Whip Smart: A Memoir

by Melissa Febos

  Soon after, I spotted my neighbor loading her whites at the neighborhood Laundromat. I feigned engrossment in the television mounted over her machine, covertly scouring her sweatpants and running sneakers for some sign of her dual life. Did I expect to see a pair of knee-high leather boots emerge from her mesh laundry bag? A whip? Of medium height, with a cascade of dark hair and the kind of face that people call handsome on a woman, she was impenetrable. I would never have pegged her as anything other than another Pratt student.

  I had always been fascinated by the ability to appear one thing and to be another and was routinely enthralled by anything taboo: drug culture, deviant sexual practices, the criminal machinations of my hometown’s juvenile delinquents. Even as a kid, I’d always found most compelling those stories of underworlds and extremes: Raymond Chandler, Anaïs Nin, Go Ask Alice. My interest in this woman, though, was something more specific than the romance of misbehavior.

  Though I’d waited tables my first year in New York and had before that been both a chambermaid and boatyard hand on the Cape, my most recent jobs had been in publishing. At the time that I met my new neighbor, I had taken a hiatus from working life—my longest since the age of fourteen—and while I finished college my parents would cover my living expenses. Since childhood I’d never accepted so much help from them, having decided early on that making my own money meant more freedom. Life may have been easier with help, but I could never give in to the pleasure of that ease. I itched for the independence that self-sufficiency lent me, the confidence I found in not needing or owing anyone. Money was security, and I needed my own.

  In that August of 2002, circumstances were urging me toward my neighbor’s door. Air-conditioning was an unaffordable luxury. I lay draped across our curbside-salvaged couch lacquered in sweat. Feet in a bucket of ice water, I recounted the list of options that awaited me post-graduation, as I had sat and done the day before, and the day before that. I would graduate with a stellar GPA, but what else? A liberal arts degree was indeed a “liberal” qualification to work in the arts; it qualified me to make coffee and answer phones for someone actually doing something related to the arts. I knew I could succeed in a classroom environment, but my stamina for work that I didn’t find compelling had never been great. I interviewed well and enjoyed the challenge of playing the right role in order to get a job. It never took long, however, for me to grow bored and simply stop showing up. I couldn’t bear office work or ass kissing and had little confidence that my skills—talking about books, writing, and reading people—would translate into employment I could sustain.

  I stared at the sneaker trussed to the leg of the couch by a piece of rope, which I used to ferry my recreational drugs up the four stories from my dealer on street level. Thinking of his usual wolf whistle with white knuckles, I watched a water bug brazenly meander across the living room floor. I needed money before I could make that call. In fact, I needed money for more than that. Life in New York cost more than it had in Boston, from subway fares to food. I only accepted the bare minimum from my parents, and too often the utility money ended up in that sneaker.

  I heard the choke of pipes in the wall behind me as a toilet flushed next door, where I imagined a life free of these worries. I doubted my neighbor was obsessing about her financial situation right now. She was probably reading the Times—or some more exotic fare—in air-conditioned, roachless comfort. Surely she had no need to accept money from her parents, or anyone. That was enough; without knowing what exactly I’d say to her, I stepped out of the bucket into a pair of blackened flip-flops, shuffled into the hallway, heart pounding, and knocked on my neighbor’s door.

  She opened the door wearing a pink robe, slippers, and a bemused smile, as though she had been expecting me.

  “Good morning,” she said, raising an oversize mug in cheers.

  “Hi,” I said, and searched for a good segue. So I hear you’re a dominatrix wasn’t going to cut it.

  She raised her brows expectantly. “You’re Rebecca’s roommate, right? From next door?”

  “Yes—Melissa, it’s Melissa.” I stuck out my hand. She switched her mug to her left hand and shook mine. Did she know why I was there? I felt like an idiot.

  “Nice to meet you, Melissa. Do you want some coffee?”

