Best Friend's Journey Pt. 05

"Mate, why didn't you answer your fucking messages?" He shouted, exasperated, as he collapsed on my bed.

"Got a fucking essay due in at the end of the week!" I replied, looking up from my laptop. "I've only just found out!"

"I haven't got anyone else I can talk to about this... I just need a few minutes," Carl pleaded, his puppy dog eyes fully deployed.

I sighed, turning away from my laptop in anguish. Why was there so much writing at uni? I wasn't even doing a typically 'academic' course and yet still, I had to write things. It just wasn't fair.

"What's up?" I asked, taking a deep breath.

Carl smiled, leaning backwards on his arms. His face was pale and clammy, but the smile looked real: reassured.

"Jess wants to escalate things," he began. "Well, she doesn't, but she's being pushed to it."

"What are you talking about?" I questioned him, still thinking about angles and equations that seemed irrelevant to me.

"Her... page," he continued. "She's making enough to consider dropping out of university, but her subscribers are rabid. They crave the new. She's already started doing more explicit stuff, but they clamour for more!"

"Fuck, mate. I don't know what to say..." I started, thinking. "Can't she just take the money and stop? Or just carry on doing what she's doing now?"

"Well... yeah, but," he flushed and screwed up his face before speaking on. "The subscribers drop when it gets 'stale' and so she makes less money. People don't want to pay for stuff they've seen before. And she... Well, she's enjoying it."

"Then what's wrong?" I chuckled.

His eyebrows knitted as he stared at me, before replying, "I'm scared it will keep escalating, and she'll be found out. If it ever comes to full length videos, it's harder to hide her identity."

"Then stop when it gets that far? I'm failing to see what the problem is."

"What if she doesn't stop?"

"Mate, I'm going to be crass here, but you let her fuck another guy, and she willingly gave that up and stayed with you. She let her best friend give you head. You really think she'll continue against your wishes?"

He flushed again at that; his mouth drawn into a tight line.

"Okay, but... she's doing stuff with dildos now and they're still hounding her to do a scene with another person..." He trailed off, looking glum.

"If it gets to the point where she wants to do that, then just do one with her? You can keep your face out of the camera; nobody cares about the lad getting his knob slobbered on."

I tried to smile reassuringly, but a not so tiny part in the back of my mind couldn't help but think about offering myself for the role.

Carl rested his face in his hands, "But then there's all sorts of stuff about her having a boyfriend and 'tricking' her 'loyal fans'... It's a fucking minefield."

"Mate, you can only do what you're both comfortable with. She was making money before; she wouldn't stop making money if she carried on doing the same. People already pay for that because she's fucking hot. Her photos were found by our housemate, for fuck's sake. She's got to be desirable for that to even become a possibility! She'll stop if you ask her to."

As much as I wanted to help them, I needed to write this fucking essay, and I hoped my last point covered all the bases he was worried about.

Seeing as he stood up immediately, then I guessed they had.

"Cheers, Sam," he said, face tranquil. "Yeah, mate. You're right. I don't know why I'm so worried."

After a little more back-and-forth, I got him to leave my room so I could carry on suffering in this purgatory.

***

By the time the Easter break had rolled around, I had forgotten all about the trouble with Jess's side hustle, so it came as a shock when Zach swung his laptop around to face me with a huge grin on his face.

We had been smoking on his balcony so Jess and Carl could have some privacy in my flat - Abby had obviously brought someone back to her place from her last class of the day, meaning that their place was off limits unless they wanted to compete with the noises from her bedroom.

"It's her, man, I'm sure of it," he drawled, smile plastered across his face.

"We've talked about this before, mate," I replied, preparing to end the conversation. "There's no way you could..."

My words trailed off as he made something larger on the screen, a huge grin on his face.

Jess, wearing bunny ears and the kind of mask you saw posh old birds wear to the opera, laid on a bed, pointing the camera down at herself using a selfie stick and giving a full view of her naked body. A moment later, someone else came into the frame, pushing himself between her legs as she looked up at the camera.

