CHAPTER 12 – BREAKING POINT
Eliza
There are a hundred ways to fake an orgasm, but none of them work when you’re on camera for an audience of six hundred and change, every one of them a hungry, anonymous little red dot on your screen.
I’m on the brink of one (a real one, for once) as the feed lights up with a wall of all-caps: “OH FUCK YES SHOW US,” “DEEPER,” “GO FASTER, BUNNY,” and the classic: “PLZ CALL ME DADDY.”
The toy in my hand is new—heavy, glass, and at least ten inches long, girthy like a Coke can.
I swirl it inside in my pussy, adoring the stretch.
Then, I moan at the precise pitch that gets the tip jar raining tokens, and let my other hand hover just off-camera, caressing the outside of my thigh.
I know my angles. I know what these guys want.
They want the little gasp when I arch my back, the way my blonde locks cling to my neck when I toss my head. They want the pop of my nipples like hard, suckable raspberries, the rhythm of my hand. Most of all, they want my voice—high, girlish, a little bit lost—begging for more. I oblige.
“Please, Daddy,” I coo, words thick with need, “make me come—harder, please, oh please—”
Then, like a bucket of ice, a knock at the door. Not a light tap, but a cop-knock: sharp, deliberate, repeated. Three in a row, just enough to spike my adrenaline.
“Eliza? What’s going on in there?”
Oh shit, it’s my mom. I’ve been camming for more than a year now, with my parents blissfully unaware, sometimes even downstairs.
But lately, I know Nancy and Gerald have been watching and listening more carefully, and I freeze, everything on me slick and trembling, the glass rod still pushed deep in my sweltering cunt.
What do I do? My eyes cut to the timer at the bottom of the cam screen: 00:41:14.
Shit. I’m nowhere near done, and my “special request” tipper—a degenerate named “FargoLawman”—just paid an extra $150 for a triple finish.
But there is no triple finish now, only the reality of my mother on the other side of my bedroom door.
Her voice, through the wood: “Eliza? What’s going on in there?”
I lunge for the keyboard, smashing the “mute” and “end session” buttons in a frantic sequence that leaves my knuckles greasy with lube.
The chat window disappears, replaced by my own sweat-slick face in the webcam preview.
I look completely, devastatingly fucked.
Hair tangled, lips swollen, mascara streaked under my left eye.
“Just a second!” I croak, trying to disguise the quiver.
There are only ten seconds, max, before she comes in anyway.
I snatch a towel, wipe myself in two frantic swipes, and launch the “movie” tab I keep open for emergencies.
In three more seconds, the cam rig is off, the toy hidden under a pile of sweatpants, and my thick, terrycloth robe swathed around my body.
I cinch the belt tight, grateful that it hides the wet patch on my thigh.
“Sorry,” I call to the closed door, voice an octave higher than usual. “Just give me a sec.”
A long, dangerous pause.
“I keep hearing strange noises,” she says. “Like a dog growling,” her voice goes lower “Are you alright?”
OMG, Nancy thinks my low moans are a dog! Thank goodness! I glance at the mirror, trying to smooth my face, trying to look like anything but what I am.
“Just watching a movie, Mom. You know me. It’s probably too loud,” I say, while pantomiming shutting a laptop. “I’ll turn it down, sorry!”
She lingers on the other side. “A movie?”
“Yeah!” I say, chipper and airhead-bright. “It’s actually The Secret Life of Pets, so lots of dogs. Super loud. Sorry if I disturbed you.”
She doesn’t respond. I know the stance: arms crossed, nostrils flaring, eyes narrowed like a sniper. I can feel her X-ray vision drilling through the door.
Then, the doorknob jiggles.
Shit. I left it unlocked.
I back up, clutching the robe tight, putting on my most tragic “please don’t scold me” face.
Nancy opens the door a hair and slides in. She’s in her Sunday Target dress, with slippers, and she gives the room a sweep that takes in my laptop, my haphazard bed, and the waft of vanilla lube I never manage to fully clear from the air.
She doesn’t buy it. Of course she doesn’t. Nancy Shaw spent two decades as a hospital administrator and can sense lies in her sleep.
“You look flushed,” she says.
I smile wanly. “Just an intense scene. There was a home invasion in the movie, and I guess I got kind of freaked out. You know, because I’m afraid for the dogs’ safety. But they’re fighters, and they’re ready for the home invader! Bow wow!”
She raises an eyebrow. “Really.”
“Oh yeah,” I babble. “You know how it is. Movies these days are insane, even the kiddie ones.”
