The Catfish Chronicles - Ch 02 Hooked

Over the next few days, I tried my best not to think of that evening. When you have an epic streak of bad judgment like that, you don’t want to dwell on it. Any part of the night felt simply embarrassing, whether it was the ludicrous exercise in dressing up, falling for Jay’s bullshit, that painfully awkward fight, waking up a total stranger mistakenly, or getting fucked like a cheap hooker by another total stranger... I mean, there’s no part of that I could come off looking good to myself. It was a blundering car crash of a night, best forgotten.

Some parts were hard to forget, like the finger bruises on my breasts and hips, the delicious achiness in my thighs and pussy. Badges of my serious lapse of judgment, albeit a sexually intense lapse.

Jay texted to apologize. In a calmer state, and wanting to put the matter in the past, I accepted his apology, was cordial but polite, and ended the relationship.

The trench coat never came up. He didn’t mention it, and I didn’t want to give him a hold over me, some basis for continuing contact, by mentioning it.

I think he floated the possibility of continuing, with the promise of his honesty. Whatever we had, it had been real and exciting in a sense, and perhaps, with the air cleared, there might be a chance?

But really, I just didn’t want to. Honestly, the whole thing had been a humiliation. I was done with being humiliated. It stung.

But you know how it is, after a while, even a sting fades. The thing with Jay, that kind of still hurt. I’d been played for a fool, and you can’t ever forgive someone who makes you feel stupid.

But the encounter with Mike, the House Detective, that was a little different. I’d had agency, I’d made choices, bad ones, been in control of the situation, sort of, and the sex, as cheap and sleazy and empty as it had been, had also been intense and... genuine?

I found myself reliving the experience, revisiting, especially alone at night with a vibrator. I embroidered the encounter, wrote new dialogue, revised the scenario. Sometimes handcuffs were involved, or a genuine arrest. Sometimes Mike was putty in my hands, and I was a femme fatale in some black and white film noir, effortlessly deflecting an interrogation with poise and raw sexuality.

I guess, yes, I am a little pervy. We all are, alone at night with our vibrators.

We were complete and utter strangers to each other, with absolutely nothing in common, and apart from our flash point of lust, no chemistry whatsoever. I couldn’t see any reason for us ever to even talk to each other, nothing about him that could ever interest me, no place he’d even possibly fit into my life.

I was sure he viewed me as a cheap hooker who he’d been lucky to evade without long term consequences. I had no intention of ever going near that hotel again. So really, there was no reason for either of us to ever want to, or even to imagine wanting to, get in contact again. Apart from the memory of the sex, of course. But obviously, that’s not enough.

So of course I got back in touch with him again.

&&&

It wasn’t as if I just woke up and decided to do it. I didn’t wildly fling myself into a thing. Everyone in my circle considered me the least reckless person they knew.

Good old Kate. Dependable Kate. Careful Kate. Kate was the woman you called when you needed someone to come and pick you up. The one who ended up designated driver. Kate who always drove the speed limit. Kate who worked at a sensible job at the bank. Kate who dated men as stable and reliable as she was. As dull as she was.

I think that had been the appeal of Jay. Our cyber-romance through texts and emails was actually adventurous. We talked about travel, about art, about life. There had been an excitement to Jay that hadn’t been there with most of the men in my life.

Because it had been cyber, Jay had been safe... I’d taken no risks at all. Right up until it blew up in my face.

The fling with Mike, the Hotel Detective, had been so left field, so out there for me. Some weird combination of recklessness and frustration, embarrassment and tension, and just a sudden impulsive need to play a role, be someone different.

The sex had been volcanic.

No lie. Mike had been the greatest sex of my life.

Which is kind of embarrassing to admit, because it had basically been a quicky. The greatest sex of your life was a quicky with a security guard who mistook you for a hooker. God, that was pathetic.

But there it was, it had been genuinely, wildly hot.

It’s hard to let something like that go.

And there was something else, something hard to explain. Mike had seen a different side of me. A side that didn’t really exist. There was in his mind, in his memory, a Kate that was a million miles from who I was. Maybe a cheap out of control hooker, but it was still a vivid picture of a totally different Kate. Maybe I just wanted a glimpse of that women, the woman in his mind’s eye.

After about a week, I contacted the hotel

&&&.

“Hello, my name is Kate. I stayed at your hotel a few weeks ago, and while we were there, the Hotel Detective, I think his name was Mike, he was so wonderfully helpful with a problem we had. I’m just following up from the trip. I was wondering if you could put me through.”

