figure my heart out // muke

6

"Hey, Calum" Ashton asked while trying not to divert his attention off of the road in front of him, "Can you pull out that 5 seconds of sex or whatever they're called and put it into the automotive head unit? It's just to give us a topic to talk about."

Up until this point, the car ride had been dead silent. I had my eyes glued on the passing suburbs outside of the car window, Luke's feet still laid atop of my thighs in protest. I grew used to being his 'footrest' and it didn't bother me as much as the car ride dragged on. I avoided touching his shoes at all costs, didn't want Luke germs on me. No, not for free.

I heard the glovebox open and my head turned to watch the current scene unfolding: Calum struggling to open the CD case and then shuffling forward to place the CD into the CD player.

As Ashton's hands inched over to crank up the volume knob, the car was filled with the sounds of singing 'heyyyeaahh's. I was bopping my head in small movements, the track was groovy. Calum closed the CD case and looked at the back. "This one is called..." He yelled over the loud music, "She Looks So Perfect".

We were all consumed in the instrumental, listening deeply into the lyrics. "The lead singer gives me chills in a nice way" Luke yelled over the music and again, that was something we could agree on. "It's orgasmic. I want him to give me an orgasm."

"Really? Him?" Ashton piped up.

"Yeah, why not." Luke suggested. "He has a sexy voice."

"Not as sexy as mine..." I said underneath my breath, hoping the music drowned out my own vocal chords.

"What?" Luke snapped his head at me, "You're cocky, you know?"

"Yeah, I know" my eyes trailed down to my twiddling thumbs. I knew I thrived off of compliments. I needed someone to consistently boost my self-deflated ego so it was big and could fill the whole atmosphere. I liked the attention on me, always. Even if the attention was heated, I still wanted it on me. That's why I liked sex so much, I liked the attention. I craved it. I also liked the high I got out of it. The one thing I didn't enjoy about sex were the people involved.

"Yeah, I bet you're so cocky that you think that you could give me a better orgasm than him. And he's had vocal lessons, Michael."

I didn't want to engage with him. I was too consumed in my own head again.

"Oh, cat got your tongue?" Luke continued, "What are you thinking about? Hmm? I bet you can't even fuck for the life of you."

"Actually-" Calum involved himself into the conversation we were having as he grabbed the volume dial to turn it down a bit so we didn't have to strain our words every time we wanted to speak. I looked up at Calum who had whipped his head to face the both of us in the back seat, "Michael is very good at sex. That's literally his day job... well night job" Calum joked.

My eyes drifted to see Luke's gobsmacked expression. For some reason, he didn't appear to me to be the one who wouldn't assume I was a sex worker. That's how I paid my bills, day to day, week by week. Some months were slow and underwhelming, some months were packed and booked. I could never really gage how much I was going to earn each week as I wasn't earning a stable income. Every week was stress-inducing, never knowing what financial or even sexual situation I was going to be placed in.

"Really?..." Luke blinked.

"Yeah, look him up on insta. His at is michaelclifford. He has his OnlyFans attached to it if you're interested." Calum winked at Luke as he immediately took his phone out to find my account. I watched in amusement at how hungry he was to see me naked. It made me smirk a little, thinking about how much I could continue this streak and possibly dry him of all the money he has. "He also could use a little bit of side cash so please, from me, his best friend" Calum put his hand to his heart in adoration, "Subscribe to his OnlyFans."

I couldn't help but laugh at how Calum was helping me pursue this man for his sexual desire. It was almost like he was on my promotion team, trying to persuade people to give me as much money as they could to keep me afloat and in business because I never disappoint.

Luke's eyes never left the screen as they bulged out of his sockets. He was also chewing on his pretty pale pink nail-polish on his pinkie finger. I was wondering if he was thinking about me, and if he was: What was he thinking about? Did he like what he saw?

I bet he wouldn't of noticed the little black spade emoji I had in my insta bio. It was mostly overlooked and never taken into account. I was a sex-positive asexual who enjoyed my personal endeavours and sexual experiences - whether that was for work or my own pleasure. Although, I did draw the line at forming a romantic relationship with any of my clientele. It was unprofessional and it also made me extremely uncomfortable. In my eyes, clients were strictly business and any bond created was purely just sexual arousal and enjoyment. No one had to know that I also had trouble feeling romantic emotions on a large scale and that I had only fallen in love once in my whole life. Even though I wasn't ashamed of the fact that my romantic orientation laid somewhere on the aromantic spectrum, it was still something I kept hidden away. It was mostly in fear that if I did want to pursue something more permanent and committed with someone, that what I could give to them could never be enough. That I could never be enough for them. That I could never give them what they truly desired or needed.

"Wow" Luke said amazed, "You have a nice ass" He smiled smugly, looking up at his phone to meet my gaze. "I bet you're now going to get off to me scrolling through your OnlyFans" he winked at me, as he leaned closer in my direction and whispered, "You're also welcome for the 20 dollars".

I couldn't believe this was working. He had purchased my OnlyFans subscription to see my bare, naked ass. For 20 bucks more, he could get into bed with me. I would do whatever he wanted me to do, I didn't care. Although for me to bottom, that's an extra $20 on top of that. At least when I topped I had some sort of control of the situation. Not saying that I didn't enjoy bottoming as well, I just prefered the dominant position over submission - I was an easy switch.

He crashed back into his seat with a laugh as he continued chomping on his nail and scrolling through, what I assumed was, my feed. I had a lot of content up, I did a lot of stuff. I even had custom requests that costed $50 each. Of course I had boundaries on what was asked of me, somethings I didn't want to get myself entangled into as some kink scenes were weird and creepy in nature. I was hoping that Luke would pull out his credit card, dial in his digits, and write up some really nasty shit he'd want me to do to him. I would do it all for the cash. I was greedy. I was money hungry. I was a mere cash grab.

I crossed my arms again and rested them on my chest, glancing out the window and focusing on the music being played. I didn't keep track of time well, and assumed a lengthy hour had passed since somewhere along the way Ashton said we'd hit our first pit stop in around 2 hours.

"Well, what did everyone think about that?" Ashton spoke up after the album ended.

"I thought it was okay, they're alright." Calum commented.

"What did you think Luke, Michael?" Ashton gestured to us for our own opinions.

"I actually liked it" Luke smiled, "My favourite track was that one song that was like 'just saying' or something..." His face falling into thought, trying to retrace the tune he just heard, "Or at least that's what I think he was saying..."

"What about you Michael?" Ashton moved quickly onto me, eager to hear my thoughts on the CD (probably because I was the one who bought it). "What did you think of it?"

I sat and pondered for a moment, processing every sound I just heard and tried to put it into a helpful review. "I think they're my new favourite band."