Q-S
Q is for Quality
Don’t get lazy. It’s perfectly acceptable for one’s mind to wander on the job, but totting up your credit card receipts while some poor john bones you from behind will not go unnoticed. Feigning interest is the social lubricant of modern life and not too much to ask in one hour out of the day. Think of it as increasing the chances of a tip and repeat business.
Q is also for Quitting
Some people say once you’ve been paid for sex, you are never really out of the business. I’ll report back in 2037 whether this is true.
R is for Relationships
This is not a film or a fairy tale. You will not end up marrying a rich, attractive single man you met on the job and live happily ever after. Do not date the clients, do not confuse the nature of the relationship. Enjoy the man if he’s nice but never forget where the line is. Would you expect a personal trainer to follow a client home from the gym, or get together on weekends just to hang out? No. Out of the question.
S is for Sexy
Sexiness is not a square-yards-of-cloth to exposed-skin ratio. Sexy is not the inevitable result of being blonde, tan, and thin (though it seems to work for television hosts). Sexy is the result of being pulled together and comfortable in your skin. Holding your stomach in when your clothes are off is not fuckable. Slapping your ample behind and inviting him to ride the wobble is.
SHARK
Etymology: probably modified of German Schurke, “scoundrel.”
Function: noun, intransitive verb
1: any of numerous marine elasmobranch fishes that have a fusiform body and lateral gill clefts and are rapacious predators
2: a crafty person who preys upon others through usury, extortion, or trickery
3: one who excels greatly in a particular field
4: the act of entrapment of a person, usually younger or less experienced
I’ve been eyeing up someone at the gym for the last few months.
This is not a habit, really. Gyms are for exercising, perhaps a bit of socializing, but the widespread idea of workouts as meat markets is gruesome by any standard. On the upside, if you do meet someone in an atmosphere of lycra-clad, endorphin-soaked madness, you can rest easy that he has seen you at your worst, covered in sweat and hair undone, and found you attractive.
On the other hand, I wouldn’t want to date anyone who regularly saw me at my worst.
At the start of the year, though, one man in particular caught my eye. Shy smile, soft-looking hair, impressively muscled build. I made inquiries. Gleaned his name.
“Gay,” barked N, who is not gay himself but claims to have the most finely attuned straight-man gaydar in the south of England. It’s rubbish, but I dare not say. “Without doubt.”
“I don’t think so,” I sighed, trying not to stare as the object of our conversation worked his way around the free weights.
“Ten-pence bet says he is.”
Them’s, as they say, fightin’ words. “You’re on.”
“It would indeed be a pleasure,” N said, rubbing his hands, “to see the master shark lose this one.” vendredi, le 2 avril
Conversations with clients are not exactly what one might call “normal,” but still have their rigid conventions. It’s nice to know where someone is from, a general outline of what he does. Most of the men are business travelers and not frequent consumers of sex services. A little idle chatter puts both parties at ease.
There’s a fine line between curiosity and nosiness, though, and while meeting a working girl is a bit like going on a first date, some lines of interrogation are simply off limits. These include questions about one’s parents, location of one’s house (as I only do outcalls), vehicle registration number…
On the other hand, the fact that you are unlikely to meet again means a customer can ask the sort of questions that would get anyone else a rapid introduction to the pavement. Context is everything.
Example 1: “Do you think you’ll marry and have children?”
I like children well enough. I especially like when they go back to their parents.
Sometimes-sometimes-I am struck by the charm of a precocious bebe and think rearing young’uns a good idea. And if someone could take charge of children between the ages of eleven and sixteen, it would sweeten the deal immensely.
Clients are perhaps the only people I can answer this question honestly to. The ambivalence toward a future family, the uncertainty whether this world is a suitable place to chain oneself to another being or beings, frankly, troubles me. As many of them are married and have children, they appreciate this. Sometimes they offer advice.
Some adore their children and family life. Some are… well, they’re out paying for sex, aren’t they?
My parents are sometimes fool enough to ask after my future plans for babymaking and receive the stock answer of “I simply haven’t met the right man.” Any paramour who dares let this query pass his lips is on a one-way trip to speed dating and singleton hell.
Example 2: Questions about taste in films, books, and music.
Potential mates receive an honest answer. My taste in cultural minutiae might be dodgy, but it is my own, and anyone hoping to merge his material possessions with mine in a happy reenactment of Homo erectus setting up housekeeping in the Olduvai Gorge, will have to live with a collection of music that could best be described by the term “selective appeal.”
In a client situation, I try to discern what his taste might be and stray not too far off the beaten mainstream. Trying to cover the finer points of free jazz whilst administering a soapy titwank is possibly straining the privileges of my position.
Example 3: “How many people have you been to bed with?”
No client has ever asked. Sometimes they ask how long I have been working, but whether they attempt to deduce the number of my past lovers based on the answer is unknown. Given that my working practices have been sometimes sporadic, it’s unlikely they would reach an accurate total.
