1. Isaiah
Isaiah
September, London
Isaiah closed his laptop, hiding the screen where he’d been in the midst of registering for a profile on a camming site, as he heard movement in the corridor.
Malek wandered into the living room, already dressed in his training gear and carrying two steaming cups of coffee. Isaiah smiled at him. “Jake still in bed?”
“Dead to the world,” Malek replied with a soft smile.
“Well, you did keep him up late.” Isaiah winked at his flustered friend.
Malek shot him a glare that had Isaiah grinning even wider.
“What’s on the docket today, then?” he asked.
Malek took a seat next to him, passing him the coffee. “Training first, then I have a meeting with a potential new agent.” Malek narrowed his eyes in a calculating way that made Isaiah shift uncomfortably and take a sip of scalding coffee. “Carl Owens. You know him?”
Isaiah spluttered. Setting the coffee down slowly, he nodded. “My uncle.”
Family was a difficult topic these days, and Isaiah knew his friends had been deliberately tiptoeing around it, but he barely knew Carl. Hadn’t seen him since he was a kid.
Malek watched him as he gingerly took another sip, the burn in his throat steadying him as he thought of his uncle, who looked so much like his father it was almost uncanny but had disappeared from their lives years ago, the lucky bastard.
“I take it you aren’t close?” He asked.
A steadying breath left Isaiah’s lips as he attempted to gather his thoughts. “It’s nothing bad, not like my parents…” He trailed off, and Malek watched him, careful. His hand twitched towards Isaiah, then landed back on his lap as though he were uncertain any comfort would be welcome.
“I won’t meet with him if you don’t—”
“No, it’s fine. It’s good, even. He’s a big deal,” Isaiah insisted. “My parents were sort of estranged from the family a long time ago, so I don’t really know the man.2 Can’t get you an in with him, sorry, Mal.” He laughed.
“That isn’t why I was asking, Zay.” Mal wrung his hands. “Does he know?”
Isaiah shook his head. “I doubt it; I don’t think he’s spoken to any of us in ten years at least.”
“’Cause you know his son—er, your cousin, I suppose—came out at the Olympics.”
Isaiah knew. Of course he knew. It had been all over the news.
Inescapable. Elliot Owens and Jackson Jennings were the new Olympic power couple, and though he was just a casual runner himself, with a friend going pro like Malek had this year, and an estranged cousin in the industry, Isaiah kept up with the news, if somewhat discreetly.
He took another sip of his coffee, sighing as the now-cool-enough-to-drink liquid slid down his throat. He knew what Malek was going to ask before he said it.
“Have you considered reaching out? Maybe they could help…”
“I don’t need help. I’m fine. Classes start up again in three weeks, my parents put down a semester of tuition before they found out, and they can’t unpay it.
” What he didn’t say was that he had a plan, one that would be put into action as soon as his two hosts were reliably out of the house for the day.
“Zay, come on. What happens when your next tuition payment comes due?”
Isaiah shrugged. “Maybe they’ll come around? Or I could land a killer fellowship.” He laughed, though it sounded brittle even to his own ears.
Malek didn’t look convinced. He gnawed at his bottom lip, and Isaiah could almost hear the words forming before they were even spoken. “Do you think, maybe—”
Isaiah was saved from further discussion by Jacob entering the room, sleep-rumpled and scratching his stomach. A soft smile came over Malek’s face as he watched his boyfriend. It was so sweet it made Isaiah’s teeth hurt.
“Coffee?” Jacob croaked.
“I’ve got it, babe.” Malek jumped off the couch to prepare his boyfriend’s morning dose of caffeine, leaving Isaiah to stare into his own coffee cup.
His mind drifted to the family he only knew from a distance again, and he wondered if maybe Malek had a point.
Camming was a long shot, he knew that, and the idea of losing his place at Oxford over finances made him feel ill.
He had to admit he was curious about his cousin Elliot and his life now that he’d been thrust into the spotlight, but how do you start to bridge a distance like that? Blood alone wasn’t enough.
Jacob was out the door less than half an hour after he rolled out of bed, dressed in his suit and tie, on his way to his internship.
Malek hung around a bit longer, slowly sipping a second black coffee before getting ready for training.
“So what are you planning to do all day, then?” Malek asked.
