She had never done anything like this before.
Ever.
She had never even thought about it -- well, that wasn't entirely true.
She had thought about it, and if she was honest, she probably had thought about it a lot. But just as a fantasy, an impossible fantasy that she never dared even whisper to herself.
1.
Her husband had.
She remembered -- he had been looking at his laptop with a crease in his forehead, an earbud relaying some sort of noise. She had asked "What's that, Hon?"
He looked up and spun his computer around. "Can you believe this?"
All she saw was a nude woman bent over a desk, getting ploughed by a doughy man with his features blurred out.
"What is going on there?" she asked, not knowing the context. Roger showed her things he came across that other men, lesser men, would never admit to even accidentally seeing.
"It's a kind of reality porn, I guess. Air quotes around 'reality'. I was thinking about our visit Saturday."
She snorted back a laugh. "Oh, the 'visit' when I was all sheets to the wind? I sure giggle a lot when I'm drunk."
He quickly came back -- "You have a beautiful giggle." He smiled at her and paused for a bit, just appreciating her. "But yes, that conversation." He scowled briefly in thought. "We were talking about things you'd like to try or do, just once maybe, just to see what it was like. I like seeing you be adventurous and try shit out. Vee, you are amazing, and I really enjoy it whenever you recognize that."
She smiled at the compliment. "As long as it's not badminton or cross-country skiing again -- other people have the right coordination, not me." She laughed again. "So explain this to me, what station is going to show this reality show?"
His brow furrowed again briefly as he considered what to say. "It's like this. These are clips that different companies produce which show a 'casting couch' session with a potential new porn actress. They're supposed to be unscripted and natural, and a lot of the time the clips are presented as scams."
"How's that?" his wife asked. She had come to a stop and was listening intently.
"The premise is that these are fake casting agents who set themselves up as real agents who need to run potential actresses 'through the paces', as it were. The audience buy the premise and enjoy the fantasy -- not only do they get to watch a normal dude have sex with a gorgeous woman, but believing that the guy gets to have sex for free in this situation makes it all the more enticing to the supremely average, average viewer."
"So this is all a setup?" Veronica felt herself start getting angry.
"No, no -- that's the irony of 'reality' media. It's all a fiction, presented as reality complete with utterly mundane dialog. People have to sign releases and all that stuff, and everyone gets paid. But it's an accessible entry point into this genre of performance art. And it can totally be either a career-starter or a one-off."
Then the rest of the conversation from that blurry Saturday night started to come back.
They had been talking about "bucket-list" and million-year (as in "not in a") ideas. Now that the kids were all grown and deep in their own lives, Veronica and Roger were finding excitement and joy in a lot of different things. He had suggested sky diving or rappelling (she had responded with a hearty "FUCK NO!"), and she had mentioned having a go at web cam stuff, adult modeling, or something.
Back to the conversation -- as she thought about it, this actually sounded kind of thrilling. Her breath caught and her heart stopped for just a beat as she thought -- could I actually do this?
Trying to keep any quaver from her voice she carefully asked Roger -- "If we were to do something like that, how could we do it?"
"Well, if you're interested --" Roger had actually done some serious research. There were two production companies working just an hour away who were doing exactly this kind of thing. As he told her about the different things to expect and how long a shoot would take, she felt herself getting excited.
She had never, NEVER (well, maybe a tiny little bit) thought she would ever do this kind of thing.
But now, she thought -- hmmm. I bet I could.
She tuned back in to what her husband was saying -- "and I figured, you were the absolute best Lady M in the Scottish play in college, and if you can pull that off so beautifully you could easily do this too. Didn't one of your professors say that acting was tougher than standing naked on stage?"
She remembered the confidence that one observation had given her.
That clinched it.
"Let's do it!"
2.
She snapped back to the present when she realized the producer was waiting for an answer.
"Pardon? Sorry, I did not mean to zone out a bit there." She coughed a short laugh of embarrassment. "This is new to me, and I'm still trying to take it all in."
"No prob" he was cute, and smiled again at her. "What would you like as your name?" This she had actually thought about. Roger's ideas were mostly designed to make her giggle, and she smiled at the memory.
"Nikki Vee."
"Excellent! By the way, you are looking terrific for the MILF set. If you don't mind me saying so, you really take care of yourself, er, Nikki." The producer seemed genuine.
"Thank you! Since the kids got a little older, I really got into Zoomba and other stuff. I've been an instructor for about two years now."