Not Safe for Work

by Michael Estrin

  I look at the women. It’s easy to be a sanctimonious ass and pity them for selling their bodies to the internet smut machine. But you’d have to be a real son of a bitch not to empathize with the pain that comes from kneeling on a concrete floor for hours on end.

  Dean told me that Cal/OSHA, the state agency that sees to workplace safety, periodically clamps down on porn producers in order to reduce the risk of sexually transmitted diseases. And while that’s a noble goal, I get the sense that the workers would prefer government intervention if it led to kneepads.

  “Use a chair,” B Money says.

  At a snail’s pace, Crystal drags a plastic folding chair toward her assignment. The naked white guy in the Nikes doesn’t offer to help her set up the chair, but the minute Crystal sits down, he puts his dick in her face. Ever the pro, Crystal angles him away from her and gets him hard with a few quick pumps.

  Soon enough, the guy with the bullhorn orders the next batch of perverts to their stations, and the assembly line of smut rolls along like Henry Ford’s wet dream.

  “Now last year,” B Money says, returning to a conversation I had forgotten about. “Last year, Christmas fucking sucked an ice-cold dick.”

  “What did you do last year?”

  “Hard-candy Christmas, Heywood. We stayed home.”

  “Staycation,” I say, referencing the portmanteau that has come to define middle-class leisure in the Great Recession.

  “Ain’t that some bourgeois shit? It’s a staycation when you have a j-o-b,” he says.

  “I don’t get it,” I say. “You’re making a grand today.”

  “And I’m happy to have the work,” he says. “I got bills to pay. That’s why I took this gig. But rates have been dropping like a motherfucker. I had to lay off a blonde at Thanksgiving. A blonde!”

  “Is that bad?” I ask, not realizing that B Money thinks of his girls as employees, unless the term lay off has a different meaning in porn that I’m unaware of.

  “A blonde? A titty-fucking, dick-sucking blonde girl? Jesus, Heywood, don’t you know shit about shit?”

  I don’t know shit about shit, but thankfully B Money doesn’t mind playing professor excrement.

  Blondes, he explains, should be among his top earners. There’s always a demand for them, and a suitcase pimp like B Money should be able to book three or four blondes at a time. Redheads, he explains by way of comparison, can charge a little more because it’s impossible to fake the fair skin and freckles, but they aren’t nearly as versatile.

  “A redhead is good for a Charlie’s Angels parody, but mostly they’re pretty niche,” he says. “Producers who want to see red carpet book that shit special, but they never use the same girl twice because the fans complain about variety.”

  The idea that a fan would take the time to lodge a complaint strikes me as ridiculous. But then again, I’m looking at a guy with a bullhorn directing four losers through a gangbang, so maybe it’s best to keep an open mind.

  “I can book a blonde for a blonde shoot, or a regular shoot, or a DP, if she’s willing to take one in the pink and one in the stink,” B Money says. “Shit, if they’re new, I can book ’em as teens by putting them in pigtails, then three months later, I book ’em as MILFs. That’s motherfucking versatility, Heywood.”

  Blondes, apparently, are the workhorses of a suitcase pimp’s stable.

  I ask B Money why talent rates have been dropping, and like most everyone else I’ve met in porn, he blames the tubes.

  “Letting motherfuckers bust a nut for free is bad for business,” he says.

  B Money may be a suitcase pimp, but his understanding of economics is surprisingly good. Then again, I’m not sure why it’s all that surprising that B Money would know a thing or two about his business. Business acumen may be the exception to the rule in porn, but surely someone in the industry must know what’s up, as Booty Blunt might say.

  “But the tubes are making money,” I say.

  “Damn right they are,” he says. “That’s the new business model. Pass the overhead off to your vendors, monopolize the market, and sell at scale.”

  My eyes must look a little incredulous, because B Money volunteers that he reads TechCrunch, Mashable, and The Wall Street Journal. Apparently, Booty Blunt turned him on to the internet’s must-read digital-media blogs.

  “So you’re saying there’s a porn monopoly?”

