by Isa Mazzei
I spent less and less time in the real world and more and more time online. I began neglecting everything for camming: my friends, my family, my personal hygiene. My sister was hurt that I never wanted to hang out anymore, and my mom wondered if I had joined a cult. I only bothered to put on makeup for work, and I spent most of the day in old yoga pants and T-shirts. I only did laundry when I needed to wash my lingerie, and my car had had an illuminated “check engine” light for nearly three months. My house was a mess: clothes, towels, takeout containers, coffee cups. The air was stale and dark. I was climbing back up the ranks slowly, #175, #162, #112.
It wasn’t just my show that took up so much time, it was everything around it: showering, waxing, hair, makeup, outfits. Shopping for supplies and props and costumes. Setting up games and taking them down, cleaning my cam room. I was burning through webcams every two months and replacing my external microphone weekly. Managing my viewers, however, took the most time. The calls, the texts, the Snapchats, the emails full of personal problems and inside jokes, the endless YouTube links I had to pretend to watch and respond to, the gifts that needed thank yous and the birthdays I needed to remember.
“I think I’m gonna do a bunch of privates tonight,” I announced loudly.
I was making a game board for a token keno night while Facetiming Demon. I didn’t particularly like playing token keno, but it was an easy game to set up, and I could grab my board if I had no idea what else to do or if I decided to work a day shift last-minute.
“Do you have a lot of demand for privates?”
“Yeah, I mean, enough.” Pussy flash, I wrote in purple marker on the keno board. 100 tokens. “But if I do a privates-only night, it will encourage new people to become regular private clients. Like, if you wanna see me, you gotta pay.”
“That is an option.” Demon sucked in his lips. I could tell he didn’t like the idea of me doing a privates-only night. That would mean he wouldn’t get to see me. Demon rarely tipped, and despite his usefulness in other ways, it was starting to bother me.
“I met a girl on Twitter, FaeMae? She only does privates once a week and cleans up.” Custom Video. I covered it with a Post-it. Six hundred tokens.
“Would you want to do that?”
“Do what?”
“Only privates?”
“Of course not. I love my show. It’s just to give me a boost on slow nights, like Mondays or Tuesdays. Sometimes I barely make any money. Which is dumb because what’s better than watching me?”
“I suppose it can’t hurt. If no one books one, you can always just do a regular show.”
“Yeah. They will book me, though.” I paused, looking over the board. “Do you think it’s weird to have homemade cookies as a prize or something?”
Demon laughed. “I don’t think anyone in your room would believe you can cook.”
“I can cook!” I chewed the cap of the marker. “From a box…”
Demon smiled at me. It always amazed me how attentive he was. He would just sit for hours and talk to me. I was always doing something else: taking a bath, eating a pizza, making a game, shopping for lingerie online. He was always doing nothing else, just watching me, considering what I said, offering advice. He was quickly becoming the only person I spoke to outside of my show.
“I’ll add that fact to my dream journal.” Demon mimed writing something in the air.
“Your dream journal?”
“Yeah, the journal I keep about you.” He smiled. “I write down everything that matters.” He began writing in the air again. “Una can cook—from a box.”
How cute. Demon was so sweet. Suddenly, an idea seized me.
I looked right into my phone’s camera. “Come visit me.”
“What?” Demon’s blue eyes got a bit brighter.
Yes. Demon could be exactly what I needed. Maybe I did have some feelings for him that our professional relationship had led me to suppress. Maybe he was cute. Hot, even. Obviously kind and intelligent. Supportive. I wasn’t giving him enough credit. Maybe there could be something real here.
“You heard me. Come visit,” I repeated.
“What? A visit…Oh I, I mean…Yes!” I had clearly caught him off guard. “Why?” he added, an afterthought.
“What do you mean, why?”
“I just didn’t think, visits, it seems like…” He glanced down at his desk.
“Demon.”
Demon paused and rubbed his hands together.