The angle on the guy wasn't great, as it was focused on her, but I recognised the almost lean body. Since starting uni, Jess had been making Carl exercise. This had eventually removed a lot of excess fat from him, but hadn't replaced it with muscle, taking him from pudgy to almost skinny - muscles visible from where no fat covered them rather than where they were large or pronounced.

The masked man getting between Jess's legs looked surprisingly like that.

After several moments of groping, squeezing and the slapping of genitals against one another, Carl pushed his cock into Jess, who let out a gasp of pleasure, dropping the camera. The scene faded to black.

All in all, it was less than a couple of minutes, but to me it was painfully obvious that it was Jess and Carl. I didn't think Zach would have noticed Carl's body changes like I had; never seeing him out of baggy clothes, but then would he think Jess was fucking someone else?

"Now, I've watched that clip about fifty times and you know what I've noticed?" Zach asked me when it ended.

"What?" I swallowed.

"That noise at the end there?" His grin somehow got even wider. "I've heard that lots of times."

I thought quickly, "It was a generic porn moan, mate. They probably all do it."

He shook his head, "Not like that."

He spun the laptop back round to face him, replaying the last second several times, "That's your boy's girl, and if the description is right, that's your boy."

I forced myself to laugh.

"You think that's Carl?" I asked. "You think he'd do something like that on video?"

Zach's smile faltered and he leaned in to look at the screen closely.

"The dick would explain why she's with him," he said with an amused expression. "But yeah, I thought your boy was fatter than this. I'll see soon enough, anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"I have a lot of sway in her communities, so my suggestions as to what she does next are listened to."

"What? Do you think someone like this actually cares what the nerds on the other side of the screen are saying?"

He huffed before speaking, "Yeah, fool. If it wasn't for peeps like me, they'd be nothing, so they listen to what I have to say."

I doubted him but remembered Carl's panicked conversation a couple of months back. I guess it was supply and demand, but surely one loud voice couldn't influence her that much?

"Even if that's true, what are you going to do?" I asked, genuinely curious as to how he thought he could suss her out.

"All manner of things, man," he said, relaxing back on his sofa. "Longer videos, get her to dress up or dye her hair, maybe convince her to chat to us privately, you know?"

"Right..." I dismissed him. "Well, good luck with that. Thanks for the fag."

I walked to the door, emphasising his fool's errand by shaking my head and sighing.

"I know it's her, man," he spoke softly as I opened the door.

"Then why not just ask her?" I said over my shoulder.

He shrugged and I let the door swing closed.

***

"I told you it would escalate!" Carl cried, collapsing on the sofa without even taking his shoes off.

I shuffled over to give him room and paused the video on my phone, "What?"

"Jess," he replied flatly, still collapsed over the arm of the sofa.

I ignored him, turning back to my phone. I would listen when he bothered to talk properly.

After a few minutes, he got up and walked to the kitchen area and pulled a can of pre-mixed whiskey and coke out of the fridge, downing it in one go then immediately taking out a second.

"We've got a few weeks left, mate," I called over to him. "Might want to leave the celebrating until then."

He wagged his finger at me, drinking the second can with almost as much ferocity as the first, before suddenly spluttering and doubling over, coughing. He raised the hand that was previously pointing at me into a 'stop' gesture and eventually stopped coughing, taking another sip and walking back over to me.

He flopped onto the sofa next to me, "We're doing videos together now."

I looked over at him, a sudden pang of guilt that I hadn't mentioned what Zach had shown me. Before I could say anything, he went on.

"After we spoke, she did some dildo videos - just blowjobs and the like. Then they wanted more, so she did the same sort of thing, but... on me... like blowjobs and tit wanks, you know? And they pressed for more, so we did sex videos," he paused to take a breath. "It was all safe, very short videos with both of us, just clips from longer videos. We hid our faces or wore masks, and so on..."

"Sound like a dream," I smiled and patted him on the back. "You're fucking your own girlfriend and she's getting paid for it!"

He grimaced, "But it's exactly what I said before. It has escalated. It was just pictures, then videos, then explicit things, then things with me... She's making me take supplements and drink bottles and bottles of water and pineapple juice for some of these videos. It's not just 'turn up and fuck'."

"Why?" I asked, confused.

"The diet? It's supposed to make me spunk more," he looked down, resignation plain on his face.

