Inside the Life of a Manhattan Escort

By Nancy

I met Sarah on a rainy Tuesday afternoon in a coffee shop near Union Square. She was younger than I expected, with careful makeup and designer sunglasses perched on her head. When she ordered her latte, the barista smiled at her like they were old friends. No one in that café would have guessed what she does for a living. That's exactly how Sarah wants it.

"People think they know what my life looks like," she told me, stirring sugar into her cup. "They imagine something from a movie. But most of my days are pretty ordinary." Sarah has been working as an escort in Manhattan for three years. She wakes up around ten, checks her phone for messages from her booking agent, then goes to the gym. She meal preps on Sundays. She calls her mother in Ohio every Wednesday, carefully editing out the details of her week. The extraordinary part of her life happens in the margins, in hotel rooms and penthouse apartments, in the hours between dinner and midnight.

What struck me most about Sarah's story, and the stories of the other escorts I've spoken with over the past six months, is how much emotional labor goes into this work. Yes, there's the physical intimacy that most people focus on. But Sarah spends far more time listening than anything else. She's heard about failing marriages, demanding bosses, loneliness that feels like drowning. One regular client, a Wall Street executive, mostly wants to talk about his estranged daughter. Another, a widow, just needs someone to have dinner with who makes him feel young again. "I'm like a therapist who also looks good in a dress," Sarah said with a tired smile.

The money is what keeps her doing it, she admits freely. On a good week, she can make what most people earn in a month. She's paid off her credit card debt, started a retirement account, and is saving for a down payment on a condo. But the money comes with a price that doesn't show up on any invoice. There's the exhaustion of being "on" all the time, of performing enthusiasm and interest even when she's tired or sad or just wants to be alone. There's the fear that lives quietly in the back of her mind during every first meeting with a new client, wondering if this will be the one who doesn't respect her boundaries.

Sarah has rules. She screens every client carefully, checks references, trusts her instincts. She never drinks more than one glass of wine during appointments. She has a friend who checks in with her at specific times, a safety net made of text messages and phone calls. But even with all these precautions, she's had close calls. The client who wouldn't take no for an answer. The one who tried to remove the condom without asking. The man who followed her to the subway after their appointment ended, wanting to know where she really lived.

What makes it bearable, she says, are the other Super Asian Model escorts she's met. There's an informal network of women who share information about dangerous clients, recommend good security services, offer advice about everything from taxes to difficult situations. They meet for brunch sometimes, these women living double lives, and for a few hours they can be completely honest about their work. "We understand each other," Sarah explained. "We don't have to pretend or justify. We just get it."

As our coffee grew cold and the rain continued to fall outside, I asked Sarah if she thinks about leaving. She was quiet for a long moment. "All the time," she finally said. "But then I look at my bank account and think about what other jobs I could get with my degree. I think about going back to making thirty-five thousand a year, struggling to pay rent, having no savings. And I stay." She paused, then added something that's stayed with me ever since. "The hardest part isn't the work itself. It's knowing that I can't tell anyone about it. I'm good at what I do. I help people, in my own way. But I can never put it on a resume or tell my family or be proud of it in public. That's what really costs."