Anjali's Red Scarf Ch. 01

We met up at a café. It was a frigid July day and all the inside tables were taken, so we sat outside in our jackets and huddled close to a big gas heater as we caught up on one another's lives.

"Sarah, I didn't thank you properly. When I got the letter to confirm my change of enrolment... it was a gigantic weight coming off my shoulders. I knew I'd made the right choice."

"I'm glad to hear it." I patted her hand. "So, astrophysics? What are you studying these days?"

She'd fallen in love. Not in those words, and not with a human being, but there was no missing the brightness in her eyes and the way she flapped her hands as she talked faster than I could take it all in. Neutron stars, that was it: the white-hot bones of dead stars, crushed by unimaginable gravitic forces into arcane states of matter. Marbles the size of a city and the weight of a star, spinning hundreds of times a second, tearing everything near them apart.

Yes, within her passion for astronomy she had found an obsession. So she had come to do her PhD in Melbourne under Professor Cheng, a world expert in the field.

The problem, of course, was money. She'd secured a scholarship but it was barely enough to live on. For the time being she was staying in a crowded share house, but that was becoming impossible. It was always noisy, and she always had to wait for the one bathroom, and her housemates were pigs. Like me, she was sensitive to distraction, and she needed her personal space.

"I'm fed up with eating ramen. I have no money for anything." She patted her jacket, and I realised it was the same one I'd seen her in seven years ago; it was quite faded now, and looking a little threadbare.

She could have looked for a part-time job, but that would have been swapping one distraction for another. I've known way too many people who tried to combine a PhD with work and ended up dropping out, and Anjali wasn't the multi-tasking sort.

"So, I had an idea for what I could do about it."

"Oh?"

"I'm thinking of becoming a kept woman." Which gets me back to where we came in.

She'd heard that some students supported themselves through university by doing escort work. Her natural curiosity had taken her to the internet, and so she discovered the existence of "sugar daddy" websites.

"Um, Anjali...you do understand that it would mean sleeping with the guy?"

"Oh, Sarah! I know I'm naïve but I'm not completely innocent. I know that much." She looked off into the distance, twirling a teaspoon in her fingers. "I quite enjoy sex, you know. When it's with somebody who's good at it and isn't going to go blabbing to the whole world. And I don't care about all that purity nonsense... don't tell my parents I said that. If somebody wants to pay me for it, fine! I looked up what people charge... whooh! But I know it's a big step. So I wanted your advice."

"Okay. Uh, you'll have to give me some time to think. This isn't exactly the conversation I expected to be having today."

She must have noticed that I was looking flustered. "Sarah, I don't mean to offend you. If you have a problem with it..."

I shook my head. "Not morally. I mean, one of my friends worked as an escort for years. Consenting adults and all that." I shrugged. "It's just... it's not easy work. She had to deal with difficult people sometimes, and it takes a lot out of you. Need to be able to assess people and figure out who's okay and who's not. I think that's going to be very hard for you, and I don't want you to get hurt."

"I know. That's why I was thinking mistress, not escorting. That way it'd only be one guy and I could wait a while to find somebody nice."

I sighed. "Look, this all seems a bit... extreme. If you don't have anywhere else, I have a spare bedroom. You could stay there for a few weeks until you can find something better."

I wasn't comfortable making the offer. I really need my space, and after some bad experiences with good friends who turned into terrible housemates I'm very reluctant to share with anybody, even somebody who I'd known as long as Anjali. But I'd have felt bad if I didn't offer.

"Sarah, that's very kind of you. But I just can't take charity. It's been so hard to get out from being dependent on my parents, I don't want to be dependent on somebody else. No offence. And I really want to live by myself, at least for a bit."

"You'd still be dependent on some guy."

"That's different. It's paid work and I know what the exchange is."

I sighed. "Okay, you know, I'm way out of my depth. Let me ask my friend, and I'll get back to you."

We met up again a couple of days later, and I relayed the advice my friend Kate had given me. "She thinks it might work, but there's a lot of stuff you need to watch out for." Anjali and I discussed how to sort the wheat from the chaff, how to protect her real identity from discovery, and the importance of setting boundaries.

