WHAT LEADS US to do the wicked things we do? I mean, the truly perverse, heinous stuff? Is it the devil? Or some self-destructive impulse? Some kind of illness buried deep in our bones? Or is it about hopelessness, in the end? 

   About desperation?

   Hey, listen up.

   Ain’t easy being a mama in this world. This much is true.

   Being an artist who’s female is even worse.

   Yeah, go ahead. Roll your eyes. Laugh.

   But here’s the sick truth:

   All I ever wanted to do was to make art. To earn the respect of my peers. To contribute something of cultural value.

   I never thought the path I would take would earn me the contempt and ridicule of my family and friends, or, worse, land me in big trouble with the law.

   Never thought the path I would take would go so far as to make me and my ex-best friend, Serena, the butt of some national joke, featured in opening monologues of the Tonight Show and Late Night—featured on the cover of The National Enquirer and The NY Post—my name and face dragged through the mud.

   I was an embarrassment to all. Called a whore, a man-hater, a castrating dyke and a pornographer.

   What could I say to all this?

   During the trial—televised on Court TV—when I stood up in my own defense and cried, “But I’m a victim of circumstance!” the jury all laughed. So did the judge—also, a woman. Even my court-appointed lawyer chuckled a little. He tried to hide that fact. But I still caught it.

   All right, so maybe I am an idiot.

   But who would have known that things could go so wrong?

   Should I call on God—or the devil—to help me out, here?

   Oh shit.

   Where to begin?

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   Serena.

   I first met her as a photographer.

   Photography is what I do. My love, my art, if you want to call it that.

   Serena was fronting a band called The Sirens, probably the 3^rd or 4^th Lower East Side band she’d started since the age of 15.

   Serena’s calling—or art—was performance. The Sirens was a post-punk performance band. By “performance” I mean they incorporated a stage show that was one part F.Y. performance art. She flipped the audience and used stage props like giant “labial” wings and fruit-colored jelly dildoes. Part of her job as performance artist/band leader was to provoke an audience, as well as entertain them.

   Often, it was said, she did neither.

   But, it wasn’t like she couldn’t sing. Don’t believe the haters.

   Anyway, I was granted full access to photograph her band on tour. Her first national tour, which included six states, places like Austin Texas, Portland Oregon, Chicago Illinois … right back to New York Fucking City, where she and I are from.

   We were both 19.

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   Of course, rents being what they are in NYC, Serena couldn’t earn a living from her art. Her website, DIY-printed paraphernalia, and T-shirts helped, but they weren’t enough. My own photography earned me close to nothing. Serena was a little better off, but she still had to scam money, as I did, through temp jobs and the like. She even tried starting a cleaning service, which I was a part of.

   That lasted three weeks.

   People are pigs and when I found myself on my hands and knees scrubbing crystallized cat pee from a bathroom tile floor, I thought, “This is it: as low as it gets.”

   (Little did I know.)

   Serena? Forget it. She would get high half the time and not even bother showing up.

   Oh yeah. She liked to get high, Serena. I forgot to mention that. I mean, okay, I did too, on occasion. But Serena took it to a whole other level.

   And if there was yeyo around, forget it.

   That fine white powder was her weakness. No shit.

   I maybe smoked when someone lit a bowl—not to seem unfriendly. Even scored a little weed on my own, now and then.

   Harmless shit.

   I liked to drink, too, in local E.V. bars. I never turned down a Raspberry Stoli and soda. Especially if it was free.

   But Serena? The word to use was “ravenous.” There wasn’t a drug on this earth she hadn’t tried. And I’ve seen her put away a dozen shots of Maker’s Mark in one sitting and still ask for more.

   In the beginning of our relationship, she kept asking me for drugs.

   “I don’t have any,” I would tell her. “No money either.”

   “Yeah, babe,” she would laugh. “You and me both.”

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   Call it a lifestyle issue, then, or plain bad luck, money was a sore spot, always.

