I hadn’t been naked in front of anyone since my mom gave me my last bath when I was six.
“Call from the payphone on the corner of 20th and Walnut and we will give you the address.”
My appointment was for 2:00 p.m. that Saturday, and I had time to kill. So, I nervously sat on a park bench in Rittenhouse Square park, one of the most elite neighborhoods in Philadelphia, and took stock of my life up to that point.
I had just turned 20 the week before. It had been almost a year since I dropped out of fashion design school. Since then, I was on my third crappy retail Job, this time around selling furniture at Structube, French Canada’s answer to IKEA. I had no direction or idea what I was doing. I was renting an equally crappy 2-bedroom apartment on Pine Street with some raver friends of mine, but didn’t have any REAL friends at that time. I burned all those bridges when I left the scene almost a year prior.
I knew I had more to offer.
I started to pursue the adult employment ads in the back of the City Paper on my lunch breaks, mainly because I was too poor to eat. I knew I didn’t want to be an escort or a stripper. That would be taking things a little too far. I was a former goth and thought being a dominatrix was glamorous and edgy.
After a few months, it happened. Royal Castle was hiring dommes and submissives.
I called. They asked what experience I had. I lied and said I role-played with my boyfriend.
Truth? I had never had a boyfriend.
Even more true? I was a virgin.
At 1:55, me and my khaki Jncos walked to the corner and slipped a quarter into the slot of the payphone and dialed the number.
A woman instructed me to cross the street and ring the buzzer. I slid into the mirrored elevator and pulled the gate closed. I hit the “3” button just as I was instructed. All I could think is ‘What the HELL am I doing?” But, as it always had been my whole life until then, and after, curiosity won.
The elevator stopped at the third floor and looked directly out onto a lush blood red hallway and a tiny woman, easily well into her 40s, with a face meaner than a pit bull trained for fighting. I came to find out this was Jackie. She lived at the dungeon.
She took me into a beige room with nurse costumes and a full-length mirror.
“I need your driver’s license,” she demanded.
Scared, I handed it over.
“Are you a cop?” she curtly asked.
That made me giggle. “No,” I replied.
“OK,” she answered. “I need to do a strip search. Take off your clothes.”
I hadn’t been naked in front of anyone since my mom gave me my last bath when I was six. But I had a choice to make...get out of there or comply. I was too nervous and curious to leave. While she disappeared with my Pennsylvania license, I pulled off my Jncos, baggy white polo shirt, and navy sweater vest.
Jackie was gone for all of two minutes. When she came back, she looked me up and down with the disinterest of a doctor for a few seconds. (I later found out Jackie was a former nurse at Bellevue in NYC.)
“OK, get dressed,” she ordered. While I did, she again asked about my qualifications and interests. Again, I lied.
“What is your experience with domination and submission?” she asked.
“Oh...”I stammered. “you, know.....with boyfriends and, like, amateur phone sex,” I answered, pulling on my pants.
The whole “interview” took about five minutes, including the strip search, and ended with her taking me to the back room where I discovered about four other girls in varying stages of goth-ness huddled on a cheap futon.
“These are the girls,” Jackie said warmly this time. “Come back at 5 p.m. on Monday for training week.”
The next two days were a whirlwind. I was still working at the furniture store, but I also had to buy some pieces for my work outfits. I stopped at Trash & Vaudeville and found what would turn out to be my favorite working outfit, a comfy PVC A-line dress. It slipped on and off easily between sessions, was breathable (for PVC) and I looked hot as hell in it. I told the sales associate I'd gotten a Job as a dominatrix and she was more than helpful.
The rest of my shopping spree consisted of a leather bra, some cheap over-the-elbow satin gloves, and a crappy pair of black plastic boots from Easy Pickins. Like many women, I always remember events by what I wore.
Monday came and I packed my humble costumes. Feeling a bit luxurious, I did something I never did, and hailed a cab.
“Sex workers don’t walk or take the bus!” I justified to myself.