Nancy squints at me, then at the bed, then back at me. “Next time, keep it down. Your father and I are trying to watch TV downstairs.”
I nod, penitent. “Sorry. I’ll be quiet.”
She doesn’t leave. She hovers in the doorway, clearly expecting me to crack.
“You sure you’re okay, Eliza?”
I do the thing where I bite the inside of my cheek and look away. “I’m fine, Mom. Really.”
Another beat. Her eyes flick to my legs, and for a second I think she can see the big wet spot on my thigh, but instead, she just says, “Don’t stay up all night. We have brunch tomorrow.”
Then, finally, she closes the door behind her.
I don’t move for a solid minute, just stand there, robe clutched, sweat cooling in sticky rivulets between my boobs. When my legs work again, I sink onto the bed, knees pressed to my chest, heart jackhammering so loud I think maybe the whole house can hear.
Only then do I realize the cam is still on. The little red light blinks, quietly accusatory. At least I’m off the site, so no one caught that interaction with my mom.
I crawl over and unplug it, breathing like I just sprinted a 400-meter dash.
This can’t keep going, I think. Not like this. Then, my eyes catch a message on my computer screen. It says, “UR SO PRETTY WHEN U CUM. DO IT 4 ME?”
I almost laugh. I almost cry.
Paralegal by day, camgirl by night, and also, Jack Landry’s not-so-secret girlfriend.
Every day the walls close in a little more.
Every day, my mother’s questions get sharper, my dad’s silences get heavier, the stakes ratchet higher.
I’m living three lives, none of them particularly successful, and the grind is starting to wear me down.
I curl up on top of my sheets, the room still thick with the afterglow of both pleasure and terror, and stare at the ceiling, counting the spider cracks.
I can’t keep this up. Not forever.
But for now, I just breathe and pray that I survive another day.
The next morning, I leave for work before either parent is up.
I claim a dentist appointment, but really, I need to see Jack.
In person, in daylight, where my voice won’t quiver and my hands won’t shake.
He picks the spot—Tantor Café, a hipster-brick place halfway across town, the kind of joint with zero chance of running into Nancy’s book club or one of Dad’s old bowling teammates.
It’s a full hour before I have to be at the office, but I tell myself if I’m late, then so be it.
Jack is already there when I arrive, handsome in the corner booth, fingers wrapped around a mug of straight black.
Despite everything that’s happened, my knees go weak when I catch sight of my man.
He’s just so gorgeous with that dark hair brushed back from a patrician face, his blue shirt stretched over broad shoulders.
In this light, he doesn’t look like a secret or a sin.
He looks like the only true thing I’ve ever done.
I slide into the booth across from him. He glances up, and that smile—crooked, warm, a little dangerous—breaks the tension just enough for me to breathe.
“Morning, sweetheart,” he says, reaching for my hand under the table. His grip is solid, grounding. “You okay? I got your message and was worried.”
I nod, but the effort of holding it together is too much. I bite my lip, hard, but tears come anyway, fast and stupid, rolling down my face before I can blink them back.
Jack’s face shifts—worry, then anger, then something like heartbreak. He thumbs a tear off my cheek. “Talk to me,” he says softly.
I try. I really do. But all that comes out is a sob.
“It’s too much,” I say, when I can finally speak. “They know, Jack. Not everything, but they know I’m hiding something. My mom is on my case every second. My dad’s got this look, like he thinks I’m a total disappointment and he doesn’t even know why.”
Jack doesn’t flinch. “Do you want to tell them about your job? About us?”
“No!” I say, too loud, and get a glare from the barista behind the counter. I lower my voice, frantic. “If my dad found out about us—about you and me—he’d lose it. You know he would. I’d never see him again. My mom would probably make me move to a convent.”
Jack’s face gets that hard look I love. “You’re a grown woman, Eliza. They can’t control you forever.”
I sigh, sag into the bench, and wish I could crawl under the table and never come out. “I know. I just—I don’t want to lose them. Or you.”
Jack squeezes my hand. “You’re not going to lose me. That’s not on the table, okay?”
I nod, but I can feel the edges of everything starting to crumble.
He leans in, voice low. “Sweetheart, listen to me. You’re killing yourself trying to keep everyone happy. Your folks, your job, your cam customers, me. It’s not possible. Something’s going to break, and I don’t want it to be you.”
I blink hard, willing the tears to stop. “So what do I do, Jack? Quit my job? Move out? Run away and join the circus?”
He doesn’t laugh. “Move in with me.”
I stare at him, mouth open, the words caught between hope and fear.