Calling Maggie May (8 page)

Sat, Dec 13

I've been thinking a lot about the date the other day with Ada. I had fun, but I also felt kind of like an imposter. I know I'm still
very new to all this stuff, but watching Ada work just made me aware of how much I don't know.

It's like when you go to a restaurant and the waitress says, “Hi! Just so you know, it's my first day,” and you smile but inwardly you groan because you know she's going to mess up your order or forget about you completely or spill water on your shirt and generally be a big nuisance. That's how I felt. Like there was this whole encyclopedia of stuff I'm supposed to know, and I am pretty clueless about all of it.

I mean, not that I've never heard of a blow job, and on paper it doesn't sound like rocket science. But the mechanics of it are surprisingly . . . It's not easy to get the hang of. Also it's really gross, and I'm not sure how to get over that.

Miss Irma said it was okay to have things you won't do, but blow jobs probably shouldn't be on that list. I'll look like a real idiot if I won't do that, because it's not even that weird. Plus, I'd probably lose a lot of money to the other girls. So I just need to get better at it somehow.

And there are probably a lot of other things clients might ask for that I've never even heard of, so I don't know whether they should be on my list or not. I guess I need to do some research. Thank God for the Internet. . . . I don't even want to think about how girls like me had to figure this stuff out fifty years ago.

Wed, Dec 17

It's payday today! Ada and I are going to leave at lunch to go to Miss Irma's office together and pick up our envelopes. I'm not as scared this time, since I've seen how it goes. I only have to talk to Anne, not Irma. Plus, it will be sooo much better this time because my envelope will have actual money in it! No more start-up fees coming out of my pay. Maybe Ada and I can finally go shopping afterward.

Wed, Dec 17, later

Guess there's been a change of plans. I just got a call from Anne. She told me I'm not supposed to go to the office to pick up my envelope today. I'm supposed to go Saturday. And she gave me a totally different address to go to. I asked if Ada could wait until Saturday too, so we could still go together, but Anne told me that Miss Irma wants to see me alone.

Miss Irma wants to see me? I don't understand. I'm really confused. Why would Miss Irma waste her Saturday handing cash over to a newbie like me? And why at a different address? And why can't Ada be there?

I tried to ask Anne what was going on, but she told me not to worry. That Miss Irma just wants to have a private conversation with me. That doesn't make me worry any less, to be honest. I like Miss Irma so far, and Ada says she treats everyone well, but at the same time, the morning after my night
with Damon, Ada seemed scared of Irma. At the very least, she is definitely intimidating. What does she want to talk to me about? Did she find out about Damon? Am I in trouble?

Should I even go? Maybe if I just don't show up and let her keep the money, she'll let it drop. Except I want the money. I mean, I earned it, didn't I? There wasn't much point in showing up to the date if I'm going to chicken out on picking up my payment.

Sat, Dec 20

That was . . . interesting. It wasn't what I was expecting at all, but I have a lot to think about now. I had to take three buses to get to Miss Irma's house, which was in an out-of-the-way suburb. I'd never been there before, but I've heard my parents mention it. A lot of people they knew from Taiwan live around there, though it's a mixed neighborhood.

From the outside the house looked nice but reassuringly normal. Not that different from my house. It has a pretty garden, and I wondered for a moment if Miss Irma works in the garden the same way my mom does. But Miss Irma has a career; she must be too busy for that. She must hire people.

Miss Irma welcomed me at the front door and invited me back to what she called her “office.” She was wearing jeans and a pink shirt, which was a little strange, compared to how sharp and businessy she had looked when I met her the other time.
I guess it's not so strange for her to dress down on a Saturday, but it was weird to see her looking so . . . normal. But reassuring, too. I couldn't quite believe she would want to yell at me or fire me or whatever in her weekend clothes.

