The Harlot Manifesto

Leslieann Eccles

The Harlot Manifesto

A Memoir

Copyright © 2020 by Leslieann Eccles

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

Leslieann Eccles asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book and on its cover are trade names, service marks, trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publishers and the book are not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. None of the companies referenced within the book have endorsed the book.

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To a young me; uncomfortable in her skin and speech.

You blossomed in spite of the soil.

The world is not a pleasant place to be without someone to hold and be held by.

—Nikki Giovanni

Contents

Preface

1. The Girlfriend

2. The Proclamation

3. Old Habits Die Hard

4. Men Will Be Boys

5. Beginning Of The End

6. Hoe And Prove

7. How Will I Hoe?

8. Dancing With The Devil

9. New Year, New Me!

10. Still Coming Up Short

11. Can’t Teach An Old Dog New Tricks

12. Starting From Scratch

13. Pussy Pity Party

14. Child’s Play

15. A Shot In The Dark

16. Dragged Down Memory Lane

17. Don’t Quit

Preface

Writing this memoir forced me to relive some of the most painful seasons of my life. Many times I believed readers might find it too raw to digest. Still, I was impelled to give a voice to women who look like me and share some of the same experiences.

Take only what you need from my story, but leave room for the rest.

—Leslieann Eccles, 2020

1

The Girlfriend

It was 1 AM on the eve of Memorial Day 2017. As I sat up in bed watching a movie on my tablet, from the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of the most humongous roach I’d ever seen in my life! It was so monstrous that I thought my mind was playing tricks on me. I opened and closed my eyes then shook my head, I probably need to sleep. As if aware of my disbelief, the roach crawled out again to confirm my initial fears. The way I felt about roaches was the same way most people felt about rodents. I loathed both creatures but something about small creepy crawlies made me want to burn everything. Were there more? Where was my cat to kill it? How on earth was I going to sleep, much less leave my bed for the rest of the night? I was petrified and I needed somebody somewhere to save me. So, my first instinct was to text him. Though, the likelihood of him hopping on the next train from Far Rockaway, Queens to Brooklyn was zero percent.

All I needed was someone to listen, calm me down, and tell me it was okay to put my feet on the ground. It was late but I would try my luck anyway because who else could I tell? I was doing what any normal woman would do in my position—find a man to handle it. I needed a knight in shining armor to swoop in and save the day, even if it was just figuratively. Who better than Mr. Phillips? The man was good-looking, strong, and smart; so I trusted him enough to be just that for me. But when his reply to my frustration wasn’t as encouraging as I’d hoped it would be; I called. Perhaps if he heard the desperation in my voice he’d understand the severity of my discomfort, no?

Hey, wassup Eccles? I’m here with my girlfriend and she feels some type of way. I just wanted you to stop texting me late at night. This is like booty call hours. My mouth went dry. My eyes glossed over and my body was rigid. Girlfriend? I could hear my heart pounding outside of my chest for the first time in my life. Yeah. He answered, She feels like this is booty call hours. My stomach tightened, Are you joking? I hoped and prayed he’d burst into a fit of laughter and say Of course! I demanded this man who’d been courting me for four months tell me Yes, I’m just joking with you. But in those cynical crevices of my mind, I already knew what his response would be. No! I’m here with my girlfriend. I just wanted to let you know not to hit me up so late.

I paused, staring into space completely speechless. Say something, anything! Yell! Curse! Do something, you idiot! I was silently scolding myself. But Okay was all I muttered. I felt like he’d reached through the phone and tore my heart out in one fell swoop. Okay, you have a good night. Click. I was devastated. I needed to purge. I called my best friend, Ashley. She’d known about my situation with Mr. Phillips for a little while and was the only one I’d gone into detail about him with (a blessing in disguise). I’d mentioned him to my female roommates but kept the intimate information away from them. Speaking of intimacy, do you think men and women define it differently? Is it only restricted to physical interaction? Is intimacy as obvious as holding hands and kissing? What about just sitting silently with someone for hours?