Non-clients always ask. If I think the man has a good sense of humor, I tell him a number that is roughly accurate. Or at least within the same order of magnitude. I don’t know the real answer myself. For geeky men with extremely good senses of humor, I offer the total in scientific notation or hexadecimal.
If I think he does not have a good sense of humor, I try to change the subject or turn the question back on him.
Why does it matter? Quantity is no guarantee of quality. Frequency definitely isn’t. But a low total is not indicative of personality either. A high number of ex-lovers could just as easily say “I’m good at hostessing, and the lack of stalkers implies my selective powers are decent” as it does the more common interpretation of “I’m a big wet girlslut with a drinking problem.” Men-and women-who have been shocked by my answer were often heard to mumble, “But you look like such a nice girl!”
I am nice. Very nice indeed.
At the age of seventeen someone split with me because he was my third partner and this was an unacceptably high number to him. The next man, number 4, claimed the number of my previous lovers was unacceptably low. There’s no pleasing some people.
The last time I had a lover with more former partners than me (that I knew of) was at the age of nineteen.
Example 4: “We only have a quarter of an hour. May I come in your mouth?”
In a normal situation, this might meet with a grimace at best and a restraint order at worst. At work, though, typical responses range from “Go on then!” to “Okay, but I would rather you came on my face.” dimanche, le 4 avril
A year or two ago it became apparent how neatly I’ve left the first flush of youth behind. The Maginot Line was, of all things, music. Watching videos after a prolonged absence from popular culture, I noticed to my horror that those who are not old enough to remember Lionel Richie the first time around consider him some sort of Grand Pooh-Bah of soft rock. Lionel was everywhere, sporting mini-dreads, bling, and cred. Wrong, wrong, wrong! Did no one else have their early memories of music television inexorably scarred by the sight of Mr. Richie crooning earnestly to his own clay head? Sometimes I fear for the younger generation, truly.
Which reminds me that my mother’s birthday is looming and I really must remember to make her that Neil Sedaka Tzedakah box I’m always promising-or is it threatening? — to craft.
WAX
Etymology: Middle English, from Old English weax; akin to Old High German wahs, Lithuanian vaskas
Function: transitive verb, intransitive verb, noun
1: a substance secreted by bees and used for constructing the honeycomb, composed of a mixture of esters, cerotic acid, and hydrocarbons
2: any of various substances resembling beeswax: any of numerous substances that differ from fats in being less greasy, harder, and more brittle and in containing principally compounds of high molecular weight (as fatty acids, alcohols, and saturated hydrocarbons), or a solid substance of mineral origin consisting of hydrocarbons of high molecular weight
3: something likened to wax as soft, impressionable, or readily molded
4: to treat or rub with wax, usually for polishing or stiffening
5: the process of removing body hair in the most painful, yet somehow satisfying, way possible
6: to follow the object of your affection around the room in an attempt to get them to take notice of you
I stood by the paper towel dispenser, blotting sweat off my neck until the 10-Pence Bet came into view. He was setting up a bench-press-cum-torture-device. When he turned away to slide a weight off the rack, I slid in behind him.
“Work in sets with you?” Gym-speak for asking if you can alternate on the weights. Never regarded as an overt come-on: people who are waxing you are more likely to stand off to the side and watch.
It was a ludicrous request, of course. I couldn’t have spotted the weight he could probably lift with his little toe. “You lifting?” he asked. Soft voice, nice.
“Maybe the bar plus twenty,” I said. Damn, I actually sound like I know what I’m talking about.
He nodded. We went through three sets each. I stood on the opposite side of the bar as he pressed out his reps, watching the long-sleeved shirt strain at his chest. On my sets I tried hard to look cool and serious, not the giggling feeble creature I play when N’s in the gym. We finished on the bench and moved off to other sides of the gym. Play it cool, girl, I thought. Don’t follow him around the room. Don’t wax.
Half an hour later I walked through to the aerobic area. He was on a rowing machine, had been for a few minutes-the sweat was just starting to trickle past his hairline. I sat on one a few seats away and strapped my feet in.
“Hard workout day for you then?” he asked.
I smiled. “Just cooling down.” I rowed through five minutes, watching his reflection surreptitiously in the glass opposite us. His sweat was really starting to pour. He had taken off the long-sleeved top. I finished and walked out the door behind him, caught a glance of his back squeezing together at the end of each stroke. The droplets sliding down the crevice of his spine.
I was alone in the hall leading to the changing rooms. Wait a few minutes, I thought. He’ll come out and you can say something.
Don’t. He’ll know you waited.
Coward.
Tart.
What would I say, anyway? “Oh, to be the person who gets to lick that sweat off you,” then walk away? The door cracked. I didn’t wait to see who it was. I ducked in the ladies’ faster than a greased goose. mardi, le 6 avril
N and I went out for Italian and beer. We sat outside waiting for the food. It was a mild evening, I was a little tired from a long session of working out frustrations in the gym, and the drink went straight to my head. We talked about the coming month, what he was doing with work, a bit about women he was interested in. I confessed that I’d been doing a little Internet snooping on the Boy.