She told me to take a seat and offered me a glass of lemonade. Then she asked me how I was doing with the work. How I felt about how things were going. I was feeling awkward and not at all sure what she was looking for, so I just said everything was fine. Then she brought up my first client, and I got that feeling in my stomach like in class when the teacher starts handing back the graded exams. I wasn't exactly sure I had passed.

“The client contacted me,” she said in that slow, precise way of hers. “He had a few . . .”

“Complaints?” I said, feeling queasy.

“Suggestions.”

“I'm sorry,” I said quickly, feeling like I was defending myself to my mom after getting yet another bad grade. “I . . . I'm still new to this. There's a lot of stuff I don't know, but I'm trying to learn. And I'm a . . .”

Irma held up her hand, and I closed my mouth, dropping my eyes in embarrassment.

“Don't apologize,” she said. “And don't worry. In this business, skill and knowledge can be useful. But another kind of knowledge is even more useful.”

I looked up.

“You might have guessed by now,” she went on. “Men who are looking for skill don't hire sixteen-year-olds. Your innocence is a selling point. Keep it as long as you can.”

“Oh,” I said, surprised. “But Ada . . . She's so sophisticated. And talented. Don't men like that?”

“Some men, yes. But you have something Ada will never have. It can make you a lot of money, if you know how to use it.”

I couldn't believe that. What could I possibly have that Ada didn't?

“Why do you think men choose you when I show them your picture next to Ada's?”

“I—I have no idea,” I answered honestly. It seemed impossible that anyone would do that.

“You want to know what they say? They say, ‘I want the Asian girl.'”

I looked up at her, startled.

“They pick me because I'm Asian? But . . . why?”

“Probably because they are racist pigs,” Miss Irma replied with a delicate shrug. “But it's not important. What's important is if you keep them happy, they can make you rich. Those pigs have made me very rich.”

I fidgeted in my seat, trying to take this information in.

“But if all they care about is my race,” I said slowly, “why did that man complain about me?”

Miss Irma leaned forward and steepled her fingers on the desk.

“Try to understand, my dear,” she said. “When clients ask for an Asian girl, they are not talking about skin color. Not really. What they want is the fantasy in their head. The fantasy they have been fed. You know this fantasy, because it has been fed to you too. They want a dragon lady. They want a kung-fu princess. They want a Japanese schoolgirl.”

“But I'm not Japanese.”

Miss Irma cocked an eyebrow at me. “For the right price, you can be Japanese enough.” She stood up and stepped out from behind her desk.

“Come with me. I will show you something.”

I got up and followed her into another part of the house. She opened a door and I noticed immediately that things were different here. The decor in most of the house was just normal, tasteful suburban, like the houses of most of my classmates. But in this part of the house, it was totally different, like something out of a Chinatown tourist shop or a Hollywood back lot.

Right away I was dazzled by all the red and gold in the room. Once my eyes adjusted to that, I was able to pick out other details: lacquer and jade and porcelain and bamboo. Dragons and peacocks and cranes and Buddhas. It was like a Pier 1 Imports had exploded all over her living room.

“Tell me,” said Miss Irma. “What do you notice?”

“I . . . well . . . it's all Asian stuff,” I said. “A lot of it reminds me of stuff my mom has lying around, or stuff I've seen when we visit family in Taiwan.”

“And the rest?”

I felt a little embarrassed to say what I thought about the other stuff, but a look from Miss Irma reassured me that she wouldn't be offended.

“It looks more like stuff I've seen in some Asian restaurants, I guess,” I said. “Kind of a mishmash of different countries and cultures and styles.”

“Very good,” said Miss Irma. “Perhaps you have guessed that I entertain clients in these rooms.” So I had been right that she didn't have the clients visit her in that antiseptic office downtown. “Some of them have known me for a long time. They have certain expectations.”

“But it's not real,” I said. “It's all stereotypes.”

Miss Irma shrugged. “What does it matter? We give them a fantasy, and they give us money. Everyone is happy that way.”

