Sally lifts the card, her mouth pursed as she studies it, almost furtively considering it...<br/><br/>She sets the card down, feeling the eyes burning into her... what happened to this poor girl from West Texas, came to Sin City to hit it big and wound up broke, that'd make her scoot back her chair with her jean-clad thighs and stand up, in front of a room of total strangers..?<br/><br/>Curling one beckoning finger at the waitress, she whispers into the girl's ear and watches her go with half-veiled eyes... if the hostess is compliant, she'll dim the lights a little and cue up some music.  'Something slow,' Sally'd requested in a soft, husky voice, re-donning her hat low on her forehead.<br/><br/>The moment is fragile, hovering on the edge of a knife... too much, and she'd draw laughter.  Too little, and she'd look pathetic.  But if she can commit to this moment, feel it, believe it... then maybe she could make the others feel it, and believe it, too.  Just like when she plays her music... the way she can make the audience nod through the red heat and smoke and say,<i>Damn, that's beautiful...</i>Just like when she learned to make love to a boy... how much she'd savored every twitch of his muscles, every flutter of his breath... how powerful, how beautiful, yet how subservient to the emotion she had felt... a maestro, a slave, and an artist in one.  Conducting.  Feeding.  Releasing...<br/><br/>The music begins softly, fading up to a slow, droning hum.  It's "Wandering Star," by Portishead... one of Sally's favorite songs.  It's one that's always affected her in a surreal way.  It's affected her since she first heard it in the ways that senses can capture a moment; the way that sourwood honey and clean, sun-dried sheets carry her back to her Mama's yard over 10 years ago, and make that moment more real than the reality that surrounds her.  But the song isn't a vivid, sun-bleached memory... it's a place in her heart, a dark, warm, and cozy place that, when she hears the low, droning humming of that bass line, the thrumming rhythm as it takes a slow, steady, biological tempo up from nothing to the burning core of her desire... it helps her reach a part of her that not everyone sees... some don't even have.  A pitch-black zen of heartless, thoughtless pattern whose only desire was to take and be taken.<br/><br/>She begins swaying in a steady, languid half-tempo, shifting her weight as she rolls her hips and shoulders in a subtle shifting grind, then arching her back little by little, drawing her legs together in an almost demure, Marilyn-esque swivel as she bends at the waist and lets her short, black hair fall across her face before drawing herself up in a long, smooth roll of the upper body... serpentine in movement and grace, betraying an appetite for the carnal as she slowly straightens and lets her fingertips trail up her legs and lower torso...<br/><br/>The hat rolls smoothly into her open hands before she places it back on her head, higher this time as she cranes her neck up gracefully to meet it, thus stretching her lithe midsection in a long, gentle arch before flicking, almost accidentally, to loose the top button of her jeans.   One boot meets the table then, not shaking the heavy surface, but certainly capturing the attention of those not watching closely... she meets the dealer's eyes then, staring him down as she trails fingertips lazily down from her hat across her smooth, youthful face... pausing to tease at the bee-stung lips as if to chew at one long-fingered tip.  With a twist of her supple leg, she points her toe and slides her foot out cleanly-- a fascinating trick for those familiar with boots... hard as hell to get off... and leaves that boot to topple to the floor on its own.<br/><br/>The scratching sub-layer of the music settles in, hissing and whooshing rhythms flooding from a deejay table with the subtlety of the hissing winds of some distant void.  The singer's voice-- mournful and wanting-- echoes something in Sally's own heart.<br/><br/>She steps out of the other boot as easily, leaving bare feet to carry her across the rug.  Swaying her shoulders and lower body now, she falls into a charmed-cobra like sway, her long-lashed eyes fluttering shut as she grinds her way lower and lower, twisting her lean, feminine frame into a shrinking stance that reveals her incredible sense of balance.  She works her way closer to Andi and Jim, and-- tipping her head forward, lets her hat fall over Jim's shoulder with careful grace... as if she'd done it every day... as she straddles his thigh with her long, slim-muscled legs.<br/><br/>The crotch of her jeans-- form fitting over her small body-- settle onto his knee as she twists and dips her shoulders and back, writhing in tidal currents that ripple from her upper to lower body and back.  She wraps one hand around Jim's neck, leaning closer to the lean-jawed 'cowboy' from anywhere but the West... and grinning like a malevolent girl she hooks one long-fingered hand into the hem of her t-shirt and hitches it up past her navel.  Then, she seems to changer her mind, and theatrically releases the garment again and, as if scolding herself silently, she straightens her upper body with a dramatic pout and stands again, turning back to the open floor where she'd begun her dance.<br/><br/>(pausing here to let others have a chance to roleplay too... well, that and I'm tired.  LOL)