Nervous. Good. I wanted him to be nervous. He was so cute.
“It’ll be nice.” I smiled into his blue eyes, imagining how bright they must be in person.
“Well, that would definitely be nice.” Demon was bobbing his head, and I could hear his computer opening and booting up. “What dates shall I search for tickets?”
“Now,” I offered. “I’m bored.”
As I watched him search for tickets, I tried not to smile. Best not let him see how excited I was. Maybe Demon was meant to be my boyfriend. He could move to Boulder and we could do my shows together. He could make me dinner and run me baths and run his fingers along the inside of my arms how I liked. He did, after all, have a dream journal about me.
×××
I knew there were unspoken rules in camming: Do not date your clients. Do not sleep with your clients. Do not meet with your clients outside of prearranged, raffled-off “dates” or events that they pay for. As with any rules, there are rulebreakers, and these girls were whispered about: the camgirl who married a fan, the camgirl who let her fans pay her for sex during a porn convention, the camgirl who brought a fan on her show and had sex with him.
I knew these rules going in; they were important. If fans thought you might date them, they could get aggressive or pretend to overdose on Ambien for attention. They might stop tipping you because they think you want to dirty-talk them for free. They begin to feel entitled, like you owe them parts of your life that you maybe wanted to keep to yourself.
The morning I was supposed to pick up Demon from the airport, I woke early and showered. I shaved everything. Tweezed my eyebrows. Scrubbed my teeth. Agonized over which earrings would make my ears look cutest. Then I drove to the airport, blasting Lana Del Rey.
The second I saw Demon at baggage claim, I knew I had made a grave error. He was tall, taller than I expected, and wearing a large, oversized black coat. His face was the same as on video chat: blue eyes, light brown hair and beard, wire-rimmed glasses. His body, which I had never seen below his upper chest, was different. Never before had the word “rotund” come to my mind to describe anyone, but at that second, halfway between Carousel 8 and Carousel 9 at the baggage claim at Denver International Airport, rotund was exactly the word that came to mind.
His rotundity was due not just to his size but to the way he moved: nervously, as if his legs were working at different speeds. I wasn’t attracted to him. I knew this immediately. It wasn’t his size, or his face, or his hair. Or any physical feature, really. It was his energy. The way he swayed, as if he were a top about to fall over after its last spin. He walked with an anxiety that made me want to dunk him in a bathtub full of Klonopin. Demon caught my eye and began moving toward me.
“Una!” he called out. “Or, Isa, should I say.” He pronounced my name “Ice-Uh” not “Ees-Uh,” and I realized suddenly that he had never heard my real name said out loud.
“Hi, Demon.” I hugged him, registering how his body twitched ever so slightly. He wiped some sweat off his forehead.
“Peter, please.” He bowed a little bit, and I instantly regretted every decision I had ever made. Three days. Demon would be with me for three days.
“Peter, right. Sorry. Did you get your bag?”
He had flown from DC. On the car ride to my house, he explained proudly that he had never been west of the Mississippi before. He was staying at a hotel near my apart
ment but wouldn’t be able to check in for several more hours. As I led him up the stairs to my place, I heard his suitcase bumping on the stairs behind him.
“You could just leave that in the car?” I suggested.
“Oh, no, this is quite all right.”
I nodded and let him in. “My apartment is kind of a mess.” I added, “As you know.”
Demon set his bag neatly by the door and took off his shoes. “Oh, it’s so surreal seeing your place in real life.”
He walked around my apartment, soaking it all in like a small child at a museum. “So this is where the famous Una lives.”
I cringed, racked my brain for an activity that would kill time until Demon could go to his hotel.
“So, what do you want to do?”
“Oh, I’m fine with anything, really.” Demon stood awkwardly in my tiny kitchen, arms crossed, still in his long coat. I glanced at my phone. It was 10:30 a.m.
“Well, honestly, I’m super tired. I am not used to getting up this early.”
“Understandable.”
“Can we just take a nap?”
