Trying to explain your job to someone could be tough when that job didn't even exist ten years ago. This was especially true when it had the delightfully non-descriptive career of 'influencer.' Video essayists and professional game players could call themselves 'filmmakers' or 'streamers.' Youtube had pierced the mainstream consciousness enough that your grandmother at least knew what it was.
Instasnap sounded like something your grandmother would say, almost like a portmanteau of two real websites like FaceSpace or Tweddit. It sounded like something someone would make up in a hurry, but... that's the name the creators really went with. As the name implied, it was about sending 'snaps' of yourself around the world instantly though the world wide web. There was a small description field to fill with hashtags, shallow affirmations and disclosures of brand deals... but the main focus were the pictures.
Thus, Instasnap was absolutely filled to the rafters with models.
Or at least women calling themselves models. If someone was able to make a living, or even break even, by posting images of their faces and bodies to Instasnap... they could safely call themselves a 'model.' Someone who wrote porn online might call himself an 'author' instead of the more accurate description 'writer' or 'degenerate,' but he'd only be fooling himself.
The life of the Instasnap model was one of glamorous locations, outfit changes, juice cleanses, and perhaps dubious sponsorship opportunities. It was like being a beautiful flower that could only be carefully cultivated if shielded and tended to by experts. Then again, that also described the manufacturing process of vanilla, and that flavor was so ordinary, the word itself was now a synonym for 'ordinary.' But these opinions changed through history. There was a period in early American history where lobster was considered food for the poor. Everything was in flux.
In the modern permanently online world, there was an army of lovely women on Instasnap trying to find a way to stand out in a very crowded market.
It was perhaps harder to do so when you lived in northwestern North Dakota.
Apparently, one 'north' didn't describe quite how cold and barren this area was. Williston was less than one hundred kilometers south from the Canadian border, a dry and cold city that wasn't nearly as interesting or fun as the big cities on America's coast. It was a fine place to work, some said. The population had swelled in the last ten years or so, but most of those were people working in the area with no permanent address.
Williston might be a fine place to work... but why would someone be a model if they wanted a normal job?
The most glaring feature Williston lacked that an Instasnap model might crave... were beaches. It was nearly in the dead center of the entire continent, far from either ocean. One could go to Lake Sakakawea and have a jolly time and enjoy the somewhat natural beauty of a man-made lake, but it was not like a normal sandy beach facing an ocean. There certainly weren't any palm trees there. The nearest beaches that were more traditional were probably on Lake Superior to the east...quite a drive away. If you framed the shot just so... the followers might believe your sand-coated feet were facing the Atlantic Ocean... instead of a lake.
That was the life of the Instasnap model. If you couldn't afford to fly to Belize... every beach essentially looked the same. From San Francisco to Cape Verde... sand looked like sand and water looked like water. The only things in the sand that might give away your actual location were the seashells... and litter. All you had to do was turn off geolocation.
For those who couldn't afford the trip to a real beach in Michigan and pretend that it was Barbados... it was fortunate that pools looked like pools anywhere in the world.
Whoever decided to open a large outdoor public pool in North Dakota must have been mentored by Captain Wrong Way Peach Fuzz, but there it was: the Williston Sports and Leisure Center and Pool. It supplied facilities for other athletic activities that made more sense for winter like basketball courts and batting cages. But those were sensibly inside the building, shielded from the weather. Whereas the pool was outside the back of the facility, where it would be much too cold to use for at least half the year. There was also that unnecessary double 'and' in the title of the facility. Maybe they wanted to specifically namedrop the pool in the facility's name so drunken idiots wouldn't try to ice fish in it in the winter.
In early April, on the first somewhat sunny day, Nikki wanted to get some shots of her lounging casually by a pool. Maybe she'd say this pool was in a resort in the Phillipines, but not say exactly where. There were over ten thousand islands for there to be a pool to visit. Nobody could call her out then without properly checking them all first.
Nikki and her photographer Diana drove into the mostly deserted parking lot of the Williston Sports and Leisure Center and Pool. There was a slightly dusty sedan in the parking lot, as desaturated and lusterless as the rest of this town... and next to it, a snazzy electric car in bright blue. It stood out like a gold coin sitting in a litter box.
Nikki squinted as she saw the car. She'd seen someone driving around with that car... but who? Where did the owner even charge that thing in this hopeless backwater?