  “Soon enough,” he says. “All them sites are owned by TubeWorks. Well, all the ones that get the traffic. Everyone knows that.”

  Everyone may know that TubeWorks is in the process of becoming a monopoly, but nobody reports that. We don’t, and neither does PND. But that charge is also conspicuously absent from GFY, which is strange because the emerging monopoly is literally taking food off the tables of B Money and nearly everyone else in this business.

  “It’s all just branding at this point,” he says. “Branding like a motherfucker.”

  “Branding?”

  “Think about it,” he says. “If you owned Coke and Pepsi, you’d keep them both in business, wouldn’t you?”

  “I don’t know, I’d...”

  “Heywood, it’s the same shit in the can, but people need variety. Or at least, they need the appearance of variety,” he says, taking a swig from his Dr Pepper without a hint of irony. “That’s why I got big-booby bitches and the itty-bitty-titty committee. I book ’em black, brown, yellow, and white. I’m the United Colors of motherfucking Benetton. Shit, if aliens landed on Earth, I’d be booking the green Martian hoes with three titties.”

  I’m not sure why B Money thinks alien porn stars will have three titties, but race and the possibility of intergalactic porn are red herrings. The only real issue is money, and the way B Money sees it, most of us are deaf, dumb, and blind.

  “Eventually, all this shit ends up on the tubes,” he says. “And the more money there is out there for the tubes, the harder it is out there for a suitcase pimp.”

  Then B Money points to Nina Wild, her moans practiced and as artificial as the flavors in the suitcase pimp’s soda.

  “She thinks she’s getting fucked now,” he says. “But that fucking ain’t nothing compared to the real way this business fucks you. Fucks you hard, Heywood. You’ll see.”

  Chapter 39: Fluffer piece

  Gangbangs don’t break for lunch, which I find both comforting and troubling. But I need to check in with the office, so I wander off set into a windowless maze of bullpens and conference rooms.

  Like The Daily Pornographer, the offices at this production facility have a low-rent utilitarian feel with few personal touches, so it’s hard to tell if most of the staff is off for Christmas, or laid off for good.

  I pass a sad miniature Christmas tree, and locate a small conference room that looks like a quiet place to make a call.

  As I dial the office, I worry that I really don’t have much to report. My job, I realize, isn’t all that different from B Money’s girls. One of our biggest advertisers is furious, and I’ve been sent out to stroke their ego by playing reporter. But if they notice me, they don’t appear to care. Rachel disappeared soon after I arrived, and with the exception of Nina Wild, everyone associated with the production is indifferent to press, and about as grumpy as you might expect.

  “We’re dead as dick,” Sunny says. “Tell me you have something.”

  “Slow news day?” I ask.

  “Isn’t that what I just said?” she snaps. “Come on, Heywood, we need to update the site. We’ve been evergreen all morning. Oz has been all over my ass.”

  It’s hard to imagine Oz all over anyone’s ass, because he seldom leaves his office and never stops strip-mining his nose for boogers. But he probably is peppering Sunny with instant messages, so I should cut her some slack.

  “I’ve got an interview with the star,” I say. “Plus, the director says he’s going to give me an exclusive and talk about his next project, but I have to talk to him after they do the cumshots.”

 
; “OK, write those up when you get back,” she says. “What about news? Is anything breaking? I want scoops.”

  “Scoops?”

  “What are you, a fucking parrot?”

  “No.”

  “That was a rhetorical question.”

  I press the phone close to my ear and look up for inspiration. There’s nothing above me but white ceiling tiles with a brownish, dirty hue.

  “Porn stars need kneepads,” I blurt out without thinking it through.

  “Did Cal/OSHA show up?” she asks excitedly. “Are they going to shut down the set? Because that would be major.”

  “No, no. It’s just that these floors, they’re concrete, you know? That’s very tough on the knees, for the women...with the hand jobs.”

  “Hand jobs!” Sunny says in a tone that’s equal parts outrage and inquiry.

  “Yeah, when they give hand jobs, it’s pretty brutal on their knees, so I was thinking...”