   Earning it honestly, of course, was out of the question. To do that meant killing endless hours as a wage slave, which she could no longer afford to do, or additional schooling to pursue better opportunity, the cost of which she could afford even less.

   “Money makes whores of all of us,” my boyfriend Raymond once said. And I agree.

   One way or another, we all have to find ways to make it.   

   Serena, being a resourceful gal, cooked up all kinds of schemes that didn’t finally involve having to take all her clothes off. One of her schemes, early on, involved taking out free ads on craigslist.

   Looking back on it now, I can be judgmental and say it was fucking weird, say it was wrong. So can she. Now.

   But we live in a free market economy, which promotes exploitation, and capitalism is the breeding ground for corruption. What can I say?

   Besides, there were other factors, other needs … ones you’ll hear about, as this true-life tragicomedy unfolds.

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   So, yeah, it’s true. I mean, what you’ve probably heard by now.

   But for the record I’ll repeat myself. Maybe this way I won’t have to say it again.

   Serena took out ads on craigslist.

   Ads.

   As a domina.

   That’s a fact.

   It started as a goof, I think, before she started taking it seriously, before she realized it came from a deeper need.

   What makes us do the things that we do? You tell me.

   What I mean is that there are needs, then there are needs below that. People often do things for a reason, but not one they can put their finger on.

   At least not one they can put their finger on immediately.

   But I’m no fucked-up psychologist, so don’t quote me.

   Okay, so Serena took out ads on craigslist as a domina.

   What’s a domina, you ask? Another word, a cornier one, would be “dominatrix.”

   Now before you freak out with images of whips and leather hoods with zippers and blood-drinking cults, chill out. ‘Cause it wasn’t like that.

   At least that’s how Serena explained it to me.

   The ads were placed under the “strictly platonic” section, with headlines like “Selfless Devotees Wanted” or “Seeking Male Submissives.” In the ads, she would detail—straight out—what she was looking for: male, service-oriented subs who would run errands for her (like interns, come to think of it), and pay what she called “adoration tributes.” These involved small gifts (with the receipt), but never straight money.

   Her lucky, selfless servant would then be rewarded, if that’s the right word, with small intimate tasks, like maybe rearranging her empress’s panty and lingerie collection, hand-washing her “special” underwear (thongs, usually) or running her bath or preparing a personal meal. Or her sub would be allowed some minor physical contact, such as washing her hair, maybe, or deep massaging her naked back, or feet. Only rarely would she grant them the opportunity to go further: like allowing them to kiss her in tender spots and other things she was a little vague about. There really wasn’t any sexual interaction, at least not in any conventional sense, at least as I understood it, and the subs never seemed to mind.

   She told me, they got off on the idea of distance, of “serving a goddess”—even if that goddess didn’t exist, except in their own heads.

   Not that Serena was a slouch in the looks department, let me tell you. With an angel face, thick wavy auburn hair, and a slender, long-limbed frame, she was eye-catching enough at age 13 to stand out from the crowd and do some modeling and minor runway work. By 15, when her figure filled out slightly, they no longer wanted her. And it wasn’t that she got fat at all—only that her hips and rear end acquired a less adolescent shape, and she looked like a real woman. No amount of dieting could change that.

   But she was a natural beauty—straight out. A head-turner, with unnerving poise. And that attitude! As someone else once said, “Her presence through a room sent shockwaves.”

   Me? I always said openly: “What I wouldn’t give for a punishing ass like Serena’s!”

   But back to the domination shit.

   These kind of ads helped Serena out, a little. And, in the beginning, she had a purely mercenary objective.

   “It’s not like I’m a narcissist, or have a sense of entitlement,” she once told me.

   Whatever that meant.

   But as time went by she admitted that she enjoyed the idea of being “in control.” Somehow it suited her personality, she said. Or maybe it was a self-esteem issue. Or just the thought of having someone at her beck and call, 24/7.

