Twelve Fifty an Hour

by

Paula Dillon

A man finds out the hard way that he should read all contracts

“Oooowwww, god dammit that hurt,” Paul Weston shouted. He cursed the day his photographer shot his portfolio for his modeling agency. He was wearing a speedo and nothing else in one shot. “Oooowww, oh my god, do you have to do that?”

“Its in the contract Mr. Weston, everything is in the contract.” The technician giggled as she spread more hot wax on Mr. Weston. He was getting a full body wax.

“That god damned bloody contract.” He shouted.

That contract he signed two weeks ago. He was desperate for work. He got called in three weeks ago for an interview.

“Oooowwww, can you hurry up and get this over with.”

The technician was in stitches and began working slower and in ways she knew were just a bit more painful. She knew she was indemnified against any legal action.

That bloody contract. He went in for the interview with Amanda Bloody Cosworth. She was the client who was responsible for all his current pain and agony. Why didn’t he really read the bloody contract and have the agency and his lawyer read the contract. He thought it was a standard modeling contract. He wasn’t a big-time model, but he did get many small bits and commercial work here and there, enough to keep a roof over his head, pay the bills and keep himself alive.

“Ooooowwwww!!! Oh god damn it, that really hurt.”

The technician had a huge smile on her face, “That’s the cost of beauty dearie. It will be just a half hour more and then I will be finished.” She could finish it in ten minutes, but this was just too much fun. She always wanted to give a man a full body wax. Women go through this somewhat stoically. If the man had only grinned and bore it, she would have made it as painless as possible, but that would not have been as much fun. This man brought out her sadistic side. She loved what she did, causing pain and being not legally culpable for the pain.

Amanda Bloody Cosworth. She was the gorgeous client, no gorgeous doesn’t say enough about her beauty. She was a goddess, in a 15,000-dollar Alexander McQueen crystal embellished Jacket and skirt and her 4-inch Christian Louboutin pumps. Paul didn’t know it, but that was all she was wearing at the time. She was full commando.

She had spent an hour downplaying the role to him, making it sound like he was just an extra to fill out the sets for the campaign, window dressing, so to speak. She would pay him twelve fifty an hour for a minimum of forty hours to a maximum of a hundred twenty hours.

He mulled it over in his mind. He was hoping for more, but with a downturn in the economy they were currently going through any work was work. 500 to a possible 1500 dollars. She couldn’t offer less, but he hoped for a little more. He signed the bloody contract without reading it.

Amanda Bloody Cosworth opened her five-thousand-dollar Dior handbag and counted out five one-hundred dollar bills, “Here is an advance you look like you could use a good meal. In two weeks, Tuesday at ten o’clock, you will report here, and we will prepare for the shoot.”

Paul signed a receipt and signed the bloody contract in a dozen places. The five-hundred-dollar advance on the contract was important. He didn’t know it because he didn’t read the contract., but the advance started a seventy-two-hour clock. He could over the next three days report back and repudiate the contract and there would be no consequences, but NO!!! HE DIDN’T READ THE BLOODY CONTRACT. He just put it in the mail to his agent.

Paul went and had a hamburger, diet coke and no fries. From there he went to the grocery and bought some real food and paid some bills.

A week later Wendy Grayson, his agent, called him. “Hey Paula,” she teased, “just got your contract, you really should have called me.”

“It was just a standard modeling contract for a subordinate role. Except for just a bit less than I hoped for. I’ve read a hundred of them.”

“A subordinate role, less than you hoped for. You didn’t read the bloody contract did you. At least you didn’t take any money yet.”

“She advanced me five hundred dollars, Wendy. My shelves were bare, I was hungry.”

All Paul could hear for the next three minutes, was a mixture of laughing and crying, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry Paula. Just give me a bit to get myself in order… Paula, and I use that name intentionally, because that is who you legally are now, as far as Chandra Collins Lingerie is concerned. You are now officially a ladies’ lingerie model, a very well-paid lingerie model. You will be paid one thousand-two hundred-fifty dollars an hour for forty to a hundred twenty hours. That is fifty to one-hundred-fifty thousand dollars, dearie.”