She parked a respectful few spaces away from the other cars and stepped out. Nikki wanted to maximize their photo time, so she had gotten dressed in her apartment. This means she was walking around this cold morning in a small pink bikini, sunglasses and high heels. She had her brown leather bomber jacket, the fur lining pulled in close to her neck. Diana pulled the camera bag and the folding beach chair out from the backseat and followed her inside.
Even though this place wasn't meant to be open for another hour or so... there was already someone else here.
Riley, the woman at the front desk, was talking to a tall woman with dusty blonde hair. She had a nearly square face with prominent cheekbones leading to a wide mouth with plump lips and a beauty mark a bit off from her nose. It was almost suspiciously perfectly placed, as if she could rub it off with her thumb like a fleck of chocolate. Her body was full and mostly curvy, hidden under a dark overcoat, with her shapely bare legs sticking out beneath them.
Nikki immediately recognized her. This was Felecia, a fellow Instasnap model from around the same area. Despite living in the same city, the only reason Nikki knew her was because Instasnap had suggested her as a friend at some point. Presumably, Instasnap's algorithms found that they were often going to the same salons and boutiques and thought they might know each other. They had interacted a few times through the website... mostly negatively.
"What are you doing here?" Nikki snapped quickly, pulling her sunglasses up off her head.
Felecia turned her head towards her. This was the first time they'd met in person, but with the intensity of their prior interactions, it didn't feel like it. Felecia immediately felt tension rise in her throat. She responded, "I should ask you the same thing. This place isn't open until ten o'clock."
"I know it's not." Nikki said. "That why I reserved the hour before they opened."
"But that's what I did." Felecia said. "I reserved it a week ago."
"I did, too!" Nikki persisted. "What, are you stalking me?"
"You wish." She shook her head.
"Well, get lost." Nikki said. "Find some other pool to pretend to drink those sponsored energy drinks in."
"I reserved this place today, and I'm getting some pictures of me in that pool." Felecia said. "I don't care what you do, but keep me out of your pictures."
"Like I'd want you in my 'snaps anyway!"
"Ladies!" Riley said, holding out both hands. "I'm sorry for this oversight that has led to this double-booking. I'll refund the reservation fee if you like. But... this pool normally holds twenty-five swimmers at once. Surely, you can just... both use it at the same time. Draw a line down the middle like a sitcom if you want, but... we can agree to share, correct?"
They glanced at each other. If they just kept to themselves, they could both just get through this and go on with their day, right? Every second they were in front of this desk was a second they weren't striking an attractive pose, and one less picture they could post for their followers.
They both quietly agreed to share the pool.
--
Nikki had wished that the pool was hundreds of feet long, so they could just stay at the opposite ends of it like a rich couple in a strained loveless marriage eating dinner at the opposite ends of a banquet table. But this pool was probably twice as long as an in-ground pool at a house in the suburbs. Not that many people in Nebraska fussed with in-ground pools, of course. It rarely got above 80 degrees, and even then, the relatively arid conditions made it very survivable with just a fan.
Felecia went inside to change, so Nikki chose her half of the pool and opened up her lounge chair. Diana set up her camera and tripod, a DSLR that was a few years old by now. It still took fine pictures in the RAW file format. Most of the fancy stuff on newer camera models were for doing video, something that Nikki rarely indulged in. She enjoyed the crisp clarity of ultra-high-definition pictures, something that no moving format, even HD video, could quite match.
This was why Diana was an invaluable member of her team... if two people were enough to make a team. Diana's photography really helped her images stand out above the phone selfie-takers and other rank amateurs. There was more setup and faff to deal with using real DSLRs, but thankfully Diana handled all of it with precision and speed. It did mean Nikki often found herself holding the end of a measuring tape AND a light meter, so Diana could find the precise settings she needed. But the work spoke for itself.
Felecia emerged from the double doors, having changed somewhere inside. For the first time, Nikki got an eyeful of Felecia in real life. She packed herself into a little pink bikini with a high-cut pair of bottoms, a line of untanned flesh above the cups of her top. She had a barbell piercing in her navel with a clear gemstone, probably not a real diamond. Felecia's camerawoman, Miranda, caught this entrance on her choice of equipment, a state-of-the-art smartphone on a special handheld stabilizer. Felecia came to rest on her bamboo beach chair set at the other side of the pool, crossing her legs and striking a relaxing pose.
Nikki looked annoyed. She dropped the measuring tape and walked to the edge of the pool, still unwilling to violate the invisible line dividing the pool in half. "Hey!" She called over.
Felecia craned her head over. "Yes?" She asked.
"You're wearing pink."
"Yes, I am."
"You need to change. I'M already wearing pink."
