"Okay, boys, we're probably about done. Unless there are any last-minute requests?"
I look expectantly round the faces of the young men I'm posing for. I should probably mention that the photographers are my brother, Martin, and three of his friends. And I'm Emma: Emma Daniels.
I can see that there's something Gurdip -- the quiet, shy one -- wants to say, but he'll be too shy to speak up. He's enjoyed himself -- they all have -- but he's barely said a word over the whole one-hour session.
I prompt him. "Gurdip?"
"Er... well, yeah." He's embarrassed and I encourage him with a smile. "You know those Czech casting photos you get on the Internet?"
I do. "Where the model ends up on the stool?"
He nods and manages a self-conscious grin.
I know what he wants. I perch myself at the front edge of the stool they've provided, spread my legs as far apart as they'll go, with my hands on my thighs, and smile at Gurdip, who is delighted. He takes the shot and is followed by the others. We do it again with my hands on the stool, then behind my head, then cupping my breasts. There's some moving in for close-ups, too; they've gained confidence over the last hour.
Did I mention that I'm naked?
Eventually they're done and the session is over. "We can do selfies, if anyone would like to."
There are nods all round; they would like to do selfies. The young ones usually do: it's something to show their mates.
While we're taking selfies, Mum, who has excellent timing, brings in the coffee.
And if you're wondering why I'm posing for my brother and his friends, the explanation -- most of which I will spare you -- is complicated. But, basically, I blame my mother.
Her mother, my gran, was a stripper in the seventies, when censorship by the Lord Chamberlain ended and girls could dance naked for an audience without being arrested. And they did: in theatres, clubs, and the back rooms of local pubs. We still meet people now who remember Gran stripping all those years ago.
Mum was a model. It was before the Internet got going, in the heyday of top-shelf magazines some of which became very explicit. A lot of that stuff has been scanned by 'collectors' and is now on the Internet, and no doubt on the phones and laptops of half the boys at Martin's school. Not to mention the teachers and a handful of the girls. Mum's forty-two now and gave up modelling in her thirties, but she's looked after herself. She's noticed the growing demand for older models in the magazines and on porn sites, though, and she's thinking about it. Again.
So, you see, it's in the blood.
As for me, I got to uni against the odds and need to earn to cover basic living costs. Bar work and waitressing pay peanuts and I don't fancy escorting, table dancing or sucking off the landlord in lieu of rent. So, like my mum, I ended up as a 'glamour' model. There's an agency; there is in most university towns. Mostly it's not glamour, of course, it's just soft porn. Some of it's quite sexy and erotic, though, even if it is quite explicit, and some of it's just spreading your legs and shoving things up your fanny: 'insertions' in the jargon of amateur pornographers. You'd be surprised at the variety of insertions.
By and large, though, I haven't found amateur pornographers to be the bunch of sleazy perverts you might imagine. Most are friendly and sociable once you get to know them, reasonably polite, and observe the unwritten 'no touching' rule without being told. They pay me; I take my clothes off, pose however they want and they take photographs. What they do with them is up to them.
Not that anyone's paying for the present session, of course; this one's a freebie. A gift.
Pictures inevitably find their way onto the Internet and I did worry at one time about embarrassing Martin, but it seems that having a mother and a sister who are pornstars -- not that either of us have ever been 'stars', exactly -- earned him some kudos. And half of them swap naked selfies these days anyway, and share stuff that they find, so I guess it's not such a big deal.
Nevertheless I was surprised when Mum said that what Martin fancied for his birthday was a photo-shoot with me for him and his mates. It's his eighteenth, which is quite a big deal: end of schooldays, off to uni, etc. I had to think about it, though. I mean, I love him dearly but he is my brother and I had visions of all his rugby team, not to mention his classmates, turning up for a cheap thrill. I needn't have worried: he only invited three -- all lads I'd met before -- and in hindsight I can see he set it up as much for them as for himself. They're an eclectic bunch, though.
There's Gurdip. Like Martin, Gurdip's into maths and science and stuff, but he's bright, seriously bright. Straight A's all the way through school and in October he's off to Cambridge to study computer science. Small, bespectacled, of Indian extraction, a kid almost made to be bullied, which he would have been had he not made a friend of Terry, though a more unlikely pair would be hard to imagine.
Terry is Martin's best mate; they play rugby together. They were friends in primary school, and Terry was a big lad even then. Now, he's about six foot two and built, as they say in these parts, like a brick shithouse. And it's all muscle. On the rugby field Terry is formidable: fast and agile despite his size and very hard to stop. He's aiming for a career in professional rugby. And no one picks on his friend, Gurdip.
Off the field you couldn't meet a nicer bloke than Terry. He's quiet, polite, softly spoken. Perhaps he has to be: if he ever lost his rag with someone he'd probably rip them apart. I've watched him play -- big, strong thighs in skimpy little shorts -- and I won't pretend that a lascivious thought has never crossed my mind.
Then there's Lorne, another of Martin's friends from way back. Lorne's an artist -- not brilliant, but pretty good. He draws, paints, sculpts -- we have a small statuette he made in our living room -- but his big thing is photography and he's off to art school in September. I suspect that's why he's here; they probably won't learn much from me, but there's plenty that Lorne could teach them about taking photographs.
Incidentally, I doubt if Gurdip's ever seen a girl naked; Terry probably has: he'll certainly have had plenty of offers; and I'm sure I won't be the first woman Lorne has photographed in the altogether, nor the last.
***
They've moved the furniture around to make space in the middle of the floor. Someone, presumably Lorne, has set up a couple of studio lights round a big, circular rug and a stool, which I presume is where they'll want me to pose, and I see they're all sporting proper digital cameras. No one is using a phone.
I smile to put them at their ease. "Are you going to tell me what to do, boys, or leave it up to me?"
"You kick it off," says Lorne, "and we'll chip in as and when."