"The good thing about escorting," Kate had said, "is that they pay by the hour, and when the time's up you're done. But rich guys, if they have you on retainer, a lot of them will expect you to be sitting around waiting for the call twenty-four-seven. Does your friend want that?"

No, Anjali did not want that. Kate had warned us that escorting could be mentally exhausting - "it's not even the sex, it's that you're working flat out to make them feel clever and charming." For that reason, Anjali had decided that she wasn't going to offer more than one date a week; that way she could allow herself time to prepare, and to decompress afterwards.

She and I talked over that and other aspects of the arrangement: how much money she was looking for and how to receive it, what sort of gifts would be reasonable to accept, and what to refuse, what sort of warning signs to watch for and what to do if she got into trouble.

I still had huge misgivings about the whole idea. Sex life or no, Anjali was still an unschuldsengel in my eyes, and with all the preparation in the world I wasn't sure she could deal with this. My instinct was to protect her, both as a fellow Aspie and as my former student. But I couldn't offer another solution that she was willing to accept. As we talked, I realised that somewhere along the way her language had shifted from "if I did this" to "I will". She'd made her decision, for better or for worse, and I knew how hard it was to shift her once she'd made up her mind; all I could do was try to help her deal with it.

Anjali created a profile on a website Kate had recommended. Attractive scientist "Lily" seeks gentleman for intelligent conversation and more, no married men please. She took a couple of selfies that were alluring without being easily recognisable, and I went over them and blurred out a couple of identifying details in the background before she submitted them.

"Do you think I'll get any responses?" she asked me.

"I expect so. Plenty of fish in the sea," I said.

I phoned her a couple of days later. "How's the ad going? Any responses?"

"Sarah, you were right. There are many fish in the ocean. But unfortunately I think perhaps they are the creepy kind that lives at the bottom?"

"Oh dear. Dick pics?"

"Three so far. Some others who wanted me to talk dirty or send nudes. I just blocked them like we discussed."

"Good lass. Any keepers?"

"Well, there was one gentleman, but he sounds too good to be true." She read me the message he'd sent her.

"Ah. Right, I see the issue. No, he's not literally offering to shower you in gold." I had to explain that one.

"Oh my goodness. No, I think I shall have to decline his kind offer."

Eventually the initial rush of creeps moved on to pester somebody else, and Anjali began to get some more worthwhile leads. She heard from a handful of men who seemed at least semi-serious about a possible arrangement, and made a series of appointments to meet with them.

But one by one, each of those leads fell through. Sometimes she decided they were unsuitable: the man who admitted he was married to a woman who "didn't understand him", the man who wanted her to drop her studies and come live on his yacht, the man who started their lunch meeting by bullying the waitress.

Sometimes, though, it was the men who rejected her, often for reasons that made no sense to her. She was too pushy, too aloof, too wrapped up in herself, so they said, none of which matched the woman I knew.

Every time she found a new gentleman she'd convince herself that this was the one, this time it would all work out, and every time she'd end up with hopes dashed. She'd phone me in frustration, and I'd listen to her vent for a bit, and together we'd try to figure out what had gone wrong.

I'm not much good at reading between the lines, but from what she could tell me of their conversations I got the impression she'd inadvertently trodden on some egos. Anjali was the sort who'd correct people on trivial errors and think she was helping, because she assumed that everybody wanted to be helped towards perfection. But the sort of men she was meeting with didn't appreciate being corrected. Some, I think, expected her to be impressed by their achievements, and may not have taken it well when she seemed more interested in talking about her own research.

Or they might have taken her body language amiss. It's something that happens to me a lot. Making eye contact is distracting, so the more I want to hear what you have to say, the more likely I am to stare at the wall or my shoes instead of your face, and people often take that amiss.

There was one fellow, though. His name was James, and they hit it off at their first meeting. He found her fascinating, and would very much like to meet her for a dinner date. He liked sailing, and horse-riding. That rang a bell for me.

"What did you say he does?"

"Something in mining. Coal mining."

"Wait a moment..." I pulled up a LinkedIn profile and sent it to her. "It's not this guy, is it?"

"It is! Do you know him?"

