Page 2 of Hidden Desires

I smile, warm but distant. “Thanks, but I told my parents I’d help with something tonight. Rain check?”

“Another time, for sure,” says one with a knowing smirk. We all know that I never go to firm happy hours, and they wander away, already relieved.

I allow myself a breath. I organize my desk, line up my pens like soldiers, and slip my laptop into the battered blue canvas bag I’ve carried since high school. I log out of the system, and stand, pushing in my desk chair. The office has emptied with a suddenness that would be tragic if you didn’t know how fake the camaraderie was.

I wait until the elevator dings, then walk out, posture still perfect. But in the lobby, where nobody’s watching, I pop open my phone and let my mouth stretch into an actual grin. There’s a new message waiting: the username is an inside joke, and the emoji at the end is almost obscene. My thumb hovers over the reply button, just for a second.

Then I tuck the phone away, allow my bun to loosen half a centimeter, and walk out the glass doors into the dusk, the good girl in her armor of professionalism. But inside, somewhere under the starched layers, my pulse is already racing for what comes next.

My parents’ house sits on a cul-de-sac in St. Cloud, just outside Minneapolis proper. Every driveway is a lineup of sedans, every porch engineered for the exact amount of seasonal decor to imply Normal Family Inside. I park behind Dad’s aging Taurus, slip off my heels the instant I’m inside the mudroom, and trade the professional glide for a softer, slippered shuffle.

The kitchen is alive with the warble of a local radio host and the scent of steamed broccoli. My mom Nancy, queen of casseroles, despiser of silence, is orchestrating dinner with one hand on the oven timer and the other speed-dialing relatives about nothing. She has the build and energy of a sparrow on Adderall. She clocks my arrival by the sound of the screen door, then calls out, “Eliza! I’m so glad you’re home, honey. Did you eat yet?”

“No, but I can wait,” I call back, stowing my bag beneath the mail organizer. “Need help?”

“Just pour yourself some iced tea, hun,” she says, as if that’s the extent of her ambitions for my adult independence.

I set the table, methodically spacing the silverware, arranging napkins with a fastidiousness I catch from the inside but am powerless to stop. Dad is stationed in the living room, body formed to the contours of his La-Z-Boy, TV remote in a permanent nest of cheez-dust and golf tees. He’s watching something loud and brainless, letting it fill the space where conversation might otherwise try to take root.

At 6:30 sharp, Mom calls us to eat. The dinner is a Greatest Hits compilation: chicken breast, salad, some jiggly dessert involving marshmallows and canned pineapple. The three of us sit, exchanging the usual pleasantries. My role here is as prescribed as my job, just with a higher sugar content.

“So, how was work?” Mom asks, spearing a cherry tomato with surgical precision.

“Good. The firm has a big class-action going, so everyone’s a little frantic.” I arrange the words to sound busy but not overwhelmed, as if being a paralegal is the sort of thing that never stains your soul or makes you wish you could climb out of your own skin.

Dad doesn’t look up. “Your boss treating you alright? You’re not letting those lawyers run you ragged, are you?”

I smile. “They’d fall apart without me.”

He grunts, which in Dad-ese is basically ‘proud of you, kid.’

Mom leans in, lowering her voice like we’re plotting a heist. “Your cousin Matt got engaged. His fiancée is a dental hygienist. Isn’t that nice?”

“So happy for them,” I say, because that’s what I’m programmed to say.

Mom seems about to launch into a wedding registry tirade while throwing in hints about why I should think about getting my own fiancé, but I cut her off gently. “I’ve got a huge presentation to prep for tomorrow. I might go upstairs, if that’s okay?”

“Of course, honey. We don’t want to keep you,” she says, and Dad echoes it with another grunt, this one indicating permission to leave the table before the end of Wheel of Fortune.

I clean my plate, rinse it, and thank them both in the same breezy, undisturbed tone I’ve honed over years of hiding my frays. I’m three steps up the staircase when I hear Mom already phoning someone to share the news that I have ‘a big day tomorrow.’ If only they knew the truth.

Once I’m inside my bedroom—still pink around the edges from a previous life—I flip the lock, then wedge my desk chair under the handle for insurance. The walls are plastered with reminders of who I was supposed to be: honor roll certificates, a watercolor of Lake Itasca, a shelf of decapitated Breyer horses. I ignore them, heading instead to the closet, where I kneel and feel for the false panel in the floor.

Underneath: a steel box, a webcam the size of a robin’s egg, two ring lights, and a battered makeup kit. I know it looks like I’m John Wick retrieving weapons and cash from a buried vault, and I am in a way, except that my weapons aren’t guns and ammunition. My weapons are lights, camera, and action, and I love it. Don’t get me wrong because the first time I set this up, my hands shook so badly I nearly dropped the camera. Now it’s a ritual: I snap the tripod together, check the angles, make sure nothing in the background will betray me. My laptop comes out next. I place it on my desk, angled so the camera never captures my face, only from the chin down—shoulders, collarbones, the necessary flesh.

I shed my work uniform as my heart races: blouse unbuttoned, skirt peeled away, hose abandoned in a limp coil. Next comes the transformation. Smoky shadow on my lids, a perfectly-drawn cat-eye, and a pink lipstick that emphasizes my pillow pout. I strap on a black lace bra that hugs my huge girls, and a matching G-string that bisects the perfect peach of my ass. The ring lights go on, and poof! Eliza Shaw vanishes. In her place is BunnySnowGirl, performer extraordinaire.

I breathe in once, twice, and let my heartbeat settle into the rhythm of anticipation. Then I open my laptop, navigate to the cam site, and log in. The username is one nobody in St. Cloud would recognize, but in certain online circles it’s practically a legend. I see the private messages lighting up already: three regulars, two new ones, all eager and chatty. Their requests range from the vanilla to the super X-rated.

I check my boobs, tuck a golden strand of hair behind one ear, and then smile coyly.

When the chatroom window opens, I say, “Hey, darlings. Did you miss me?” My voice is lower, breathier, the first real part of me to show itself all day. And just like that, the day’s numbness slips away. Here, no one asks about my cousin’s engagement, or if my boss is nice. Here, I get to choose who I am, every second.

The ticker at the bottom of the screen jumps as the first tip lands: twenty bucks, just for saying hello.

I keep an eye on the time, but for now, in this hot pink haze, I am entirely, gloriously, myself.

The light from my ring lamps is hot on my skin, making every inch of me brighter and more forgiving than real life ever allows. I’ve set up the camera so it frames only what matters: my throat, my chest, my thighs spread on the edge of a pink IKEA chair I’d never have picked if not for the way it makes me look edible. Anonymity is the whole game, and I play it like a pro. Not a single pixel of my face has ever made it onto the screen.