  “Sure. Thanks.” I followed her into the air-conditioned cool, determined to muster my usual confidence. I had expected to find chains hanging from the ceiling and cages lining the walls—some kind of, well, dungeon. Instead, she had bookshelves lined with the same titles as mine, a Schiele print hanging over the kitchen table, and an assortment of Ikea furniture. After she filled another oversize mug from a French press, we sat at her kitchen table, where there was indeed a “Week in Review.”

  “So, you went to UMass with Rebecca?” I asked.

  “Yeah.” She smiled.

  “And now you are—”

  “In law school,” she finished.

  “Right.” I nodded, suddenly aware of the possibility that she might not want to tell me anything about her work.

  “And I work as a domme. But Rebecca probably already told you that.” She smiled again, and I relaxed. She went to law school? The polarity of this arrangement appealed to me; what powers of transformation she must have had to be able to exist in such disparate worlds! She looked so normal.

  After that she answered my questions patiently, if somewhat elliptically:

  “So, is there any actual sex involved?”

  “No. But it is definitely sexual in nature.”

  “Is the money good?”

  She paused at this, and I worried that I’d crossed a line.

  “Yes,” she said cautiously, “once you pay your dues. I mean, relatively good. Not compared to other sex industry work.” I saw pride flicker across her face with this acknowledgment. The difference between “other sex industry work” and hers clearly went further than money. She shrugged. “Sex sells better than anything, right?”

  “Is it hard to get into?” I asked. “I mean, could you help me—”

  She shook her head before I’d finished my sentence.

  “It’s not hard to get the job,” she said. “There are magazines you can find—even New York magazine runs ads. Just call one of the dungeons advertising dommes and ask if they’re hiring; they usually are.”

  “So,” I smiled cautiously, “if getting the job is easy, what’s the hard part?”

  “Keeping it.” She smiled. “Domming isn’t for everybody.” These words rendered it exactly the sort of challenge that screamed out to be marked a Point B.

  Nothing she described about the actual sessions frightened me: spanking, bondage, feminization, verbal humiliation, torture, role-play; I didn’t know what half of these practices were, but I knew I could master them if I needed to. The vulnerability of stripping had always disturbed me; it seemed too easy to be condescended to, to be humiliated. My need to be in control had always trumped the allure of being so desired. But my neighbor presented the possibility of both. Not to mention the money.

  With a stack of books including The Art of Female Domination and Mistress Ruby Ties It Together, and the unspoken promise that I could one day enlist the services of men who would pay to scrub my toilet, I left her apartment with all I needed to make fast money without taking off my clothes. I was also armed with a kind of certainty; I would become a dominatrix.

  3

  THE AD IN BACK of The Village Voice read:

  Attractive young woman wanted for nurse role-play and domination. No experience necessary. Good $$. No sex.

  At a loss for how to dress for such an interview, I wore what I did to conventional ones: black pants, button-up shirt, and cardigan. Fighting my way through the congested sidewalks of Herald Square, I dodged tourists outfitted in fanny packs and digital cameras who stopped mid-stride to stare up at the Empire State Building, or the display windows of Macy’s. I arrived at my destination unkempt, overwhelmed with sweat and irritation. After ringing the
buzzer and riding the elevator to the second floor, I was greeted by a lanky woman in jeans with full lips and bare feet.

  “Hi.” She sighed, and gave me a blasé smile. “I’m Fiona. I’ll give you a tour.” I could see I would not wow her with my firm handshake. I gave a feeble wave.

  “Hi, Fiona, I’m Melissa.”

  She gave me a once-over.

  “Not for long, you’re not.”

  She led me down hallways of polished wood decorated by ornate rugs, while sconces glowed along the red walls, reflected in mirrors hung in gilt frames. Here, in the sprawling Dungeon of Mistress X, I found what I had expected of my neighbor’s apartment, and I was hopelessly impressed. I had nothing to compare it to; it was like a movie set—an atmosphere truly designed for fantasy—more lush than I had even remotely imagined. It occupied the entire floor, comprised of a maze of dark hallways. Along these halls were the polished doors of a highly styled, big-budget dream; think David Lynch. Excitement folded through me in waves. I had to work here.