I laughed, "What? You're taking cum tablets?"

He spoke over my laughter, "No! Well... yeah, but don't say it like that. The supplements and the obscene amount of drinking I'm doing make me spaff everywhere. It's like a fucking volcano, mate. The pineapple juice is to make it better for her. Less bitter, she said."

I hadn't managed to stop laughing throughout the explanation, and looking down at his glum face just reignited the laughter.

"Fuck off," Carl sighed, letting his head drop back onto the top of the sofa. "Knobhead."

A moment later, I saw his chest convulsing and he raised his head up again, quiet laughter escaping from him. We caught each other's eyes and broke out into full-on bouts of belly laughter.

"It's not funny!" He protested when he finally managed to stop laughing.

"Oh no. I have to have sex with a beautiful woman and make all these people on the internet pay me to see, and I have to improve my diet and hydration too," I squealed in a high mocking voice.

"But they keep pushing for more!" Carl retorted; his laughter subsided entirely now. "It's going to go too far."

"Well, what is too far?"

He sighed, "I don't know. I think their comments are just getting to me. They're brutal. For every 'nice cock bro', there's several 'she needs a real cock' or 'when's she going to take some bbc'. It's just not on."

"Hey, at least people are complimenting your dick," I snickered.

A couple of hours later and Carl had worked himself up, drinking the remaining pre-mixed cans from our fridge and pacing around the living room. I had planned on going out, but didn't want to abandon him in his state, so I sent a quick message and hoped Abby would forgive me enough to open her door for me later on.

"Look, I love her. I want to marry her," he slurred. "But I want us to have fun, right?"

"Why aren't you with her tonight then, mate?" I asked calmly.

"I can't right now... it's too..." he trailed off. "We've talked about doing it again, you know?"

"Doing what?" I questioned, unable to keep up with his rapidly switching topics of conversation.

"Like, swinging," he explained. "She's already had you, and I had a bit of Abby. So, we thought, why not do it again?"

"And why didn't you?"

"I think she's too jealous."

Jess? Would she be jealous? Even though she'll happily take another cock in front of her boyfriend.

"You sure about that, mate? I mean, you just said you've both eagerly tasted some forbidden fruit together."

"I didn't actually fuck anyone though."

"She did."

Carl was silent at that for several long seconds. He tried to take a sip from his can before realising it was empty.

"That was different," he said finally.

"How?"

"It was a group thing."

"Was it though?"

"What do you mean?" Carl looked at me with wide watery eyes.

"Well..." I began, considering. "That second time with us three... you didn't actually have sex with her."

He shook his head, "No, but she still gave me a blowjob, right?"

"Well, yeah... but you spent a lot of time... not joining in?" I countered.

Again, he went to take a sip before looking angrily at the empty thing and putting it on the coffee table.

"Okay, well... I was still part of it, and I liked seeing her. It was different. It was dirty," he took a breath. "When we're together, it's mostly loving and nice... I can't see her as a sex object, but when we did that, I did. It was a different experience... Even in the videos we're doing, people are telling me to fuck her harder and-"

"-Yeah," I interrupted. "But you said they're saying all sorts of rubbish. Don't worry about them. Worry about you and Jess. You're happy, right? Do the things that make you happy."

He snorted, smiling, and getting to his feet. As he reached down for his can, he stumbled and would have collapsed into the table if I hadn't caught him.

"Whoa, I think you've had a bit too much. Let's get you to bed," I said, preparing to throw him over my shoulder.

"You're right," he said, breaking free of my grip and shaking his head. "G'night."

He stumbled towards the bathroom, leaving me alone to the sound of him crashing around. I messaged Abby.

***

Summer had rolled around quickly and this year I didn't need to worry about finding another place to live. Abby was fine with us staying where we were, even Zach, so we just renewed our contracts with her dad, who owned the building, and went about our business.

As usual, I drove Abby, Carl and Jess back home at the beginning of summer. We decided that we would spend the first couple of weeks at home and then make the most of the rest of summer down by the beach.

It always felt constricting to be back at home now, so when I got a message from Jess saying that they were hiring a suite in the middle of the town to have a party with some of our old friends, I was overjoyed with the excuse to get out of my family's hair.

