Cristina, Part One

People find it hard to believe that  I was once a university lecturer who moonlighted as a porn merchant, but it is true. I worked at a small private university in Mexico City centre back in 2002, which was rather handy as I could nip out to one of the many bars in the Zona Rosa area to meet a punter and sell him a video or two. Since I was about the only seller of BDSM videos in town I had a rather nice, select clientèle, and through them I became a habitué of the lap dancing clubs. I should point out that in Mexico you can not only touch the girls, but there are usually rooms above the club where you can take one of them if your middle leg feels in need of the exercise, and you can agree a price with the trollop.

Exercise of any kind was the last thing on my mind after having just finished a long hot afternoon in the company of students, and as is always the case after such surfeits, I felt the need for something long, cold and alcoholic. I left the university and walked across a main avenue to a lap dancing club that was managed by Paco, an acquaintance of mine. Sitting in his office in return for my gin and tonic I got to hear his tale of woe. It seemed like a good deal at the time, but it led to an interesting couple of days with a lippy Argentinian madam who had to be put in her place.

"I have had enough of those Argentinian bitches," Paco said wearily, speaking to me in English.

"What Argentinian bitches?"

"You didn't see them when you walked in? The white girls, by the door," Paco explained.

"I thought they were more of your Russian whores," I answered.

"Naah, the hair's not dyed. Not out of a bottle. They are the real deal," Paco went on, smacking his lips approvingly.

"Then you should be pleased," I told him.

"They treat the Johns very badly," he replied. Then seeing my puzzled look he went on: "That is what you call the customers, the Johns, isn't it?"

"Not in Britain," I said, shaking my head. "Over there we call 'em punters."

"OK, my English teacher. The Argentinian girls treat the punters badly," explained Paco, pleased at having added another word to his English vocabulary.

"So get shot of 'em," I said, ever the practical man.

"I do, but then the punters complain that we do not have white girls for them to fuck, so I take on more Argentinians. Then they start treating the punters badly and..." His voice trailed off into nothingness.

"The punters are Mexican - why don't they just slap the bitches around like they do their wives?"

"Some do, but then the girl starts screaming and that annoys the other men in the other rooms. They start to mock him, saying he cannot control a woman," Paco said with a shrug as I shook my head in bewilderment.

"You need to learn how to handle women," I told him.

"And you do," he said, mockingly, as he slapped his thighs in glee at what he thought was my bombast.

"I reckon that I could keep your little Argies in line," I told him.

"If you want to try, then go ahead," said Paco.

"You want me to be your bruiser?"

"What's a bruiser?"

"A bruiser is the thug who keeps order in a brothel. Makes sure that the punters pay up and leave quietly and that the whores don't steal."

"OK, you can be my bruiser," Paco replied, genially.

"I am the professor of history at that place just across the road, in case you had forgotten," I told him.

"Of course, if you think that it is too much for you," he said, obviously trying to goad me.

"How much are you offering?"

"You want cash or pussy?"

I sat back and considered the option. "I'll take the pussy," I replied. "How many are you offering?

"Keep them quiet and you can have as much as you want. But, please, I don't want too much violence," Paco cautioned me.

"I don't want any," I replied.

"So what's the plan?"

"It is not what happens, but the fear of what might happen" I told him.

Paco gave another one of those shrugs and later on that day I started my new life as a brothel bruiser.

To be continued