Page 26 of Call Me Mrs. Taylor

He’ll learn.

His groans get louder; his grip gets tighter. I move a hand from his thigh to his balls. I massage them, suck him, and moan until his body stiffens and he shoots all of his frustration down my throat.

Ugh.

Who decided this shit should be thick and salty?

But I’d be lying if I said I’m not turned on.

I go home after we fuck, just like I did the first time. I would give anything to spend the night, but it’s too soon. I need him to feel my absence.

Besides, I need to check on daddy and film my next live.

His bedroom door is closed when I get home. That means he’s already asleep. I’m sure he pretended to be tired on purpose so Faith would put him to bed early.

Daddy avoids me whenever he can.

The old stairs creak loudly under the weight of my footsteps. That sound, like something ancient and brittle is dying, filled me with dread when I was little. But I’ve rewired my own brain. My heart no longer races when I hear it. My hands no longer tremble. My mouth no longer feels like cotton. Nowadays, the creaking makeshimflinch in his pathetic little wheelchair, anxious and mute and paralyzed with fear.

I love that for him.

Sometimes I walk around on purpose, with nowhere to go and nothing to do but exercise my pettiness.

In my room, I change into a fitted pink top, smoothing it over my waist as I stare at my reflection in the mirror. I look good. Soft. Sweet. Marketable.

It’s feeling like a pastel kind of night, so I select my muted palette, my fingers grazing over the buttery shades like they’re my beloved children (if I actually liked children). I fire up my ring light, and the glow washes over me, blurring my imperfections, sharpening my features. I lowkey look expensive, or at least like somebody who should have way more than 981 followers.

I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.

I tilt my head, giving myself a once over. It’s not like I’m lacking. I have the looks. The high cheekbones. The perfect juicy pout. The kind of skin people spend thousands of dollars to get. I have the products—some of them luxury. PR packages fromFenty, for fuck’s sake. And I’m interesting.

It’s not that I want to be a full-time beauty influencer. It’s just…why aren’t I, already? Girls with less than me, with absolutely nothing special about them, blow up every day. Some plain Jane in her boyfriend’s hoodie who sits on live in bad lighting and swatches drugstore lip glosses can wake up to 50k followers while I struggle to hit a thousand after three years.

It’s not fair.

Maybe I don’t like to admit it to myself, but every now and then, I feel like I deserve the spotlight. I feel it all the way down in my bones. Sitting in the shadows of everybody else’s light just feels…wrong. It’s like something in the universe forgot to align for me.

I was meant for more.

Period.

I scrub what’s left of my makeup off, rubbing hard enough to feel the sting. Then I retreat to my vanity, my oasis in this house, the place where I create my own reality and make myself into someone worth watching.

Then I press “Go Live.”

“I’m gonna do something different today, you guys. I’m gonna talk to you about something important.”

I smooth the primer across my skin, pressing it in with my fingertips like I’m sealing in a dark secret. My face is a canvas, my past mistakes covered over in one swipe. If only life worked like that.

“I wanna talk about men.” I pause for dramatic effect as my viewer count ticks up by three. “And dating,” I continue. “And love. And not the corny kind of love. I wanna talk aboutreallove. The kind that snatches you up by the throat and refuses to let go.”

I reach for my foundation. “Dating is so stupid these days, y’all. Like, all this bullshit about talking stages.”

I dot the foundation onto my face, blending it in with a damp sponge as I lean into the camera.

“What is there to talk about? Your favorite color? Your favorite food? Your childhood trauma? Booo, shut up.”

Four more viewers, and a comment.

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