  Behind three of those doors were the official “dungeons”: the Red Room, the Black Room, and the Blue Room. Accordingly colored, these rooms were huge—the Blue Room was easily seven hundred square feet—and all with ten-foot ceilings.

  “The Red and Blue Rooms have full baths,” Fiona explained as she pushed open the bathroom door in the Red Room. She circled the marbled floor, pointing out amenities. “These towel racks are heated, so they need to be unplugged after sessions. All the sinks should have Scope, Dixie cups, and these little packages with disposable toothbrushes and paste.” I traced her steps, lingering over the miniature tube of Crest in its sealed package like take-out dinnerware and running my hand along the warm towels as I followed her back out into the Red Room. “That over there is the bondage table,” she said, indicating a waist-high bed with leather upholstery and metal rings intermittently hung around its edges. “The top is a lid that opens.”

  “For storage?” I asked.

  “For slaves. It doubles as a coffin.”

  “A coffin?”

  “For clients into sensory deprivation. If you’re lucky, you get to tie them up—gag, blindfold, the works—and stick ’em in there for most of the session.” She shrugged. “It can get worked into role-play scenes, too.”

  I nodded, trying to picture myself improvising scenarios that incorporated coffins. She moved on, making her way around the room. “Here you’ve got the hanging cage, Catherine wheel, candles and clamps and economy-size lube in the wardrobe drawer.” She stooped to pull open the drawer. “And it looks like some pornos and panties.” I squinted to catch a glimpse as she slid the drawer shut and noticed a straitjacketed dummy propped in the corner behind the wardrobe, thick chains draped around its shoulders, its face hidden under a rubber mask with a zippered mouth. Mounted on the walls were hooks from which hung leather floggers, whips, riding crops, paddles, cuffs, blindfolds, and even a couple of gas masks. Fiona flipped switches, turned on fans, timers, and kicked open a wooden chest filled with muscular coils of rope. “Here are the stocks,” she said, pointing to a wooden frame with three holes in its wide horizontal beam: a neck-sized one flanked by two wrist-sized—I’d only ever seen these in period films and maybe at a renaissance faire as a kid. “That,” she pointed to a leather riding saddle draped over the stocks, “is the genuine article. Boss man has a thing for equestrian stuff; go figure.” As we left the Red Room, I inspected a human-size cage on the floor near the door, complete with a padlocked gate and gleaming dog dish inside.

  The other two dungeons proved variations on the first. The Blue Room featured a giant wooden cross instead of a wheel; the Black Room had a leather swing that hung from the ceiling, dangling over a four-poster bondage bed. They all had a throne of some kind and mirrors on most of their walls. I avoided my own reflection in these. Fiona pointed out portable toilets tucked behind the dungeon doors and in the supply closets. Some of these were equipped with wheels and genuine porcelain bowls; some were more closely related to lawn chairs with plastic toilet seats.

  Reeling, I wondered how I’d ever remember the names of all this equipment, let alone learn how to use it.

  “So, most of this is probably for show, huh?” I asked, hopeful.

  Fiona smirked silently.

  We then made our way through the three medical rooms: Med 1, Med 2, and Med 3. More pristine than most doctor’s offices I had visited, these had adjustable examination tables, mirrored walls and ceilings, and cupboards filled with glinting equipment. There were proctoscopes and stethoscopes, rolling wheels with spikes and pincers. Clamps, syringes, thermometers, tongue depressors, gadgets to peek and pry in ears, eyes, noses, and mouths, and, in Med 2, huge anatomical posters of both the female and male reproductive systems in color.

  Down the hall was the Cross-Dressing Room, with a mountainous leather couch and a vanity table whose matching wardrobe was bursting with man-size stilettos, French-maid costumes, and panties big enough to have a picnic on.

  “So, the Cross-Dressing Room is just for …,” I posited.

  “Cross-Dressing is for cross-dressing.” Fiona smiled. “Feminization. Usually it’s part of a role-play, your slave playing the dirty slut, you with a strap-on, and so forth. Sometimes it’s just a game of dress-up, which is easy and fun.”

  I nodded, aware of how much nodding I was doing.

