I've been at this gig for about three years now in a Northeastern city. Career-wise, it wasn't what I expected to be doing at my age, but I can't gripe about the pay. This is for a private apartment complex (not a hotel, mind you), so it's rightly what Europeans define as being a Concierge (attending to high-end residents' needs).
I'm in my mid-twenties, tall and reasonably fit, outfitted in a blazer, gray slacks and dress shoes, and I sport a genuine-enough smile that's kept fresh every day. This is no mean feat, as the job is the essence of repetition; if you think it's easy coming up with clever ways to say the weather stinks, guess again.
When you're handing that Mercedes owner her Wall Street Journal at 7 AM, you need to have your happy face on your mug, a talent that most guys my age can't list on their resumes. Attitude is everything in the Service and Hospitality Industry, allow me to inform you.
The reason I'm writing this bit of introductory hooey is because I want you, dear reader, to know this isn't some sort of braggadoccio you'll be slogging through. It's just a few episodes in my life as a Concierge, ones where I've gone beyond the usual services a guy like me will do to earn those holiday tips. I may do a series of stories, depending upon interest. Time will tell.
To start off with I want to talk about sussing people out. That is, trying to anticipate what a person like one of these residents is going to need before they even know it themselves. That's how I do over 7K a year in tips: knowing when to step in and when to back off.
People at certain salary levels and/or privileged backgrounds don't like the direct approach, you see -- you must give them their own space. But it doesn't hurt to gently nudge. In fact, thoughtful gestures always pay off in dollars.
Getting to the sexual stuff in the building: it's always there, right under the surface. If I had a dime for every instance when a female resident told me something confidential about her husband's behavior, well, you know, I'd be retiring early. Like, next week. And I don't mean it's always overt stuff; mostly it's just little hints that they wouldn't mind something extra in their lives.
Hell, some of the married men here have given me signals that they'd love an informal intro to a sexy lady who just moved in on the fifth floor, for that matter. They're more direct in their comments, naturally, than the women.
But, I'm avoiding the main subject. Let me tell you about Mrs. Harris, for starters. Not her real name, of course, but it might as well be. She's a long-standing resident of this building, which is set back on a short, relatively-unknown street off a major thoroughfare in the city, but manages to seem nestled in just the right spot to allow easy walking distance to every cultural (museums, opera, clubs) as well as practical conveniences (grocery, shopping, shopping, and shopping) that one might need.
It's a brick edifice, constructed in the latter 20th Century but mimicking the staid looks of some preserved buildings in Britain. Tourists and passers-by stop in at my desk all the time, remarking on its authenticity. They all think they're freaking Frank Lloyd Wright, let me tell you.
Mrs. Harris is perfectly coiffed and made up, at any hour of the day. Don't expect to catch her with pale, reddened morning eyes, not her. She's petite and well formed, appears to be about 40, and has a soft, slightly British accent. If you've seen classic Bette Davis movies, that's the voice.
If anything Mrs. Harris wears costs less that a thou or maybe two, I've never seen her in it. Don't ask about the various tasteful jewelry pieces and what they may cost, please. I've met her husband twice so far in three years, so the vague "he travels a lot on business" will have to do.
Mrs. Harris and I have carried on a discreet and unusual sexual life for about a year now. We've never actually spoken about it, oddly enough. Even as I write this today I wonder if she might read it sometime and recognize us. I believe she'd get a charge out of it, in her own refined way, but I will never know. Such is our arrangement.
As I said I believe she is about forty in years. But never forget this about the well-off: you can't guess their ages without a look at the driver's license, and even then you don't know if it's forged. Her wide, deep-set eyes are light brown and she has a patrician nose that leans toward a possible Italian half-heritage. That may explain how warm and moist her skin can look. Her hair is so professionally colored that it looks like real chestnut brown. She wears it down around her graceful neck, almost to her shoulders.
Her breasts are firm and high and not artificial, as best I can tell, with responsive nipples. Not thin-waisted but not thick, her daily trips to the gym keep her shapely, which is doubly-important for petite women. Invariably, Mrs. Harris totters expertly on expensive, imported heels that one day may be her downfall (literally), but I guess one never loses the stigma of being short.
Her Gorsuch wardrobe style complements her figure, with her favorite looks epitomizing the "just back from Aspen, by way of the Alps" attitude, namely ski pants that hug her hips and ass quite well. Well, I'm pretty sure she'd never refer to them as pants, but that's how I grew up speaking.
Most of all, Mrs. Harris has that thing called charisma. Charisma has the power to mesmerize you, to make your eyes draw down from hers to the source of that strong but soft voice, to study those moistened lips and the perfect teeth within, as they expel the time-tested, upper-echelon diction ("Raymond, your tie was an excellent choice. I compliment your wife. Has the mail arrived?").
Not that I'm intimidated by such personal magnetism. Note the fact that I've just given you, the reader, my actual first name and divulged the fact that I'm a married man. No, not intimidated by such a person as Mrs. Harris, but certainly drawn to her. I could listen to her read the phone book with that voice.
