Content Warning: This work of fiction contains mature themes, including sexual content, addiction, and emotional distress. It is not intended as a commentary on the inherent morality of sex work, nor is it meant to represent the diversity of experiences within the industry.
He was forty-seven with gray at his temples and scars on his wrists from two years ago when he'd tried to stop. Tried to quit the feeds. Lasted three days before the shaking started. Before the emptiness became unbearable. He'd been watching for fifteen years. Every night. Sometimes during lunch. In bathroom stalls. In his car. The watching had replaced everything. Replaced sex with his wife. Replaced the possibility of sex with his wife. She'd left him six months ago. Took the furniture. Left the laptop.
She was twenty-nine with surgery scars hidden under foundation and a rating system tattooed on her ribs where clients couldn't see unless she showed them. Five stars. Permanent. She'd been doing this since she was nineteen. Ten years. Started with amateur content in her dorm room. Graduated to professional studios. Now she had a manager. A lawyer. An accountant. A merchandising deal. Her body was a brand. Her face was trademarked. Her orgasms were intellectual property with backend revenue streams.
They sat in the hotel room. Same chain he always used. Room 304. Always 304. The cameras were already positioned. She'd arrived thirty minutes early to set up. Three angles. Professional lighting. The laptop open on the desk showing the live count. Subscribers watching in real-time. Two hundred and eighty-three people. Paying nineteen ninety-nine per stream. The chat already scrolling with demands before anything had happened.
She lit a cigarette. Offered him one.
He took it. Put it to his lips. She lit it for him. He inhaled and immediately coughed. Rough. His eyes watered.
Don't smoke, she said. Statement not question.
Used to. Twenty years ago. Before.
Before what.
Before I got married. Before I became this.
She nodded. Took a drag. She'd started smoking three years into the work. Needed something to do with her hands between sessions. Something that felt like a choice. The cigarette was hers. The body was theirs. The subscribers. The viewers who paid.
The subscriber count ticked up. Three hundred and twelve. Peak hours approaching. Friday night. The loneliest night of the week. She knew the metrics. Knew that Friday and Sunday were best. Saturday was worst. Saturday people had plans. Had lives. Had alternatives to watching strangers perform intimacy.
You been doing this long, she said. Ashed into the hotel tray.
Paying for it.
Yeah.
Long enough to know it doesn't work. Long enough to keep trying anyway.
She nodded. Started unbuttoning her shirt. Methodical. Every gesture practiced. She'd performed this scene eight thousand times. Had the exact movements mapped. The turn. The look over the shoulder. The slow reveal. Nothing spontaneous. Nothing real. Just the choreography of manufactured desire.
My wife left me six months ago, he said.
They always do.
She didn't leave because of this. She left because I couldn't. Couldn't touch her. Couldn't want her. Not after. Not after years of this. The real thing felt wrong. Too slow. Too complicated. Too human. She'd try to kiss me and I'd think about camera angles. She'd touch me and I'd wait for her to perform it better. Like the streams. Like the feeds.
The Boy watching from his dorm room three states away understood completely. He was nineteen. Virgin. Not by choice. By conditioning. He'd been watching since he was eleven. Eight years. Had learned sex from screens. Had learned women from performances. When he'd finally gotten a girl in his room last semester he couldn't. Just couldn't. She was too real. Made sounds he didn't expect. Moved wrong. Wanted things he didn't understand. Wanted him to look at her. Actually look. He'd asked her to be quiet. To stay still. To be more like the streams. She left. Called him a freak. He went back to watching. Subscribed to three new channels. The real thing had failed. The screen never failed.
She checked the laptop. Four hundred and seven subscribers now. The money accumulated in real-time. Seventy-three dollars. One hundred and twelve. One hundred and fifty-eight. She'd make three thousand tonight if the stream went well. Would spend two thousand on the surgery scheduled for next month. Lip fillers wearing off. Needed maintenance. The body depreciated fast. The competition was younger. Twenty-two. Twenty. Eighteen. She had maybe three good years left before she aged out. Before the algorithm stopped recommending her. Before she became obsolete.
You ever think about stopping, he said.
Every day.
But you don't.
Where would I go. What would I do. I'm twenty-nine with a degree in English Literature from a state school. Ten years of nothing on my resume except this. No skills except this. No references except five-star reviews from men I've never met. I tried to go back once. Got a job interview at a publishing house. They googled me. Found everything. The videos don't go away. They're forever. I'm forever now. This version. This performed version.
The chat was getting restless. Demanding they start. Demanding action. Talking wasn't what they paid for. The Manager sent her a text message. Move it along. Time is money. Every minute of conversation was revenue lost. The algorithm punished low engagement. Lower ranking meant less visibility meant less money meant irrelevance meant nothing.
I knew you before, he said. Stubbed out the cigarette. His hand shook slightly.
She stopped unbuttoning. Looked at him. Actually looked. Past the camera. Past the audience. Past the transaction.
Before what.
Before you were this. You worked at the bookstore on campus. The one that closed down. University Books. I was a TA. Anthropology. You'd recommend books. Actual books. Not content. Not feeds. Books. You recommended this one novel to me once. About violence. About the West. Said it was the most honest book about men you'd ever read.
