Nigel demands five minutes alone to change before we begin. He’s brought a collection of carrier bags, brimming with clothes and implements, which he empties over my bathroom floor and begins to sort through hurriedly before insisting I leave him in peace.
‘No, no tea for me thanks. Have you got any Bacardi? No? Vodka, surely? That’ll have to do then. With coke and plenty of ice…’ and he’s back to his sorting.
I’ve barely completed his drink order when I heard a croaky ‘ready!’ and look up to find Nigel tottering into my kitchen.
He’s in knee-high white socks, four inch black heels, grey gym slip, blouse, stripy tie, and, to complete the effect, untidy black plaits precariously perched on his shiny, age spot strewn bonce.
Nigel is 92. My oldest client. He snatches at his vodka, sticks his tongue out at me, then skips up the two flights of stairs to my playroom, to await an overdue punishment.
The playroom itself is in a detached attic, to spare the neighbours’ ears, and painted all in white, since it must also double as a modelling studio.
It smells faintly of Dettol, in tribute to the constant disinfecting of surfaces and implements that takes place between clients. Some tell me the mere whiff of Dettol can now make their cocks bob.
There’s a picture of Queen Victoria on the wall, the ultimate no-nonsense pin up, and a school desk, sofa, and rows of implements. It can be a headmistress’ study, a classroom, or, with a little imagination and minimal rejigging, an auntie’s boudoir. Outside seagulls shriek their disapproval amid the traffic’s drone.
Nigel stands before me, trembling, as I start to scold him. He lifts his skirts and positions himself across my desk, and I begin. He takes 24 cold strokes of the cane, then goes to stand in the corner, stripy buttocks exposed.
I pace back and forth, swishing canes and tawses, watching him shiver at the sound. After a few minutes I take him across my knee and start to spank with hand and slipper.
He’s been visiting me for ten years, in strict rotation with three other women: we all see him quarterly. Occasionally, if one of us is ill or on holiday, he will switch up the order, although this displeases him.
The retiree has been visiting disciplinarians for sixty-five years, first finding their numbers in phone boxes, now online. His desire to be punished began in his teens.
As long as I can remember older clients have told me they’ve craved punishment from a dominant woman. It feels innate and inescapable.
I have a theory that it stems from them being caned at school for punishment, back before those less savoury teaching methods were banned from the classroom.
The surge of endorphins and joy one can get after a good consensual thrashing is simply unparalleled, they tell me. With all these physical and emotional benefits, it’s a shame masochists are too often seen as hilarious, bizarre, inexplicable and weird: the punchline to a joke no one asked to hear.
I have many clients in their 80s and a handful in their 90s, still catching trains or driving to see me. Of course, spankos tend to be wealthy and middle class, which is also associated with enjoying better health and greater longevity, but still – I do suspect pain possesses some spectacular health benefits for them.
Nigel usually drives to see me, in his shiny navy Jaguar. It’s about a two hour drive from his house to mine. Occasionally I’ve visited him, and admired his many paintings, antiques and the air raid shelter in his garden, but he prefers to come to me. It’s a day out.
He’s also nimbler than me in his heels. The cross-dressing is a more recent phenomenon, since the death of his wife a decade ago when he started seeing me. Nigel tells me he missed having a touch of femininity about the house.
He first found me on a porn site. He spends a lot of time looking at porn nowadays. Having nursed his wife through cancer he finds that time hangs heavy. He noted my porn name, googled me and found my email.
Others have seen me in documentaries on Amazon – My Body, My Business, and Fifty Shades of Fetish Model. Older chaps are pretty resourceful when tracking down girls. Historically, they needed to be: if they went looking for women in the 1950s and 60s, it meant cards in phone boxes, word of mouth, the occasional contact mag.
I started in 1995, and quite miss the days I would receive hand-written letters to a PO box to arrange a meeting. It meant fewer time-wasters: having put so much effort into an encounter, you were less likely to change your mind last-minute, or not turn up at all.
I don’t ask my clients if they have any health issues before I start to attack them. I assume they’ll tell me if there’s anything I need to know. However, I will ask a few general questions about their state of mind, as this will impact how much play they can endure. One chap had played for so many decades he’d destroyed his bottom, and found a plastic surgeon prepared to graft a new one onto his own flesh.
It looked a little peculiar, but I could hit it for hours without fear of bloody seepage. Bottoms do weaken after a lifetime of being thrashed. You get the dreaded ‘weak spot’ which will open messily on the first stroke.
A new bottom is the obvious solution to the man accustomed to getting all he wants, immediately, unimpeded by dreary practicalities.
I’ve never faced a medical emergency while peddling my kinky wares. I’ve been told by a few of my frailer clients that if it happens I should ring for an ambulance, leave the front door open and clear off. This seems a sensible plan. Another reason to get the money upfront.
Another client, Michael, found me on Facebook. Aged 85, his wife died suddenly last year. She had been consensually spanking him throughout their forty year marriage, particularly slapping his face, which he adores.
You’re reading On Call with Melissa Todd, a brand new column from Metro.co.uk
Hello there, I’m Melissa Todd – a sex worker and dominatrix. As someone who’s been in the business for nearly 30 years, I’m here to share a deep dive into the psychology of what my clients really want when they call for my services. I’ll be divulging all my secrets in my fortnightly column with Metro, On Call. You’ll discover my tales of sex work past and a glimpse into the minds of those who’ll pay thousands to have their darkest desires indulged.
I can’t do it as hard or as fast as she could, but he’s determinedly training me up. Only the right side of his face, as his dentures don’t sit too comfortably on the left and he’s worried I might break them.
The other day, I slapped Michael until I was sweating, but he still shook his head at my inefficacy. He showed me pictures of his wife, in her late 70s, dressed in leather gloves and basque, clutching a whip. He brought me red wine and dark chocolate, because he’s read that’s what girls like, and that the two combine well together. He didn’t want me to leave.
As a former electrician, he does jobs around my house occasionally as part payment, but prefers me to go to him, since he likes a few beers while I whack him. I felt rotten when our hour was up and I had to go. But there was another one waiting.
Mostly the older chaps are widowers, although some still fib to their wives to clear an afternoon to visit me. Some have always been single, like Joseph, who has cerebral palsy. He’s 75 and in a wheelchair, but until a recent shoulder injury was quite independent, a college lecturer.
A few chaste kisses aside, he’s barely been touched by a woman, and fantasies about his pretty young carers comprise the whole of his sexuality.
One of them, seeing his state of arousal when she changed him, suggested he see an escort. But he was too embarrassed to try to have sex: instead, he wanted to be scolded, slapped, then held. So she got in touch with me.
Many of my clients might be be old, but they visit me to escape the real world, not whitter on about their health, blood pressure and sciatica.
They want to feel wild, young and reckless for an afternoon; to leave their woes at the door – and as far as I’m concerned it’s a privilege to help them do that.
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