   Serena never had a daddy, maybe that was it.

   But don’t quote me.

   She was less into corporal punishment and that whole cheesy vamp with-a-whip thing, more into the psychological aspect of power-exchange and boundary play. When it came down to it, she said, from the sub P.O.V., it was mostly about “pleasing Mommy.” And she would sometimes express herself that way to subs: “Now Mommy wants you to arrange her things, all nice and neat.” And, afterwards she might say, by way of encouragement, “Good job! Such a good boy!” And she would pet their sorry heads while maybe they shuddered and sometimes cried to be touched that way.

   Afterwards, she would remove the dog collar or whatever and send precious boyo on his way, while she slumped back on her busted couch in the solitude of her crib and poured herself a half a bottle of Makers. Or maybe blew a line, if she had it.

   You better recognize this fact: People are complicated.

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   Now and then, Serena tried straight or vanilla relationships, too. Especially early on, when she wasn’t on tour or off on one of her crazy, self-destructive binges. But somehow things never seemed to work out.

   Raymond, my boyfriend, would call that “ironic,” I guess. Because Serena was so sexy and smart, you’d think she’d never have a problem.

   But she had problems.

   Boy, did she.

   Alcohol and drugs could really change that girl, let me tell you.

   But when she was straight she could be a sweetheart and a lot of fun. She had what you might call “a strong personality,” which went beyond cutting down haters, dancing on tabletops in bars, and doing lap dances on strangers as a goof. And her unpredictability, of course, only added to her allure.

   “Allure”:  I like that word. That’s one I picked up since spending much of my time alone these days, reading. Since learning to use a dictionary.

   When I first met her, Serena, she was wearing a black tank top that read “kamikaze” on the front and “temptress” on the back, which seemed perfectly right, somehow.

   One night, at some dive bar off Avenue C called The Dead End, she was approached by some longhaired L.A. type—the kind who still dressed retro-‘70s in turtleneck and white pants—and was asked if she’d ever done any fetish modeling.

   “Of course,” she replied.

   “I’d like to see some of your work,” said the chump and handed her a business card with his email address. “I’m starting a new monthly magazine, and I’m paying top dollar for pictures. You have the right look.”

   Of course she did.

   The guy hung around some more, bought both Serena and me a few more drinks, and then reminded her to stay in touch, send some photo samples.

   “I’m serious,” he said, and as if to emphasize the point, reminded her, “Top dollar!”

   Serena turned to me afterwards and said, “Looks like you and me will be shooting some fetish photographs.”

   I liked the idea, and a day later I was picking up rolls of film in Chinatown where it’s fucking cheap, then meeting Serena at Trash and Vaudeville, a trendy-hip boutique on St. Marks Place, where they sold all kinds of madcool, punky rock ‘n’ roll wear.

   Serena picked up a leatherette bustier, some black satin opera gloves to combine with fishnets and domme stilettos she had at home.

   Oh my God, Serena looked mad sexy! And at her apartment she had one of her subs—a quiet guy I never met before, her current favorite—dress her in a number of mix-and-match outfits. “You bangin’-hot bitch!” I howled as she took a number of fucked-up poses and laughed.

   We even got her sub into it, blindfolded him while having him wear a ball gag.

   In one shot she took the equestrian position, riding her ponyboy while he gamely held her up on all fours.

   In another shot, she put on her black gloss 4-inch stilettos and stood on his bare chest.

   “This is called ‘trampling,’” she said, in all seriousness, trying to educate me.

   I watched the heels pressing into his nipples.

   “Doesn’t that hurt?”

   “He doesn’t mind,” said Serena. “Isn’t that right, Baby?”

   Baby—his nickname, as it turned out—issued a sigh, signifying he was all right.

   “My sweet Baby is in subspace,” she said, talking for him. “That’s why he can’t answer.”

   Later, she told me what “subspace” was: a headspace, like deep meditation, where a sub finds peace of mind.

   Sounded good to me.

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