“Hotel Detective?”

“Yes. I think his name was Mike.”

“You mean security, Mike Polonia?”

“Yes, that’s him. Could you put me through.”

“I’m afraid Mike’s not on shift tonight.”

“Perhaps his voice mail?”

“Staff Security don’t have individual voicemails I’m afraid.”

“Oh, well, perhaps his email.”

“We don’t give out staff email, I’m sorry. But if you send an email to our general inquiries, I’ll make sure to forward it to Mike.”

“That would be wonderful! Thank you.”

&&&

“Hello Mike. This is Kate. I hope that you remember me. I just wanted to thank you for what you did to me during my brief visit to your hotel. Unfortunately, I will not be visiting again in the foreseeable future. But I wanted to express my appreciation for all your help. Keep in touch. Kate.”

I stared at the first email of my new gmail account. A gmail account I’d created expressly for this email. My heart was pounding.

It had been just like this when I’d phoned the hotel, terrifying. It had been a relief to be told that he was out, I thought if they’d put me through, I might have simply hung up out of sheer embarrassment. As it was, I’d been able to fake my way, voice casual, hands shaking, kicking myself at the sheer ridiculousness of it all.

Now here I was emailing him directly, sort of. I stared at the email, changed “to me” to “for me.” It was originally “for me.” But it had been exciting to write it the other way. It had made me wet.

Which was sort of pathetic. Sensible, dull Kate, getting horny over a slightly risque reference.

Still, other people would see this. “For me” was better.

There was a moment’s reservation. What was I doing? How would he react. He was going to get a mash letter from the crazy hooker who’d gone up and down the hotel kicking doors and harassing guests, and then fucked him to get out of a trespass notice? Men like bold women, they don’t like batshit insane ones. A message from me would not be a welcome thing. He’d think I was stalking him.

He’d probably just take one look and delete. Or maybe send a polite reply and hope I’d go away forever.

I really shouldn’t.

But I did. I pressed send. Then I went to work at the bank, and spent the rest of the day thinking about what a mistake it was.

That evening, I got a message back.

“From Mike Polonia,

Dear Kate. Thank you for your kind words. At the Imperial, we do our best to provide first class service to clients and visitors. We were happy to service you. Mike.

PS: If you need to contact me directly, this is my personal email....”

I had to smile. He’d ‘serviced’ me, all right. Bold of him to put that in the email, I felt relieved, my contact hadn’t been unwelcome. He didn’t see me as some weird, crazy, stalker slut who would make his life hell. Or maybe he did, but he was trying to divert me down a path that wouldn’t get him fired? No, he could have just ignored the whole thing.

I had his private email, which was both exciting and terrifying. We were communicating directly.

I waited a day, stewing over it, before I wrote back.

“Hello Mike. I’m glad you are willing to talk to me. I can’t imagine what sort of impression you had of me, or of my stability. I’m not crazy, really. That night was a very bad night for me, and it could have been worse, except for you. I want to thank you for your patience and your sympathy. I would look forward to corresponding with you, if you are interested.”

I looked it over. I liked it. A very nice letter, not too personal, didn’t give too much away. Perfectly ‘business formal’ just like the correspondence I did for the Bank.

I chewed my lip, and added. “Oh, and by the way, the sex was amazing. Thank you for that!”

I hit send.

&&&

“I have a confession to make,” I typed.

“Oh?” he texted back.

After a careful volley of emails back and forth, feeling each other out, checking for signs of insanity or instability, we’d gotten comfortable enough to embark on a live text session. I’d spoofed my phone, so he couldn’t track me.

For our first text session, I was in bed, propped up against pillows, wearing a fuzzy bathrobe and big pink slippers with lizard toes - don’t ask, it was a gift.

“You were right.” My heart skipped a beat, my stomach felt light. I felt this sense of wild excitement, almost elation at what I was going to type next. “I was hooking. The guy was a John.”

“Not really surprised.” He texted back.

“You didn’t believe me?” I smiled, playing at mock outrage.

“The way you were dressed, you looked like you were working the street down at Orion.”

I’d heard of that, Orion was part of the local red light district. Quickly, I looked it up. Orion and Mulvey, they were cross streets.

“Yes.” I typed. “I was. That’s where he picked me up, at Orion and Mulvey, I usually worked there. I guess he thought I looked hot.”

“You definitely looked hot.”

I smiled.

“Thank you.”

“If he picked you up, how come your car was in the hotel parkade?”

