Group Dynamics
“Huh?” Joey said. “What’s that?”
“An industrial sociologist,” I tried to explain, “studies how somebody’s job, and where they work, affects them. Like mentally, and physically.”
We both looked around and laughed.
The usual room, in the same budget motel. Still reeking of sex from last night’s shoot.
Tonight we’d pick it back up, with a different script. Or maybe work from the same one.
“Group dynamics,” I said. “You know.”
“Wow,” Joey said. “Val, you’re even smarter than I thought.”
I stiffened. “Me?”
I sat up in bed, blew on my too-hot coffee. If I was smart, Lars would never have conned me. Instead of being “personal assistant to the Fetish Porn King of Shangri-La Productions,” I’d be analyzing workplace dynamics somewhere.
“You are.” Joey set down his coffee. “Usually. But this time, you let your heart . . .”
I knew what was coming.
“Ass-fuck you.”
Out of nowhere, tears came. Rapes. Beatings so bad, I could only be filmed from the chest down. Choking. Lars doing it, for fun. It made him cum harder, seeing panic in my eyes. Last night, I froze up, praying . . . that he wouldn’t stop . . . until . . . until . . .
Joey nuzzled me, careful of my bruises. We hadn’t fucked this time. Just held each other, nude, enjoying the comfort of skin. His chest and head hair, both curly, were like a security blanket. Usually, he smelled like nobody else. Today, like sweat, ‘cos we hadn’t showered yet, but Joey-sweat smelled good to me. And cum from last night. But this time, it wasn’t just his.
When his phone pinged, my heart raced. Lars! We were here, “after hours,” without him. We’d never snuck in here before.
Would he hurt us?
As Joey reached behind for his phone, I clung tightly to him, as much as it hurt.
“Carlos.” His body felt tense. He set the phone down on the bed and turned over.
“I . . . gotta see him later.”
“Why?”
He shook his head.
Joey and Carlos: Lars’s biggest bi stars. It was Carlos who I smelled on Joey. And maybe not just from the shoot.
Maybe more than I wanted to believe. Smart as I was.
But Joey loved me, didn’t he?
I loved him: Beautiful, perceptive Joey, who wrote songs he wouldn’t show me. Who’d stood up to Lars for me and literally got kicked in the stomach. Doubling over in pain, Joey’s eyes were twice their size. “Let’s run away,” hoarsely, he’d whispered in my ear, that night.
Carlos, too? I wondered now.
Group dynamics, we’d call it. No fancy degrees or turned-up noses. Just a cheap motel workplace stinking of pleasure. Sometimes against our will.
But not always.
I got dressed, slowly.