Demon nervously uncrossed his arms and glanced toward my bedroom. “Sure. Yeah. That works.”
I walked past him into my room and unbuttoned my jeans.
“Well, come on.” He had seen me masturbate, after all. This wasn’t the time to be awkward. Demon followed me into the room, and, after setting his coat gently on a chair, took off his pants as well. I glanced over, noting the red hearts on his white boxers and the knee-high argyle socks he was wearing.
“Compression socks,” he laughed awkwardly, noticing my eyes. “One of the joys of getting old!”
“You’re thirty-two,” I answered, a bit more harshly than I intended. I pulled the curtains closed over the sliding glass door leading to my balcony. Demon got into my bed and pulled the covers over him, sliding his body all the way to the edge. I got in the other side and shut my eyes.
“'Kay, night.” I rolled away from him and willed myself to sleep.
“Night.” Demon remained on his back, staring up at the ceiling.
After an acceptable amount of time had elapsed, I pretended to wake up. I drove Demon to get lunch, then dropped him at his hotel. We barely spoke.
That night, I cammed from my apartment while Demon watched from his hotel room. I felt uncomfortable, the way I felt when Alex dropped by my cam room—which was rare now, if ever. I pictured Demon at the hotel, at the tiny hotel table, laptop open, probably still in the same button-up and khakis he had worn at the airport.
1NerdyGuy tipped 25 tokens: :)
“Seriously, another one?” I laughed. “Stop tipping twenty-five! There aren’t any twenty-fives left!” I gestured to the keno board next to me, every single twenty-five square removed.
Demon9: They were good prizes too
Wild_West: Una always has good prizes.
secret_bee tipped 25 tokens: It’s not enough for a square but it’s all I’ve got. Sorry ;)
“SB! You’re ridiculous.” I smiled. “You’re such a liar!”
Rex213 tipped 25 tokens: me too
“There are no twenty-fives left!” I bit my lip and giggled at the tips. “I guess I’m gonna start forcing prizes on you guys if you’re not careful.”
secret_bee tipped 25 tokens: I just found these ;)
1NerdyGuy: You didn’t snapchat at all today Una, were you busy?
Private Message from Demon9: I’d like to see that bra come off… ;)
“Oh, yeah. I’m sorry I’ve been MIA on Snapchat. I had so many errands to do and just boring stuff.” I clicked away from Demon’s message, choosing to ignore it.
Private Message from secret_bee: I had a busy day too…
Private Message from secret_bee: had a hanging today.
Rex213: Me too. My boss had me picking his kids up at school today xD xD
“What? Seriously, Rex?” I laughed. “Is that even legal? Like, aren’t you supposed to only do business stuff for him?”
Rex213: Yeah. But an assistant does what an assistant is asked I suppose
“I guess so. Well, were the kids nice at least?”
I typed back to secret_bee.
Private Message from TheOnlyUna: oh shit. That’s so rough. Are you okay?
Wild_West: I am awful with children
bombNo.20: me too I’m so awkward I feel like I don’t know what to say to them at all
“Me too! I would be the most awkward parent of all. Plus, I’d probably drop my kid every other hour.”
Private Message from secret_bee: his 5 year-old kid found him in the garage.
Private Message from secret_ bee: had to take them to Starbucks for hot cocoa while the coroner and cops did their thing
“Then eventually he’d seek revenge.” I laughed and glanced at my room count. Still over 140 viewers. “That’s the title of my autobiography: Murdered by My Own Baby.”
Private Message from TheOnlyUna: jesus i’m so sorry, sb.
Private Message from TheOnlyUna: I’m sure you provided a lot of comfort.
Private Message from TheOnlyUna: what can i do to comfort you?
Wild_West: how can you write an autobiography if you’re dead?
Mattduncan: Ghosts
1NerdyGuy: oh God this room always ends up talking about ghosts doesn’t it
FunnyGuy tipped 2500 tokens: Wonderful to meet you!