Fuck! My smile vanished. I was having fun playing sexy, and now I was getting cross examined. I thought fast.

“He picked me up earlier, that’s when we made the appointment... the date. Earlier on the street. I drove there myself later.”

Don’t ask any more questions, I thought at him.

“So what went wrong? What happened?”

I smiled again. Okay, this was going where it wanted. I was prepared.

“The Trick, I think his name was Jay. Seemed like a nice guy, flashed a lot of money. I thought this would be a good time. Spend the night, make some cash. Have some real fun, you know. I was in the mood.”

Okay, establish horny hooker mentality.

“I get to the Hotel and I walk in the room, and he’s wearing nothing but a bathrobe. And he’s got a micro-penis!”

“No!”

“Yes! I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was as thick as my little finger, and half as long, and he’s already playing with it. There’s no hair down there, and I don’t think it’s because he shaves. He didn’t even have balls, just this pair of little reddish warts. I’ve never seen anything like it!”

I grinned wickedly. Fuck you, Jay.

“And then it starts to leak, and I thought he was peeing, right there in the open on the hotel carpet. But he was coming. It was just like water, like he was peeing.”

“And that’s it,” I conclude. “He says thank you for coming, and shoves me out. I couldn’t believe it. This asshole trick has me drive all across town and miss out on business, just so he can ejaculate his micropenis right in front of me the minute I walk through the door.”

Fuck you some more, Jay. I grinned wickedly. If only that story could somehow get out.

“Did he pay you at least?”

“No!” I typed. “He stiffed me, and not in the good way. I got nothing. I think I left my coat behind. I was just so thrown, I forgot all about it. All I could think was what an asshole.”

“Definitely an asshole!”

“Thanks. I was so stunned, I didn’t know what to do. I just started walking away. Then I got mad and came back. The rest you caught on camera.”

“I’m surprised you weren’t angrier, when I met up with you.”

I thought about that. I should have been angrier, yes.

“I was embarrassed to have ended up knocking on the wrong door. Poor guy, it wasn’t his fault. He must have thought I was crazy. I probably woke him up. I just thought, well that’s fucked, I should just get out of here. If you hadn’t shown up, I would have just slunk away.”

“Chalked it up to experience.”

“Another one for the books. I could write a book with all the crazy stuff I’ve seen.”

Wait! Where had that come from? What if he asked. This was the only story I had prepared.

Mike was the only outrageous sex I’d ever had.

“I’m sorry I caught you, it sounds like it would have sorted itself out. I didn’t need to do anything.”

I smiled and leaned back against my pillows. This was a more enjoyable subject.

“I’m not sorry. I’m not sorry at all, not even a little bit,” I typed boldly. I felt this tiny little wet squeeze. Time for sexy talk.

Maybe I should send him a present? Maybe a sexy selfie? No. Not yet. The idea of taking a picture of myself felt exciting, but too dangerous. Maybe something without a face? I blushed at the thought.

“That was pretty wild.” He texted.

“You mean you don’t fuck wayward hookers in your offices all the time? Catch and release? I would have thought that was a perk of the job.” I grinned at my cleverness.

“God no! I would get fired on the spot. You’re my first.”

“A virgin! I must be irresistible!”

“It was amazing,” he texted. “Just amazing. It was the hottest fuck of my life.”

Oh yes, I grinned. Keep on. I wanted more.

Compliment my sexual majesty, oh worshipful man!

“It was straight out of a porno, but better!”

“It was hot,” I texted. I wanted to type dirty. “Very hot. I really needed a good hard fuck after that experience, and you came through. I loved getting plowed by that big hard cock of yours. I was so ready.”

“How come?” he texted. “I always thought hookers didn’t really enjoy sex. They faked it, you know. You were on fire.”

“All real,” I texted back, feeling like a sex goddess. “Some of us love our work.”

“I’d love to do it again.”

Here it comes. That was more than I wanted.

“Sorry,” I texted. “I’m back in Chicago. But the next time I’m out your way...”

“You’re not from here?”

“No,” I typed. “I was just in town for a few days to party. I was just doing a little adventuring on the side.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be!” I texted. “You were the highlight of the trip! You rocked my world! I had bruises!”

“Sorry.”

“Loved them!” I thought a little. “What about your palm? Did I leave teeth marks?”

“Badge of honor.”

“I love it!” I giggled a little. “Tell me: What went through your mind when I walked my fingers up your trouser...”