I slid into the back of the car.
“20th and Walnut, please.”
Minutes later I was dumped in front of the Irish Pub on said corner. Me and my bag made our way back up to the third floor where a much different scene met me. Instead of the tomb-like stillness, there was a flurry of activity and giggling girls in street clothes.
“Five p.m. is when we got ready for the after-work crowd,” Jackie explained.
“Cool....Just like all my crappy retail Jobs!” I thought to myself. As stern as Jackie was a few days before was how sweet and kind she was that night. She partnered me up with Katie, my trainer, who gave me a tour and told me the rules.
“Half hour is $90, an hour is $160. The girl gets 40%, the house 60% and NO BLOWJOBS!”
I went into the bathroom to put on my plastic boots, fishnets, PVC dress, gloves, and fake eyelashes. I wanted to be fierce. I wasn’t getting paid that night, but I was going to observe Katie doing a “sensual session.”
My vision was cruel ice princesses clad in black leather with quivering naked businessmen at their feet. Instead I watched Katie give a massage and a latex-gloved hand Job. I stood awkwardly in the corner, severely over-dressed for the occasion.
I left that night at 11 p.m. feeling a little disappointed but still extremely curious. I was a real dominatrix now! I had serious cred.
The next night I went back again at 5. This time I was going to work with Jackie. No sessions were booked when I arrived, but someone named Baby Billy called and booked an appointment. He was driving all the way from Lancaster, PA. In a diaper. Jackie and I sat around waiting most of the night while she told me weird nursing stories. I began to suspect that Jackie had lost her license in some sort of scandal.
Our waiting was interrupted with random phone calls from Baby Billy telling us he had just pissed or pooped himself. Jackie was convinced he was Just making dirty phone calls and wasn’t serious. I later found out when I was dungeon manager that this was very common.
When the phone rang with Baby Billy from the corner of 20th and Walnut three hours later, we were shocked. I was excited to witness my first real domme session! I even overlooked the fact it involved an adult baby.
Baby Billy selected my favorite room, the dungeon room, which was 100 percent black with a cage barely big enough for a person to stand in. (Later I discovered the bars got super cold on naked business man flesh if the a/c, which was placed directly behind it, was left on for an hour before the session.)
After all the payments and “are you a cop” hoopla, Jackie got back into mega-bitch character and commanded Baby Billy to strip. That is when we discovered he was indeed wearing a diaper. I observed all this perched upon my plastic boots, safely poised by the door.
Baby Billy was ordered to lie on his back on the floor so Jackie could roleplay changing his diaper.
At least, that was the plan.
Instead, what met us is nothing my virgin ass knew existed. Turns out Baby Billy was also not simply fantasizing and role playing about pooping and pissing his diaper.
The stench hit me first before I could fully fathom what my eyes were seeing. Baby Billy’s entire crotch area was caked in shit.
This sent Jackie into a rage. And one I think was legitimate, not role play.
“YOU FU**ING PIG! YOU ARE DISGUSTING!” Jackie screamed.
I was mildly terrified but leaving never crossed my mind. How the HELL was this going to turn out?
“Get into the bathroom and wash yourself in the tub!” Jackie yelled. “I’m not touching your sick ass!”
I got the impression this was pretty much exactly what Baby Billy wanted.
“Yes, Mistress,” he replied.
It all ended with Baby Billy Jerking himself off in the tub, ejaculating in his own shit and piss.
I stood wide eyed in the corner. I pretended to be cool and collected, like I had seen this sort of thing before and it had all turned out exactly as I had expected.
The next night, I had my first solo, paid session. I guess Baby Billy was an accelerated course and I graduated early. I had no idea what to do. I had never even touched a dick before. I was happy that my client picked my favorite room.
I was terrible. I fumbled with my whips and was an obvious amateur with my rope knots. I searched for mean things to say and it all felt completely unnatural. Through a lot of rhythmic spanking, I somehow managed to fill up the 30 minutes.
