“I would make the worst mistress ever.”
This is my friend Emma speaking, in response to a newspaper article reporting that a significant percentage of New York City real-estate purchases involve a mistress, usually a wealthy older man purchasing an apartment for a younger woman who is not his wife.
Emma is dry, sarcastic and bitingly intelligent. After five years of friendship, I have no idea what her body looks like because she wears only loose black blouses over long black skirts.
The New York Times article described the typical mistress as in her mid- to late 20s, “saucy,” “sexy” and with “no particular skill set.”
Apparently, the men of New York have a habit of providing credit lines and expansive condos for these women, often more luxurious than those provided for their wives. Who knew that a bit of well-placed flirting could land you in your very own swanky, work-free lifestyle and multimillion-dollar condo? Clearly, this is my calling.
My female friends disagree: “Ari, would you really do that for a condo?”
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I want the condo.
The trouble is, I am not quite clear how to start. Where do you go to meet married successful corporate men in their 40s and 50s with low morals and high assets? And what outfit alluringly communicates–but-doesn’t communicate–“I want your credit line, baby”? My roommate suggested that I watch “Sex and the City” to see how Carrie met Big, then replicate.
I also seem to be lacking proper mistress credentials. I am neither “saucy” nor lacking “a particular skill set.” Sarcasm and intellectualism probably aren’t high on the Mistress Tree either, and I would lose further points when I announce that I want to publish an article about the relationship.
Emma adds that in her relationships, the emotional part of them has to take precedence over the physical part, another strategy that might not fly as a mistress. “And you’d have to be happy all the time. I’m not happy.”
Alas, mistresshood is not in the cards for Emma and me: We have fallen out of the Mistress Tree altogether. Instead, we must assume that we will forever depend on our own incomes.
This discovery is something of a letdown, particularly if you’ve seen my income. Despite Ivy League educations and every intention of making it on our own as independent women, when we picked our heads up from the books, mistresshood suddenly seemed a viable option. Perhaps the women we mocked in college–the ones who traipsed around in nearly non-existent outfits–weren’t completely delusional. They were just planning ahead.
As I rush off to various commitments I deplore, the same high-heeled young women are a fixture on city sidewalks, brushing a hand across the buns of men I had presumed to be their fathers.
The Prada heels suggest that she has found herself a nice fat parachute from the all-too-real struggles of getting by in the big city–at a price, of course. And she will be quietly taken care of in the event of the man’s passing, as is the New York norm. (He might, for example, have her name put on the condo deed.)
The phenomenon is so popular that you can now ask strangers if they’re mistresses.
A woman in my building recently leaned into my ear to ask if the man I introduced as my uncle was actually my uncle, or if we were a “Pretty Woman thing.” I snorted. I assured her that I had chosen the more glamorous option, the Working Long Hours and Living in a Small Apartment Thing.
Then I asked my uncle if he wanted to buy me a condo.
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