I hang out with my friends. I’ve adopted way too many cats. I go to the movies by myself and out to eat and there’s no shame behind it. I’ve gone on some dates, but with the same end goal in mind, get laid and ticking everything off of my list.
There have been the good and then the outright terrible.
I’ve made a decision about how to move forward and I’m not sure how Chelsea will take it, but I’m going to tell her anyway.
“I’m done with the apps,” I tell her and she gasps.
“But the lore, the endless entertainment we get from you being on apps,” she complains and I give her a glare. “You’re right, this isn’t about me.”
“I’m not looking to date, and while a lot of guys on there aren’t either, so many of them suck,” I complain.
They suck at sex, just looking to bust their load and dip, no interest in exploring kink or power dynamics. Others are looking to date and see me as someone who’s biological clock is ticking while I clearly state in my profile that I don’t want children. Which leads me to believe half of these motherfuckers can’t read.
“I figure I can use money to solve the problem,” I tell her and she looks at me wide-eyed.
“A prostitute?” she says, grabbing the stem of the champagne flute like a high society housewife would clutch their pearls.
“No, dumbass. I’m signing up for a sex club.”
“Those are a real thing?” Chelsea asks, and I nod.
“Yes, it’s a real thing. I found one I think will be a good fit. I think it will take a lot of the burden away from what I want, you know?”
“Kate, I mean this with all my heart, no. I don’t know. Explain it to me.”
Chelsea is happily married with a husband who gets her. They’re all over each other like horny teenagers, and she doesn’t have similar interests behind closed doors as I do.
“When I meet these guys on apps, they’re usually a complete disappointment.”
“Like Justin,” she says, and we both wince.
Justin looked good on paper, normal job, nice enough guy. But he wasn’t packing and didn’t know how to overcompensate with his hands or his mouth. When I didn’t finish, he called me a slut and said he wasn’t interested in me anyway.
“I’m on an exploration to find what I like and I’ve seen glimpses of it. But the club will be a place where men have the same ideas minus the mental labor of fielding them out through apps and continually being disappointed.”
All of my hook ups weren’t bad, I actually enjoyed some of them. Though, when I found myself comparing them to the stranger at the marina, they couldn’t hold a candle. Maybe I’d built up that memory in my mind, but deep down I know I didn’t. He was the standard I wanted for myself, and the apps weren’t providing it.
“I know to engage in the things I want to do there needs to be some sort of trust in there, which is hard when I don’t want a boyfriend and I don’t want to take chances on these online encounters anymore,” I reiterate and Chelsea nods her head, seeming to understand.
“I’m picturing a sex dungeon or like the red room,” Chelsea says and I laugh into my glass.
“Of course you would. It’s actually very classy. I took a tour yesterday and filled out all the paperwork.”
“So how much are we talking monthly?” she asks.
I hide myself behind my glass as I mumble the number.
“What was that?”
“Five thousand.”
“A month? Kate! Do you think your Aunt Helene would’ve predicted your trust fund would go to supporting a sex club membership?”
I wince and grab a piece of calamari as my best friend blinks at me. A typical associate art professor wouldn’t be able to afford it, but my situation of where my money comes from is unique and equally complicated.
Chelsea whistles. “If you think about the return on investment and how much each orgasm costs, damn,” she says, her economics brain doing overtime.
“It’s not just about that,” I tell her and she nods.