“Oh my God! Funny!” I squealed, caught completely by surprise by his large tip. “Thank you!”
I clicked on his profile. A new-ish account: only four months old. I could see a tip he had left me shortly after my show with Ginger, but nothing else.
Private Message from secret_bee: nothing, I just wanted to tell you. Talking helps.
Private Message from TheOnlyUna: well I am always here to listen, you can text me too if you need to
“Welcome to my show, Funny! Have you watched before?”
FunnyGuy tipped 2500 tokens: Not really. I am not big into camgirls
Demon9: Welcome Funny!
secret_bee: yay!
“Holy fuck! Thank you!” FunnyGuy had just made my entire night, $250 in under three minutes. “Well, Funny crushed the count—bra coming off.”
Private Message from Demon9: Wow, who is this man?
FunnyGuy: No, just play some music
“Oh?” I paused, fingers on my bra hook. “We can play some music.” I hesitated. It felt weird not taking off my bra, since we’d hit the count. And once my boobs were out, my viewer count was sure to double. On the other hand, this guy had the potential to blow my other tippers out of the water.
FunnyGuy: I love Bela Fleck do you know Big Country?
Private Message from Demon9: It’s cool watching, knowing I’m so close to you.
“I do not. Should I put it on?” I left my bra on and searched Spotify, a soft banjo filling the room. “Oh wow. This is beautiful. So you’re a big music fan?”
Private Message from TheOnlyUna: thanks Demon
It was a sweet night full of jazz, blues, and several $125 tips. I wasn’t sure who Funny was, but I hoped I had him on the hook. It was rare to find a tipper with this kind of money, and even rarer that he didn’t seem to care if my clothes were off. Once I signed off, Demon sent me a text.
Demon: Who was that new guy? That was crazy!
Una: Someone I picked up from Ginger I think
Demon: Wow. What a tipper.
Una: Yeah, I hope he sticks around. He was kind of weird. I’ve never kept my clothes on an entire night before
Demon: It was a nice change of pace!
Demon: Do you want to get some food? Pizza?
I thought about picking up Demon at his hotel, driving him to a late-night restaurant, sitting across from him as he watched me eat.
<
br /> Una: I’m actually super exhausted. Fucking with my schedule really messed me up. I’m gonna pass out now I think so we can do some fun stuff tomorrow.
Demon: Aw okay. Talk to you in the morning! Sleep tight.
Una: Goodnight.
I set down my phone and pulled up Dominos.com on my laptop. I ordered a pizza then went to Google.
Fun things to do in Boulder…
×××
The next day I picked Demon up at his hotel and drove him to a local coffee shop. He told me he wanted to see the Starbucks I always went to, but I told him it was wrong for a tourist to go to a chain. He asked me if it was wrong for a local to go to a chain. I said nothing and ordered a latte.
I’d made a list of the best things to do when visiting Boulder: we’d walk around the park, visit some hiking trails, and then we’d drive up to Nederland and gawk at a cute little mountain town. I hoped I could turn the thirty-minute drive into a forty-five-minute drive and maybe kill some extra time.
I drove slowly up the mountain roads, hitting the brake before every curve, pulling over frequently to let cars pass.
“Even as a local, these roads can be super dangerous,” I explained to Demon.
“Yes, the fall is quite steep.” At least he seemed to appreciate my over-caution.
We hadn’t spoken much the entire day. In fact, it was as if now that we weren’t separated by the phone, there was no point in talking at all.
“So what are we planning on doing tonight?” Demon asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, for your show. What’s the plan? I can help.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I’ll probably wing it.” I realized as the words were leaving my mouth that I was talking my way out of a great excuse to drop him off earlier. “Or, maybe plan something when we get back. I’m not sure. I’ll have to look at my list of show ideas.”
“I hope that Funny character comes back. He was great.”
“Yeah, for sure.”
There was a long pause.
“Is there still lots of snow this high up?”
“Yeah, usually.”