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Tuesday, Nov 24, 2009
Mary Lou and her johns mix it up -- who's zooming who? Part 2 in a series.
Jul 11, 2000 | Mary Lou has spent the past two years in various beds gathering data, marveling that her johns are "all so different. It's fascinating for me to get inside their minds." She tries to look at it as an investment in "a career in psychology or sociology where I'll help people on the street or addicted to drugs or something."
She's studying the men, but they're not the ones on the street or addicted. And it's not the only time Mary Lou blurs her identity and role with her johns'. Her confusion is understandable: She's just a whore and they are lawyers and politicians and men who "work internationally, buy and sell businesses." Yet they're turning to her, so she wants the money and security that would reflect her high perch in the power structure.
The most she has made in a week so far is $1,500, from three tricks. To drum up business, she put an ad in the paper that read: "Beautiful young student in search of wealthy male benefactor." She wanted "one certain guy to take care of me, to put me through school and everything in exchange for sex. And I had a lot of calls, and met a few guys who said they couldn't afford to put that commitment into me, but they'd see me on a transactional basis."
I ask how her "wealthy male benefactor" would differ from a rich husband. Mary Lou says, "I'd prefer not to be married. I'm an independent person; I'd rather they came to see me at my place.
"I want to do what I want to do. Social work might not make thousands and thousands of dollars, but it's what I want to do." She then adds without irony, "Life's too short to do a job you don't like just for the money."
Mary Lou has no friends her own age because her occupation "makes people uncomfortable. One time I tried to tell a friend -- this really cool girl who works at a record store -- and it was like she pitied me, even after I said, 'Don't feel sorry for me.' After that, I decided not to tell people." She dropped her last girlfriend, Crystal -- the one who introduced her to First Guy -- after Crystal tried to rip her off in a drug deal.
First Guy does offer friendly advice and has her call him when she goes out with someone new, for safety. He has instructed her to "get proof of where they work [before sex]. Get a business card and give it to me, and I'll call and check them out." Mary Lou's generally afraid to push for a card, however, in what she perceives as a buyer's market. "I don't want to piss them off," she says. "I'm afraid they'll go, 'Forget it, there's plenty of girls out there better looking than you.'"
Mary Lou says one wily lawyer "showed me proof of all the money he makes, bank statements and everything. He's a millionaire but he said, 'We have to go through a trial period.'" The lawyer's proposal was free access to her for a month, with full payment at the end if he was satisfied.
"He said he'd pay for my school, my housing, everything," Mary Lou recounts. "So he asked me to go into this parking garage and give him a blow job. So I did and he loved it. He gave me $40. And I said, 'I feel way cheap; I've gotten $450 for a blow job,' and he said, 'But this is the trial period.'" She told First Guy, who said, "That's bullshit -- he should be paying you for the trial period. Drop it." She saw the lawyer a few more times anyway.
