Act Five: Show Business
Warning: The following chapter contains language depicting sexual inuendoes with actions such as under age drinking and prostitution. Please be advised.
"Mr. Grant?" Aaron asks the crowd, staring eerily at Grant, his eyes piercing through his physique.
"No, uh— call me Ronin, Mr. Miles. Ronin Grant." He offers his hands as Aaron eyes him in terror. Aaron looks at both Jude and Ivy, their eyes screaming to "just shake hands already".
Aaron awkwardly takes Ronin's hands as he tries to make eye contact with him.
"So, uhm, Mr. Grant—"
"Ronin" Ronin interpolates.
"Oh right, Ronin. So uhm, quick question. Why are you here?" Aaron asks him while Ronin retorts with a smirk.
"I could say the same for you, Mr. Miles, why are you here?"
"Aaron, please. Call me Aaron."
"That was rude of me, Mr. Aaron." Ronin over-enunciates Aaron's name. "Again, why are you here?"
Aaron sniffles. "Well, as far as you've heard, I'm here for work."
"No, no, no. Aaron. My question does not exactly pertain as for the reason why you're here, no, no. My question is, why is your kind here? A rich young man like you, with a father affiliated of the government. Do you need money?" Ronin shakes his head. "I hardly doubt that. Are you bored? But this job's not fun at all. Unless of course, you are here to whistle blow over this little business of ours—"
"No. I'm not here for that." Aaron looks at Ronin steeply.
"And how can we trust your words, again?"
"If that were my plan, I would have already called the cops on you, but I didn't. I don't have a reason to. I don't really have the incentives to. Rather, I'm here for my friends."
Ronin looks over the people at the back. "Friends? Which friends? Mr. Kelvin? I don't see any trace of Mr. Kelvin here."
Aaron shows a disgruntled look. "No, Mr. Grant— I mean Ronin. I'm not exactly pertaining to Baron."
Ronin takes off his glasses and wipes it over with his shirt slowly.
"Interesting postulation, Mr. Miles, but I believe I haven't seen you hanging out with any of these people here at school. You know, I watch over them at school, making sure they're safe, and no one's suspicious of them doing this line of work…"
"Don't worry Ronin. Aaron means well. When he said friends, he was pertaining to me." Jude answers, pointing to herself.
"I guess Mr. Ronin over here must not be doing his job properly," Aaron teases him. "I found out your little secret even though you've always kept your eyes on these two girls. I mean— I believe that was what you were doing on the volleyball field that day, wasn't it?"
"Volleyball field? What volleyball field?" Ivy asks, intrigued.
"On the night I followed you over here, Ronin was eyeing both of you from the opposite side of the field." Aaron replies.
"I thought you had something to do at university that day, Ronin. Why were you staying behind, watching us?" Ivy asks.
"I just had to make sure you were fine." Ronin replies, cold sweat dripping over his ears. He avoids eye contact and turns around. "Anyway, Mr. Miles. I believe it's approximately two hours before clients start barging over the bar's entrance. You'll need to research one of the clients that has reserved for our special services here on Bar Fantasia. We'll need to get him. We'll need to make him come over and choose one of our ladies, Jude and Ivy, to be his escort for the night. To get more chances of winning, I'll need you to do background research on him. See his types. See his fetishes."
"His fetishes?" Aaron asks disgustingly.
"Yes. His fetishes. And I need you to choose which one of either Jude or Ivy will approach him tonight. I'll need you to prepare a design choice proposal that the client will like— something he will totally fawn over. Anyway, this is my first mission for you, Aaron. Think of this as your probation period. If you succeed, you're on the team. If not, you know the drill."
Ronin walks over to the counter and grabs a parcel. He hands it over to Aaron. Aaron opens it and sees a laptop inside.
"What's this for?" Aaron asks.
"Inside is our database. You'll need to connect the dots, to create a conclusion regarding our client's preferences." Ronin replies. "Oh, and one more thing— his name is Zhang. Eric Zhang."