&&&

The text session was fun, sexy but disappointingly not nearly as explicit as it could have been. But heavy on the flirting, which was fine, since I’d established boundaries. Pretending to live in another city meant that sex, casual hookups were out of the question. But he’d hung in there anyway, probably hoping for future visits.

We talked about pictures. He asked. I invited him to send a dick pic. He was shy. He asked some questions I had to dodge, mostly about the hooker lifestyle. After we wrapped up, I signed off, reached for my vibrator, had a delicious, tidy little orgasm and slept like a baby.

The next day, I flew through work with a smile on my face.

&&&

Over the next few sessions, I broadened my character. I wasn’t just a street hooker, I was an escort too, and an exotic dancer, and a burlesque performer. A free spirit who loved sex and adventure.

I was also an Arts History major, I threw that in because it seemed like a free spirit sort of thing. My real degree was Commerce, which had lead me to a position with the bank.

It was a little bit of a mistake, because it turned out he was very fond of art, and knowledgeable, so I had to dodge around the subject a bit, but he didn’t seem to notice. What was the harm in a little fib like that?

He’d claimed to be a ‘Hotel Detective’ rather than just another security guard.

We all told lies.

And I loved to travel! Something my chosen vocation in the sex industry allowed me to do. I hadn’t ever actually been anywhere in real life. But this other Kate, this ‘Better-Kate’ I was pretending to be, she strode the world.

The problem was, I didn’t know anything about art history, or art. Or the difference between a stripper and a burlesque artist, or an escort and a streetwalker.

I had vague ideas. You see this stuff on television. But how accurate was any of that?

I needed to do homework.

&&&

“How much do you charge?” My mouth was dry, but at least my voice hadn’t cracked.

I’d driven around Orion a couple of times. The hooker had shaggy red hair, that looked a little like Natasha Lyonne, and a black leather jacket festooned with chains. She’d smiled at me as I drove past. I figured I could talk to her without getting stabbed.

“Excuse me?” Her brow furrowed, she looked confused, bent down to look at me, as I sat in my car.

I hadn’t taken hookers to be so polite.

“How much do you charge?” I asked, blushing deeply. “Is it by the hour? Half hour? By the act? Is that personal?”

She stared at me.

“Do you want to...?”

“Oh,” I said. “No. Not at all. I just I want to know?”

“Are you a cop? Is this a cop thing?”

“No.” I blushed a little. I didn’t want her to get hostile. “I’m not a cop.”

“Are you a reporter?” Her brow furrowed. “A missionary? A social worker?”

“No, none of this. I’m just an ordinary girl. I work at a bank.”

“Are you thinking of hooking.”

“No.”

“Why are you asking?”

“I just need to know. It’s kind of complicated, it’s a personal thing."

She didn’t look convinced. She was kind of starting to look a little hostile.

“I just want to ask a few questions. I’ll pay!”

The hooker waved, I couldn’t see where. But then a man joined her.

“Is that your pimp?” I asked.

“Fuck you,” she said. “He’s my boyfriend.”

She turned to him. “She wants to ask questions. She’ll pay.”

“How much?” he asked.

“What’s the going rate to ask questions?” I was floundering. This had all been such a mistake.

“Why do you want to ask questions?” he asked. “What questions?”

“It’s sort of complicated. It’s hard to explain. Look, I’ll just go.”

“No,” he put his hand on the car door. I felt a surge of panic. “You’ll pay. Fine, let’s go somewhere and talk.”

Where? I was starting to get scared. But before I could say anything, he pointed at a burger place across the street.

“We’ll go over there. We can talk. We’ll have lunch, on you.”

Public place, okay. That was safe enough. Assuming that lunch on me wasn’t a weird hooker euphemism.

It was kind of complicated to explain things to them. Perhaps not so much complicated, as kind of silly. They were bemused. But we warmed up, and so I heard about prices, which really amounted to what you could get, which amounted to what street you worked, what time of day, what acts were involved. And from there it drifted into other aspects of life, a practical matter of fact tutorial, that included complaining about ill fitting boots, or runs in stockings.

Then, as the conversation turned to threesomes and exotic arrangements, I felt a hand on my thigh, and got cold feet.

On the way home, I stopped at the bookstore and bought “Art History for Dummies.” I had homework to do.

&&&

“So the girlfriend experience...” Mike was saying, “is you just go over and hang out and pretend to be a girlfriend and have sex.”

“And watch television together, and talk. Girlfriend things,” I concluded.

“It’s weird.”

