With endless thanks to the lovely and delectable
Jackie.Hikaru
for her tireless reviews and excellent suggestions. If you haven't favourited her yet - well, then I'm afraid that we can't be friends.
☙ ♀ ❧
I stared at the boarded-up windows of the building on the other side of the alley, and listened to the distant screeching of a passing Metropolitan Line train.
Night was falling over North London, and my small meal of cheap rice hadn't quite stilled my hunger.
Soon it would be time for me to prepare - time to try to eke another week of base and makeup out of my dwindling supply.
My tomato plant's pale single blossom mocked me from my tiny windowsill garden.
Tomatoes... I'd had some tomatoes last week, hadn't I? Out of a box, sure, but it counted... didn't it?
It would be month end soon, and my rent and bills would be due.
I was short. Not terminally short, I still had time. But short enough that I might have to look for "alternate revenue streams" even though I'd promised myself that I wouldn't ever...
I sighed.
I'd lost seventeen subscribers this month. I was running perilously close to dropping out of ranking on any of the remaining sites that I advertised myself on.
I stared at my short, neat nails and the cheap turquoise acrylic that coated them.
Cam-girl.
Such an abrupt,
dismissive
name for what so many of us were finding ourselves doing to pad the sides.
Some might do it for spending money, or likes, or the thrill - but not me. I wasn't talented or unique enough to exhibit, and I didn't have a qualification in design or anything that had yet granted me anything more than zero-hours office work.
So I'd resorted to the same thing that so many other women had over the centuries - my body.
I didn't perform sex acts. I was strictly soft-core only - so far at least. I'd managed to create a niche early on - painting and drawing while wearing little to nothing, showing mixed-media competence while (frequently) spilling paint on myself in ditsy and but strategically-chosen ways that were calculated to entice people to come back.
There seemed to be enough men who'd pay some small amount to watch me do it. Most were ephemeral, paying four pounds and some change to see my barely-covered boobs and bum as I mixed paints or sketched wide fantasy landscapes with charcoal or pen.
Some subscribed, and I depended on their regular weekly stipend far more than I liked to think.
A grey pigeon fluttered past my window; I came out of my reverie, and glanced down at the scratched screen of my last-legs phone.
Show time.
My stomach growled; I drank a glass of tap water to still it.
Then I opened my diminished tray of makeup, using long-honed skills to eke out lots from little.
Base and blush wouldn't change my face much; it never did. But I'd learned by trial and error what looked best on camera, and I stuck religiously to my routine, armouring myself against the next few hours of horny patrons that I'd do my (distant, limited) best to please enough that they'd come back tomorrow.
A touch of blush, a perilously-thin layer of lip gloss, and I'd have a thin veneer that completed me under the soft tones of the lighting.
My stage awaited - a battered desk, the cheapest glow ring light I'd been able to find on Amazon, a reliable if old Dell, and the Nikon camera my brother had handed down to me when he'd upgraded.
I guarded them more than anything else in my existence, because I was nothing without them.
I topped up my water jug, made sure my cables were all neatly bound together so that nothing could come undone.
I pulled my easel closer and pinned some fresh card to it, then made sure my cheap second camera - a shitty thrift-store-special webcam - was pointed directly at it. Low-fi for my work, HDMI for what passed for boobs. That's what brought the money in, after all - even the two excuses I was blessed with could at least do something for me...
I policed my backdrop, removing anything that clashed with my persona, and took a moment to centre myself.
Today would be charcoal. Charcoal was cheap, I had plenty of it, and I needed the acrylics to finish a work I was hoping I'd be able to sell at market over the weekend.
"Okay, Viv. Let's make bank tonight. You're still young. This is just for now. We'll get through it."
My mantra; my little false promise to myself, every single day...
I sighed out a breath and stretched my shoulders.
I moved my easel into place, tucked a stick of charcoal behind an ear for me to "forget" about, and donned my ear buds.
The green and purple sheen on my camera's lens taunted me like some weird, bestial eye. I stared balefully back at it, then adopted my persona's happy smile.
I logged into my account, queued up my software, started my video stream and turned on my light.
I stared into my camera's maw and smiled for my subscribers.
"Hi, it's Ellie, and tonight we're doing charcoal!"
mbak318> Hi Ellie!
SolarBadger> evening Ellie!
Moxie> morning Ellie! XD show us your bum! XD
And the demands of my fans began. Seventy one online, and others trickling in. Could be much better, could still be much worse. At least I recognised my regulars - a core of maybe ten who'd stuck by me over the year or so I'd been doing this so far.
I knew most of their preferences. I knew the sort of innuendo they'd drop, if I gave them the slightest excuse. And I knew they'd come back - if I gave them a reason to.
So I began my performance, and the evening slipped by.
A mountainscape slowly formed under my fingers, dappled by the expressive shadows from tall clouds marching over the foreground meadows as a distant stream took shape and then meandered closer.
I already had a streak of charcoal dust on my cheek, and another smudge on the visible bits of my left breast.
I might not be good at anything else but I was damn good at landscapes.
It was a pity that my subscribers wanted nude cat-girls tonsil-deep in one another...
I sniggered.
"Sorry," I answered a question, remembering to put the little bubble in my voice. "I just thought of something silly. So... who else has questions so far? Are we all having fun?"
mbak318> Are there going to be any people Ellie?
"But you guys know I'm not good at people," I answered, tucking my fringe back and smiling coquettishly. "They always come out strange, with the wrong proportions."
It was the opening they wanted, and they leapt for it.
SolarBadger> What proportions Ellie? :pokerface:
"Their boobs are too big," I said, puffing out my own minimalist chest. "They look top-heavy. Anyway, you guys always ask the same question. And I always give the same answer."
"Ellie" smiled.
"But... I suppose... I could be convinced..."
A chime. And another, and another. People were spamming emoji bells and winged bills in chat. My "crew" and some other randos were flinging money in my pot - forty percent of whatever it was would go to my streaming platform, the rest could be mine...