It had become a running theme since he’d turned up at their door, but for the first time, Isaiah was going to lie.
“Get a head start on thinking of a thesis topic, probably. I want to expand on that agency paper I did last year, but I haven’t figured out a direction yet. Might head out to the Bodleian later, just to get some work done.”
“You just like being surrounded by all those books,” Malek quipped.
Isaiah shrugged. It was true, he did. But if things went to plan, he’d be far too busy to visit his favourite haunt today.
“There’s leftover chicken in the fridge if you want it.” Malek grabbed his gym bag and headed for the door. “And just text if you need anything.”
“Mal.” Isaiah rolled his eyes. “I’m fine. Go show them what you can do.” He smiled. “And tell my uncle he’d be a damn fool not to sign Cyprus’s greatest export since Stoic philosophy.”3
Malek snorted. “You’re such a fucking nerd.”
“You love me.”
“We do.” Malek’s eyes softened. “You know that, right? You’ve always got a place here with us, Zay. You’re family—the good kind, the kind you choose.”
Isaiah thought he might just kill Malek if he made him get all puffy from crying before his big debut, so he ushered him out the door, then took a steadying breath and splashed some water on his face.
It was showtime.
The ring light he’d bought from the shop down the road that sold everything from refurbished phones to kitchen mops was set up on the corner of the bathroom worktop.
He could see himself in the mirror this way, so at least if he did anything incredibly cringe he could course correct quickly.
It was awkward, but somehow, filming himself jerking it in his friend’s living room felt like a step too far, at least for his first show.
He looked at the lines of his body and briefly wondered if this was insane.
He’d always been confident, but now he couldn’t help but notice that his lower abs lacked definition, and he wasn’t sure if the freckles on his shoulders would read as cute or dirty on camera.
It was too late to back out now though. He rubbed himself over his joggers, picturing a faceless man there with him—not Ollie, that wasn’t going to be enough to get him going with the nerves running through him.
And as guilty as that would have made him feel a week ago, now it gave him a sense of freedom.
He could be anyone here, could be seen by anyone.
The anonymity of the black cloth mask he wore fed the fantasy, and once he was hard enough to be certain he’d at least give his viewers something to look at, he went to start the show.
A tremor of nerves shot through his fingers as he clicked the go live button on the site.
He steadied himself on the sink, pasting on the most confident smirk he could muster for the camera as he pulled his shirt over his head and displayed himself, trailing a spit-slicked finger over a nipple, just to tease the three viewers who were looking to get off in the middle of the fucking day… nope, make that four.
“Welcome, Flash23,” he said, biting his lip in a way he hoped looked coquettish and not vampiric. “I’m so excited you could join us.”
The excitement became a lot more real when the newcomer fired off a tip. The ding that echoed in the bathroom was weirdly affirming and gave Isaiah exactly the encouragement he needed to get on with the show. The blue dildo he’d suctioned to the tile wall wasn’t going to fuck itself, after all.
Isaiah was spent in every way by the time he closed the stream.
It had been worth it though. One hundred and eighteen quid.
It was good for what had only amounted to a couple hours work, even if he counted the set-up and grooming time, but it wasn’t like he could make a full eight-hour day of this.
And if that one user hadn’t dropped a fifty at the start, he didn’t know if the others would have even bothered tipping.
They’d seemed to like him though, if the chat was anything to go by.
In fact, it had been a bit overwhelming to see them words flying by on the screen, the requests getting filthier by the minute.
Isaiah was exhausted; it was apparent this wasn’t as easy as it looked.
If he wanted to survive on camming he was going to need to do more than get himself off in his friends’ bathroom.
He hadn’t realised quite how much he’d been secretly hoping this would be his financial salvation, the ticket to a life of his own.
It wasn’t enough, might never be,4 but it was all he had, for now.
A week later, as he settled onto the lumpy brown sofa with the spring digging into his back that had become his de facto home and checked his accounts, Isaiah knew something had to give.
“I still haven’t forgiven you for this, you know,” Isaiah groused as he sat in the warm cafe, bracketed by Jacob and Malek as though they were scared he’d bolt if they gave him even the slightest leeway.
“We know,” Jacob replied with a grin. “Still worth it.”
He watched the door warily for a head of blonde hair. His own faded blue locks fell in front of his eyes.