We must be in sync-N, who has been so good about not obsessing on his own ex, revealed that he’d been doing the same. “So did you find anything?” I asked first. Nothing, he said. Maybe she was married. Maybe she moved. I thought it was too soon. She was an impulsive girl, a bit dappy, but settling down already would beggar belief even for her. He asked if I had found anything.
“A little,” I said. “Enough.” He’s moved, he’s probably single. Nothing earth-shattering. We sipped at our drinks. The food came. The first course was bigger than we expected, he finished mine off. The second course came, I just had a salad. I suppose I feel I’ve violated the Boy’s privacy by looking, but couldn’t stop myself.
“Mutual inability to let go,” N said.
“Yes.” We sat in silence a bit longer, chewing, waving off the ubiquitous fresh-ground-pepper boys with their porn-sized grinders.
“So, meet any nice girls with big tits lately?” he asked suddenly. I laughed so hard I almost choked on a mouthful of arugula. mercredi,
CHILD
Etymology: from Old English cild, akin to Gothic kilthei (womb), Sanskrit jathara (belly).
Function: noun
1: a young person of either sex between infancy and youth
2: one strongly influenced by another or by a place or state of affairs
3: a product or result
4: anyone born in a year I had a double-digit birthday in
“Guess what,” N smirked.
“What.” I was in no mood for guessing games.
“I’ve been talking to your little friend,” he said.
“Which little friend?” N meant 10-Pence Bet. “So what do you know?” I asked.
“He’s a student.”
“Loads of people are students these days. Your point?”
“He’s eighteen.”
Oh no, you must be joking. No one looks like that at eighteen. “You’re having me on.”
“First year at university, engineering something.”
I frowned. I thought of 10-Pence Bet, how smooth and unlined his face was. And how polite. Bells started going off in my head: good-looking men don’t stay nice for long. “Figures. There ought to be a law.” I sighed. “They shouldn’t build teenagers to adult spec. It’s just not fair.” samedi, le 10 avril
“Have fun last night?” N asked. We were at the gym. I leant against the wall just outside the door of the men’s changing room while he laced up a pair of sneakers. The announcement boards were crowded with fliers. Yoga, physiotherapy, five-a-side football. Something called Ultimate. Ultimate what? I wondered. Ultimate stretching? Ultimate watersports? Ooo, get the rubber mat.
“Okay,” I said. Friday was A3’s birthday. I wasn’t going to go because I was afraid of the Boy turning up. When I had told N this, he said I’d be silly to let that stop me. So I fretted about what to wear, flirted with the idea of not going, then went anyway.
N started warming up on the treadmill. The machines on that side of the gym face a window. I can’t imagine who thought the vista of illegally parked cars and staggering teenagers in the street below would be an inspirational view. “Was your ex there?”
“He was.” The Boy turned up late, before the birthday party left the bar and went on to the club. I was talking to A3, we were eyeing up various people in the room and rating them on shaggability.
“Guy in the red shirt?”
“Only if drunk.”
“Him or you?”
“Both.”
Then A3, who was facing the door, caught sight of the Boy.
“Bloke in the blue checked shirt?” he asked.
I turned round, saw who it was, and shuddered involuntarily. “Fuck off,” I said.
“Sorry, that was unfair,” he said.
“No, it’s okay.”
“Did he say anything?” N upped his speed and broke into a jog.
“No, he kept a good distance.” Not knowing whether or not the Boy would be there was by far the worst part of the evening. I found it difficult to keep up conversation with anyone, my eyes were scanning the room for him constantly. If I saw someone who resembled him, my mouth went dry and my words jumbled. But once I knew he was there, I relaxed.
The Boy didn’t look at me, I didn’t look at him. He hovered around the fringes of the large group talking to people we knew.
N and I were both at a slow run. Sweat started to prickle my collarbone. “Did you pick up?” he asked.
“Not really,” I said. “There was one fellow in the bar, who came up out of nowhere. He pulled my hair hard and bit me on the neck, then walked away.”
“Really? What did you do?”
“Nothing.” My knees had gone to jelly. The stranger had held my hair for a long moment, staring at me. I stared back. He pulled harder. Our gaze didn’t break. I knew probably all of my friends were watching. Fuck them. Then the man who bit me walked off back to his friends. He didn’t say anything.
“What did he do?”
“Nothing.”
“Really?” N ran on for a bit. “Maybe he was doing it for a bet. So how late were you out?”
“Late late.” We went on to a club. I was talking to a friend of A3’s from home, a very pretty short girl with spiky hair. I kind of fancied her and was aware that the Boy (whose voice I could hear behind me) was probably watching. We queued and went inside. The music was old-school, they even played Vanilla Ice. I couldn’t stop dancing. The Boy stayed on the edge of the crowd.
