I am determined not to give up, in spite of the fact that papers and websites suggest the London economy is based on exactly three things:
1. Copywriting and copyediting. Been there, done that… actually, I haven’t as such. Tried to be there and do that, and been turned down by everyone from scientific journals to World Walrus Weekly. The country’s finer philately organs did not even honor me with a rejection letter.
2. Temping and PAs (personal assistants). Definitely been there and don’t ever, ever want to do that again. Revisiting calloused fingertips from sealing billing envelopes at a stockbroker’s is a fate too depressing to contemplate. The abject degradation of having to collect someone’s daughter’s school uniforms from the dry cleaner makes scat play look a doddle.
3. Prostitution. Damnation.
I could stay in the business and go independent. It would mean never having to give up a third of my earnings to an agency again. On the other hand, it would mean vetting my own clients, taking calls all hours of the day and night, maintaining a portfolio, organizing security and… oh. Too much work for me on my own. There’d barely be time for scheduling waxes, let alone any other essential maintenance operations. samedi, le 29 mai
Letters. Applications. Download, print, fill in. Envelopes and stamps on letters I’ll probably never have replies to. And then, late yesterday afternoon, a call from a personnel department. They want to see me for an interview. A position I would love to have.
Shortlisted. And I know the list is extremely short. My chances are good.
That’s it-I’m off the game.
From the profiles on my agency’s website, it’s apparent that a lot of the girls-maybe not the majority, but a large proportion-are not from the UK. Eastern Europe, North Africa, Asia. Britain is doing a roaring trade in importing sex workers.
I don’t ask about their motivations for doing the job. It’s not my business. I wasn’t forced into working for the agency and hope they weren’t either. If the agency was really a stable of illegal workers under the thumb of an abusive pimp, they wouldn’t hire so many local girls.
Would they?
I realize that all that aside, I’m not really in a very different position from those Jordanian and Polish girls right now. Maybe they’re over on student visas and in extreme debt. Somewhere along the way, it was implied-not guaranteed, I understand that, but implied-that the reward for working hard at school and completing a degree was a reasonable career. Now here I am wondering whether a six-month appointment color-correcting magazine illustrations or assistant managing at a high-street retailer would be a better career move. And competing with hundreds of other graduates for the same paltry pickings.
But for now, I have shirts to iron and interview questions to worry about. lundi, le 31 mai
I rose early to catch a train. This was a London I had only heard rumors of: suited men and women crowding the platforms, waiting for a place on a packed carriage. Most looked slightly dazed, not quite awake; others had clearly risen early and had their schedule down to a science. I wondered whether some of the freshly made-up women had to rise at half four to look so pulled together by eight.
The train arrived on time, but it took less walking than I expected to find the offices. I went round the corner for a cup of tea and to waste time beforehand. A woman whose grasp of English was remedial at best prepared my drink, pouring in the milk long before the tea was steeped and before I could stop her. I sat at a small table facing a window on the street. Everyone around me, builders to executives, was bent over a newspaper. I had none, and looked out on the human traffic.
When I arrived, the other two interviewees were already there. We introduced ourselves, talked briefly about the social and professional connections that joined us. Then we filed into a room and, with a group of interviewers, watched each other’s brief presentations. We were directed back to the first room afterward, and called in one at a time for the interview proper.
A dark-blonde, pudding-faced girl was the first candidate. When she left for her grilling, the other interviewee smiled wanly at me. “I knew when I saw you I didn’t have a chance,” he said. I had thought something similar, since while my degrees and references were better, his experience was enviable.
“Don’t be silly,” I said. “It could be any of us.” Either, I corrected silently, since it was fairly certain the other girl didn’t have a chance. Her degree was only tangentially related, her graduate experience nonexistent, and she had mumbled and dragged through her presentation, the content of which was not terribly impressive.
The second candidate went for his interview and must have left straight after, as he didn’t come back to the room.
I entered the room for my interview already sweating. Don’t walk into the table, I thought. Don’t drop anything. There were three people on the other side: a tall, thin man, an elderly gentleman with glasses, and a thirtyish woman with short dark hair.
They took their questions in turns. The division of labor soon became clear: the older man asked very little and was clearly more senior. The thin man asked questions relating to personality-the usual things, such as what I thought my weaknesses were and where I saw my career in five years’ time. The younger woman was left the technical questions, and these scared me the most, but I thought before starting to answer each. At some points I was aware that composing an answer left them hanging for the start of my sentences, but I thought it better to get it right than to amble aimlessly.
When the interview concluded, the three stood with me. The selection should be made fairly quickly, they said, since they wanted someone to start as soon as possible. I could expect a phone call or letter in the next few days. Since I was the last candidate, they left the room as well. The elderly man and the young woman turned down the hall one way, to walk to their offices. The tall man offered to walk me through to the lobby.
We stood quietly in the elevator together. I smiled. “I remember you from a conference three years ago,” he said. “Impressive presentation.”
“Thank you,” I said. Crud. Most of the presentation I’d given earlier in the day had been recycled from that one.
We walked through the quiet carpeted hallways. He started talking about his own work, something he was clearly passionate about. I like people with passion. I asked him leading questions, argued the devil’s advocate while making it clear I actually agreed with his side, and in the end he stood with me at a taxi queue until the cab came to take me to the station. He shook my hand warmly and closed the door for me. As the taxi pulled away, I could see him still standing at the curb.
My heart was beating fast. That was good, I thought. Now I have someone on my side.
Juin
W-Z
W is for Whore
Working girl, prostitute, call girl, woman of negotiable affection, ho. I don’t think any one term is any more or less degrading than another. It’s simply a label, go with it, have fun with it. Indignation at someone else’s moniker for a whore is so outdated. So politically correct, so nineties. You sell sex for a living-what did you expect, to be billed as an “erotic entertainments consultant”?
“Sex therapist” wouldn’t be too bad, though.
X is for Xerxes
Xerxes was a great king of Persia in the fifth century BC.
(I couldn’t think of a good topic that started with X.)
Y is for Youth
Younger is better in the business. This is an ironclad rule-unless you’re over forty, in which case the agency will probably add a robust decade to increase the naughty-granny factor. Expect that your profile will not tell your age accurately. If actresses can continue to play ingenues well into their thirties, why can’t you? But it’s up to you to remember which lie you told whom and keep up the facade. The client is paying for an illusion, and letting slip
