A Consumer's Guide to Male Hustlers (17 page)

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As I have already written, the answering machine has made it possible for models to run their businesses efficiently out of their homes. Until recently, they had to take care of calls from legitimate clients, as well as contending with callers who literally made jerk- off calls or, worse, harassed them. The harassment consisted of verbal abuse and of making phony appointments. (Worst-case scenario: making an appointment for an out call and giving the model a nonexistent address.) To protect themselves against the latter, models tried to call back a prospective client to verify his number. I write "tried," because some callers do not keep appointments even if the models have their correct home phone numbers. (What are models going to do with the jerk's phone number? Report him to whom?)

Now a majority of hustlers use beepers without a voice mail capability. This frequently results in a nifty game of phone tag, in which the parties never connect or, if they do, it is too late for making appointments.

Many models deliberately ignore beeps when they cannot take on assignments. Most of their callers want action
now
. If the models are too busy that day, they do not bother to call back just to talk to a prospective client. Dealing with beepers can become very frustrating, and requires a special technique to get satisfactory results.

The late afternoon seems the best time to beep most models, since many of them work during the day. (Some will answer the beep from work but cannot talk freely.) Of course, if you manage to catch a model who does not work, the earlier in the day the better. If he is free, he might give you a good deal because this is his slow time. You might also consider making an appointment for the following day, which gives both parties more flexibility.

So, in the late afternoon, you look at the gay paper. You check the ads that appeal to you, ranking them from lowest to highest. You call the highest-ranking ad first. If all you can do is punch in your number (sometimes the beeper will have a voice mail option), write down the phone number you called, and a brief summary of the ad. Unfortunately, many models with beepers do not mention a name in their ads. The only way you can identify them when they call back is by their phone number.

You wait fifteen minutes and, if you receive no return call, go to the second ad on the list, repeating this process as many times as necessary, until you make contact and set up an appointment with a suitable model. I ask models who call after an appointment has already been made with someone else to give me information about themselves for a future meeting.

Beeping models and then having to wait for them to call back is tedious. I do it very rarely, only when all my backup systems are down.
Simply not having to deal with this chore makes seeing regulars a preferred option.

With my regulars, I make my appointments days ahead of time. I am often asked how I know that I will be horny next Wednesday at 7 p.m. The person who asks me this question will also be the one who invites me for a special dinner two months in advance. How do I know that I will want to have dinner then? If I am in good health, I will be in a mood to have sex three days hence and dinner two months down the road.

The best thing about seeing hustlers and models is that clients do not need to impress them sexually or, indeed, in any other way. I have experienced very few performance failures with hustlers, and these were invariably due to drugs prescribed for some physical ailment. On those rare occasions, I did not lose the hustler because I could not climax. Rather, he comforted me and told me that on our next date things would work out. He did not want to lose me.

In the next chapter, I will write about how I managed one hustler over a period of many years. I will discuss useful and practical management strategies. Why manage hustlers at all? Why not see different hustlers for variety, and not have to deal with any managerial problems?

There are many reasons for sticking with fewer hustlers and models. Sex becomes better once the participants are used to each other; it is tiring and boring to find new hustlers all the time; it is safer all around to limit one's exposure to fewer hustlers.

I have always had to make special financial arrangements with hustlers and models to get a quantity discount as a regular. Naturally, as I get to know them, I start socializing with them. This makes the experience more meaningful. Of course, not all hustlers and models are open to more than a sex session. I do not become their regular.

Clients who limit their contacts with hustlers and models to sex shortchange themselves. A regular hustler is a
paid
sex buddy. Of course, one can meet a sex buddy on a regular basis without taking a personal interest in him, but after a few times this become old hat. (My encounter with Watanabe in Tokyo was great fun because we did not understand each other and had to rely only on body language. After ten times, the lack of communication would have become tedious.)

I have been asked many times how I find subjects of common interest with hustlers, as if they were somehow different from other gay pickups. I relate to them the same way I relate to people in general. Hustlers who are often (not always) younger and poorer than their clients are gratified when they are asked about their lives and their issues, and are taken seriously.

Some eight years ago, I met Darell, a Polk Street hustler. For a while, we saw each other on a regular basis. One day I had a splinter in the thumb of my right hand and could not get it out. When I brought Darell home I asked him, "Can you help me get the splinter out of my finger?"

"I'll try," he answered.

I handed him a sterilized sewing needle to help him dig it out. This is how I learned to do it when I was a child. "Man, that's not the way you do it."

"How do you do it, then?"

"Do you have nail clippers?"

"I do. But I have never heard of it being done this way."

"Well, that's the way I do it."

"Whatever works is fine with me," I said. I brought him the nail clippers. "Here you are. Please perform the procedure."

A moment later the splinter was out. "Well, Darell, thank you. I learned something new today."

"I'll say one thing for you, Joseph. You do listen to people."

Had Darell verbalized his entire train of thought it would be something like, "Joseph, you are one smart dude who does listen to people, even if they are hustlers,
and
young,
and
black."

That day I earned Darell's respect. Not many clients did!

Some clients try to impress their hustlers with, of all things, their riches. No person in his right mind would tell a plumber or an auto mechanic that he was very rich. So why make a statement like this to a hustler?

Apparently, many clients compare themselves to their hustlers and find that they are wanting: the latter are younger, handsomer, slimmer, better hung, and more muscular. (These are precisely the attributes they are hired for!) These clients must feel that the only thing they have going for them is having more money—lots of it—than their hustlers. If you tell a hustler that you are very rich you invite gouging!