I flopped into a chair, sweating heavily from the exertion on the dance floor. A3 picked up my feet and put them on his lap, massaging my instep in the open black stilettoes. Someone snapped a picture of us. I closed my eyes to the heat and haze of the club. Music has always had the power to change my mood. Or perhaps it was the drink. It was easy to forget everything around me.
N jumped off the treadmill and we went to stretch. “And that was it? You danced for a while and went home?”
“No-at least four men tried to chat me up.” One of them knelt down while I was still sitting, eyes shut, enjoying the music. “I’ve never seen anyone look so happy,” he said. Ha, I thought. “Thank you,” I said. We started talking. He wanted to dance, I didn’t.
“Get anyone’s number?” N winced as he tried to urge more length out of his hamstrings.
“Just one worth noticing. A trolley dolly from British Airways.”
“Male or female?”
“Male.”
“Nice looking?”
“Aren’t they all?” The Boy stuck around for a long time, but even he was gone by 3 a.m. There was still a hard core of us buying round after round in honor of the birthday boy. The flight steward was more persistent than the other men who’d come up during the night, and gave me his card. I waved him goodbye as we staggered out to find the night buses.
“Weights?” N said, edging toward the frightening bench apparatus in the corner.
“Go on then.” dimanche, le 11 avril
I retrieved my bag and brought out a box of condoms. He held the member in front of my face while I tore the corner of the wrapper open. I held the shaft and balanced the unrolled rubber on the tip of the cock.
“Do you have to do that?” the client asked.
“Afraid I must,” I sighed. “Minimizes the risks involved.”
“I trust you,” he said.
“That’s very kind,” I said, and smiled. “Trouble is, I don’t know where this thing”-and I gestured at the instrument he brandished before me-“has been.”
“Oh,” he said, and was quiet a moment. “It’s just that, I really don’t like the smell those things leave on it.”
I thought. “I could give it a good hot-water-and-soap scrub in the bathroom instead of using a condom,” I offered. “Would that do?” Against my policy, but it was low risk for him and almost none for me.
He sighed in relief. It was a big fleshy black dildo-his own cock stayed well zipped up. I took the dildo over to the sink, being careful to wash all the soap off carefully so he wouldn’t taste any when he sucked my juices off it later. lundi, le 12 avril
Went to a club. Saw Angel, who was wearing a skirt that was more of a glorified belt. The girl just has unbelievable legs. The music was loud, we didn’t speak, I wouldn’t have known what to say to her anyway. Danced together and jumped and sang along when the DJ spun The Jam’s “That’s Entertainment.” Looked at the boys who were watching us-realized none of them were old enough to know the tune.
Fucking ’ell. They probably weren’t even born then. I smiled evilly.
I picked out one young man, a tall, thin, and freckled lad. He looked like a stretched-out version of the Boy. Led him back toward the toilets, where we snogged. I pulled up his dark green shirt, licked his nipples. “Do you live close to here?” he asked, surprised. I shook my head no, asked if he did. He didn’t. I pushed out the back exit and we fucked on the steps by the bins. mardi, le 13 avril
It’s widely circulated and well known that You Get What You Pay For. I don’t agree. Some things come for free and some at a cost, but one isn’t better than the other.
There are downsides to unpaid casual sex, of course. Aren’t there always? By engaging in truly random, one-night attachments, you open yourself up to stalking, relationships, and all other manner of sexually transmitted ills. For some reason, we as a nation have collectively decided that a drunken snog in a crowded club is an acceptable overture to everlasting love. It isn’t. So let us get that straight right away.
The men I have encountered in my working life can be characterized by a single feature-timidity. Whether it’s requesting watersports or going through the back door, by and large the clients seem uncomfortable with demanding what they, as paying customers, are implicitly entitled to. If one thing can be predicted, it’s that the more exotic the request, the more times he will ring the manager pre-appointment to discuss it. One-night men, on the other hand, tend to just take.
Don’t get me wrong. I find a client’s sometime inability to express his inner desires charming. Sweet, even. But it’s amusing when I ask what a man would like to do, and he replies with “Whatever you want to do.”
You mean, go home and watch television while sipping hot chocolate in my pajamas? I think he would feel my fee was somehow less than justified. But still better is the mumbled reply of “Oh, you know, the usual.”
No, I don’t know. For you the usual might be open-air rope bondage with a ring of ponygirls. I know it is for me.
Your typical club-stud, on the other hand, has a take-no-prisoners approach to his needs that I find refreshing. You’re there, he’s there, the DJ is playing Carmina Burana, which is definitely the signal to collect your coat and get out, and you’re the only two people not playing find-my-tonsils in the taxi queue. It’s a forgone conclusion what will happen next, and the only guarantee is that someone’s wrinkly bits will make it to CCTV in the next half hour. And to be honest I don’t pick up random men because I want a love match. Nothing less than a full cervical bruising will do, and I am rarely disappointed.
