Pure Imagination

Chapter 14: Feed the Birds

Jane made the final payments, and so the trio left with the promise to come back soon. As they were walking back to the car, Charlie asked, "So what was up with you in there, Jane?"

"What?" she brazenly answered back, putting on her sunglasses.

"Oh, don't take us as fools. You were exceptionally nice in there. You paid them far more than what was necessary. What prompted such behavior?"

Jane sighed. "Well, time for another story. This one is not all happiness and good feelings, though." She started the car and drove off.

"Mine weren't, either." Charlie said.

"I must agree with you both." agreed Lucy.

She made sure she had a clear view of the road, and started talking.

"One night, as we were going up to bed, Michael asked about prostitution. He'd heard some about it from his friends and he was curious, thinking Mary enlighten us further. Well, she suddenly got very serious, and began telling us of a recent experience she'd had.

Mary was walking in the city with one of her lovers at night. From what I understand, this was maybe a distraction from all the sex and the pleading for it, as well as various other things. They came across somewhere, I think it was a church. There was a woman on the steps. This was a rundown part of London, so it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume she was a prostitute. The man went over and initiated conversation. Their initial thoughts turned out to be true.

Her husband had left her and their children, leaving them in poverty. She had to run her own operation from the darker, grimier parts of the city. Even with sex work, she was just able to bring in the bare minimum they needed- and sometimes not even that. She made it clear she only did it for food to give to her children.

And she could only ask for tuppence.

Mary was touched, willing to give her all the money she had, but her lover was only interested in the sex. He threw a few coins at her without any thought at all and went in there. This was a sick, starving woman, yet he didn't care. He just wanted to fuck her, and that he did, violently and without her concern.

She was herself frightened, but she could only watch as he performed various unsafe sex acts on the woman. She hadn't forgotten, and God knows, I haven't forgotten what she said to this day. Mary watched as he jabbed his penis into every orifice she had, as he released his spend all over her body, as her arms went all over her in the least possible passionate way. The woman clearly wasn't enjoying it.

The man with Mary recognized this and he got angry, blaming her. He started yelling abuse at her and beating her, trying to make her feel like shit. She probably did already, but he wasn't backing down. Mary had to go in and pull him off. She apologized and paid the woman for her troubles, and dragged her lover off for sex.

There isn't a day that goes by now where I don't think about it. You obviously hope that she eventually turned out alright, but not everybody does. That's one of the lessons I learned as I grew up. I saw prostitution in a completely different light. Although sex often hasn't come easy for me over the years, I never wanted to hire one for myself. Even today, I thought of that woman on the steps, calling out for tuppence...

Well, anyway, Michael apparently completely missed the point of the story. The next day, he and a friend ran up to our father, asking for tuppence, saying it was for the birds. It was one of the only times he had ever made a request like that, by the way. But, he turned him down, saying that money would be better off invested in the bank. I was happy they wouldn't be going in search of the woman, but I still thought that was a little cold. It seemed like the bank were he worked was the only thing he thought about those days..."

Silence followed in the car for about a minute. Finally, Charlie said "So your last name is Banks and your father worked at the bank?"

"Why, yes. You're the first person to ever notice that, Charlie."

"I'm guessing that he was a success, then."

"Well, for the most part he was, Lucy..."