he wanted to know if there was anything else he could get you?”

“Oh come on, Trinity!” she says impatiently. “Not even you can be that …”

“That what?”

“Naïve.”

“Oh. I thought you were going to say dumb.”

“That too. You know as well as I do that when somebody asks if they can get you anything else, they’re really asking if you want drugs.”

“They are?”

“Trinity …” she says warningly.

“Okay, okay.” I roll my eyes upwards and sigh. “I admit that might be true some of the time, but it’s not true now. They’re probably just taking extra good care of us because we’re with Ajala.”

“That’s another thing. I don’t know why you even invited me to come along with you when you were just going to spend the evening flirting with him anyway.”

I gape at her.

“Flirting with him?”

“Yes, flirting with him. Don’t think I haven’t noticed the way the two of you have been smiling at each other, and all that touchy-feely stuff. I’m not a complete moron, you know.”

For a moment, I don’t quite know what to say. This is so outrageous, I’m not sure how to handle it.

My mind flicks back to earlier, when Ajala put his hand on my elbow and when he smiled as he excused himself from the table. Could anyone really have thought we were flirting? Surely not. Except that someone did. Someone who knows me very well.

“Steph,” I say after a moment. “You know I’m in a relationship with Ethan, right?”

“Of course. And that just makes it all the more …”

“And you know I’d never flirt with another guy while I was with him?”

“Well, that’s what I used to think.”

“I wouldn’t! Of course I wouldn’t. You know how I feel about cheating. It’s not even an option for me.”

“But then why were you so … you know?” She waves her arms around vaguely.

“Steph, I have no idea what you saw, or what you thought you saw, but I can promise you this. There’s not even a flicker of attraction between Ajala and me. I might not always know when someone is offering me drugs, but I do know when a guy is flirting with me. And Ajala was absolutely not. The only one behaving inappropriately tonight is you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. The PMS queen. Ajala really hasn’t done anything to deserve this. I wish you’d just snap out of it and behave normally.”

A waiter arrives with our drinks, and Steph takes a thirsty sip of her Long Island Iced Tea.

And then – just like that – she does snap out of it. As though someone has flicked a switch, Scary Steph goes back into hiding and Nice Steph comes out to play. Not even Ajala coming back a few minutes later tips her back into grumpiness.

It’s such a relief.