As Pam advised, Tommy walked up to the white security guard at the door, who happened to be looking straight at him and asked, "Young man, I need to see your ID to decide if you can go in." ”

"Bruce of Hill Street." Tommy took out the day card and said to the other party.

The white security guard glanced at the black card ticket in Tommy's hand: "Boy, no one told you that you need to pay a two-dollar toll in addition to the code?" ”

Tommy Hawke hesitated, took out two one-dollar bills and handed them to the other party, knowing that he would need to pay extra, so he would not have ridden seventeen kilometers on his bicycle to patronize it.

Seeing that there was no one nearby, the white security guard took the money, tilted his head behind the door, and said with a wicked smile: "Go in and enjoy, boy, remember clearly, don't make trouble, because that will hurt me." ”

The Paradise Club is no stranger to Tommy Hawke, a long-established club chain that he had visited with his classmates at the Paradise Club in Boston when he was studying abroad in Boston.

Walking through the dark and narrow hallway, the receptionist at the front desk confirmed the tickets and let Tommy Hawke enter the loud-sounding, flashing lights, but shabby and deserted hall.

That's right, there will be no fragrant pictures of imaginary beautiful women dancing without an inch in the hall.

Cigarette butts all over the floor, choking smoke and cheap perfumes, large vacant seats, and dancers who writhing their bodies on a dimly lit stage with no breath and a face clear are the real picture of this mass consumption strip club.

Moreover, although there are indeed dancers dancing on the high stage in the hall inside, and the clothes are constantly reduced, Tommy can be sure that until the end of the stage, the other party will keep a full set of bikinis, and there will be no light picture.

Striptease is a legitimate profession in the United States, like teachers, drivers, doctors and other industries, the industry is very mature, and the rules are also strict, in the United States, this kind of club is hierarchical, there is indeed the kind of Tommy Hawke imagines that the drunken gold fans, naked beauty clubs exist, but the kind only exists in some specific cities, such as Las Vegas, New York, Boston, etc., generally the kind of high-end consumption places that are membership.

At the moment, there were only six or seven guests in the club hall, two of them were sitting at the bar drinking beer, and they didn't go to the show at all, and the rest of them were just sitting around the seats and holding their arms, and they didn't have any desire to throw change at the dancers.

Obviously, this is the coldest time for business at the club in the afternoon, and it may not be until nightfall at the earliest, when a large number of men have finished work, that business may be a little more prosperous.

Tommy Hawk didn't go to the show, he sat down at the bar, handed the change and said to the bartender, "Please give me a beer." ”

Then I looked at the price list on the bar, and compared to the Paradise Club in Boston in 2022, the price of the Providence Paradise Club in 1982 is really affordable.

Unlimited hall day tickets cost $15 per person.

A single hall ticket costs $3 per person.

Each dance between the single curtains costs $3.

The Champagne Room is priced at $50 every 15 minutes with a bottle of Champagne.

If guests want something more exciting, they need to spend extra, such as going to sit down in a single curtain, closing the curtain, and receiving the individual service of the dancer, although you can't use your hands and feet, but the dancer can sit on your lap and show for a while, two minutes a song, a song for three dollars.

If you want to go one step closer, you need to go to a higher champagne private room, the club will give you a champagne, and then it depends on the dancer's ability, so that the guest can buy her for more than fifteen minutes, generally if you buy a generous champagne for an hour, if the guest is not annoying, and has fun, then it is not surprising that there is a plot of going out for a supper and playing poker together.

"Boy, when I was as young and handsome as you were, I never needed to come to a place like this to meet women." In a position next to the bar, a white man holds up whiskey, looks sideways at Tommy Hawke, and jokes, "Don't you think falling in love with high school girls attracts you more than these dancing girls?" It's only an old guy in my thirties and forties who thinks of coming here to have some fun with tips. ”

Listening to the other party's accent, it was obvious that he was not a native of Rhode Island, but more like a visitor from Florida.

"Sir, I think your current mature appearance is also very attractive to women." Tommy Hawk took the beer from the bartender, gestured to the other party and said with a smile.

Bars are like that, whether you know each other or not, you can pass the time with a few small talks.

The reason why Tommy Hawke complimented the other party was actually thinking that if the middle-aged white man could be accosted by a dancer and could afford to pay for the champagne room, he might need Adlar to improve his staying power.

When the man saw Tommy respond to him, he laughed happily: "Boy, you are very good at talking, yes, of course I am very charming, if I am in Miami, I can take four or five Cuban babes in a night in a bar, but Providence is rotten, the bars around here are all drunk Irish drunkards, the bar girl can be my grandmother at her age, no way, I can only come here to drink and pass the time, at least there will be no drunks looking for trouble here, at most the dancers will persuade me to go to the private room to open a champagne." ”

"Are you here on a business trip, sir? That's a bit bad, the city is too small and the entertainment industry is scarce. Tommy Hawk said as he took a sip of beer into his mouth.

The man laughed: "No, worse than a business trip, I'm here on vacation." ”

"Vacation? Sorry, I rarely see outsiders coming to Providence for vacation. Tommy glanced at the other man, and if it weren't for some serious brain illness, no one would choose to vacation to a small remote city like Providence.

The middle-aged white man nodded in agreement, and shrugged with a wry smile: "I understand, but it can't be helped, the nature of the job determines where I should go on vacation, Will Hendrick, a maintenance engineer at the Rhode Island processing plant of Philip Morris Tobacco Company." ”

"Carlo...... Carlo Leon, a student at the University of Rhode Island. Tommy Hawke was stunned for a moment, and then responded with some surprise: "Sir, I ......"

With a "I understand" expression, the man interrupted Tommy Hawke's words: "You can't hide it from me, boy, I was just as curious about this kind of place that adults can visit when I was in high school, don't worry, I won't help you divulge secrets." ”

"I'm not curious here, sir, I'm curious about another question, when did Philip Morris Tobacco Company open a tobacco processing plant in Rhode Island?" Tommy asked the white man who called himself Will.

The white man drank the whiskey, made a gesture to the bartender, and then sighed and said to Tommy: "It has just opened, on the high seas two hundred nautical miles away from Providence, so that's why I can only stay here for a vacation, because I have to make sure that if there is a problem with the factory machinery, I can rush to repair it as soon as possible." ”

Tommy Hawke heard the other party's words, and his mind flashed to the nightly news he had seen on the TV before, and he smiled a little more, and said to himself in a voice that only he could hear:

"May God bless me, a poor American ghost."