I Had to Say Something by Mike Jones Page B

stay on your toes. This advice has served me very well on many occasions. One that I remember in particular involved a well-dressed businessman I arranged to meet in a hotel room.

    â€œC’mon in, buddy!” the businessman said when he opened the door. “How are you? Can I get you anything?”
    I can’t tell you why, but suddenly my gut turned into knots. “May I use your bathroom?” I asked.
    â€œSure.” He took a seat at the table in the room where he had his laptop up and running.
    I went into the bathroom and looked around. There were no toiletries. No shaving cream. No razor. No deodorant. No toothbrush. All the towels were still very fresh and folded. It looked like the maid had literally just cleaned the sinks.
    â€œWhen did you get into town?” I asked from the bathroom, running the water but not doing anything with it.
    â€œYesterday,” he replied. “Boy, I sure can’t wait to have some hot man-on-man action.”
    I stopped cold. His words sounded very odd, as though he were reading my ad word for word.
    I shut off the water, dabbed my hands on a small towel, and carefully walked out of the bathroom. Once I stepped into the foyer of the hotel room, I was prepared for just about anything. “This sure is a nice place,” I said, which was a huge lie, because it looked just like every other Hilton or Sheraton I’d been in. I used that line as an excuse to look around the room.
    As I looked in the closet, what few hairs I hadn’t shaved off my back were standing straight up. There were no clothes and no suitcases. I wanted to ask, “Travel light?” but I decided not to do that. It was pretty clear to me what it meant when someone has been in a hotel room for a day and there are no suitcases, clothes, or toiletries in the room.
    I gazed around the room a bit more. “Everything okay?” the handsome businessman in the tie and dress slacks asked.
    â€œHow did you hear about me?”

    â€œFrom your ad.”
    That was all the confirmation I needed. “I’m sorry, I gotta go,” I said. “I’m really not feeling well. Sorry ’bout that.”
    He immediately stood up and walked toward me, prompting me to walk backward toward the door. I was expecting him to say something like, “Why are you leaving so soon?” or “Can I make you feel better?” But he didn’t say a word other than “okay” in a very matter-of-fact tone. No emotion, no trying to change my mind. Nothing, just like his toiletries.
    â€œNice to meet you,” I said, my heart racing faster than my feet. I closed the door to the room behind me and walked briskly down the hall. I pushed the down button several times. I got in, hit the L button, and held my breath until I got to the busy lobby.
    Was that a setup I had just walked away from? The nice clothes and no suitcases probably meant that he was a cop and this was a sting, and at any moment a reporter would pop out of the closet with a camera. There was no way to know, so I listened to my gut and left. Thankfully, I hadn’t gotten undressed.

CHAPTER 5
    MY THIRD YEAR WITH ART

    For awhile, I had a personal training business and, in the 1990s, my own small gym. Some of my clients were serious about getting in shape and some were not. Inevitably, many of them came to hit me up for sex, even though I made it very clear that my personal training business was strictly about weight training and fitness. After three years of owning the gym, I was burned-out. After all, I had been a trainer for twenty years. Plus, the rent was going up dramatically, so I decided to shut it down. Some of my personal training clients became escorting clients. Some continued to see me just for fitness training at other gyms. Some saw me just for massage.
    My massage and personal training services were never a cover for my escorting services. I enjoyed doing all three because it allowed me to