Or as N puts it, when you know you’re not going to see her again anyway, why not push the boundaries?
Who else but a nonpaying stranger would insist that he would only do the deed if my womanhood was partially lined with ice chips first? Who else would try-unsuccessfully-to fist me whilst driving (N.B.: not ideal in city traffic)? No client would dare, for fear I would whip out a calculator and start totting up the additional cost of this service.
There’s a lot of talk in escort circles of Girlfriend Experience (GFE). That’s because it is by far the most requested thing we offer. I have been cuddled to within an inch of my life by well-meaning chaps whose only previous acquaintance with me was via a website. I’ve sipped red wine and watched telly with single gents until the taxi beeped its horn outside. And no pickup, to my recollection, has ever stretched out on the counterpane and told me stories of his childhood in Africa.
The last gentleman before the boy at the club-and I am rather stretching the meaning of the word “gentleman” here-who followed me home on a random stayed exactly ninety minutes. We did the deed, considered doing it again, then he fretted about his recent ex, dressed, and left. I was somewhat offended that he turned down the offer of a cup of tea. Still, I went to bed having gotten what I wanted out of the night, which was a good and forceful banging.
Clients are another species altogether. They have invited me on holiday, asked my opinion on the possibility of extraterrestrial life, and cleaned my shoes while waxing poetic on the proportions of my profile. The most upholstered compliment I ever received from a pickup, on the other hand, was something along the lines of “Coffee? A clean towel? This is great-staying at your place is like being in a hotel.”
Ah, no. I’ve been in plenty of hotels. And the men aren’t paying for fluffy towels. jeudi, le 15 avril
The client was a revisit. He was in law enforcement, and the first time out he’d taken me to a semiformal work event. From the ratio of nubile cuties to paunchy detectives, I may not have been the only paid girl there. Or perhaps the Met’s PR efforts are paying off in unexpected ways. I had been seated next to my date, while one of his colleagues, a Scottish youth, looked down the front of my top in a way that suggested it was meant more surreptitiously than it came off.
This time the customer met me at his flat and asked a lot of questions, probably because we were alone. This can be dicey: are they just curious or potential stalkers? As they say, the truth is like the sun, its benefit is entirely dependent on our distance from it.
So I have a manufactured history that is mostly, but not completely, true. Minor but plausible differences in hometown, university, degree, current home. Other questions are simpler to answer.
“Have you ever dominated?”
“Honey, that was how I started in the business.” When I was a student and worked briefly as a domme, it was something I didn’t especially enjoy and didn’t want to do again. Largely because getting out of character was difficult for me. But maybe being more of a submissive in my private life led to some empathy for those who like to be dominated, because I’ve ended up doing it more than a few times in this job as well.
“Really?” The client nodded and pursed his lips. “Really.” He was tall, well over six feet. Thick framed and strong. Probably mid-forties. Bald. And single, which is (from what I’ve seen) as likely in clients as not. “I find that… fascinating.”
What is it about men who know seven ways to kill you with their bare hands who just want to be pussycats in the bedroom?
“Have you ever let someone take control?” I asked. He was sitting in a stuffy chair, and I was curled up at his feet drinking Shiraz and stroking the back of his legs.
“I always wanted to, but…”
“Sweetie,” I said, and reached up to stroke his chin. “Don’t be shy. That’s what I’m here for.”
A first-time submissive is usually easy to handle and eager to please. It takes months before they start trying to deviously control the action from below. I asked if he would let me tie him up, he said yes, what with? I wasn’t prepared, so I asked for a handful of ties. He led me upstairs to the bedroom and produced them.
I told him to undress. He did, as I sat on the bed, cross-legged. I ordered him onto the bed. He hesitated a moment. “Get down, face up, legs and arms straight,” I said abruptly. He did. I pulled my skirt up and crawled over him, heels still on. Straddling his chest, I tied his hands to the bed. At the foot of the bed there was nothing handy, so I looped the ends of the ties round the wheels of the bed-frame and hoped they would hold. I could feel him craning his neck, trying to get his mouth closer to my bottom. “Lie back,” I barked. “If I want you to touch me, you’ll know it.”
It was standard S amp;M, nothing challenging. Tease and (extremely) light torture. But I did end up with the cleanest shoes outside of a Nine West. dimanche, le 18 avril
N has taken a hiatus from his usual running commentary on sport and tits to focus on pussy.
His cat, that is.
Unlike my dearly departed feline, who would take to spring like a cat to a nest full of little flightless baby birds, using her catlike reflexes to jump cattily from branch to branch and scaring the living kittens out of any and all tree dwellers, N’s pussy has been dragging along, unable even to pull herself up the steps.
She came back from the veterinary clinic with a bandaged paw and a pinched look, as it was explained to me, having had a thorn the size of another cat drawn out of her foot. It had formed an abscess and-well, something too disgusting and technical to go into, really. But I gather it involved “draining,” which I presume has nothing to do with kitchen sinks. N has been looking after her with the tender mercy of a ward sister who missed her calling. It’s rather sweet.
