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“I can’t ask you for money. We’re both flat broke.”
“I could have found another job. Anything to keep you from having to do this.” He waves at the screen.
After placing a hand on his, I tell him as gently and genuinely as I can, “I know this is going to be hard to believe, but it’s not actually all that bad.”
“Not all that bad?” he shoots back at me. “These men are using you like a fuck toy.”
If it were anyo
ne else, I would throw them out now for saying something like that. But this is Brice. He’s my best friend. So instead of throwing him out, I give him exactly what he’s dishing at me right now.
“And at the hospital, your manager isn’t using you?” I shoot back at him, my earlier timidity gone.
“Not for sex,” Brice says.
“I’m not actually having sex with anyone. I’m just letting them live out their fantasies. And most of them are actually nice. They’re not the nasty perverts you’re making them out to be.”
“They’re paying you to do things on camera—I don’t even want to imagine what sorts of things—but you’re nothing more than a dancing monkey to them.”
“You do realize that you just described every actor ever, right? Because that’s all I am. An actor. I give them the chance to break away from whatever dreary lives they have. And they’re keeping me from being thrown out on the streets.”
Brice isn’t budging. He’s got his arms folded across his chest in the way he always does when he’s entrenched himself in his side of an argument. From experience, I know that the only way to ever make him budge is to leave him alone. To back off and give him time to consider my side. But I don’t want this to hang in the air. Now that it’s out there, I need Brice to understand this side of me.
“Fine, let me show you then,” I say and yank the laptop away from him. Before Brice can argue, I go to open the chat window only to realize, to my utter horror, that it has been minimized this whole time. We’ve been on camera for my audience. Only, it’s not my audience anymore. I usually get maybe twenty or thirty viewers each night. A consistent number, but relatively low. Right now there are a hundred people logged into my video stream. And the number is only climbing.
So is my revenue.
“They’ve been listening to us the whole time,” I whisper in awe. “And they’ve already donated a hundred dollars. That’s what I usually make in two nights.”
“So they’ve been spying on us?” Brice asks. “Oh, yeah, they sound like real stand-up gentlemen.”
I get it. He’s upset. This is the whole reason I’ve been hiding this side of my life from everyone. It’s not that I’m ashamed of it. And I know that’s not exactly Brice’s hold up either. He’s as open-minded as I am. I bet he would be willing to admit that selling sex, if done safely and responsibly, is a useful job for all those involved. Of course, in the real world, this sort of thing often gets convoluted with pimps and drugs and kidnappings. I have none of these concerns. Plus, it’s not like I’m actually selling my body. None of the men watching me from the other side of the computer get to claim me for the night. Images and sound is all they get. They can look but not touch.
Perhaps if I can make Brice see this, he won’t feel so let down both by himself and me. I know he only means well. He’s overreacting because this is all overwhelming. So instead of ignoring him for a week or two and then continuing on with our friendship as if this never happened, I try to make him understand.
“Look,” I say, leaning my shoulder into his for just a moment to bring his focus back to the present. He was staring at the wall, no doubt wondering how deep this hole really went. “It’s really not that bad. I host chat sessions for two hours a night. Sure, I do things on camera, but nobody’s getting hurt. If anyone is rude to me in the chat, I can kick them out with a press of a button. See?” I point to a dropdown menu that displays options like ‘Mute’ and ‘Ban’.
Brice is still stiff. Arms folded. After briefly glancing at the screen that shows a still of me covering my breasts with one arm, he’s resumed his fervent watch of a bare spot on my wall. “I’ll give you an example, alright? Just, don’t leave. Please.”
I set the computer on the desk, angling it where I usually do so that it shows all of me sitting on the foot of the bed. After positioning the lights I use in the background and fluffing up my hair a bit, I address my audience.
“Sorry for the mix up. I’d explain what this is all about, but it seems most of you heard already. So I guess my broadcast is lasting a bit longer tonight, but it’s going to be a bit out of sorts. I hope you all can understand and be on your best behavior. This is Brice. My best friend.” Brice is only partially in the shot, his shoulder and leg creeping in from the left frame. I try to pull him in to wave, but he yanks out of my grip. “Anyway, I guess I should start with how I actually do this,” I say, addressing Brice now.
“So I usually start by warming up the viewers. You know, asking how their day was and stuff. They can interact with me in the chat room here. Everyone always says I have the cutest voice, and I’ve been accused more than once of putting it on.” I look straight into the camera and smile. “Now that you’ve all heard me when I didn’t know we were recording, you’ll see this really is how my voice sounds. Anyway, then I usually describe what I did that day. Maybe talk about something funny that happened.”
A bell rings on the computer. Brice looks over to read the alert that’s popped up. His eyes go wide.
“Okay, see? I’ve got a request to take off my shirt. That’s how this works. They make requests and I either accept or decline, depending on what it is and how big the donation is.”
Then I lean over and whisper into Brice’s ear. “This is where I make most of my money. One viewer can put in a request. If I accept, that means everyone has to pony up a certain amount of money to stay connected. I decide how much though.”
After pressing the ‘Accept’ icon, I’m prompted to enter a dollar amount. “It’s good to keep the early requests low. Don’t want to lose half your viewers before you’ve even begun.” I enter in two dollars and wink at Brice. “I’ve got a hundred viewers right now, so that will be two hundred bucks if they all accept. I’m betting we lose half of them right off the bat. Maybe more.”
But I’m pleasantly surprised when all but one send their donations in. After the non-payer is booted from the room, it’s time to keep my side of the promise. It’s not until this moment that I have a horrifying realization: I’m not wearing a bra. Usually, if a request comes in to remove my shirt, it’s not a big deal. I would have a bra on—something lacy or see-through—that I could earn more donations to have taken off later. But I’ve got nothing. And since I clicked ‘Accept’, there’s no turning back; Brice is about to get an in-depth education about how camming works.
“Brice,” I hiss over in his direction. “I have to take my shirt off now. I don’t care if you look. I mean, you saw everything before when you walked in on me changing that one time. Just don’t leave. Please?”
He’s chewing his bottom lip. Something he only does when fighting against a bout of stress. “Fine,” he says with resignation. “I’ll stay and watch your boobs.” That last part is accompanied by a slight smirk. He’s trying to lighten the mood, but he’s right back to sullen half a second after he’s made this lame joke.
