Jenny's voice, though not her only identifier, was the one Dahlia most relied on and enjoyed. It was smooth and confident, warm despite the fact that there was no actual physical warmth to her. She responded to it in kind, smiling despite herself. "I'd say the same, but, you know," she teased, picturing Jenny how she assumed her to look. No matter how many times she'd touched her face, the picture would always be little better than a watercolor, but it was something. She had delicate features with high, elegant cheekbones and, according to her, blonde hair that felt luxurious to the touch. And if there was anything Dahlia knew intimately, it was luxury.
"You smell nice," Dahlia mused, able to pick up hints of whatever perfume Jenny wore tonight. "I'm sure you look beautiful, too." She moved into the bedroom with Lucy leading the way and, once inside, she dropped the dog's leash and commanded her to stay. Lucy wasn't Jenny's biggest fan, to say the least. Some nights, whenever she wouldn't stop growling or throwing a fit, Ginnifer would allow her to keep the dog in a separate room with the assurance that she would be returned to her in the exact shape she was left. Tonight, though clearly annoyed, Lucy didn't seem as if she would be making things difficult. Instead, she laid down and kept her eyes on Jenny, ever cautious.
If Jenny had seen Dahlia just three years before, she wouldn't have believed the girl standing before her was the same one. So pressured by her mother to be the perfect image of a young woman destined to be Miss America, ("Stand up straighter, Dahlia. You're slouching, dear. Don't you think you could stand to lose a pound or two?") she'd been every bit the goody-two shoes her parents wanted her to be. But then there'd been an accident, and Dahlia's life made a drastic turn. Nothing, including Dahlia, would ever be the same.
She still remembered the day she came home with the nose ring, and the simple memory of her mother's full blown hissy fit made Dahlia quietly crack a smile to herself.
"How's your night going so far?" Small talk might have seemed strange in a place like this, but even though Dahlia knew better, she considered Jenny more than someone she paid for favors. Over the past two years, Dahlia had experienced her fair share of the entertainers in the Red Door, but Jenny had been her very first those two years before. Their very first meeting, Dahlia told her that she didn't want her to be gentle with her - didn't want her treating her like she was fragile. She didn't want Jenny taking care of her. At all. She had her overbearing, obsessive parents for that.
No, the last thing she wanted from Jenny was to be coddled.
It was a well known rule here that you had to pay up front, so without saying a word, Dahlia reached into her purse and handed Jenny an envelope. It wasn't just the payment for tonight, but rather the payment for the entire week. Sometimes, Dahlia found herself here four or five times a week, and it wasn't entirely unheard of for her to go even more than that.