natural coloured hair; not the stereotypical peroxide blonde, and only
a few had fake boobs. Most looked like
someone she could see any day walking down Yonge street. Some were Asian, some Filipino, some were
even Russian. Some were too skinny, some
were fat, others looked really rough. How did men choose which one they wanted? And how sleazy and desperate
were these guys to pay so much for a hand job when there were girls like her,
dressed to the nines, getting tipsy in night clubs every weekend looking to
hook up for free?
Alex knew that she should be
horrified by seeing women so blatantly objectified and up for sale, but she
found herself strangely interested as she read how clients could choose
‘masseuses’ to be topless, naked, with shaved, or with ‘natural’ pubic
fashions. They could also choose the service: regular, full, VIP. Regular was a shower and a massage with hand
job, a full was a blow job. The VIP? Well that was undisclosed, but Alex could easily imagine what would be
offered there.
It seemed the only rule that the
parlours were adamant about was that masseuses were not to be touched unless it
was ‘specifically arranged before the appointment and fees were adjusted’;
which would explain why the celeb got himself into trouble. Why didn’t he just pay for the VIP?
Transfixed (and perhaps slightly
aroused), Alex clicked on a banner advertisement looking for new, attractive,
intelligent ladies to earn extra cash as an escort. Alex remembered watching an episode of Designing Women where Suzanne had been
persuaded to be an escort for a bald, but very rich geek. She was paid to accompany him to his school
reunion as a piece of eye candy in an effort to make him look more
popular. Sure she had watched it when
she was still a kid, but damn, what had she been thinking? Eye candy, my ass. Of course, it was all about sex.
“How many escort services are
there in Toronto?” she asked Angela.
“Oh god, many. Too many. And they are always changing their location,
their names, their owners. Usually an
agency gets into trouble with the police or they don’t look after their girls.
Then they get a bad reputation so they have to change.” Angela slid closer to the edge of the couch
and leaned forward. “Before I started my own agency, I was with this other
one. I’m not going to name any
names. But they were awful. They only cared about money and how much I
could make them. They would book me
whenever they could. 2 or 3 times a
day. They would send me out to places
that they never even checked out, dirty apartments, sketchy hotels. Mostly out on the east side. And they didn’t arrange
my transportation. Sometimes I had to
take a taxi to my appointments. Out of my own pocket!”
“Why didn’t you just
quit?”
“I did,” Angela tried to run
her fingers through her hair but they got stuck in a tangle and she yanked at
the mess, ripping out many strands of hair before freeing her fingers. Alex watched in horror as Angela flicked the
loose hair strands haphazardly onto the sofa. “I quit eventually. Fuck them.” Angela paused and looked closely at Alex. “I didn’t want to get into this today, but
you need to hear this.” Pulling her
t-shirt down over her knees, Angela wiggled herself forward until she was at
the edge of the sofa.
“It had seemed like just any
other appointment. My manager,” she
twisted her gold rings around her finger, “he was a bastard. He was constantly
double booking me, sending me out twice a day. He never called ahead to confirm
that the clients were actually at the location before I left. One time, I took a cab all the way out to the
airport and the client wasn’t even there. I had to pay for that cab fare.” Reaching across the table, she pushed aside the Pepsi can and grabbed a
white coffee mug. ‘Best Mom’ was
emblazoned in bright red and framed with
Dexter Scott King, Ralph Wiley