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“Strained relationship?” I asked, taking a bite of my pizza, finding I actually liked her unexpected combination.
“We’re… very different people. She’s very driven, very extroverted. She made it very clear all my life what she expected of me as a child, then as an adult. And, well, I… have never been able to live up to those expectations. And I think I just… got tired of trying to,” she confessed. “But the only way I could… stop trying was to get further away.”
“It was just you and your mom?”
“Yeah.”
“What does your mom do for a living?” I asked.
“Business. She worked hard to get herself a plush corner office, and she wanted me to want the same.”
“What did you want?”
“Not… that,” she admitted, shaking her head. “As much as she tried to mold me into a mini version of her, I never had whatit took. But, uh, because I think I was so focused on trying to be what she wanted, that I never really figured out whatIwanted.”
“How’d you manage to move down here?”
“I’d been working for years. My mom insisted that, in addition to extracurriculars, that having a strong work history would look good to one of the colleges she wanted. And because of work, school, and all of those extracurriculars, I had no way to spend any of it. So I had a nice nest egg to get started.”
“The app hasn’t been around that long, though, right?” I asked as she finally started to eat.
“No. At first, I got jobs similar to what I’d been doing in Connecticut. Barista, serving, that sort of thing. But things are… crazier here than they were back home. My anxiety got out of control pretty quickly.”
“So you started working from home?” I asked.
“I found some jobs. They… they worked when I strung them together. But I was working… sixteen hours a day just to make ends meet. I was this close,” she said, pinching her fingers together, “to swallowing my pride and going home.”
“Then you heard about Sion’s website.”
“Well, I mean, before then, I’d heard a lot of stories about women making six-plus figures selling pictures of their feet. Or doing ASMR. Or even just selling their garbage and things like that. I guess I squirreled that information away. Then when I saw the first advertisement for Sion’s site, I just… decided to try it. Within a month, I was making more than I was making at all my previous jobs… and only working a few hours a week.”
“That’s great.”
“Yeah. It felt surreal at first, but the money just kept getting better. Soon, I was able to move to a better area, and I still manage to put a big chunk of my income away for…”
“For?” I asked when she trailed off.
“Honestly, I don’t know what for. I told myself that I would only do this for five more years, max. And that by then, I would have taken some classes, or figured out a new career path.”
“Not going well, huh?” I asked.
“I just… I don’t know how people decide their entire future like that.”
“My guess is they pick something they enjoy or are good at, then make money doing that.”
“So… how do you make money?” she asked.
To that, I lifted a hand, rubbing my brow, not sure how much I should really tell her. How did the other guys explain this to the women they were interested in? How far into their relationship did they feel it was right to confess this type of sensitive shit?
Then again, I guess there was no one Siana was going to tell. And no reason to do so.
“When I was young, I worked as an exotic dancer.”
“Really?” she asked, face brightening.
“Really,” I said, nodding. “I was eighteen. And sick of being so poor. I had gotten into weights in high school, so I had a body more mature than my age. Someone scouted me one day. I tried out. Got the job. The rest was history.”
“How’d you become a biker then?”