Last night as we left the gym, he did not offer me a lift home, nor suggest a drink or a meal somewhere. Mumbling something about changing a dressing, he all but ran to the parking lot.
I smirked. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were getting a little pussy on the side.” mardi, le 20 avril
Coffee with N and A1 for no better reason than to dissect my love life. Again. “So what happened to that trolley dolly?” N asked, sipping an Americano.
“Could have been something. But he called it off, by phone, this weekend,” I reported. It was annoying. Admittedly, he was probably more often in the air than in town, but this should be no barrier. In my opinion some of the best relationships involve not seeing each other.
“Did he have a reason?” N asked.
“Too busy with work. Couldn’t be bothered.”
“Did he actually say that second bit?” N looked puzzled.
“No, I’m paraphrasing.” It is probably too great a leap of faith to believe a man would be so guileless as to say that he was too busy with work and for that to actually be the case.
A1 shrugged. “Well, here’s hoping he realizes what he’s missing.”
“Doubtful. We never got past snogging.” Three dates, lots of conversation, a torrent of e-mail. Resulting in nothing more than a couple of awkward hugs and a bit of tongue-tying before Cinderella had to drive home. Wary of what happened the last few times, I didn’t think it right to push him too fast. But whatever his buttons were, I clearly was not pressing them.
“Really?” spluttered N. “I would have at least slept with you first.”
“Cheers, darling,” I said, blowing him an ironic kiss.
“I have a friend,” A1 ventured. “A bit on the short side, though..”
“Is that a euphemism? I’ve already seen your little friend, thanks,” I said, glancing at the crotch of his jeans.
“Ouch,” A1 said, and turned to N. “She’s getting angry,” he said. “She’s never this sharp when she has a regular shag.” mercredi, le 21 avril
I know a girl. A nice girl, a well-brought-up girl, whose vowels are all very round and correct and whose manners are exquisite.
This girl, I’ve known her a few years, since we both were students. Like me, her degree was mostly useless; like me, she’d moved to London to find her way. And found it mostly a drain on finances. Moving from temp job to temp job, or stringing two or three part-time and freelance projects together at a time to make enough money to keep the tiny, not-terribly-expensive flat she lives in.
And this girl doesn’t really know what she wants. She might fancy the academic life, but really more as retreat from the rest of the world than a genuine love for the world of letters. When I see her in pubs with friends, every few weeks or so, she always looks like a slightly shabby librarian, but I’ve noticed the way she moves and she could be so much sexier than that. Her legs are fantastic. I also know she’s been struggling with depression for some time, with-literally-the scars to prove it. And the men in her life are either abusive or doormats.
I buy her a pint, knowing it’s too late in the evening for her to get the next round, but that’s fine because she really couldn’t afford it. The money she does spend freely goes on books. She loves reading, this one, and get her on the right subject and her milk-white arms will be flying about, lit fag in one hand, expounding this or that theory or proclaiming this or that writer an unsung genius.
More often, however, she’ll mumble through a conversation and I will try twice as hard as I would with anyone else to keep it going. Because no matter what her better instincts, she always answers the question “So how are you keeping these days?” honestly. And it’s always something depressing.
What might make her life better? Who knows. Chronic money shortage is one problem. Feeling intimidated by every woman who comes within a quarter-mile radius of her current boyfriend doesn’t help. (Oh, yes, she’s probably pulled that accidental pregnancy scheme once or twice. Not faking it, of course, but conveniently forgetting a pill or three here and there, when the leash had to be tugged on a bit.)
So maybe it occurs to me, well, it’s no cure-all, but a few months in prostitution might do her the world of good. Have to primp and smile for once. Put the overdraft back in the black. Get her mind off herself every now and again.
But I can’t say anything. She’s waiting to hear on Ph. D. funding for this autumn. In a mostly useless subject. jeudi,
RESULT
Etymology: from Latin resultare (to rebound)
Function: noun, intransitive verb
1: to proceed or arise as a consequence, effect, or conclusion
2: beneficial or tangible effect
3: something obtained by calculation or investigation
4: what I will say when I make N look like the fool he is. Because it’s not about the money, it’s about the principle.
N and I went out to a club he worked at a few years ago. They were playing the usual pop trash, but the doormen knew us and waved us through.
It was packed with the usual bodies. A few on the floor, shaking their moneymakers, more at the bar looking everyone over. A meat market but not unfriendly for it. I leaned on a white leather sofa and looked round. A familiar face in a small clutch of men. Ten-Pence Bet. I elbowed N and gestured at him.
“Told you,” he said. Or would have said, but I couldn’t hear him over the music. Mouthed. I knew what he meant. I shrugged. Being with other men is not ipso facto gay. And the bet stood, regardless.