  “Heywood, get your shit together,” Sunny says in a calm voice calculated to mask a seething volcano of rage. “You’re a professional. If there’s no news, you go out there, and you make news.”

  Chapter 40: The Other Ron

  Finding my way back to the gangbang is more challenging than expected. After a few wrong turns, I’m beginning to feel like the guys from Spinal Tap, which is not a boost to my professional confidence.

  From the looks of things, I appear to have wandered into the postproduction section of the office. At least, that’s my guess because there are a lot of desks with side-by-side computer monitors—the big ones that announce to the world that their user does something creative that in no way involves spreadsheets.

  “You lost?” I hear a gruff man’s voice ask.

  I am lost, so I say yes before turning around because I hope that the voice is my way out. But when I do turn around, I realize that my assumption was both right and wrong because the voice belongs to Ron—the Other Ron. He’s naked except for a faded purple towel around his waist.

  “You’re the Other Ron,” I say.

  The Other Ron is one of those guys who always seems to have a psycho scowl on his face, like he wants you to know that he was born to fuck chicks and fuck up dudes, which is alarming because there are no women present. But calling him the Other Ron causes him to pause, which buys me a little breathing room. After all, the Other Ron doesn’t know that another Ron—the Ron—is the reason I have labeled him the Other Ron. It’s all very confusing, and for a moment I am grateful that my job doesn’t involve keeping track of the credits on the thousands of porn films the Valley pumps out each year. Then I realize that my job is much worse than that, because I’m face-to-face with a killer.

  Technically, he’s a suspected killer. Or maybe he’s just an unconfirmed person of interest. Either way, the look Boyd gave me when Miles froze Ron’s image on our TV comes flashing back to me, and with it Boyd’s warning that I might find myself standing between a murderer and his freedom.

  I feel a chill run down my spine and I pray that Ron doesn’t notice me shaking in my Chuck Taylors. I look down at my feet and then over at Ron’s. He’s not wearing shoes or socks, which is troubling because even a novice like me knows you should never go barefoot at a gangbang.

  I follow Ron’s bare feet moving across the floor. And as I look up, I see that he’s wedged himself into the doorway, backing me into an office with no other exit.

  Even without the steroids and the Marine Corps training, I’m pretty sure Ron could pound my ass in the violent, nonsexual meaning of that phrase. I’m not much of a fighter, which is why I rely on the gift of gab in situations like this. The trouble is, I’ve never really been in a situation like this. I can talk my way out of trouble with the best of the bullshit artists, but Ron looks like the kind of guy who’d break a dog’s neck for shits and giggles, and in my limited experience, those guys aren’t talkers.

  “We met on the set of Fuck-Whores 8,” I say. “Well, we didn’t really meet exactly, you were balls deep in Mary Jane...”

  “Mary Jane?” Ron says in surprisingly soft voice.

  “Yeah, your costar,” I say. “Blonde. Smokes a lot of weed, hence the name.”

  “I don’t smoke weed.”

  “Sure. That’s great. Well, anyway,” I say, extending my hand and instantly regretting the overture. “Ron, I’m Heywood. Heywood Jablowme.”

  “How do you know my name?” Ron asks.

  It’s a good question that I don’t really have an answer for. It would be creepy not to answer it, and I’m not going to win a creep-out tournament with Ron. So I make it up.

  “Are you kidding?” I say. “You’re a porn star, everyone knows your name.”

  The tight muscles in Ron’s jaw relax into a sheepish smile.

  “Nobody knows my name,” he says. “I’m the unknown dick.”

  “Unknown dick,” I say, slowly reaching into my pocket for my reporter’s pad. “I like it. Anonymous dick, unknown, there’s something there.”

  I take a pen out of my pocket and flip the pad open.

  “I’d like to interview you, Ron. Would that be OK?”

  Chapter 41: Crossing swords @ the Rubicon

  I’m about to do something really stupid.

  Then again, there’s no such thing as professional reporting from a gangbang. There just isn’t.

