How She Became

This is about how I became a prostitute. This is also about how I left it.

Although it only lasted for a few months, I can tell you with absolute certainty that prostitution saved my life. Just read all of this before you judge, OK?

I don't regret that it happened, I don't hate myself for having done it. Yes, it had some terrible moments. Yes, it was often humiliating. Yes, sometimes it undoubtedly dehumanized me. Yes. But sometimes it was OK. Sometimes it was interesting. Sometimes I even came. Yes. Sometimes I really would. I'm not proud of that, not at all. It's just what happens sometimes. My body would respond.

Anyway, It was what it was, I am who I am, and now I've been able to move on and get back to "normal" life (whatever that is, let's just call it "not-needing-to-whore-myself-out" life) -- thanks to the salvation that came to me in the form of sex work.

It was at the tail end of a recent summer full of one stupid decision after another (long story), and I found myself without a place to live, without a job, without access to my bank account, and without a way to even identify myself. It is an absolute terrifying hell to live that way, people. Do. Not. Try. It.

I'm sorry if this offends a certain segment of the feminists in the audience if I phrase it this way -- but there is a "white knight" in this story. I met him during an outdoor concert in the downtown area where I'd been trying to scrape together my dignity, along with something to eat, for about three weeks.

The young man who became my pimp and saved me from homelessness was a college boy not even 22 years old. There I was, over twice his age, way-too-skinny from near starvation, desperate for a roof and a bed and a good nosh on -- well, anything to eat that didn't come from a dumpster or the religion-soaked halfway house downtown -- but my tits and ass were still nice, I didn't smell too bad (it had rained earlier and I'd let myself soak in it), and I was still one helluva of charming bitch when I felt like smiling and having a bit of chat.

Which is what I did with him. I just walked up, smiled, and started talking about the band.

I was wearing mismatched flip flops (that I'd found a few days apart from one another, lying alongside the same stretch of road), a loose pair of ripped-up jeans I'd been given from the halfway house (with a belt made from plastic grocery bags I'd tied together end-to-end, no joke), gray old holey granny panties, no bra, and a faded old Miami Dolphins t-shirt (also from the halfway house). The only thing I "owned" was the flip flops I'd discovered and the panties (and those I'd actually stolen out of a midnight laundromat a couple months before).

So we talked. I smiled. I tried not to stand upwind of him. Seriously. I was rinsed but not washed, if you know what I mean, and it was a muggy summer night. I pushed out my chest and tried my best to prove to him that I was one helluva charming skank. Finally he let me suck him off in the bushes, just a block away from the halfway house, less than ten minutes into our conversation.

I had no pride. If I had to suck a dick, I would suck a dick. Or worse. My lesbianism was (and is) still intact, mind you -- but desperate times and all that.... And besides, I'd gotten really good at blowjobs back in high school, when I was still trying to hide my true self while dating "good boys" and giving them at least one good reason to keep coming back to me. My oral skills kept me safely hidden inside my "high school hetero" cover for a good long time. (Stupid, looking back on it now, I was such a butch athletic girl and so obviously lesbian; but those were different times and that's a different story.)

That night in particular I was weak from lack of food and water (too full of pride to go back to take the halfway house's religious charity, too grossed out to eat from the trash behind the restaurants again), so I'd decided to give head for cash. It had worked out pretty well to that point -- he was my third and the band hadn't even finished their first set. Honestly, by the time he was done with me I'd swallowed enough that my hunger pains had died down somewhat and my head had begun to clear.

He offered to take me to get a proper bite to eat. I accepted. We walked a few blocks away from the concert, to a restaurant/bar full of half-drunk college kids, and he bought me my first decent meal in fucking forever.

Near the end of that long, easy-talking dinner he offered me a job selling myself -- in return for food, shelter, clothing, weed, and booze.

I accepted.

He fucked me standing up behind the restaurant dumpsters before taking me home. So yeah, I kind of ended up in the dumpster anyway! But dumpster-adjacent was better than dumpster-diving at that point. So I just gripped the dirty steel rim with both hands, closed my eyes, and let him take me from behind.

My first fuck for pay.

I slept at his apartment that very night. It was the first real bed I'd been in since I'd left the halfway house. I took a real shower. I put on a clean t-shirt. I had a full belly.

It was heaven.

In the morning he fucked me again, then he left. A few hours later he was back. He gave me a brand new laptop and a cell phone and told me my first appointment was waiting in the parking lot, ready to come up and climb on.

And so it began.

Turned out that this kid was running a little ring already, which utterly floored me. Apparently that's how some college girls got their drugs, you know? He'd told me all about it over that first dinner. What a bubble I'd been living in! He provided them with the molly or meth or crack or whatever they wanted in order to get high, and they fucked whoever he told them to fuck, and those other guys would pay him. He'd go back and get more drugs from his dealer, text some guys, text some girls, and they'd all do it all over again.

This kind of thing exists out there, folks. In everyday America. Right now.

And there I was, a new business opportunity. Apparently I was the cougar type that he'd been hoping to find. And I was willing to work just about every day. His other girls would not. According to him, they didn't even think of themselves as whores. They were more or less just looking for fun on the weekends, they'd fuck some dude for him and score their shit and then go on and party however they wanted to party. He didn't force any terms beyond that, and he didn't even really see some of the girls all that much except when they came to him really begging.

He wasn't a jerk about it, not that I could ever tell. And he was always really nice to me, almost like a much younger boyfriend sometimes. He probably fucked me two or three times a week, and he would ask me first if he could. Every time.

And you know what? I let him. I didn't mind.

I know. Weird. But how could I refuse? I owed him so much!

My pimp sold me mostly to his classmates, a few younger professors, his dealer and his dealer's friends, and eventually to the wrong undercover cop -- a narc posing as a college kid. So all of it came crashing down after a few months.

I went to jail, which sucked on all kinds of levels, but that part didn't actually last all that long. I was in the county for seven days, then I was transferred to a state-run rehab joint for a month. My pimp came from a very rich family and worked a plea bargain for his first offense, in case you wanted to know. No. Joke. No possession, either. There was nothing at his apartment but weed, which was on me at the time. He served two nights in the county and then had house arrest and community service, and I never saw him again. Supposedly he's back in Boca working for his dad.

But he got his parents to hire the lawyer who worked on my case, so that was really awesome of him to do. And that was how I officially got my identity back and could finally get into my bank account and start getting my life back on track. I make sure to send good vibes his way every day, because (in the worst of ways, I know, I know) he really did save my life!

So for a while I was a working woman, selling myself for all the hot pockets I could eat, all the weed I could smoke, and all the Stoli I could pack into his rich kid high-end apartment freezer. I showered as often as I wanted (which was after every fucking appointment). I slept on clean sheets (which I changed after every fucking appointment). I wore clean clothes (which he took me to shop for, which of course I fucking loved). I even got a laptop out of it, and I'm using it right now to tell you this! lol

Would I do it again? Only if I absolutely had to. Only if it was with the right service/pimp, and only if I moved to like Nevada where it's legal and regulated. Which is what prostitution should be. Every fucking where.

I never felt threatened or unsafe, but I got lucky. So many other women do not.