She sat down on one of the low, cushioned benches and indicated that I should do the same.

“When I was young,” she said, “almost as young as you, I worked in an Oriental massage parlor. It was run by a man, and he made it a very hard life. Not like you girls have now. Others who started with me couldn't take it. They let men abuse them until they were all used up. But I stayed focused. I saved my money. I
learned how to keep books, how to keep police away. I studied and used my head. One day all the other girls worked for me.

“You're like me, I think. A smart girl and hardworking. Keep your head, study what the clients want, and give them their fantasy.” She leaned forward and patted my knee. “You will do better than the others.”

I didn't know how to respond. I admit, I didn't feel totally comfortable with her suggestions. Miss Irma was so different from my mom, but in some ways they were remarkably similar. Always full of directions of how I should act and behave to be pleasing to anyone but myself.

Luckily, Irma didn't seem to expect me to say much of anything. When she had said her bit, she simply handed me a plain white envelope. I was surprised when I saw it and didn't reach for it immediately. Strangely enough, I had almost forgotten why I had come in the first place—not to receive lessons in making myself appealing to men, but to pick up my payment.

I was embarrassed to look through the envelope in front of Irma. It seemed rude, so I let her show me out her front door before I stopped and checked it. And as I flipped through the bills inside, I suddenly felt a lot better about our conversation and my new vocation. Living up to the images my mom and Miss Irma expected felt like being stuck in a cage, but having
an envelope full of cash that I earned through my own work . . . that felt like freedom.

Sun, Dec 21

I got a text from Ada today just as I was helping clear the table from lunch. It couldn't have come at a better time. Mom was hassling me again about why she didn't see me working on my homework so much anymore, what's going on with my grades, and why am I so disobedient, blah, blah, blah. I couldn't wait to get out of there, so when Ada texted to see if I wanted to go shopping with her, I texted right back that I would meet her downtown.

Of course Mom the busybody wanted to know who I was talking to and why. Out of instinct, a lie rose to my lips about how it was someone from my English class, and we're working on a group project, and I have to go meet them at the Starbucks a few blocks away. But the words died in my throat. I just thought,
I can't do this anymore. I don't want to do it. I am sick of leading a double life.

So I just told her. I mean, I didn't say, “It's my hooker friend and she's helping me pick out clothes I can wear while turning tricks.” But I did say, “It's a friend. I'm meeting her to go shopping.” Which, as far as Mom is concerned, might as well be the same thing. She nearly hit the roof when I said that. It stunned her silent for a second or two at first, and I could
read on her face the internal battle she was waging between telling me off for disrespecting her and telling me off for doing something fun with my weekend when my grades were so disappointing. And maybe also joining the battle was the nosy part of her who couldn't bear to imagine I might have a friend she didn't know about.

But that was only a moment or two before she burst forth with her battle cry. The approach she went with was the grades—how I wasn't going anywhere until I had done all my homework and brought my grades up, etc., etc. Which almost made me laugh. As if there was ever really an “until.” In my whole life, even when I was doing really well, my grades have never been good enough for me to deserve going off and doing something fun by myself. There would always be another task for me to complete, another thing I'm just not doing quite well enough at.

Well, I'm tired of living in her prison. If she wants me to stick around a minute longer, she's going to have to chain me to the radiator. And until she does that, I will go where I please. Her guilt trips can't affect me anymore.

Sun, Dec 21, later

Back from my shopping trip with Ada. After the scene earlier today, Mom is currently not speaking to me, which is a relief. I bet that won't last, though.

But the shopping trip! It was . . . well, it was definitely fun. But it was also, I don't know . . . I guess I couldn't help being a little disappointed. For so long, my fantasy was that I could become a little more like Ada. She is so beautiful and glamorous and sophisticated, and I've always been so bad at any of that stuff. Just dumpy and geeky and nothing anyone should have any reason to notice. A big part of why I got into this whole lifestyle in the first place was so I could be more like her: gorgeous and mysterious and set apart from all the other girls at school.

