FLIGHT HOME
I was flying home to see my elderly mother in Buffalo. I'd left my husband and family in Raleigh, caught a flight to Charlotte, where I caught the flight that I was now on. It was late at night, and the plane wasn't crowded. I was seated near the back. There were two seats across. A woman sat in the aisle seat while I sat next to the window. The seats on the other side of the aisle were empty. The plane was dark and most of the passengers were quiet or asleep.
The woman sitting beside me was named Andrea and we got into a conversation about where we were from, our lives, etcetera. Andrea worked for a department store in Philadelphia as an executive assistant. She had previously been a fashion model. She explained that she had gotten too old, had married and had babies and didn't have the shape or the desire to be a model any more. She was looking at some fashion magazines and was showing me some of the new fashions while talking about similar things that she had modelled. It was all very interesting.
As the conversation went on, she had flipped to some pages with negligees and sexy underwear. I asked her if she had modelled outfits like that. Without any embarrassment, she told me that she had. She went on about how the models had to change clothes quickly during shows and they were often topless or nude with lots of people walking around doing various jobs.
"Any men?" I asked.
She said, "Oh yes, but most of them were gay. But some straight guys would come in and get an eyeful."
The conversation went on and somehow got around to women having to sleep with someone to get a job. "That's very true." she said. "I had to screw a couple of guys to get jobs." I said that was awful, but she said it was just part of the job, like learning bookkeeping or something. I didn't see the parallel.