Four-count breaths. Four times. Then my mind is clear enough to type in her name. My thumb hovers over the enter key for only a split second.
It’s easy.
Too easy.
This is no back-alley hunt through the dark web with exchanges of cryptocurrencies and code words. Every tap of the keys echoes under the sound of the wind against glass. Scroll. Click. Scroll. There are numerous videos to choose from. So many with small thumbnail images of Ella’s face. One of her giving the camera the middle finger forces the corners of my lips up. None of them seem too current. All dating from two years ago and further. A tick in the back of my mind notes that it seems some things have been cleared. I’ll have to dig deeper for those if there were takedown notices issued.
She has the typical social media platforms. Although I don’t dig through those just yet.
Refining the search, and clicking away, I scroll past more photos.
They’re all so different from the Ella I know now. The version of a younger, stronger woman in all these thumbnail pictures doesn’t have dark smudges under her eyes. Even in the photos, she doesn’t appear still and quiet and wounded. I couldn’t picture this past-life version of her before, and now that it’s in front of me, the change in her is stark and jarring.
A few videos appear in the search, the name of the site flicking on a switch of alarm. Several clicks and my gaze drifts back to her sleeping form, before I go against my better judgment, and follow the link.
More than the pictures, more than the videos themselves, I’m drawn to the comments.
Given that the site has subheadings that include “hardcore,” “girl on girl,” and “amateur,” I’m prepared for some type of deviant evidence to appear. Searching her name, more than twenty videos appear. Each of them displaying her face. Her head is thrown back with pleasure written in her expression. One of her leaning forward in the middle of a bar, her legs spread on the sofa, her attitude playful, yet seductive, and both of her hands wrapped around a champagne bottle, the bubbly spilling down the side. She’s clothed in the stills, but I’d be surprised if she remained that way once I clicked on them.
Slipping the headphones into place, I do another check of the monitors, before returning to the site. I have … specific tastes so I’m not unfamiliar with websites that cater to a certain clientele.
Each video post has hundreds of comments underneath. These are the digital footprints of people who have sat where I’m sitting. They watched these videos in the glow of a hundred different screens, in different sitting rooms and bedrooms and basements.
My body hums with the recognition that this is technically research, but still … jealousy and possessiveness threaten to piss me off. My skin pebbles with goosebumps and my breathing comes fast and shallow and my hands—
My hands are clenched into fists so tight that my knuckles are white above the keyboards.
It’s all because of these fucking comments. Men and women who watched her and discussed it freely. With anxiousness, I shift in my seat, noting each of the videos falls under the category labeled “Exhibitionist.”
There’s an enormous variety in the types of comments made. Some are completely irrelevant, a simple thumbs-up or emoji. Then there are other, more detailed comments and conversations. Feminist opinions. Misogynistic ones.
And summaries of what happens within the clips.
Summaries—and reactions.
I can’t help lingering on those. The first few comments are written in all caps. Ten, twenty exclamation points. They urge the viewers to keep watching. It gets hotter, the comments read.
It only takes ten minutes to start recognizing names of the users. Some have returned to the videos again and again, the comments providing that evidence with the dates beside the comments. I recognize two usernames in particular—two men in conversation across multiple videos.
One conversation in particular gives me insight I didn’t imagine I’d ever find on a site like this. Dated four years ago.
Where’s the one with her on her knees?
Deleted. :(
Fuck me. That was one of my favorites. This one’s close, but not the real deal.
It went down with the others when they got engaged. He decides what stays and what goes.
Selfish bastard.
Engaged. Ella was engaged before. A concoction of emotion stronger than whiskey hits me all at once. She was engaged, and from the looks of it, the two of them had a shared proclivity to be watched.
The Dominant side of me shifts in my seat from the uncertainty of their relationship. My preference has always been for discretion when I indulge. The level of discretion displayed in these videos is obviously a different boundary than I have ever committed to.
I almost close the laptop, my mind reeling with more questions than answers, but I stop myself short, one thumbnail calling out to me more than all the others.