“Tell me about it,” I said. “I mean, I like Online Escort work, the money, I can’t argue with that. But it’s so much it’s own world. There are boards, you get reviews. But I don’t know. Girlfriend experience, sure, there’s money in it... but it’s just weird and kind of boring. I want a sense of adventure, not scary adventure, but it’s like a real experience, and I think that’s almost the opposite. Am I weird?”

“It sounds like you almost prefer walking the streets.”

“Sometimes, yes. There’s excitement to it.”

“Are you still online as an Escort?”

Ohh. Probing.

“Not right now. I go up now and then, but I’m kind of past that. I’m dancing these days. I have a tour through the Midwest.”

“There are tours?”

“Well, I call it a tour. I have a list of cities and clubs, I figure spend a week here, a week there.”

“Sounds rough.”

“Actually, I’m looking forward to it. The pole doesn’t wait.”

The only thing I knew about stripper poles was from watching Youtube videos, which featured quite a lot of fails. Poles falling over, strippers landing on their heads. Seriously, I was horrified. It amazed me that health and safety weren’t all over this thing.

But I had a flyer from a strip mall that said “Housewives, learn to pole dance for your husband - first lesson free!”

And I had googled a list of strip clubs with reviews across three states. No interior photos, for obvious reasons. But I could improvise.

&&&

“Are you awake?” My voice was hushed, brimming with excitement.

“Yeah,” he didn’t sound sleepy or anything. His voice was eager. I loved the way his voice seemed to light up when I called him. He was always excited when I texted or wrote or called, enthralled to hear about my wild, fearless life. I fed off that.

“I’m in a hotel room bathroom,” I whispered. I was in my own bathroom, because I thought the acoustics would lend credence to the story. “You will never guess who is sleeping in the next room! Then I told him...”

“No!” His astonishment thrilled me.

“Yes. Totally. He just pounded me, now he’s sleeping it off. I had to sneak in here and tell you about it.”

“What’s he like,” Mike whispered, he didn’t have to, but he’d fallen into the spirit. “Is he big, you know... there.”

“Huge, but not super hard. If he’d been hard, like you, like an iron bar, big as he was it might have hurt. But it was sort of like a really rigid loofah, so it filled, but sort of fit. Not circumcised. Really big head, kind of round, like a mushroom.”

“Wow.”

“Oh and insatiable. I thought I had an appetite. But he wore me out. He just wouldn’t stop. He kept going and going, and every now and then he’d flip me over, or change positions.”

“That’s intense.”

“Oh my god, I came so many times. It was incredible. And he’s huge. He’s what? Seven feet? He has to be seven feet tall. Everything looks like a toy next to him. He would pick me up like a doll. You know, when I was under him, and he was on top, my legs were spread so wide I felt like a wishbone. I looked up, and there’s just this expanse of chest. I’m eye level with his nipples. He was so huge, he would have just crushed me. But he’s holding himself up on his elbows as he thrusts into me, and the whole bed is shaking. I look on either side, and his biceps, his biceps! They’re thicker than my thighs!”

“That’s amazing.”

“It was surreal. It was like being with a giant. What am I saying, he was a giant. Hold on...”

I texted a picture of my bared breasts, glistening wetly, nipples rigid. I’d used a spray bottle on them earlier, fooling around until I had just the right look.

“This is me,” I whispered. “I’m still just drenched with sweat, head to toe.”

“Wow. I’m surprised you aren’t going back for seconds.”

“He’s sleeping right now, or yes, I’d be riding that pony. But he snores.”

“He snores?”

“Like a room full of chain saws, it’s unbelievable. Can you hear him?”

“No.”

“Good. Okay. Well, it’s amazing. Like no way am I going to sleep next to that. So I decided to come in here and tell you all about it.”

“Tell me,” Mike said. “I want every detail!”

“Okay, so here’s what happened...”

&&&

There was a strange kind of satisfaction, manufacturing a fictional encounter with a famous celebrity athlete. I just added detail after detail, the taste of sweat on his skin, the way his tongue filled my mouth, the taste of his nipples. I gave vivid descriptions of his erection and scrotum, his manner of love making.

There was a kind of creative thrill to making up the story and sharing it that made it almost real. For Mike it was real, I could hear him almost panting as I described each moment, knew he was stroking his cock.

I was wet too, excited, touching myself, fully aroused, but swept up in the creativity of the moment. I was too caught up in the artistry of storytelling to allow an orgasm. That would come later, as I relived the conversation, some alchemy of the story, its vividness, and Mike’s infectious arousal allowing me to reach several different kinds of satisfaction at once.