But, it was easy. And I made $45 out of it. At that time, that was pretty much equivalent to almost full day at the furniture store.
As time went on, I grew more and more comfortable. I started to get requested. To add to my bank roll I took on submissive, switch (playing dominant and submissive in the same scene), and massage sessions. I was making the most money and after a couple months I dropped my furniture gig to weekends-only and worked at the dungeon full-time as a Mistress and a manager. It was my first management role. Unfortunately I could never put it on my resume.
I was becoming addicted to the power, the rush, the depravity, the money. It was also my awakening as a sexual being. I was desired in "that way" for the first time. Ever. Hell, I was so hot men were willing to pay for me. And, I was able to afford to go back to school. I was oblivious to the risks and exploitation and the fact I was going home every night reeking of latex and KY Jelly.
Six months in, as summer officially turned to fall, I met a boy in real life. Ironically, his name was Bill. It was 1996, so hipsters didn’t exist yet, but if they did, his skinny, geeky ass would definitely have been one. We spent hours sitting in Independence Park making out in the grass and talking about music. And my dungeon gig made him totally hot.
I knew this was the boy I wanted to lose my virginity to, but I knew I mentally could not do it and work at the dungeon. The dungeon was my sex life. At that time, I was too sexually immature to do both. I felt like I was cheating on him with my Job.
A few weeks later, I rode up to the dungeon on my custom electric blue lowrider bike after classes and discovered all the girls standing outside, across the street, looking up to the third floor. I followed their gaze and saw the black windows to my favorite room were flung open. There were people walking around. There was something written on their windbreakers. I squinted to make it out.
In bold white letters, it said “FBI.”
Grace, the owner, who took an Acela train down from her home in NYC, was crying, yelling, and pushing Jackie on Walnut St. She was making a scene in general. During rush hour.
“You sloppy bitch!” she yelled. “How could you be so careless?! How could you do this to me?!”
I’m not sure why I didn’t pedal my ass out right then and there. I wanted to see everything.
After Grace collected herself. we all went to a strip club a few blocks away and drank. Never mind I wasn’t 21 yet. Turned out one of my old raver friends was dancing on the back of the bar. She gave me a warm greeting as she was spread eagle on a pole. I raised my glass and tipped her a dollar. After all, we were sex industry sisters.
Two days later I came back to work my shift. For the first time I didn’t have makeup on and didn’t give a shit what I looked like, and they noticed. There was a shift in my being. Whatever innocence I had left was obliterated by the bust.
Jackie pulled me into the medical room, where I first met her on that day in May.
“Listen,” she started, “The City Paper got a hold of the story. Get ready for the shit to hit the fan. You can go ahead and take the night off.”
I was numbed at the prospect of being the first ever virgin to be involved in a sex scandal. I quietly left the building, got on my low rider, and rode home.
As fate would have it, the next day I fell walking down the stairs in my third floor apartment. Luckily nothing was broken but I had a nasty sprain that required an air cast, crutches, and bed rest for two weeks. I had once raked in $1,000 one night for an all-night session with a coke head, but I didn’t have insurance, so I spent five hours in the emergency room at Pennsylvania Hospital. I spent the time counting my blessings and made a decision: I was leaving the dungeon. No goodbyes, no explanations...Just never go back.
I would lose some good clothes and my treasured VHS of "Paris Is Burning," but I Just couldn’t do it. I was going to be trapped in my apartment for two weeks anyway. No school, no furniture Job, no dungeon.
Then, I decided I was going to have sex with Bill.
The two weeks of recovery were rough emotionally. Jackie was calling my apartment (my roommates told her I left town) and the furniture store (I told them I left town to recuperate) and the FBI came to my door (damn that driver’s license) for questioning. I called them back and told them what I knew.
I was relieved.
Once I was able to walk again, Bill came over and we hung out with my roommates. We smoked some pot. Then we had sex. It was over in five minutes.
I never told him I was a virgin either.