He looked down at the end table next to the king size bed and saw the $100 bill there. This always bothered him. The payments were all taken care of electronically through Marie’s beauty salon, where the actual appointments were booked. He knew that this bill was a way of keeping distance between them. The most ironic thing about Marie’s operation—for it was hers, not his—was that her male clients were largely drawn from among the husbands of his female clients: rich dudes with no time for their wife, but plenty of time for Marie.

Mrs. Dawson was different. She had a real marriage, a husband that worked a regular job, a descent guy. He just had an injury or a health problem or something. He never asked about a client’s life, ever. He knew though, that she loved her husband, and that he just couldn’t provide the physical aspect. That was why she danced under him with those little feet going nowhere, her mind needing to go, her body needing to stay. That was why she left the tip and made the sudden dart for the door, because of the guilt associated with betraying her husband.

He left the bill on the table for the maid and walked over to the mirror to look at the worn out soccer pro with the blown knees who was now a bandage for one hundred plus broken marriages, and the boy-toy for about fifty old broads: from vicious cougars; ‘hold-me-before-we-go’ fat girls; ‘I-don’t-look-bad-for-my-age-do-I?’ old ladies; and financially independent women who were more like men were supposed to be than any man he knew.

He adjusted his tie and creased the lapels of his jacket, and still felt like a spent dick, just a carnival ride for a world of lonely women. He looked at the tired brown eyes and the barely discernable line across his forehead that would turn into a deep gouge by the time he hit fifty if his ugly father had been any indication. He was forty-three years old and already eating Viagra for breakfast. He was less worried about the long term effects of that world-reviving drug than of drinking a half gallon of pineapple juice every day—because Marie insisted!

“But it makes you taste sweet for the ladies, Baby!” Marie constantly chided when he gagged on the acidic love potion.

I hate pineapple juice.

Marie was rarely home, usually at the beauty salon or in her penthouse with the ‘Old Money’ as he called her clients. They spent Thursday nights together at home and usually got out of town on Sunday. Marie would not book him for Sunday, and only took care of the Swedish ambassador and his wife on the last Sunday of each month.

It was late Saturday morning. Mrs. Dawson was usually a 7 to 10 A. M. thing, and he had told Marie that she was demanding, and begged her not to schedule him anything until Saturday night. The fact was, after Mrs. Dawson’s appointment, he didn’t want to touch another woman. It took until dinnertime to decompress. He had a dinner date—just an escort thing with wealthy lesbian, Gloria Armintrout at seven.

This was normally how Marie accommodated his supposed exhaustion on Saturday, by scheduling him as a chauffer and bodyguard for her lesbian clients. He would not see Marie until Thursday. She had a special engagement with a lobbyist and some politicians down in D.C. Most men would be worried sick about their wife shacking up in a hotel room with three scumbag politicians for 20 hours. He wasn’t worried about Marie. She packed an H&K auto in her purse and a razor in her hair.

There was a bright spot in his life: the Milford’s, Jack and Louise, who lived next door. Jack and Louise were just out of graduate school. They were a sweet young couple seriously and responsibly in love, living a well-planned life, not a pimp and her man-whore. He looked at his gaunt hands as he finished straightening his tie, which Mrs. Dawson so sweetly insisted on putting on for him with no skill at all. The hands reflected his emaciated state.

Look at you, Mister Bone Rack.

At six foot he was still only 160 pounds. He spent so much time working he burnt a huge amount of calories. What was worse, since he had begun to care for Mrs. Dawson so deeply, he did not have an appetite. Marie basically force fed him. He looked back up into the tired eyes of that sweeper back from Columbus Ohio who came to town to play pro soccer, only to blow his knees out in the second year.

“Well Sam, you’re just a whore now. But at least you’re not cutting grass. Let’s go see the nice normal folks next door.”