She remembered the bookstore. Not him specifically. But that version of herself. The one who'd read. Who'd thought. Who'd wanted to be a writer. Before the student loans became unbearable. Forty-seven thousand dollars. English degree. No jobs. Then someone had suggested camming. Just try it. Easy money. That was ten years ago. The loans were paid off. She owned nothing else.
That wasn't me, she said.
Yeah it was. You had short hair. Wore band t-shirts. The Smiths. Joy Division. You actually read the books. Not just sold them.
The subscribers were getting angry now. The chat turned ugly. Demanding refunds. Threatening to unsubscribe. Threatening to report her. The Manager called. She declined it. Let it go to voicemail. The algorithm was punishing her. She could see the ranking drop in real-time. Engagement falling. Revenue dropping.
I can't do this, she said.
Yeah you can. You do it every night.
No. This. You. The remembering.
He reached for her. Not sexually. Just reached. To touch her arm. To connect. She pulled back instinctively. Contact cost extra. Was an upcharge. Was in the terms of service clearly stated on her website.
I've been watching you for four years, he said. Found your channel by accident. Recognized you immediately. The way you move your hands when you talk. Same as the bookstore. I subscribed that day. Watched every stream. Bought the premium content. The custom videos. The private sessions. Everything. I know your performed moans. Your fake tells. I know which angles you hate. Which positions hurt. I know you're performing and I pay anyway because the performance is all there is anymore. There's nothing else. Nothing real.
Stop, she said.
My wife left because I forgot how to want something real. You're here because you forgot how to be something real. And those four hundred people watching. They forgot the difference. We all forgot together.
The Husband in his kitchen in Ohio watched them on his phone. His Wife asleep upstairs. He paid for seventeen subscriptions. Different women. Different acts. Different illusions. Spent fourteen hundred dollars a month. More than their car payment. His Wife didn't know. Or maybe she did. Maybe she had her own subscriptions. Her own streams. Her own performers. Maybe they were both watching other people instead of seeing each other. Maybe everyone was.
The Old Man in the nursing home in Florida watched on the tablet his Grandson had given him. Eighty-six years old. The nurses had found the charges on his credit card. Three thousand dollars last month. His Grandson had laughed when they called. Said everyone does it Grandpa. Said it was normal. The Old Man remembered when photographs of ankles were scandalous. Now everything was available. Everything was content. Everything was commodified. And he watched. Because everyone watched. Because watching was what humans did now. Because the alternative was the silence of his room and the certainty of death.
She stood up. Started buttoning her shirt back up. The Manager was calling again. The stream was tanking. The ratings were dropping. She was losing followers in real-time. Each one a small death. A small erasure. Her ranking would take weeks to recover. If it recovered.
Where you going, he said.
Anywhere but here.
You'll be back tomorrow. Same time. Different room. Different client. Same performance. You can't leave. None of us can leave. There's nowhere to go.
She knew he was right. This was the trap. The machine was complete. There was no exit. No outside. Just the endless feed. The endless watching. The endless performance of intimacy for strangers who'd forgotten what intimacy was. She'd tried to leave once. Got two days into a normal life before the rent came due. Before the algorithms pulled her back. Before the money became necessary. Before necessary became inevitable.
I used to write, she said. Stories. Bad ones probably. But mine.
What happened.
This happened. This pays. Stories don't pay. English degrees don't pay. Student loans don't forgive themselves. And then one day you've done it so long you can't remember who you were before. The performance becomes you. The you becomes the performance. There's no difference anymore.
He watched her leave. Didn't follow. The camera kept rolling. Recording nothing. Recording him sitting alone on the bed. The subscribers demanded refunds. Flooded the chat with anger. The Manager called him. Left a voicemail threatening legal action. He'd violated terms of service. Had tried to make it real. Real was against the rules. Real was bad for business.
He sat alone in Room 304. The cameras still on. Recording the absence. Recording him doing nothing. The void where connection used to be. He picked up his phone. Opened the app. Twelve other streams available. Other women. Other performances. Other illusions. His credit card was saved. One click. That's all it took.
He closed the app. Opened it again. Closed it. The shaking would start soon. The emptiness. The need. He'd tried to stop before. It never worked. It never worked because there was nothing else. His wife was gone. His friends had drifted away years ago. His family saw him on holidays and found him strange. Distant. Not quite there. The screen was all he had. The performance was all anyone had.
The Boy in his dorm room closed his laptop. Sat in the dark. Felt the emptiness. Opened the laptop. The cycle was complete. The loop was closed. He'd never escape. None of them would. They'd watch until they died. Until watching was all they were.
Morning came. The hotel room was empty. He'd left before dawn. Drove home. Sat in his empty apartment. The laptop on the table. Waiting. Always waiting.
She woke up in her apartment. Checked her metrics. The damage was severe. Ranking dropped. Subscribers lost. Revenue down. She'd have to do a special stream. Something extreme. Something to win them back. The algorithm demanded it. The bills demanded it. The manager was already texting. Already planning the comeback.
She opened her laptop. Positioned the camera. Applied the makeup. Became the performance again. The subscribers returned. The money flowed. The cycle continued.
In Ohio the Husband watched. In Florida the Old Man watched. In the dorm room the Boy watched. In the empty apartment he watched.
Everyone watching. No one seen.
The subscription renewed automatically.