I was fuming by the time Ashley answered the phone. This nigga played me! Is he serious? Is he fucking serious? I snapped into the phone before she could even utter Hello. I told her everything. He has a fucking girlfriend! I asked him that! I asked him to be honest with me early on! I kept rattling over the phone. He’d literally used the words Single and stingy to describe himself when I asked about his relationship status. Ashley was just as dumbfounded, He has a what?! Before she could ask another question, I blurted out, Actually, let me call you back. I’d processed everything and become more enraged. I wanted answers, closure, logic, something! I needed things to just plain old make fucking sense! Have you ever been in the heat of an argument or pack session as they call them in Baltimore and you’re too shell-shocked to defend yourself? You know, when the neurotransmitters in your brain aren’t firing fast enough for a clever response? Well, that was me until I got my second wind. I called back. You have a girlfriend? There was no Hello this time around. Fuck the formalities. Yes. He answered. When did you get a girlfriend? Didn’t I ask if you had one and you told me no? This is where his balls must have dropped.

I don’t have to give you an explanation. He retorted like I was an insolent child being reprimanded. I wanted to SCREAM! What do you mean? How long have you had a girlfriend?! I asked you! This time Mr. Phillips took a breath before answering, It’s a female that I’ve been talking to for about a month and a half now. If my calculations were correct, shit didn’t add up. He and I had been getting to know each other for way longer than a month and a half. We’d flirted, gone out, FaceTime’d (he hated voice calls), and he’d even been to my apartment! Where did this mysterious girl come from? Who is it? I inquired. You don’t know her. I don’t owe you an explanation. We didn’t do anything. We never kissed, we never had sex. Would you listen to this motherfucker here? I was furious and he wanted to play Captain Obvious. All I wanted was a clear explanation of how things went down. I know we didn’t do that! I yelled into the phone. Don’t talk to me about things I already know! I wanted to add.

Okay, so I don’t understand. I told you my girlfriend is here and I don’t want her to feel some type of way. He’d said the same line what felt like a million times already. I exploded. She should feel some type of way! You were just texting me at this same time a couple nights ago! I’m confused! The fucking nerve of this guy. What was this? I pushed. What was what? We hung out a couple times, we did the play thing, and that was it. It was building. At that moment it didn’t register in my brain what building meant. Only after I replayed the scenario again and again in my head would it make sense. Only after I lay in bed at 5 AM and the tears filled my eyes did everything become crystal clear. Mr. Phillips was a better actor than I gave him credit for.

Imagine you meet a guy and you’re a little leery in the beginning stages. But you press on because the friendship is budding organically. That’s how most relationships begin, right? Friendship is essential in getting to know someone and subsequently taking things to the next level. It was simple: we vibed. He wasn’t like any other guy I’d come across before. We talked about more than superficial shit and that was refreshing. Mr. Phillips was into meditation and yoga, fitness, and he was even vegan! I mean how many serious Black vegans do you know? I’d never met a Black man so focused on training his body and mind, it was sexy as hell. What’s funny is that even with my attraction to him, I wanted to be careful about getting my hopes up. Call it my Woman’s Intuition but something tried to guard me against the inevitable. It was like something always held me back. I think women are always operating in a constant state of What if? No matter how fantastic a man feels. A little voice in our head says not to get too attached because it could all go to shit in a minute.

Men enjoy the chase and thrive on the idea of conquering an elusive woman. It’s seldom about the proverbial one that got away with their species. It’s almost ALWAYS about wearing a woman down until she finally lets him enter her fortress. Whether we’re speaking metaphorically or quite literally, a man’s pursuit is only complete once he’s gotten precisely what he set out for. In my case, I wish I could say it was just about sex. Don’t get me wrong, for three or four months he hinted at the promise of a more intimate (there’s that word again) situation. However, as he’s so eloquently put it over the phone in front of his girlfriend We didn’t do anything. Which I found odd because there were ample opportunities for physical contact to happen considering he’d visited my apartment twice.

