I don’t know who I’m looking for, but I expect I’ll know her when I see her. I imagine someone lush, sassy, and intelligent. Someone who’s about the real things in life, and not about their Instagram following, or getting as many “likes” as possible. I head home, and flip open my laptop. Maybe, just maybe, there’s a curvy girl waiting for me on-line.
3
Whitney
I wake up at four a.m. forgetting I can’t go into the bakery to get started on the breads and pastries for the day. I try to go back to sleep but it’s no use. Instead, I go to the living room to feed Apollo and brew some coffee. It’s time to put my ingenuity to work and figure out a way to pay the bills while SugarTime is shut down.
My fifth floor walk-up is pretty shabby but I’ve done my best to turn it into shabby-chic. I splurged on a new couch when I moved into this place. It’s overstuffed brown microfiber to hide Apollo’s fur, and the color pretty much hides any smudges from my day at the bakery. I have tons of colorful pillows and an amazing jewel tone afghan my Grandma crocheted for me.
I grab a steaming cup of coffee and a cinnamon bun before curling up under that afghan. The afghan is a luxurious turquoise blue with accents of peacock purple, emerald green, and goldenrod. It comforts me, the soft texture reminding me of my grandma. She’s the one who got me interested in baking. Every time I spent the night at her house, we baked something delicious. I hope her spirit is with me to guide me tonight as I look for options.
There must be some work-from-home jobs out there that I can do. The first site I hit has a ton of telemarketing positions. Unfortunately, they all want you to have a land line and a head set. Nope, no can do. I’m not looking to spend money before I even start a temporary job.
The next site has all sorts of different job listings, and I spend hours taking ‘tests’ to see what skill sets I have. Turns out I do not type all that fast compared to most people, and I’m not surprised. There weren’t a whole lot of papers that I had to write while at culinary school. We were more into hands-on work, like knife skills and spice tasting.
I find a site that has opportunities to write content for the internet and I search for something relating to food. But I can’t find anything on point. I make a mental note that I should start a blog for SugarTime. At the very least, I can give baking tips and recipes and keep my customer base engaged.
I’ve now landed on the third page of my search results, which is discouraging. I want to break down and cry. As I scroll down, feeling increasingly hopeless, I see one site at the bottom called MessageMe and click on it. What is this? There isn’t much of a description in the snippet, so I just dive right into the content, hoping my laptop doesn’t get a virus.
Oh strange. This doesn’t seem to be a job site because instead of job listings, I see profiles. There are pages and pages of people with names like KandyKane and BelladonnaDream offering ‘services’. The girls are really pretty, and my curiosity is piqued. Is this a dating site? Can’t be, right?
But I need a distraction from my predicament, so I click on BelladonnaDream just to see, and my eyes go wide. It appears Bella is offering her services as a dominatrix to escort you into the world of submissiveness. Um, okay.
I click through a couple more profiles and slowly, realization dawns on me. Somehow, I’ve stumbled into the world of escorting. These girls are offering “services” at an hourly rate, although it’s euphemistically described as “partying” or “companionship.” Immediately, I pause. I’m not that desperate. I will not be selling sex. Hell no. I’d rather take a shot at those telemarketing jobs before I sell sex to save my store.
I’m just about to leave the site when I see a flashing button with text on it that screams, “LIVE ON-LINE NOW!” What could that be?
“Does curiosity really kill the cat?” I ask Apollo as he sits there licking his paw and cleaning his face. Like the cat who never leaves this apartment knows anything about curiosity.
I click on the flashing button, and a woman appears on the screen. She twists and turns, and then blows kisses at the camera while keeping up a relentless patter of chit-chat. What is this?
Suddenly, it strikes me. These are cam girl shows! There was a girl I went to Le Cordon Bleu with who did these. I didn’t know her personally, but some of the guys talked about it in one of my classes. She was using it to pay for tuition. I heard she made a lot, but then again, it was just a rumor.