I saw l0-Pence Bet detach from his group and spin out in the direction of the bar. Alone. Good, because I didn’t think a confrontation would work in front of a crowd. I followed him.
Tapped him on the shoulder. “Yes?” He turned around, saw me, smiled.
“This is going to sound odd,” I said apologetically. “But I win a 10-pence bet if you’re not gay.”
“Pardon?” The music in the club was loud; he bent his head very close to mine.
“I said I win a 10-pence bet if you’re not gay.”
“Who’s the bet with?” he asked.
“I really mustn’t say. Does it matter?”
He smiled. Thought a bit. Leaned forward and kissed me. His lips were soft, slightly moist, lingered a moment. “You win,” he said. I smiled. We walked away in opposite directions.
I found N, leaned heavily on his arm. “I win,” I shouted in his ear. “Do you hate me?”
“I’ll prove you wrong,” he said, digging through his pockets.
“Yes, well.” I smirked. “Until then, hand over the coin.”
ESCAPE HATCHES-A BRIEF CONSIDERATION
• Kyle of Tongue. Pros: favored by child molesters and lovers of cold weather. They clearly go for the fantastic scenery. Cons: bleak isn’t the word. What can you say about a place where the incoming tide swallows up the main road?
• Home Counties. Pros: so soul-destroying, so boring, so obviously bad, that no one would think their new neighbor is me. Cons: so soul-destroying, so boring, so obviously bad, that no one would think their new neighbor is me.
• West Country. Pros: dairy products, moors, beaches. Pasties. Ponies. Dreamily gazing at bronzed surfers in summertime. Cons: while the trains go there, am not certain they come back.
• North America. Pros: charming accent might attract general goodwill, free drinks. Cons: am frightened by the concept of Texas.
• South America. Pros: sunshine, interesting food, mountains. Cons: rumored expatriate contingent of Nazis in hiding may prove constricting to social life.
• Australia and Environs. Pros: a few acquaintances, rumored good weather, decent confectionery. Cons: rumored expatriate contingent of Brits in hiding may prove constricting to social life.
• The Med. Pros: excellent weather, superlative food, inexpensive housing, reasonable entertainment possibilities, and not terribly far from home. Cons: Costa del Croydon is not quite the vibe I’m after.
• Fulham, South London. Pros: the transport links are decent. Cons: what does it say about a place if the ease of escaping is its highest selling point?
• Israel. Umm, no. Just… no. Not yet.
• East Anglia. Pros: good beer. Oh, I don’t half fancy a pint of IPA on a sunny afternoon. Cons: aesthetically displeasing “bump” bit of map.
• Africa. Pros: no idea. Cons: once I had a client from Zimbabwe. It doesn’t sound like a terribly nice place at the moment.
• New York. Pros: extremely menschy. Cons: if television is to be believed, pressure to meet and mate is all-consuming. I am the alpha stiletto-wearing, lingerie-obsessed, Pulitzer-reading female here and competition could be disheartening. Particularly if the quarry is an unemployed finance graduate still living at home in the Bronx.
Lately it feels I am spending more time out of town than in it. The current good weather in London is pleasant and welcome, but an unfortunate case of too little, too late. I am packing again-knickers (all varieties), books (Dodsworth, My Name Is Asher Lev, some silly crime thrillers, and the ever reliable Princess Bride), and sunblock.
In search of beaches. Will report back with detailed analysis of several of the locations discussed above. dimanche, le 25 avril
We took a holiday every year when I was young. Never anywhere too exotic, and never with my father. He claimed exhaustion from his business, until he retired and couldn’t use the excuse any longer. By the last year of school, my best friend was one of my male cousins. We have the same coloring, the same small sharp features and freckles. People think we are twins. We still acted like children, taunting and hitting each other. But that year there had been a new undercurrent of tension: we started to watch one another cautiously, for signs that one of us knew something the other didn’t.
So, our mothers take all the kids on holiday together. We drive to Brighton. I’ve never been so far south. And six of us in the car, it’s cramped, the journey feels a lot longer than it must have been. My mother’s sister, my cousin’s mother, has brought a bag of cassette tapes to keep us entertained.
Her taste in music is nothing like ours, but thankfully nowhere as antique as Mum’s. We know all the lyrics to her tapes, and we sing loudly, car windows down. It’s a sunny day. We think the holiday will be perfect.
When we get there, the beach is horrible, wet and windy. There’s nothing to do for three days. The mothers stay in and watch telly; we kids go out looking for an amusement arcade. I beat all comers at air hockey until no one will play me any longer. We spend all of our money on cotton candy, penny arcades, and chips.
I come back to the hotel, the mothers are still watching television. My cousin is in the bathroom. He’s singing, obviously unaware that the echo that makes singing in the shower sound so good also means everyone outside can hear him. He’s singing a Madonna song, and the frankly sexual lyrics-not to mention his falsetto-disturb me somewhat. Without meaning to, I can imagine him imitating the dancers in the video.