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Just as a patient may fall into the hands of a poor dentist, a client may contract the services of an incompetent or incompatible model. Some clients are so traumatized by one bad experience that they give up hustlers and models altogether. Just as a patient must not give up on dentists because of one unfortunate incident, a client ought not to disavow hustlers because a few do not work out.

Sometimes it is possible to get out of a bad deal with only a minimal loss of money. (Before I write about this, a caveat: nobody ever looks exactly the way you visualized him during the phone interview. You need to make allowances for this fact.) If you arrive at a model's home and he does not turn you on, you can simply tell him that he does not look the way you imagined him, and just leave. Personally, I would be inclined to offer him some money if I felt that there was no chemistry between us, but not, if he had misrepresented himself. In either case, do not be rude to him.

It is more complicated when a model arrives at your place. Whether or not he misrepresented himself, dismiss him gently. You do not need a vengeful model who knows your home address in your life. You can give him the same line I mentioned in the preceding paragraph, plus some cash. It might even be a good idea to have this cash ready, to avoid having to ask him to make change from a large bill.

Once the sex act has commenced, he is entitled to his full fee, unless he does not perform the specific act for which he has been hired, for instance, he cannot screw you because he cannot get an erection. In this case, the deal can be renegotiated. Again, do so diplomatically.

Chapter 10

A Practicum

In this chapter I will recount the history of my relationship with one hustler over a period of six years. Many of the problems clients face when dealing with hustlers surfaced in this particular relationship. Describing it will serve as a case study for a long-term client- hustler relationship. I will digress whenever I feel that I need to elaborate on a relevant subject.

Off and on, for almost six years, I dealt with a hustler named Gabriel. This was not a minor achievement, since Gabriel considered it his karma to manage every man who was sexually attracted to him, of whom there were many.

Gabriel came into my life at the end of 1985, right after Jed. He was introduced to me by Paul, a mutual friend, who was about to leave San Francisco, and was worried about Gabriel's financial well-being. When we first met, Gabriel was twenty-five years old. He had already retired from an illustrious career as a hustler and sometime porno star, and upgraded himself to a position that he had created for himself. He had two gentleman who, in return for occasional sexual favors, took care of his rent, utilities, and phone bill. (Each gentleman was assigned specific expense items.)

Gabriel, a short-order cook, was both an alcoholic and a workaholic. He held a full-time job, and sometimes worked at additional part-time catering assignments. Most of his income went for alcohol, occasionally for drugs, but, principally, for very expensive clothing and jewelry.

I remember well our first meeting at a cafe. Gabriel was tall, very slim, with brown, dreamy, almond-shaped eyes flanked by long lashes, and thick, long black hair arranged into a braid. He was the son of a Chinese mother and an African-American father. His facial features were Asian; his skin color was African. I like exotic and cute. Gabriel was exotic, cute, and very handsome. Maybe pretty would be a better word, because he was rather effeminate. He radiated enormous sex appeal. When I got to know him better, I would think of him as a female insect emitting pheromones compelling males from far and wide to fly and mate with her. As I would discover later, even men who were into macho partners made an exception for the effeminate, pheromone-emitting Gabriel.

He was shy by nature and spoke elegantly, in a soft, subdued, cultured voice. He told me that he had a boyfriend in Germany, a high school teacher, and was saving money to go there and live with him. After some ten minutes of chit-chat, he gave me a coquettish look and asked, "So, do you like what you see?"

The boldness of his question took me by surprise. He appeared to be so shy. In time I would find out that beneath the shy facade dwelt an imperious queen. "You are very handsome; very much my type."

"I told you that I was trying to save money for my trip to Germany. What arrangements do you have in mind?"

I was not immune to Gabriel's pheromones. I had heard enough about him to know that whatever arrangements I made, they would have to be very simple and straightforward. Otherwise, things would get out of hand financially. A quid pro quo arrangement would be best. The last thing I wanted was to become Gabriel's suitor. For this I had neither the money nor the stamina to fight off all his other suitors.

"How much did Paul tell you about my economic circumstances?" I asked.

"He said that he did not think you were very wealthy, but that you owned your own home and paid guys for... doing it."

"Well, that's correct, Gabriel. Why don't we have a trial session? What fee did you have in mind?"

"Fifty dollars per. . . deed."

I thought "deed" was an elegant term for getting laid. "If you stood on Polk Street, Gabriel," I said, "you could ask and get $50. If you advertised as a model you could ask $70. In either case, you would probably also get a handsome tip. However, if we're compatible, I'll become a regular, and you won't need to waste your time or money to find other clients. How about $30? This is what I pay your colleagues."

He thought it over for a moment. "Paul told me that you did deeds with the same guys. I need a regular. Done deal."

Of course, we were compatible. Unlike Jed, Gabriel was not a casual hustler. He was a male courtesan schooled in the art of pleasuring clients. Earlier in his life, Gabriel had worked for agencies, had run his own ads, and had performed a few heavy S/M and other fantasy scenes. When Jed needed money, he would do a singing gig, turn a trick, bake bread, whatever. He was not dedicated to any particular way of making a living. Gabriel used his sexuality to bring in the hard cash to cover his enormous expenses.

After the first session, I started seeing Gabriel on a regular basis. Within a few months, with the exception of the baths and dating guys I met there, I had sex only with Gabriel.

He insisted that I pick him up from his home or from work, and drive him back after we "did the deed." My Achilles' heel in my dealing with hustlers has been the picking-up issue. I live on top of one of San Francisco's steep hills, in an area that is not served well by public transportation. Nevertheless, like most of my neighbors, I cope with these difficulties when I have to use public transportation to go downtown where parking is all but impossible. But, then, we are not hustlers!