[Disclaimer: Today’s story is GROSS. You have been warned.]

[Trigger warning: sharp objects.]

I have always assumed that club managers have a pretty cushy, glamorous job. They basically walk around in suits, taking shots with clients, collecting tips from dancers, telling beautiful women what to do, and parking their fast and fancy sports cars in all the best spots in the parking lot.

Rocco the Pirate has a newsfeed full of photos featuring himself with the latest lovely dancers draped over both arms, captioned, “My job is better than yours.”

I assumed that was true until this weekend, when I found myself with the distinct and dubious pleasure of partying (“partying”) with a man who was the former manager of the exact the club where I work. When I found this out, I immediately pumped him for stories about his wildest, weirdest experiences.

“I got shit on one time,” he informed me.

“Nooooooo!” I gasped in shock and delight over mining a new club horror story. “Like, literally?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“How on earth did that happen?”

“I was roaming the VIP section, making sure everything was okay, when I came across a dancer having sex with a client.

“Now, I honestly didn’t care about that sort of thing, but as a manager, I couldn’t allow it, so I was just like, ‘Hey, guys, stop it!’

“So they stopped, and she pulled herself off of him, but what I didn’t realize is that they were having anal sex. And there it went – sploosh – santorum all down my pants leg.”

Can we give this guy points for using the word santorum? (If you don’t know it, don’t Google it.)

“So what did she do?” I squealed with disgust and glee.

“Oh, she apologized. She clearly felt really bad. She left, and I never saw her again. But that’s not even the worst story . . .”

“Whaaaat? No way!”

“Oh, yes, way! This one time, the toilets clogged up in the women’s bathroom. It was ten o’clock in the morning, the club was about to open, and there was no one around to fix it, just me. I had no idea how to unclog a toilet the right way, so I decided I was just gonna reach in there and try to pull out whatever was causing the blockage.

“So I got a trash bag and duct taped it to my arm really good. I figured nothing would get past that, so I stuck it in the toilet and crammed my hand in as far back as I could go.

“I immediately poked myself with a syringe. I mean, I really jammed my arm onto that syringe real good. I pulled my arm out of the toilet, and there’s the syringe, poking out of my arm, gently bobbing up and down.

“I knew this was real bad. I mean, there was the toilet just swimming in blood and feces and this syringe was just floating around in all that, and now it’s in my arm.”

You could have stuck a candle in my mouth at that point, and it would have stayed, I was so horrified. “What did you do?”

“Well,” he continued, “I had the good sense not to take the syringe out, but otherwise, I basically just freaked the fuck out. I called 911 with my one clean hand and went to the hospital immediately. I had to be on antibiotics for weeks.”

“Oh, wow.” At this point, I was a little dazed from the terror of such a thing.

“After that,” he said, slicing his hand across his neck, “I quit. I figured no job was worth that kinda risk, you know?”

We did the math and realized he quit a few months before I started. 

I thought about Rocco’s newsfeed. And I wondered, for the first time, how much shit he was leaving out. Like, literally.