Alexa punched him on the arm. “To be fair, women almost never call us, but if they do, it’s company policy to turn them away. It’s an outdated rule that needs to change, in my humble opinion. I know for a fact that a good portion of our colleagues are willing to take female clients, myself included.”

“I’m not, though,” Zack intoned solemnly. “I think women are icky.”

Alexa hit him again, and Zack rubbed his arm. “Jesus, your fists are like tiny rocks.” He turned back to Pete. “Want to know a little trick I learned?”

Pete nodded.

“Clients are much easier to deal with once you realize they fall into four basic categories: flashers, first-timers, fetishists, and freaks. Flashers only want to stay on the phone for a minute or two—long enough to hear a few dirty lines and put their hands on their dicks—and then they hang up. Learn to identify these, and you can spare yourself from wasting energy on them. They’re not going to pay your bills.

“First-timers are basically like clingy prom dates. They want fantasies and fake intimacy. Mostly, they’re lonely men who want to feel connected to someone, even if it’s just a voice on the other end of the line. Oh, and they never know what the hell they’re doing, so if you let them bumble around for a bit, you can rack up a few extra minutes.”

Zack paused and grinned. Pete had pulled a little notebook and pencil out of his back pocket and was jotting down notes. “Finally, someone appreciates my genius! So, next are the fetishists. These are people who probably watched too much porn in their formative years. Vanilla just doesn’t cut it for them anymore. Fetishists want things like footjobs, pegging, and cuckolding. Most of all, they want it rough. The rougher the better.”

“How are they money-wise?” Pete asked.

“Good. They’re most PSOs’ bread and butter. If they want an involved scenario, you can sometimes keep them on the phone for hours, or so my colleagues tell me. My record is forty-eight minutes with a guy who wanted me to invent a third man and describe him fucking me while he watched. I called him Bob.” Zack crushed his cig out and threw it in a nearby trash can. “Last but certainly not least, you have my personal favorite: the freaks. Now, here’s where the job takes a turn down a dark road. The freaks are the reason we set boundaries. I’m not knocking anyone’s sexual preferences, bear in mind. We all like a pair of handcuffs and some hot wax every now and then. But these guys don’t deal in your everyday, run-of-the-mill fetishes.”

“I’m sorry,” Pete interrupted, “but isn’t the phrase ‘run-of-the-mill fetishes’ sort of an oxymoron?”

“Jesus, you really are new. Give it a week, kid. You’ll learn. As I was saying, the freaks are the ones who want the off-limits stuff. I had a guy the other day who wanted me to pretend to be a young vixen while he fucked me.”