I wanted to make money so I could buy clothes and makeup like hers and not have to rely on her hand-me-downs. That was what the money was for. I didn't really have anything else I wanted or needed. But now . . .

After what Irma told me the other day, that's not really an option, is it? She was pretty clear about what the clients would expect from a girl like me. I'm supposed to look cute and young, like a schoolgirl, because that's their fantasy. Well, that's not my fantasy! But since when has anything I wanted ever mattered?

But I suppose if what I wanted was to be noticed, this new look will at least help me accomplish that.

I met up with Ada, and we stopped for coffee first while I told her about what had happened with Miss Irma and I explained to her all about the “look” I was supposed to have now.
Ada nodded and seemed to understand. She talked about it in another way, too. She said that when you think of it as playing a character, sometimes it was easier to get through a date. A bad client couldn't touch you or hurt you the same way if the person on the date wasn't really you. I guess that makes sense. I just wish I got to play a cooler character.

Ada did make me feel better about it. She thought the schoolgirl outfits were cute, and she wished she could get away with them. I don't really believe her, but it was nice of her to say. And she did take me to some stores where I could get stuff that looked better than I was expecting. I've seen the schoolgirls in Taiwan, and believe me, they don't look like anyone's fantasy. The school uniforms are almost as dowdy as my regular school clothes: plaid skirts down to the knee and shapeless white blouses that make everyone look puffy. And knee socks that are always slipping down. The stuff Ada picked out for me was like that, but the sexy version, I guess. The skirt was much shorter, the socks went up higher, and the shirt was a lot more formfitting. I came out of the dressing room feeling a bit shy, and Ada said I looked really cute.

I bought a few outfits along those lines, plus some decent makeup; then we went back to her place to play dress up. I stayed a couple of hours until it started to get dark, and then I got a little nervous about my parents waiting for me at home. I could call them, of course, but I wasn't quite ready to face that conversation
yet. Instead, I asked Ada a question I'd wondered about before.

“Why aren't your parents ever home?” I asked her. “Do they work a lot?”

Ada barked out a laugh. “Work? I'm the only person in this household who works.”

I didn't know how to respond to that. I just stared at her.

“So they just . . . ,” I began.

“There's no ‘they,'” she said. “I don't have a father.”

“Oh,” I said. “Did he die?”

“Beats me,” she answered in a hard voice. “Maybe. I don't have the slightest idea who he is, and neither does anyone else, as far as I know.”

“What about your mom?”

“She's here. Around. She always is.”

“Why haven't I ever seen her?”

Ada shrugged. “She's in her room. Doesn't come out much.”

“Oh,” I said. “What does she do in there?”

“Mostly lies around in bed.” Ada hesitated. It was clear she wasn't used to talking about this. “She's not . . . healthy,” she said at last.

“What's wrong with her?”

Ada got up and moved around the room, picking things up at random and putting them back down. She seemed agitated, and I kind of hated myself for bringing up the conversation. It
was none of my business. Why had I insisted on prying like my mom would? I was just about to tell Ada that she didn't have to say anything more when she spoke again.

“I don't know,” she said. “She wasn't always like this, though she was never what most people would call a normal mom. She used to get . . . episodes, where she would take to her room and not talk and hardly move for days at a time. Then, after a couple of days, she'd snap out of it and put some clothes on and go to the store and get some groceries. Then, one time, she just . . . didn't come out of it.”

“She's been like this ever since?”

“Not exactly. Sometimes she gets up and comes out and even tries to make some food. But it's not like before. The truth is, it's better for me when she keeps to herself,” she said in a rush of breath. “She's easier to deal with that way.”

I nodded as if I understood, though I didn't really. But at least I realized I didn't really want to know any more, and Ada didn't seem to want to give me more details than she already had.

It was getting late anyway, so I told her I had to catch the bus home and I got out of there.