  Still, I know I should flip through my notes one last time before I turn my porn journo career into a one-man snuff film.

  Chapter 42: Interview with a cocksman

  Ron doesn’t really talk, he spews.

  Pun intended.

  I actually wrote that in my notes because once you get Ron going he’s a total fucking blabbermouth. Kind of like Forrest Gump on crank, over-sharing faster than he can run.

  So, you don’t really quote Ron. One minute he’s telling you that he’s the Brett Favre of fucking—never misses a game—and then a split-second later he segues into an anecdote about being thrown from a moving Escalade. His stories are fascinating, but fractured and ethereal. It’s like interviewing the Most Interesting Man in the World, if he smoked meth and dropped acid whenever he wasn’t drinking Dos Equis.

  We talk for an hour and I find myself jotting down random snippets. That’s really all I can do. These are the bullet points:

  · The Iraq War was fun, but he wishes he was old enough to have served in ’Nam because those guys had “better drugs and hot and cold running pussy.”

  · He was nearly cast on a reality television show about castaways turning to cannibalism, but he couldn’t pass the psych evaluation.

  · Ted Nugent is a personal hero.

  · So is Tony Soprano, who Ron insists is a real person.

  · He doesn’t have a problem with blacks or Mexicans, but don’t get him started on the Armenians. They cheat, and they’re mean.

  · Korean chicks are his favorite Asians, but Chinese are the most common.

  · Of course the government is spying on all of us, all the time. But it’s a government operation, which means they’re incompetent, which means we have nothing to worry about, unless the IRS calls. Then you get your guns. No doubt.

  · He uses the phrase “no doubt” way too much.

  · We’re living in the end of days. No doubt.

  · A little sriracha and ketchup makes dog food taste like spicy meatloaf.

  · People who listen to Coldplay only think they know what pain is, but really they’re just fooling themselves.

  · Jesus would kick Allah’s ass. No doubt.

  · The Eagles are going to win the Super Bowl.

  · Everyone should read Dan Brown.

  · He doesn’t know if he beat Wilt Chamberlain’s record or not.

  · Most people are terrible at sex.

  · All civilian men covet female porn stars.

  · All male porn stars are pariahs, except for Ron Jeremy.

  · The Terminator series wasn’t science fiction, because robots are already taking our jobs. Look at
the internet, it’s obvious.

  · Arizona Iced Tea isn’t really from Arizona, which just proves that all ads are lies.

  · Ron Paul is right about everything.

  · The porn industry worked better under mob control.

  · He has written letters to Tony Soprano begging him to take over the porn business.

  · Tony Soprano has not written back because the Feds are watching his mail.

  · Global warming is a hoax.

  · Lizard people run the world. They control the banks and both political parties. They also have orgies and barbecues at Bohemian Grove, when they’re not running the world.

  · The lizard people are behind the “global warming hoax” because they want to buy up beachfront property in Florida. Anyone can read that in a book.

  · Ron Paul is not a lizard person.

  · Cats are better than dogs, because pumas are cooler than wolves.

  · The poor are doomed.

  · You’re not supposed to call them poor people, which is why they’re doomed.

  · He is broke because he spends all his money on steroids, meth, Vicodin, penis pills, speed, Valium, 5-hour Energy drink, and some sixteen-dollar smoothie at Whole Foods that keeps his “cumblasts” at the “professional level.”

  · Rich people deserve to be rich, even if they inherited their money.

  · Older women give better head than younger women.

  · Younger women taste better than older women, unless they’re on meth. Then their pussies taste like cat urine and rotting Chinese food.

  · He cooks ginseng into his meth to counteract the smell. (That’s a secret, so it’s off the record.)

  · Opening presents Christmas Eve is bullshit. It’s also a sign of weakness, which is why America has gone soft.

  · Men shouldn’t apologize. Ever.

  · Watching porn trains the next generation of female porn stars, which is why porn keeps getting nastier.

  · A Catholic priest, his Little League coach, and a Boy Scout leader molested Ron. But not all at the same time. That’s just how he says it. Then he changes the topic.