Instead, I closed my eyes visualizing everything, from his fingernails to the furniture of the hotel room, the feel of sweat drenched sheets against my back, the way his long frame sprawled across the bed, the feet hanging off, and just let the words flow, making up new details, my voice rising and falling with enthusiasm, as if it had really happened.

It wasn’t entirely spontaneous, of course. I’d done my homework, found which teams played where, who the superstars were. Checked out photos. I’d let my imagination work, constructing a fantasy, adding detail and texture to the scenario. I needed to be accurate, in case he checked and I was caught out in a lie. Some details, of course, I could make up without fear of contradiction, such as genital descriptions or declarations of performance.

But even with all that, talking to him, sexting, sharing, the whole thing came alive in my mind, details piled up and spilled from my lips, and I loved every minute of it.

&&&

I was completely caught up in creating this strange fictional other life for myself, another identity that I had taken to calling Better-Kate, who sprang into existence in the gap between Mike and myself.

Better-Kate was a meticulous creation. I couldn’t just lie, she had to feel real. Mike had to feel she was real.

As Better-Kate danced her way through clubs, I took pole dancing classes to get a feel for the experience - after only four classes, I quit, my muscles aching - pole dancing is hard! But I switched to pilates, to make sure I had the right muscle tone for pictures.

I attended strip clubs a couple of times, not often, to watch the dancers, the interplay and dynamics of girls and audience. I found seats at the back, rebuffed any men who came close, but bought drinks for dancers willing to sit and chat and listen to stories. I’m sure they were puzzled by why I was there. I’m equally sure that if I’d told them they would have been bemused, or perhaps amused, but I didn’t share.

I practiced routines at home, to get a feel for them.

I even signed up for an Amateur Stripper Contest, backing out at the last minute. Because obviously, Real-Kate was kind of a chickenshit.

Management was understanding, I think it happened a lot, and offered me complimentary drinks if I wanted to watch my competitors and perhaps screw up my courage.

But I only fled.

I looked up maps and googled street views, consulted Wikipedia and Youtube. Not just to make the illusions perfect, but to cast myself in them. To close my eyes and imagine I was actually there, struggling to envision the taste and texture, the sound of glasses clinking, and voices talking, the lingering smell of tobacco in the air, the weariness of ill fitting heels, the coolness of metal pole or the wear of the dance floor.

It was almost as if the adventures and exploits of Better-Kate was an erotic novel that I was writing, pouring research and creativity and passion into it, for an audience of one person. One person who didn’t know it was a novel, one person for whom Better-Kate was a living, breathing, larger than life, woman.

She was real for Mike, and so in a strange way, she’d become real for me.

She was this other, better version of me, living a life, enjoying a life in full glorious, saturated color, high definition, in 3D, while the real me just plodded along in my boring, old colourless, small-screen existence.

But Better-Kate was real. She had been real in that hotel security office, she’d come to life there.

I both wanted it and feared it. She fascinated me. I researched every possible aspect intensely, to bring her vividly to life, I loved her intensity, her passion. I bought lingerie for pictures of her, bought selfie sticks and tripods, studied art and porn to create stunning pictures. I photo-shopped her.

And yet, when the hooker and her boyfriend propositioned me, I’d fled. When the Amateur stripper night had come along, I’d chickened out. I wore lingerie and took pictures. I dressed up in sexy outfits but I never wore it outdoors, I was careful as to which pictures showed my face.

My actual sex life was dull, with dates carefully screened through a circle of friends, and encounters that were almost perfunctory and lifeless.

Real life is scary, and bruising, and we’re all kinds of small things in it, constantly second guessing ourselves. I had a job, an apartment, a car, a bank account, a network of friends. But we’re all sort of on the knife edge. Lose your job in a heartbeat, can’t pay the rent, can’t pay the phone, suddenly you’re homeless, you fall through the cracks and then what? That’s scary.

Playing pretend hooker was one thing. But there were women out there, desperate, impoverished, selling themselves and not enjoying it, just surviving and hanging on by their fingernails, with no prospects and no safety. Fantasy was one thing, but reality was precarious and vicious.

Better-Kate was all about adventures, but adventures went wrong all the time. Screw up, and Real-Kate’s life could all come tumbling down. I loved Better-Kate, but I couldn’t risk being her. Real-Kate played it safe.

I could just bring her to life for Mike, my unwitting audience, inhabit her, play her, be her. Then put her away.

&&&

I almost got caught.