"Yeah, I've done some work for his company. So he said he was single?"

"Yes... he's not?"

"Nope. I've met his wife."

Anjali swore, and swore some more, and then she started to cry. "Sarah, is there something wrong with me? Why is it the only guys I can attract are cheaters or arseholes? Maybe I'm just not suited for this."

"Oh, sweetie. You're amazing. You're a jewel, and there is nobody like you in the whole world. But that's not for everybody. Some of these guys just want somebody they can put in a box, and you're not like that."

"Do you mean that? Or are you just being nice?"

I tried to persuade her not to take the rejections personally, but without success. It wasn't just about these particular guys. It was something I knew all too well: the years of pent-up frustration from living like an alien in a world of people who don't work like we do, the exhaustion of constantly trying to camouflage our differences and trying to figure out what we did wrong when yet another interaction goes balls-up.

It's a stupid thing - I had never been comfortable with the idea of her doing this work, and part of me felt relieved every time one of these connections fell through. But at the same time I felt indignant that these men were writing her off for such superficial reasons. Couldn't they see what a mind she had, what that was worth?

It was getting very late, and eventually we had to break off the conversation so we could both get to bed. But sleep didn't come easily to me. I lay awake thinking: what sort of guy would be right for Anjali? Somebody who spoke her language, who could recognise and appreciate the spark in her, rather than expecting her to smother it. Somebody who wanted companionship but was too busy for a full-time relationship.

Someone like...

Yes, yes, of course you've worked it out. But self-knowledge isn't my one of my strong points, and it did not occur to me that the lonely workaholic I was describing was essentially myself in everything but gender. I hadn't even stopped to notice that I was lonely.

At work I like to put myself in the client's shoes, to get a feel for what they see and what they don't. Perhaps, I thought, I should see how Anjali's profile looked from the other side. What would this person see when he looked at her profile? Would he recognise Anjali as a kindred spirit? Was she even showing up on the right searches?

There was one way to find out. I climbed out of bed, pulled my dressing-gown around myself, and warmed up my laptop. I had to register for a trial account before I could view the listings, so I picked a name from one of my favourite movies, and a few minutes later I was looking at Anjali's profile through the eyes of "Miriam Blaylock". Somebody like me, but just a little bit hungrier, a little more ruthless.

It took me a moment to notice that she'd changed the first word in her profile. It now began with "Autistic scientist seeks intelligent man..."

That gave me a moment. I was proud of her for owning it, and I could understand the reasoning: put it out front and immediately filter out all the guys who can't deal with that. But I hated to think how many people would see that word and write her off immediately - and what would she think, if nobody replied at all?

I'd like to claim that the next bit was motivated purely by kindness on my part. I can't swear that it was. I've thought about it a lot, and I'm still not certain whether it was all about sparing Anjali's feelings, or if something else had crept into my decision. But whatever my reasons might have been, I paid to upgrade "Miriam Blaylock" to a full account so I could send Anjali a message.

Hi there. I saw your bio. I just wanted to say how good it was to see another Aspie on this site and know I'm not alone. It's so hard to find somebody on the same wavelength. Now I just have to find someone who's interested in women... meanwhile, good luck from one sister to another!

I hoped it might at least cheer her up a little. And once I sent it, I finally managed to switch off and get to sleep.

The next afternoon my phone buzzed with an email alert. I was in a video meeting, and I should've left it until afterwards, but after fifty minutes of bad PowerPoint slides I was beginning to lose the will to live and I badly needed a distraction. So of course I checked the message.

Hello Miriam, thank you for writing! Just so you know... I've never dated women before, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't give it a try. Would you like to meet up and talk about this in person? xxx - Lily

FUCK. That was not how it was supposed to go. No, no, no.

If the first fifty minutes of the meeting had been dull, the next hour was outright torture. I had to feign interest and nod and answer a few questions, while my brain was churning away trying to figure out how best to fix my Cunning Plan. As soon as the meeting was over I took an early mark and hopped on a train home.

I was mentally drafting an I-fucked-up email when Anjali called.

"Hi Sarah! Is this a good time to talk?"

"Uh, yeah, I'm just on the train..."