By 5 AM I’d revisited the same scene over and over and over in my head. It’s amazing how the wee hours of the morning seemed to provide one with more clarity. My second phone call with Mr. Phillips had ended much more abruptly than the first. Either he or his newly declared girlfriend had hung up on me. Despite the dispute, I believed it was some sick joke he was playing. It wasn’t until I heard a faint woman’s voice in the background say Stop that everything set in. This girlfriend of his was as real as the fucking roach that had caused this all. What do you mean stop? he said to her, I heard a giggle, and then the phone clicked. I called back of course but he ignored me. That was it. That was all I’d get. The dickhead had a girlfriend. One, might I add that didn’t exist less than 24 hours ago. On Saturday night we’d exchanged text messages that alluded to him coming over and keeping me up late. But now I was keeping him AND his girlfriend up. What a joke! I wouldn’t get a straight answer from him about anything and it rubbed me in all the wrong ways. A woman who was romantically or otherwise involved with a man needs closure.

It was one of the worst feelings in the world to end a relationship on a sour note. A man could continue with his life as if nothing happened while we suffered as a result of the time and emotions we’d invested. Why couldn’t women get the decency of a two weeks’ notice? I was tired of being laid off without an honest severance package. When he ignored my call for the third time, I decided I was done. I dialed Ashley’s number and she was there to listen and go through the motions with me. We stayed on the phone for over two hours and re-hashed our past experiences with men. We talked about all of the fucking games we’d been through with the opposite sex. It was like we were having our very own Waiting to Exhale moment. In the back of my mind though, I was trying to pinpoint the exact time frame for when the girlfriend entered the picture. Mr. Phillips had been pretty consistent but was there a behavior change I’d overlooked?

Occasionally, he missed a message or two but I always assumed that was a given as we all miss calls and texts sometimes. This is another mistake women make in trying to maintain an easy-going non-confrontational persona. We don’t want to be the ‘nagging’ partner. Usually, I chalked-up his lack of responsiveness to being too busy. But honey, there isn’t enough busy in the world. He had a surplus of time to go out and meet a different woman, right? By the way, where did they meet and how? I was driving myself crazy trying to piece together the puzzle he’d left me with. That’s when it finally dawned on me that Mr. Phillips mentioned his best friend a lot. And every single time he did, my intuition kicked into overdrive. Was this new girlfriend, in fact, just his female best friend he’d spoken so highly of? What if she’d played the background long enough and finally decided to give him an ultimatum? Everything was speculation at that point but you know what they say about an idle mind. Well, it’s worse if it’s that of a woman without closure. Ashley and I worked perilously toward solving the puzzle but for all we knew, there were no missing pieces. Why did Mr. Phillips lead me on? It wasn’t my first rodeo with someone like this, which only hastened my frustration with the male species.

Back in 2013, I’d met a man during homecoming at my alma mater, who would become my ultimate ‘situationship’. He was in a fraternity and his reputation far preceded him in the most positive ways. In my circle, there were no malicious rumors about him. I was intrigued bearing in mind the kind of nonsense I’d heard about Greek men. In every woman’s description of him the words tall, dark, and handsome always came up. I wasn’t disappointed as he stood before me in his crimson and cream letterman jacket. It was a pleasure to finally come face to face with the infamous individual. We’d shaken hands, conversed for a bit, and then carried on with the festivities in our respective groups. Before I left for the evening he stopped me on my way out and gave me his number. I took it and I texted him the same night. He was bold and asked me straight up if I wanted to have sex. I politely declined but applauded him for being so forthcoming with his intentions. Most men I’d encountered didn’t have the gall to come right out and ask that early on. To my surprise though, that night turned into a 4 and a 1/2-year friendship, most of which we spent in two different cities. I remained in Baltimore to finish my schooling before finally moving to New York to focus on becoming an actor.