I was out bar hopping with some women from work, I looked up, and there was Mike, on the other side, sitting with a group of men. His gaze passed over our group without a flicker of recognition.

My blood froze and my heart started pounding. I wanted to angle my chair so that my back was to him. But at the same time I was afraid to, what if he had spotted me and was coming over. I turned away as much as I dared, and took out my compact, pretending to examine my make up while angling the mirror to see his side of the bar.

Why should he recognize me? The one encounter I’d been dressed like a hooker with heavy make up.

Still nothing. If he saw me, if he recognized me, our whole intricately detailed sex life would collapse like a house of sticks. I would be exposed and embarrassed. I wasn’t ready for that.

“Kate?” my friend Amber said. “You look pale. Are you all right?”

I smiled falsely.

“Just tired I guess.”

After an excruciating twenty minutes, I made my excuses and left. I’d become too obsessed and worried about Mike’s presence and the risk of exposure to relax. Instead, my tension had slowly ratcheted up.

As I made my escape, Mike didn’t even look in my direction.

My secret was safe.

Although, I wasn’t entirely sure how I felt about that.

I’d been right there in front of him, after all.

&&&

I was more careful after that.

The thing was, I really liked Mike. When I wasn’t telling him outrageous sex stories, we talked. We talked about everything.

We talked art, and I told him about my visits to the Louvre and other galleries, he was genuinely knowledgeable about stuff I faked my way through, and I genuinely loved listening to him. I’d make notes about artists or schools he mentioned and looked them up.

We talked cooking, I gave him tips, I told him about foreign cuisines. We talked about life and dream. He wasn’t just a security guard at a hotel, he was working towards a Masters degree.

We told each other jokes, and after a while, we had private jokes and references we shared between us - or that he shared with Better-Kate.

It was simple to get him to talk about his personal life, the places he went, the things he did, his friends, his schedule. He had no idea that I was lying to him, so no idea that any question had an agenda. He had no secrets from me. I could have gotten his pin numbers, if I tried hard enough.

I knew exactly where he lived, I visited his apartment building one day when he was at work, and stood outside his door. It wasn’t stalker-ish, I told myself, there was absolutely nothing creepy about it. Just curious.

I did feel a little guilty sometimes. The thing was, I really liked him. I liked him a lot. And if I made up an entire world for him, an entire identity, a set of adventures and sexcapades? Where was the harm in that? I knew for a fact that he’d jerked off to Better-Kate, a lot. I had a special file of pictures. So clearly, he was enjoying. He was definitely enjoying, and I was enjoying him enjoying.

Where was the harm? His life was just better for having Better-Kate as his online/text/cyber friend. No harm at all.

I just felt a little squidgy sometimes, digging into his personal life, so that I could ensure we didn’t actually run into each other in the real world, and bring it all crashing down. But it was for his own good.

Sometimes, when I knew exactly where he was, at work or particularly someplace else, I’d visit some haunt of his, some place he liked to hang out. I’d sit in a corner of a gaming café, drinking a cup of tea and imagine him in the little group the next table over, animated and excited over their board game.

Or going to an art-house cinema, and watching some foreign movie he’d watched, sitting in the back row, wondering where he’d sat and if he’d been with anyone.

It wasn’t creepy at all. I wasn’t a stalker. I just liked him, there was affection, and I enjoyed him talking about the life he lived, even if it was modest compared to my stories. I guess the impulse that lead me to research my stories, also sort of extended to him.

It made me feel closer to him.

&&&

“Fire?” Mike said.

“It was pretty safe,” I said. “Or at least, I think it was. Over here people smoke in bars, there are all sorts of flammables everywhere. Even whisky, brandy, hard drinks they’ll go up like candles. So doing a fire act on stage, no big deal. I did make sure a fire extinguisher was close by.”

“I can’t believe it. They let you do it?”

“In the Philippines? You’d be amazed at what they let you do. I couldn’t do something like this over in North America,” I agreed. “They’d shut you right down. Fire codes and everything, right? But in Manilla, it’s like a different world for stripping.”

“How so?”

“Less formula I think,” I said thoughtfully. “Back home, it’s almost ritualistic, it’s all about the pole. Here it’s a lot more open, a lot more diverse. It’s more... I don’t know if ‘respected’ is the right word, but the attitude is definitely different. Legitimate, maybe. Legitimate entertainment. It’s more about being an entertainer, putting on a show. It’s more wide open to do things. I really like it, it gives me a lot more freedom.”

