Staining, I say.
‘Yeah, doll, staining,’ he says. ‘From impurities. In the water.’
Oh, I say. And zone straight out again. I look around the room at all the other naked men and women, of all ages shapes and sizes, and I wonder what industries they work in.
Plastics. Biotech. Small arms. Petroleum. Pharmaceuticals. Logistics. Futures commodities.
Because all those nameless faceless bureaucrats who head corporations you’ve never even heard of but whose influence and decision-making extends invisibly into every corner of your daily life – from the pills you take before breakfast, to the gas you put in your car and the memory foam pillow you rest your head on at night – those people have sex lives too. They have to fuck. And I imagine this is where they do it. Right here. At a high end sex party like this, designed to protect their dignity, if not their modesty. Wearing masks so they can be as anonymous in their private lives as they are in their public ones.
I feel a sudden urge to pee, and realize it’s the perfect excuse for us to ditch Dickie and Freddie.
I say, ‘If you’ll please excuse us, gentlemen. We need to go to the ladies’ room.’
We walk away as fast as our heels will carry us, to an upstairs bathroom.
We’re standing side by side at the bathroom mirror, touching up our make-up and I say to Anna, I thought that scene with Marquis de Sade was bad. ‘What is this place?’
‘They call it the Juliette Society,’ she says.
‘What the hell is that?’ I say.
‘I don’t know much more,’ she says. ‘That’s just what they call it. Let’s put it like this, the Fuck Factory is for regular people. These people aren’t regular people.’
I can see that, I say. ‘How on earth did Bundy get access to this place?’
‘Oh, you know,’ she giggles, ‘Bundy’s full of surprises. He moves in mysterious ways.’
‘How do you mean?’ I ask, intrigued.
‘Well,’ she says. ‘He may look low rent but he comes from money. He’s got a thing for rich girls who are like him and will do anything for him. The kind of girls that have six-figure trust funds but work as strippers. He’s even got a website for them.’
‘Let me guess,’ I say, ‘Filthy Rich Bitches?’
‘How did you know?’ Anna says, sounding genuinely surprised.
‘Just an educated hunch.’
I’m reapplying my lipstick and Anna’s dusting her cheeks with blush. She’s checking her face in the mirror to make sure it’s evenly applied and, as she does so, she says, ‘You know, older guys really know how to please a woman.’
Just when I think I’ve heard it all from Anna, she’ll drop another pearl of wisdom, another gem that turns my head. She never ceases to amaze me. And she says it as if it’s the most casual thing in the world.
‘How so?’
‘Because they’re as horny as eighteen-year-olds but their bodies just can’t keep up.’
I burst out laughing.
‘I’m serious,’ she says. ‘They go at it like maniacs until they’re winded, then they have to stop to recover and build up their stamina. Then it starts all over again. That way they can keep going all night.’
‘But aren’t young guys like that too – what’s the difference?’
And as I say it, I feel like I’m back in that room with Dickie.
‘Young guys always have something to prove,’ she says, twisting her lipstick open. ‘And, as a general rule, the ones who are really good-looking are so vain they have zero imagination in the sack.’
‘Yeah, I know exactly what you mean,’ I say, recalling my All-Star football player ex.
‘They usually want to fuck in front of mirror so they can check themselves out from every angle,’ she continues, ‘as if they’re directing their own personal porn movie. They’re fucking themselves and you’re just part of the set design. But old guys are more concerned with making sure you feel good. And they always want to try something new, because they’ve done it all before and know every trick in the book.
‘And another thing,’ she says, while adjusting her mask. ‘A hard cock never shows its age. It really doesn’t matter how old it is, as long as it’s still fully functional. And these guys, you barely have to touch them. They pop a Viagra and they get hard in a flash.’
She clicks her fingers.
I don’t know how long we were in the bathroom, but when we come out it’s not the same party. Not at all. The energy in the place has changed. It’s as if while we were away, someone rang a bell, like the one that signals the opening of the markets at the stock exchange and, a split second later, the trading floor becomes a frenzy of activity, an orgy of keystrokes.