  “Cross-Dressing is also kind of an all-purpose room, for clients who don’t want the super dungeony or medical atmosphere. Sometimes they just want to talk about shit in a normal-looking setting.” I wanted to ask what kind of shit they liked to talk about but restrained myself.

  The kitchen, as well as two dressing rooms, were places for the dommes to hang out in the downtime between sessions. The smallest room so far, the kitchen seemed cozy to me after the daunting enormity of the dungeons; it just looked like a kitchen—something I had a reference for. I didn’t realize that feigning placidity for so long had exhausted me until I felt myself relax in seeing something familiar. My default disposition was aloof and knowing, but this place had transcended any previous scenario in shock factor.

  “There’s usually water and Diet Coke in there,” said Fiona, pointing to the refrigerator, “but don’t get too used to it. It’s supposed to be for the clients, but the girls drink it all, so Remy’s going to lock it up sooner or later.”

  “Remy?”

  “He’s the boss. He comes in and out, usually at night. Totally harmless, if you stay out of his way.”

  There was a small counter along the wall, flanked by a pair of stools. The counter bore a half-full ashtray and an empty can of Diet Coke with a lipstick-stained straw. A piece of paper with large black type hung above it, taped to the wall.

  It read:

  REMEBER:

  We think may be not body Understand if we found more of one girl in the Kitchen You have Fine and We discount money from you Paid.

  We have Camera in Kitchen (everybody Know) this camera is recording 24 hours at day, every week we check that camera and if we found more of one girl in the kitchen we discount from you Paid without Advice.

  Later no Ask why we discount money from you Paid. We have few reason to not admit more of one Girl in the Kitchen.

  “Um, is that a joke?” I asked.

  “Oh no.” Fiona waved a hand dismissively. “That’s just Remy having a hissy fit. There’s always a new note appearing somewhere. Right now he’s obsessed with the noise. You’re only allowed to eat in the kitchen, so everybody gets dinner delivered, and it gets noisy in here. Sometimes you can hear it in Med Three.” She shrugged. “Everybody listens for a little while, because they don’t want to get fined, but then things go back to normal.”

  “So, English is his second language?”

  “You could tell?” She cackled.

  A small television protruded from another wall, mounted on a metal arm. Below it a large wicker hamper overflowed with laundry, mostly sheets and towels, a few frilly underthings peeking out f
rom the folds.

  “Goddamn it,” Fiona grumbled, striding over to it. “Nobody’s in session, and nobody’s doing laundry.” Turning her head over her shoulder, she said, “Excuse me while I put a load in.”

  “Of course!” I was glad for a little time to observe my surroundings without her observing me.

  Fiona pulled a pair of latex gloves out of a box sitting on the washer-dryer unit and put them on before loading the machine. Next to the washer-dryer was more countertop that led to a deep metal sink holding a few dishes and something else, which I stared at for a few seconds before recognizing it. A dildo. It was enormous, pink, and sheathed in a condom. As worldly as I considered myself, this was the first actual dildo I had ever seen. I must have inhaled sharply upon recognition, because Fiona turned her head and followed my gaze.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake!” She slammed the lid on the washing machine and peeled off one of the gloves, tossing it into a nearby trash can. With her still-gloved hand, she retrieved the dildo from the sink and headed back out into the hallway. “C’mon, I’ll introduce you to our illustrious mistresses.”

  When Fiona pushed open the dressing room door, six pairs of eyes shifted from a wall-mounted television over the door onto us. The shame of being overdressed is a very specific feeling, and I felt it then. They were all wearing sweatpants, jeans, or hot pants. One woman knelt topless in front of the mirrored wall of lockers, a faint smile visible in her reflection as she puckered her lips to apply liner. The others lay draped across a white leather sofa and love seat. They all had a fluidity of body that is particular to those accustomed to being perceived sexually. They slouched over the over-stuffed furniture looking bored and normal, some of them heavily tattooed, some fat, many older than me, and a few younger. They could have been friends of mine, schoolmates.

  “Who left this in the kitchen sink?” Fiona demanded, dangling the dildo between her thumb and forefinger by its big pink balls.