I’d done my homework. One of the strippers I’d chatted with at a bar had talked about dancing in Asia, and I’d picked up on that, followed up by reading online about the Manilla bar scene in obscure corners of the internet.

After the close call, I’d ghosted Mike for a couple of weeks, replying only once or twice perfunctorily. I decided to move Better-Kate out of the country for bold new adventures, just to be safe.

At the same time, I’d gone back through our correspondence and texts to get a sense of Mike’s haunts. There wasn’t much, our exchanges were our own little world between us.

I resolved to subtly dig a little bit, nothing intrusive, but just to be encouraging about hearing about some of his daily life, what he did, where he hung out.

“I never thought about it,” he said. “I suppose I just assumed it was the same everywhere.”

“It’s not even the same back home,” I told him. “We have stripping, and we have burlesque.”

“They’re not the same?”

“Oh shame on you!” I laughed. “Don’t ever let a burlesque dancer hear that, they’ll spank you, and not in a good way. It used to be the same, but they’ve gone off in different directions. I think they split in the sixties or seventies.”

I made a mental note to look up the history of Burlesque.

“You do both.”

“I’m multi-faceted,” I told him. “But in their own way, they’re both very narrow. Out here... it’s more like dancing, genuine exotic dancing. There’s no rules, you can do so much more. There’s so much more freedom. I love it.”

I paused.

“Although now that I think about it, I think I probably have more freedom and opportunity than a lot of local dancers. I’m North American, I think that by definition, that makes me exotic around here, almost a celebrity, which is weird.”

“But a fire act,” he asked, “how did you come up with that?”

“It wasn’t that hard. Back in junior high, I used to do ballet with scarves.”

“Aren’t scarves flammable?”

“Funny guy. Yes they are, but part of the routine was swinging around these tennis balls in stockings.”

This was true, I’d actually done this back in school, it had been a fad that lasted all of a couple of months for us. But years later, on Youtube, I could see that some women or girls had stuck with it, gaily dancing with ribbons and streamers, leaving audiences mildly entertained and mostly befuddled.

“The fire,” I said. “I used to hang with buskers during the summers off when I was studying at University.”

I needed to correct that.

“I was busking. Juggling, devil sticks, dancing - pop ‘n lock, breaking, whatever got a crowd. I picked up some fire tricks. It’s not hard when you know what you’re doing.”

I’d actually chatted with a busker who had done a fire act, part of my inspiration

“I saw a street performer blowing fire the other day, like a dragon. He juggled these flaming sticks.”

“Cool!” I said. My stomach fluttered a little, and I had a cold shiver. It was probably the same guy.

For a moment, I had a Sixth Sense moment - that scene at the end of some old movie, where the guy figures something out, and all the pieces we’ve been seeing through the whole thing suddenly fall together. I was afraid for a moment that Mike would have that, that suddenly, he’d see all the connections and sources behind all the stories I’d told and realize it was all a con.

“There’s a lot of that,” I said lamely.

“I’d worry about being burned. After all you’re dancing nude.”

Back on track.

“I’ll tell you a secret. I wear flesh colored gloves, just in case I have to grab it. I can snuff a fireball in my hand. And I smear on this fire resistant gel, like a body lotion, it makes my skin shine, so bonus. And sometimes I put a little food coloring in, to add a little extra. But you know what I have to be really careful of?”

“What?”

“My hair,” I said. “That’s the big worry, burning my hair.”

“Like Michael Jackson.”

“Yeah, I don’t put flammable gunk in my hair, but still...”

And in my mind’s eye, in his mind’s eye, I step out onto a Dancer’s stage in Manila, nude but for heels and those flesh colored gloves. I stand tall and straight, my breasts are magnificent, my nipples rigid, my skin glistens. I dance confident and commanding, my body bending back and forth. Effortlessly, with perfect control, I wield two flaming sticks like a burlesque dancer’s boa, reversing the teasing. Then I swing two fireballs around and around, the crowd gasping as I step in and out, bringing gasps and applause. Finally, on my knees, I throw my head back and breath a column of flame, as the audience roars and there’s a standing ovation. I am magnificent.

And afterwards, I get into my bathrobe, and my oversized slippers with their lizard toes, and listen to a little music, sipping a glass of boxed wine, back in my humdrum life.

I feel weirdly satisfied. Sometimes it’s not even sexual, although I do masturbate constantly to the stories I tell him. Sometimes while I tell them to him, but as often before or after. It pleases me to know that he believes them, that there’s this wilder, free-er, bolder version of me in his head.

Time to go to bed.

Long day at the bank tomorrow.