“You’re shitting me, Wendy.”

“No, I’m not… and you agreed them to make changes and now I am reading from the contract, ah here it is and I quote ‘changes up to but not including vaginoplasty.’ End quote. Paula they can give you full facial feminization, breast augmentation and lipo-suction.”

“I will just call them up and cancel the contract.”

“Yeah you can do that, I suppose. Do you have a spare hundred thousand dollars for the failure to perform clause you signed?”

“You know I don’t have that kind of money. They can’t get blood out of a turnip.”

“They can make it next to impossible to get a job in this industry. How do you feel about digging ditches or flipping burgers for the rest of your life?”

“I have the right to work.”

“Yes, you do dearie, and after you pay off the hundred thousand or so dollar judgement, they will win against you, who will hire you to do anything in this industry.”

“They wouldn’t do that. I mean who would want me to be their lingerie model. I am a guy, would you buy Chandra Collins Lingerie just because I wore it. They would lose money, a lot of money.”

“I agree in part, Paula... but they are hoping that if Chandra Collins Lingerie can make you look good, what can it do for a real woman.”

“Wendy, I am Paul, not Paula.”

“Not according to the contract, let me read this to you. Ah here it is and I quote, ‘Paul Weston agrees that when the contract becomes valid,’ which it did three days after receipt of any remuneration,’ Paul Weston agrees to go by the name of Paula Stevens for the next six months and will only wear Chandra Collins Lingerie exclusively a minimum of twenty-two hours a day seven days a week for six months. They give you two hours a day for exercise and bathing dear. Also, Chandra Collins Lingerie will have the exclusive option to extend all clauses of this contract for up to three years at two-million-dollars a year. I see that Amanda Cosworth signed this contract. Do you know anything about her?”

Paul sighed as he thought, “Oh she was a real goddess, but no I never heard of her before this mess.”

“Just gossip, but from what I’ve heard she is a real ball buster. She likes men, but she likes them in skirts, lingerie and dresses. Don’t get me wrong she isn’t one of those dominatrixes, she doesn’t beat on her men, humiliate, beyond just being dressed as a woman, or treat them like slaves. One source gave a quote, “If I can spend hours getting ready to look my best in dresses and skirts, it’s the least a man can do to be around me, that is being dressed in dresses and skirts, looking good by her same standard. My best guess is you should get use to dressing in frillies for the next three years. Amanda has the money to enforce the contract many, many times over.”

“Then why did you send me to her?”

“I didn’t send you to her.”

“Sure, you did, Casey called me and gave me the heads up.”

“Oh shit, you don’t know how much you cleared up for me, Casey cleared out two days ago and I got a stack of weird contracts. Yours was the weirdest. I bet Amanda hired Casey away from me. Casey probably got a big finder’s fee.”

“So, what am I going to do, Wendy?”

“Welcome to my world, Paula Stevens. Be careful, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.”

Amanda had her TV on her favorite fashion TV station. They gave the latest greatest news on the world of fashion and televised live Fashion Shows from London, Paris, Milan, Singapore, Tokyo, San Francisco and New York.

“I am Nate Gorman, your news source for the latest in the fashion industry. Chandra Collins Lingerie has the biggest hit with their latest campaign. All of her models in her Paris show were male dressed fully in the latest Chandra Collins lingerie. The campaign was a, forgive the pun, ballsy move, that could have gone tits up and six feet down. But... my sources tell me the orders are flying in by broomsticks left and right. The campaign was led by a new acquisition to the Chandra Collins camp. The gorgeous Paula Stevens waltzed in on her for inch stilettos and the crowd loved her. Rumors tells us she just signed a ten year fifty-million-dollar SPOKES…MANcontract, giggle giggle, for Chandra Collins Lingerie.”

“Also, just in. the latest in top model CAT TAS TRO PHIES on the CAT WALK, as top model Gloria Green is seen here in New York breaking a heel and taking a nose dive. She fell head-first into Madam Waverly’s lap. Gloria and Madam Waverly were only slightly injured. Now that was what I call one heck of a LAP DANCE.”…

The End