Love Story Of A Call Girl

I knocked on Mr. Boardmann's door. When he opened the door, his face lightened up and he held out his hands like he did yesterday. His hands appeared limp but they shook mine with force. I could feel my fingers being squashed to the bone. Like yesterday, I was the first to pull away.

"Lila. I've missed you this morning." He spoke in a rather sedate tone which betrayed none of the more stirring emotions of yesterday.

"Good evening, Mr. Boardmann." I said, mirroring his composed greeting.

"I hope you slept a little better." I said, not really sure if I wanted to turn it into a question.

"No nightmares for the first time in a month. What do you say?" He asked.

"That's good." I said.

"I have to thank you for working your magic on me." He said.

He made a sudden grasp for my hands again, and shook them with fervour. My fingers felt bruised.

"It was hardly anything. I gave you a head massage. That was it." I said.

"Still, can you imagine all the difference it made to me?" He asked.

It was not the deepness of his voice, but the withholding of some emotion which touched me. But I had no standard answer to that. In fact I did not have any standard answers to emotional questions.

"I have a list of places worthy to visit in this suburb." I said, instead.

I handed him one of my standard notebooks. He took the book and he browsed through my research.

"What the..." He said.

My heart nearly thumped out. What was wrong this time? How could it possibly go wrong?

"Goodness, Lila, you sorted out places based on your own invented scale- you call it the scale of emptiness. The higher up the scale, the emptier the place from tourists." He said, looking at me if I had gone completely crazy.

"Yes, that's right." I said, wondering about the big fuss.

He did not like crowded places, so I had compiled touristic places based on their emptiness and the corresponding off-peak times to visit.

He looked at my handwritten notebook again which ran into fifty pages, comprising fifty different places.

"How did you find the time to do this?" He asked.

"I had the whole day, Mr. Boardmann. Furthermore I did not feel like painting the walls today." I said, smiling a little.

It was pure laziness. The poor walls had to wait another day to see dark shades of lilac gradually swirling upwards into pale lilac clouds.

"All this for me?" He asked.

"Yes. I hoped that since you are new here, this might help. I had great fun compiling the list myself." I said.

"You amaze me, Lila." He said, speaking like he was in awe.

I managed a little smile and then I looked haphazardly at the living room behind him. Personal attention made me feel uncomfortable.

All my life I came in second best or worst, neglected. It was difficult to acknowledge the turn of the tide for the odd situation. My momentum had not quite adjusted itself and I needed time.

I omitted to say that I had in my own notebook, a condensed version of what I gave him. I had a whole list of tourist hangouts should he ask again. Realizing that it seemed quite petty as if I were doing a school assignment, I convinced myself that I was not wasting time with this. Who knows if future clients were to ask similar questions? It could very well be the first time they set foot in this suburb.

The penthouse suite building was new, after all. There were bound to be potential loaded clients from the city requiring escort services. These penthouse suites could double-up as hangouts away from their main home, giving them all the privacy they needed for clandestine one-night stands.

I also had another topic of interest in my notebook. No staring at the piano! My personal interest shall not be a topic of discussion. I did not mix my personal life with work.