Carl sent me a message, asking me to come over the night before in order to help set up, and so I immediately bid my family farewell and bolted.

"You're taking the piss..." I whispered to myself, stepping off the elevator to the top floor.

The hotel was a standard chain hotel that you got in every city, so when they told me about booking a suite, I was incredulous. I was more incredulous when they told me to come to the "penthouse". The hallway I had stepped into was pretty short; not the kind you see in the movies when someone's in a penthouse and the lift goes straight into their room, but a small corridor with a handful of doors.

The ones to either side of me were obviously an emergency staircase and some kind of storage room or staff room, but the two in the corridor were both numbered, so I guessed they were guest rooms.

"Not exactly a penthouse," I said to myself, walking towards the door at the end of the hallway, assuming that was their door.

I knocked, then waited, wondering who had the other room.

The door opened and I audibly gasped.

Jess stood in the doorway looking up at me in a white lingerie bodysuit, her body barely obscured by the patterned lace. I took a second to drink it all in: her feet and legs were entirely bare and uncovered as far as her wide hips, starting to take on the golden hue that her skin became as soon as a hint of sunlight hit it. The sheer, lacy, fabric began between her legs, obscuring only a miniscule amount of her flat stomach to just below her ribs, where it split into a V-shape exposing a huge amount of cleavage, before wrapping around her shoulders. Only her nipples were really obscured by the fabric woven around her.

I looked up to her face and was taken aback once more. Now, Jess is one of the, if not the, most beautiful girls I've ever seen. Even without makeup I could imagine seeing her plastered all over social media. She was wearing makeup, and not just the usual subtle kind she preferred: it looked as if she had had a professional in to apply everything.

I've been put off by women with too much make-up on in the past; caked on so much that they're basically wearing a mask. This wasn't that.

Her eyes were smoky, contrasting with her white lingerie, but the rest of her face was vibrant - high cheekbones emphasised with a pale blush that matched her lips. I couldn't tell you what else was on her, but she looked beyond gorgeous with entirely unblemished golden skin.

Her hair seemed to have been done up recently, much longer than only a few days ago and platinum to the roots. It was elaborately twisted in twin braids across the front of her head that met and joined what looked like a looser braid that trailed down almost to her bum. The remaining parts of her hair that weren't braided somehow seemed to fit naturally alongside the braids, leaving her face entirely free of hair up to just before her ears, that were covered by a curtain of silver blonde.

She raised her ice-blue eyes to mine and cocked an eyebrow, as if amused by my reaction. A moment later, her face crinkled into a smile, and she raised a hand with perfectly manicured white nails to cover her mouth.

"Alright mate," I heard from behind her. "Welcome to the penthouse."

I noticed her toenails were painted a matching white as she stood aside and gestured for me to come in.

"Is it okay if we record this?" Jess asked as I passed her.

Her voice was different. She sounded more like a lot of the students down where we went to uni, but with a different cadence to her speech. Maybe we had just been influenced by two years of being surrounded by those accents and coming back home highlighted how different we sounded now.

"Record?" I asked in response, looking around the room.

Jess and Carl both had phones in their hands, although only Carl's was pointed at me. This was the first time I had taken in the room, being so floored by Jess when I entered. They actually had booked a suite; this room was large, with three sofas positioned around a square table, the fourth side being taken up by a huge TV in front of a wide window. Off to the side, there were a desk and two chairs positioned against one of the walls, next to a closed door. On the opposite side, near to where Carl was standing, was a kitchen facsimile - the usual mini-fridge, a breakfast bar with four stools which partitioned the area from the main section, a coffee machine, a cooler and even a sink.

As well as the door I had noticed earlier, there was a closed door behind Jess, presumably the bathroom, and another closed door by the 'kitchen'. Although the room was more than just a bedroom, it somehow seemed to fit the aesthetic of these cheap chain hotels perfectly - the carpet matching the one in the hallway, for example.

"Yeah, so, we're err..." Carl trailed off as I took off my shoes.

"Don't worry, we'll blur your face out," Jess continued, her voice still sounding alien to my ears.

I noticed a camera set up on a tripod, pointing towards me from the other side of the room.