"That's okay. I have some good news, I got another message -"

"From Miriam Blaylock?"

Silence. I could almost hear the gears whirring. "Yes. How did you know that?"

"I have a confession to make. I sent that message."

"You? What? Sarah - "

Then the train went into a tunnel and I lost the call. When I got back into the sunlit realms, there was a text message waiting for me.

I had no idea you were interested. You could have just told me! I must say this is a surprise, but I'm not in the least bit offended.

I tried to draft a reply.

But I wasn't -

I was just trying to -

You've misunderstood, I -

The words just wouldn't come out right; I couldn't think of anything that wouldn't result in a let-down, and perhaps I didn't know what I really wanted to say. Eventually I settled on maybe we should talk in person.

Okay. I'm home now if you want to come over.

I changed trains and headed over to her place. There was no privacy at all there - there was a guy sleeping on the couch in the kitchen, and a couple of girls smoking out the back - so we walked to a nearby dog park. It was still cold, and our breath fogged as we walked, both of us unsure how to start the conversation.

"So," I said.

"So. Were you serious?"

I had to think about that. "I'm really not sure. I never considered the possibility that you might say yes."

"Well,I never considered the possibility that you were interested in women."

I chuckled. "First and last and always, my dear."

"But Edgar?"

"Ah, now. Once upon a time I fell in love with a cute butch lesbian. But after we'd been together a year or so, she figured out she wasn't really a she, she was a transgender man, and she needed to transition. It was complicated for the two of us. If I'd met Edgar as Edgar, it probably wouldn't have gone anywhere. But when you're already in a relationship with somebody, it's different."

"Oh." She paused for a moment, frowning the way she sometimes did when absorbing unfamiliar information, but she didn't seem bothered by it. "Have you dated anybody since you and he broke up?"

"There was this girl in Germany. That was lovely, but it was a short-term thing... nobody since I got back to Australia."

"Do you want to?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I do. I miss having somebody to cuddle up with. And, uh, and so on. But I'm so busy with work, I haven't even had time to look. And it wouldn't be fair on a partner, when I don't have the time to be a proper girlfriend."

"What if it was a person who had signed up for that sort of arrangement?"

"I guess. It just feels... weird."

"Do you mean paying for it would be weird? Or with me in particular, that is weird?"

"Bit of both. It feels like a rich people thing. Not me."

"Excuse me, Sarah? You don't think of yourself as rich?"

That stopped me in my tracks.

My job often brought me into contact with the kind of people who fly first class for free: Fortune 500 execs with titles like "Chief Operations Officer". That had become my idea of "rich", and I wasn't remotely in that league.

But it had been a very long time since I'd told myself "I can't afford that," or even "I'll have to save up for that one". I was paying off a comfortable inner-city flat with all-new furniture, and I'd hired a weekly cleaner. Any time I didn't feel like cooking, I could get food delivered without watching my budget, and if only I had time for holidays I could buy a business-class ticket to anywhere in the world. I might not have an entourage or a G5, but I could afford the things I wanted.

I could afford you, my dear.

"Huh. I suppose I am, just a little. It snuck up on me."

She, tactfully, said nothing.

"I know you're not sixteen any more, but it still feels... predatory?"

"Because you've been a kind of mentor to me?"

"I guess so."

"I am very grateful for all that you've done, Sarah, and your scruples are a credit to you. But may I ask, if you didn't have to worry about the ethics of the situation, is this something you would want to do?"

I tried to hush the incessant whisperings of the angel on my shoulder so I could think for a moment. If we didn't have that history, if we were just newly acquainted, how might I feel about Anjali?

She ticked a lot of my boxes. She was smart, and good-hearted, and cute in an owlish sort of way. (I like butch and I like cute and I like high femme. I like lots of things.) As always, she was seven years younger than me, but the gap between twenty-three and thirty is smaller than the gap between sixteen and twenty-three.

She was still something of an innocent. There are two ways that can go with me. Mostly it appeals to my protective instincts, the part of me that might show up on a stranger's doorstep armed with a hammer. But sometimes, just sometimes, it stirs something primal and ungentle that lurks deep down.