We’d spoken about my moving to the Big Apple plenty of times. He had faith I’d do it and constantly reminded me the cost of living there was higher compared to Baltimore. I assured him that I could secure anything in life as long as I was willing to work hard for it, and moving would be no different. I wasn’t expecting him to lay out a red carpet when I stepped foot off the Bolt Bus. I did, however, expect us to hang out and potentially get to know each other better, seeing as the distance wasn’t a barrier anymore. Boy, was I in for a rude awakening. We went weeks and even months barely speaking to each other and the strain on our friendship only got worse. Naively, I assumed he would help make the transition to New York much smoother. Nope. I was on my own and that was just fine. As life would have it, the last interaction I’d have with Crimson would be a couple of weeks after moving into my third Brooklyn apartment.

I’d asked Crimson if he could help set up my new bed. I reckoned that was a prime opportunity for him to finally make a move. Yes, our relationship had been strained but we always reconciled. It was obvious our attraction to each other remained despite our never-ending game of cat and mouse. We’d managed to keep in touch for four years, there had to be something there, right? Nothing happened. Crimson set up the bed, chit chat with me, and then left. There was a bit of flirting but it didn’t feel like he was trying. It was cold. I had no choice but to believe the sexual tension between us had evaporated. Had he friend-zoned me? With time I was left with more questions than answers. Eventually, I settled for the idea that he wanted me to make the first move and I’d failed. Crimson was no stranger to women throwing themselves at him but that wasn’t my ministry.

I enjoyed being in control of every aspect of my life except when it came to the bedroom. My idea of romance featured the man being a man’s man. He was supposed to take the lead and make all the first moves. I was old-fashioned in that way because to me, there is nothing sexier than a man who knows when to take the reins. However, that was not the energy I got from Crimson. Just so we’re clear; all of my notions about love and relationships were not steeped in heteronormative gender roles and stereotypes. Equality across the spectrum of gender and sexual preference was important. I don’t see myself ending up with a man who presumes my sole purpose on earth is to cook and procreate. Not a chance in hell that was going to happen. But I wanted a man who could discern between when it was time to assert himself and when it was okay to let his lioness do her thing.

Initially, when I met Crimson, I didn’t give him a second thought. A man I’d been dealing with in Virginia was who I had my sights set on. We weren’t in a serious committed relationship but I was optimistic things would eventually get there. Wrong again. See how far being a one-man woman gets you? Women don’t get pats on the ass or high fives for simultaneously having different lovers. We’re made to feel dirty for even entertaining the thought of being sexual with more than one partner. If a woman dared engage in behavior that aligned with the innate principles of man she was ostracized. Women like that were the subject of ridicule from both sexes and I was part of the problem.

I’d subscribed to the same misogynistic ideology about women who had an assortment of lovers. I never pegged myself a Pick-Me (woman who co-signs with men to appeal to them). However, I didn’t understand why a woman would take on such a lifestyle. Men are socialized to have as many sexual partners as they want while women are socialized to wait on a man to rescue us. But what were we being saved from, sexual freedom? Pleasure? Independence? I didn’t have the answers, but I was wary of asking all these damned questions.

2

The Proclamation

Ihad to be a hoe. Ashley and I spent hours on the phone after the girlfriend debacle. We resented the opposite sex for the games, the lies, and the cheating that all women experienced at their hands. At this point, I’m just ready to be a hoe, I said after a deep sigh. Might as well, she replied, which was all the blessing I needed. The problem was that we were the good girls and had no clue how to play the field. We gave all our attention, energy, and emotions abundantly to one man at a time. We’d repeatedly devoted ourselves to men with aspirations of being chosen like some legendary Pokémon. Those days were over. I’m so serious. I’m gonna do it. I just don’t know how. Ideas started trickling into my head the minute the words had left my mouth. Okay, for the next three months I’m just gonna be a hoe. Ashley chuckled, You should document it, get a journal.

I liked to think of myself as somewhat of a writer but she of all people knew how inconsistent I was. If you logged into my Celtx account right now you’d understand. I had tons of fantastic story ideas that were incomplete. This time I had to