The other thing I realize is only that morning I was in the shower too, while everyone sat inside poring over street maps and the papers, and I was singing the Divinyls’ “I Touch Myself.” mardi, le 27 avril
I’m staying in a hotel right on a river in Spain; the river goes only a few miles until it reaches the sea. I take a walk by myself. Not far from the hotel-the spring is very warm and sunny, and I am distracted by the flowers. The air smells drier and cleaner here than in the UK.
My camera is low on batteries, but I manage to take pictures of some flowers. Violet bursts of bougainvillea, orange starburst-shaped blooms I’ve never seen, tiny pink flowers in a smooth-trunked tree’s branches.
There are more sidewalk cafes than anything else. I sit at one, in a green plastic chair under an umbrella emblazoned with the name of the local brew, sip a sangria and feel like an obvious tourist. Men who pass sometimes comment to me, more often things to each other. From what they say, it seems like they notice a woman’s hair before anything else.
Because I have worn the wrong shoes for any kind of walking, I have to turn back and go home early. But instead of retreading the same route along main roads, I loop through the cobble-paved back streets where white and yellow stucco crumbles off flat-faced buildings. There are two churches, their names spelled in gay tiles pressed into the plastered walls. I try to take a picture of one but the battery of the camera runs out. I could buy new ones, but I don’t know the word for “battery,” and am already acutely aware of my strangeness to the locals. The hotel is a cool refuge when I get back. jeudi, le 29 avril
So I’m sixteen, or close to it. One day my cousin and I are at a swimming pool, treading water by the ladder at the deep end. He has been asking about some girls I know. I am vaguely dismayed that his taste in women is running to the obvious-tall blondes and dark-haired girls with chests everyone stares at. Plenty of the boys have received favors from these girls, but they wouldn’t look at my cousin nor his geeky friends twice, and he knows it.
Our friendship is becoming uneasy. Because we are related, we can and do share everything. Because of our age, attraction is possible-but, obviously, off-limits. When the subject of sex does come up, being shy and clever as we are, we couch it in the most neutral terms possible.
“If I wasn’t your cousin, and didn’t know you, I’d probably be attracted to you.”
“Me too. If I wasn’t your cousin. And didn’t know you.” And we know what we mean. Then an awkward silence, usually followed by a simulated farting noise to bring things back to the mundane. These conversations foretell the sort of relationships I will have with men through university, a parade of pale, gentle boys who are too shy to admit their desire until they are too drunk to care. A lot like the few people I dated at school, really, but with better access to alcohol. Sometimes my cousin’s friends express an interest in me; he fends them off with protestations of my tomboyishness (“She would break you in half if she heard that”) or maturity (“She wouldn’t look twice at a child like you”). I was terribly mature; I’d even tossed a boy off in a cinema, don’t you know.
There are other things as well. We don’t know it for a year yet, but I’ll be going to university, my cousin won’t. His A levels were good, and he had offers, but he didn’t follow through and his mother didn’t press. He thinks he wants to be a Royal Marine or a mechanic. I think he’s crazy. A decade later he ends up working prep in a commercial kitchen.
I pull myself up the side of the pool and scramble out in the direction of our towels, grab them both, walk back to the water.
“Hey,” he says, a little louder than absolutely necessary. “You’re walking differently. Does that mean you’re not a virgin anymore?”
“Yes,” I say, straight-faced. He starts to get out of the pool, and I throw his towel in the water. This is how he knows I care about him.
He’s not sure whether I’m kidding or not, and doesn’t press for details. I prepare a fake story anyway, just in case. When his mum comes to collect us, we both sit in the back of the car, and he just whispers names.
“Marc?”
“No.” Marc was in my year, and taller than the rest of the boys. He also spits when he speaks without realizing it and follows me around too often.
“Justin?”
“No.” I have a crush on Justin; my cousin is the only person I’ve ever told; I hope he doesn’t tell anyone else. Before leaving for university, I will tell Justin all this in a letter, and he will never speak to me again.
He senses my discomfort. “Eric. Has to be.”
The joke candidate. “No way!” I say, but refrain from giving him a nipple-twister, because to do so would compromise the new air of maturity this lie has conferred.
It doesn’t matter much anyway. Within a month it happens for real, with my cousin’s best friend. While I flinched, I didn’t make a noise. And as far as I can tell, my gait was no different the day after than it was the day before. vendredi, le 30 avril
I fly east, to Italy, to meet friends. The plane is small and crowded and the heavily made-up flight attendant screams at a child who keeps running up and down the aisle, even when the plane is taking off and landing. It’s not clear whom he belongs to; his parents are making no effort to stop him.
The first thing I do after setting my bags in the cool tile hallway is go to check e-mail. And there’s a small surprise, a message from Dr. C over in San Diego, who must have gleaned my e-mail address from A2. It’s a short but affectionate note dating from two days previously. I reply with an equally short and cheerful message.