***
"Eric Zhang. Forty-six years old. Is a businessman from Taipei. He is one of the board of the directors for a giant telecommunications company and was once apprehended for child molestation. Apparently, money had silenced the child's parents, making them withdraw their allegations." Aaron reads over the customer profile on the laptop's screen. "This guy's a monster. A creep. Are you sure you want to cater your services to this guy?" Aaron looks back to Jude and Ivy, standing behind him. Ivy snorts at Aaron.
"You know Aaron, if you have that kind of mindset in this industry, you'll never get customers." She leers at him. "Don't you get it? We're minors, and yet they're feasting on us. If you think that we're not serving to anyone that's not sick anywhere within their minds, that means, we're not fit for this industry." Ivy goes over to the table and grabs a shot of tequila. "If you still don't get my point Aaron, what I meant to say was that everybody— and I mean everybody in this industry is sick. Perverted, lustful, and sick."
Silence takes over for a while as Aaron blinks over and over, unable to contain the awkwardness.
"So uhmm— shall we continue?"
Ivy rolls her eyes, smirking. "Sure."
Aaron continues to look over Eric Zhang's details. "He is notoriously known to be an anime fanatic— a weeaboo."
Ivy leans over as she sucks on a lollipop. "So, what does this imply?"
Aaron smirks as he looks at Ivy. "For this mission, I think we need you, Ivy."
"Me?"
"Yes, you. And don't despair. According to the data, Eric Zhang's usual payout rate is quite high." Aaron's eyes ogles as he scrolls down on the laptop. "Wow— not only high, really high."
"High? How high?" Ivy asks, very intrigued.
"A hundred fifty thousand New Taiwan Dollars high."
Ivy raises a brow. "And how much is that again?"
Aaron scurries as he types down his phone's calculator. After converting, he looks at Ivy seriously, showing the calculator. "Five thousand US dollars, excluding tips."
***
"And you need me to dress up like this?" Ivy seethes as Jude tries to dress her up on the dressing room. Aaron, standing outside of the cubicle, laughs at her.
"Yes! It's what Mr. Zhang wants." Aaron replies, teasing her.
"But I don't want it!"
"How about the five thousand dollars?"
Ivy rolls her eyes. "Fine. I'll take it." She and Jude tries to fit in the knee-length stockings over to her legs. "But no taking pictures, okay?"
Aaron chuckles. "Okay, okay."
After a few minutes, Jude finally wraps up and finishes dressing up Ivy.
"Okay, we're ready!" Jude shouts over from inside the cubicle. "Are you ready? In three, two, one…"
The drapes open. Aaron laughs out loud as Mark tries to hide his chuckle. Ivy hides her face in embarrassment as Jude looks at them obliviously.
"Stop laughing at me!" Ivy protests.
"B-but you look—" Aaron boisterously laughs as he points at Ivy's outfit. "Who knew you'd look this hilariously good in a sailor moon outfit! You look so good that it's actually funny!"
Ivy tries to cover her cleavage with her hands. Her cheeks flushing red. "Stop laughing! I mean— why did you choose me for this shit?"
Aaron chuckles for a few more rounds. "Well, it's because Jude kind of fits the hot, cool girl, abusive lady style. As for you, Ivy, you kind of feel like a loli."
Ivy rolls her eyes. "But Jude's more of a loli than I am. She used to wear those ponytails before."
Aaron nods his head. "Touché. I guess people change. Well, physically at least."
Jude brows furrow. "What do you mean?"
Aaron smiles. "You used to look so innocent but now you look fucking cool and badass. But still, I believe that deep inside, you're still the same Jude. The Jude in the ponytails." He smiles, teasing her.
"Stop it you two." Ivy complains. Mark's brows furrows. "Anyway Aaron, what's the plan?"
Aaron smirks as he grabs a notebook. "Here's the plan, you should memorize these words…"