In Front of a Camera

 

When I was very young, I wanted to be a dancer. My parents dutifully enrolled me in dance classes, ballet, at first, then as I got older I switched to jazz and more modern styles. But as I got older I also thought I'd rather be an actress.

People were always smiling at me and telling me what a pretty girl I was, and wanting to pat my head, and I loved it, playing to my 'audience', which admittedly was mostly older women. Of course, that audience changed to men of all ages as I hit my teens and grew through them. But I still basked in the attention.

It's just that the attention was now more sexual in its appreciation of and admiration for ME. And you know, when people express their admiration for you all your life, well, it's pretty easy to become a bit of a narcissist, and maybe somewhat egotistical.

After all, everyone was always nice to me, and always liked to do things for me, so I came to expect people to always be nice and do things for me simply because, well, I was me.

As I hit my older teens, however, I began to sense a new reaction among some people, particularly females: resentment. They didn't like all the attention I got, and didn't appreciate my assumption that I deserved it.

They called me vain and shallow - which was fair enough. I was. But I couldn't help feeling most of their resentment and catty attitude was sheer jealousy.

Now as I got older I had begun playing to a wider audience, on the internet. I loved having my picture taken, and took a ton of selfies of myself to post on the internet so people could admire how beautiful and sexy I was.

Then my best friend, Erin, discovered this perve site, where you could post pictures and little videos of yourself, and like, create a little page so that perves could look at you and send you money or presents! I'm not talking about a porn site here, either. Apparently there were all these middle aged men who just loved to look at young girls and tell them how beautiful they were!

Which, hey, I didn't mind! Especially since I didn't see them.

Me and Erin started posting pictures and we'd answer questions and kind of flirt with these men and in return they'd send us money and presents! I did that for a little while, and then when I was at Erin's house one day I saw a check stub for several hundred dollars from the web site.

"How come you got so much?" I demanded.

She shrugged. "I guess they just like my sparkling personality," she said casually.

Too casually! I know Erin and she's a bitch! I mean, I like her, but she's a redhead, and you know what they're like. She has a very bad temper and can get emotional about stuff. She's also vindictive. But she's smart and practical and will do anything for a friend.

"You don't have a sparkling personality," I said with a scowl.

"Hmph, shows what you know," she replied.

I gave her a squinty-eyed glare, one she fully knows (since we've been friends for years) means I have serious doubts about her truthfulness, but she just ignored me and flopped down on her bed to pick up a fashion magazine.

"What exactly have you been posting on your page?" I demanded.

"Paige, you know what I'm posting. We usually take the pictures and videos of each other before we post," she said in irritation.

Which was true. I'd taken lots of pics of her, just as she had of me; in the park, at school, on the street, in stores, in our houses, etc. etc. At the same time, not every single picture on my page had been taken by Erin, and I knew I hadn't taken all of hers either.

"I think I'll look at your page and see what you're doing I'm not," I said, pulling out my smart-phone.

She rolled her eyes. "You are such a distrusting person!" she complained.

"Yeah. Right."

I brought up the site, then tapped in her site name, which was Molly McGuire, since she had red hair and a very Irish look to her. Everything seemed about the same, and I recognized all the pictures, but then at the bottom I saw a link to her 'more pictures', and when I tried to access them it said they were for members only.

"What is this members thing?" I demanded.

She shrugged, still looking at the magazine. "Nothing big. Just something for guys who have too much money."

"What's in there?"

"Just some extra pictures."

"Uh huh. What kind of pictures?"

She turned and glared at me. I glared back, and we held each other's eyes for a bit. But that's a game she always loses and she lost this time, shrugging and dropping her eyes back to her magazine.

"Let me see what's there," I demanded.

"You aren't the boss of me!"

"I am too! Want me to prove it!?"

Erin is five foot two, and very slender. She's a small-framed girl with narrow shoulders but she's very pretty, with an ethereal face with a tiny snub nose and flowing red hair. Her lips are full and her chin is narrow, and she has these huge green eyes.

I, on the other hand, am five foot nine, and very athletic. All those dance classes gave me a very fit body which I have since honed by joining the volleyball, soccer, swimming and field hockey teams at school.

I could kick Erin's ass, in other words, and we both knew it.

She rolled her eyes dramatically, and got up, then went over to her desk and brought her page on her laptop, then shrugged and threw herself back on the bed. I glared at her, then looked, and did a double-take.

"You're posting bikini pictures!?"

"Why not? People see me in bikinis at the beach or pool. What's the big deal?"

I scrolled down.

"Not these bikinis! I didn't even know you had a thong bikini? And these cups are... small! God, you little slut!" I said, half admiring, half condemning.