The thunder of the crowd's anticipation rumbled through the floor. The lights span and flickered overhead in preparation for her opening number. Serena Starr waited for a few minutes, as she always did, to allow the crowd's enthusiasm to build before she emerged onto the stage. How many times was this now? How many times had she been here? She was even more distracted than usual, the exhaustion of a seemingly never-ending world tour weighing heavily on her with every performance.
Had it always been this exhausting? she wondered. She had vague memories of small crowds in dive bars and sparsely attended open mic nights in obscure clubs. Back then the huge human machine that accompanied her tour hadn't been built yet. No roadies, no managers, no marketing managers carefully curating her social feeds for maximum impact. She spent her days sending demos to anyone and everyone, trawling the bars to beg for a slot to perform. Sure, that was exhausting but the fire in her belly to succeed had driven her forward. It was with a sense of creeping dread, standing in the darkness offstage that she realised that, for all her success, she simply didn't have the fire anymore. The nervous butterflies that used to accompany her walk out onto the stage had long since flown away, leaving behind an emptiness that she struggled to comprehend.
A hand landed on her shoulder. It was Moira, her tour manager. An older woman in her mid-fifties who supervised the complex logistics of her multi-faceted act, Moira had been hired to replace the greasy-haired mysoginist who had been a necessary but unpleasant step on the road to her success. As soon as she had gained enough influence, she'd had Moira inform him that his services were no longer required.
"Let's go!" shouted Moira, struggling to be heard over the roar of fifty-thousand screaming fans.
She gave Serena a double-thumbs up then disappeared before the singer could return her silent confirmation. In fact Serena was feeling far from 'double-thumbs up'. She was feeling like running as fast as she could, not stopping until this circus was far behind her. Instead she pinched the inside of her elbow, a technique she'd learned to distract herself from her inner voices. She shook her head, stomped each of her booted feet on the floor and steeled herself to go onstage.
She strode forward and as she appeared, the crowd bellowed her name. The sea of faces, the ones she'd once considered distant friends, were now an endless ocean of greedy jackals, their expectation crushing her, waiting for her to fail so they could post it across the internet for a surge of clout at her expense.
Never betraying the storm that was building in her mind and soul, she plastered a beaming smile across her face, pumped her fist in the air and yelled "Hello New York! Tonight we can all be Starrs!" before kicking off the show with one of her most popular hits.
---
Three hours later she left the stage, sweat pouring down her body from the exertion. As usual her heart beat in her chest but the warm glow that usually came with it was gone, leaving a chill in its place. Moira tried to approach her as she strode past but she didn't slow down, instead barking "I'm going to my dressing room." She grabbed a water bottle and a towel from a panicked stagehand and disappeared backstage.
In truth, the term 'dressing room' was a gross misnomer. Serena was provided a luxurious suite in a nearby hotel that would make tech moguls blush at the excess on display. Inside the walls were adorned with plush couches, a fully stocked bar and an empress-size bed covered in egyptian linens. She entered in the same foul mood with which she had left the stage, the short limo ride doing nothing to diffuse the building discontent that had turned her post-performance buzz into a cold chill down her back.
She slammed the door behind her and made for the bar to get herself a stiff drink. In the warm room she became aware that her damp performance outfit was starting to make her uncomfortable. Without a thought she unzipped her boots, kicking them across the room. She continued behind the bar, padding along now in her bare feet. She felt the expensive carpet beneath her toes, taking a moment to flex her toes into the deep, soft shagpile.
"I'm so fucking done with this," she murmured. "What's the even the point anymore?"
It was true. She was the world's youngest female billionaire and had no real reason to perform anymore if she didn't want to. Her savings could fund several thousand lifetimes of excess. She reached for the zipper hidden in her white corset-style top. Originally she'd worn a true corset but the endless lacing and unlacing made it impractical for use on stage. The original was hidden away in her walk-in wardrobe back in LA and this quick-release version was her current favourite for the final act of her show. Right now it was far from her favourite anything and she unzipped it just enough to loosen it before pulling it up over her head and flinging it across the bar.
The warm air met her skin and she basked in it. She ran her hands up her stomach and across her nipples, caressing away the discomfort from the places the garment had restricted her body. She fixed herself a large bourbon and threw a large chunk of ice into it. She realised that if she removed her skirt she'd be wandering around completely naked. The idea immediately thrilled her. She didn't know why, didn't need to think about it. Right now she was trying to right a miserable ship and her instinct for comfort outweighed everything. She unzipped her skirt and pulled it downward, taking her white panties with it. She stood there naked behind the bar, faintly amused at her predicament. When was the last time she'd let herself wander around naked? She had been to a private island the previous summer and spent much of her time sunbathing in nothing but her bikini bottoms. That had felt amazing, at least until the paparazzi had turned up to ruin it.
She wandered over to the couch and laid back on it, setting her drink on the floor. For a moment she let herself drift away, imagining she was back on the island, nothing between her lithe, young body and the warm tropical air. Her hands passed over herself. She cupped her small breasts, pinching the firm nipples between her fingertips. As she pinched she felt her body respond, tingles of pleasure travelling outward. She let a hand travel downward toward her shaved pussy, hoping to expand upon this mischievous moment of self-pleasure.
Suddenly, a loud knock came at the door of her suite.
"Fuck off!" she answered, shouting at whoever had disturbed her precious moment of serenity. She sat up, annoyed and grabbed her drink from the floor.
"It's Moira!" came the voice.
Serena felt her muscles tightening again, the threat of more pointless conversation bringing the stress back into her aching limbs. For a moment she was about to re-iterate the 'fuck off' for Moira's benefit when she paused. "Fuck it", she thought. "I'm a billionaire performer, the voice of a generation. Why the fuck am I stressing out about Moira?"
"Fine, come in if you must." she shouted, immediately realising, as the door opened inward, that she was sat there completely naked. An electrifying sensation travelled through her body as she considered that her tour manager was about to walk in on her completely naked. "Fuck it," she thought, "she's a woman, this can't be anything she hasn't seen before. Let her see."
Moira blustered busily through the door, already about to launch into any number of post-concert discussions that were on her mind.
"I was thinking next week we'd try the-"
She stopped. Stopped moving, stopped talking and probably stopped breathing for a second. After a long pause she shut the door behind her and searched for the words that could describe what she was seeing.
"Y-you're... naked," she muttered, her face suddenly flushing a deep crimson.
"Yes, Moira. I'm naked. My clothes were sweaty and I wanted to be naked in my suite. Is that the end of the world?"
"I-I've just never seen you... not like this... before. Maybe a brief glimpse during a costume change but never..."
"Well allow me to introduce you Moira. These are my twenty-three yr old billionaire tits," she said, pulling roughly at her nipples to illustrate her point "and this is my cute, shaved billionaire pussy." She opened her legs, dragging a finger between the folds of her smooth vagina.
Moira dropped her bags and walked to the bar, steadying herself against it. Her eyes never left Serena's body as if at any moment it might disappear as in some strange fever dream.
"I was just coming to discuss-"
