Hard to Love

Rick sauntered over to give me a pep talk. ‘You ready for this?’

I took a deep breath and glanced at the staged set—a white leather couch set against floor-to-ceiling windows in the chic loft the studio had rented. It all felt cold and contrived, but what did I expect? It was just sex. I could do this. It was the one thing I knew for sure I was good at. And most importantly, it paid a lot—enough for me to afford Lily’s medical care.

I pictured her sweet face peeking out over the edge of her quilt when I’d tucked her in earlier tonight. I’d told her Becca was going to babysit and she wouldn’t see me until morning. She’d tightened her lips and nodded. She didn’t like the dark, and sometimes even preferred to crawl into my bed at night, but she was putting on her brave face.

‘Cade?’ Rick asked, pulling my attention back to him.

‘Yeah, I’ll be fine.’

‘That’s my boy. Our actress should be here soon. She’s a new girl. You’ll love her. Young, sweet…’ He made a sucking sound with his lips and his eyes got a faraway look to them. I shuddered. Throwing aside the fact that he was an adult-film director, Rick’s demeanor just screamed sleazy.

I was almost starting to regret my decision to work for him, but visions of dollar signs kept floating before my eyes. Rick had seen me in the boxing ring several times over the previous year, and a few months ago had begun approaching me after matches, promising big money if I was ever interested in working for him. At the time, I laughed it off. But the fights brought in less than steady money and as things got worse with Lily I bit the bullet and decided to give it a shot.

The makeup artist approached, thankfully distracting Rick from whatever perverted thoughts were currently running through his head. I removed my robe at her request and she began airbrushing some type of bronzing spray over my shoulders and chest. I didn’t like the smell of it, but I pushed it from my mind and focused on what I had to do.

‘So the biggest thing for you to remember is control. No money shots until I say so. So if you need to slow down, or switch positions, just go ahead and do it. As long as you don’t come until I give the signal. We need plenty of shots and positions before that can happen,’ Rick reminded me.

‘Got it. Shouldn’t be a problem.’

He laughed. ‘Confident. I like that.’

Confidence usually wasn’t a problem for me, but I couldn’t deny there was a hint of performance anxiety at the thought of having sex with a girl I’d never met, on camera, in front of a roomful of people—lighting techs, director, film crew, and a few others whose roles I didn’t know. I tried not to focus on all that and instead reminded myself about the money Rick had promised me.

‘What about her? Shouldn’t I talk to her first? Find out what she likes, how she gets off?’

Rick laughed, and slapped my shoulder. ‘Silly boy. This is a porn shoot, not a first date. She’ll fake it, so don’t worry about her having an orgasm. Just focus on you.’

I could only imagine what a conversation like that with a stranger might sound like…. So do you like penetration or clitoral stimulation to have an orgasm? God, was I an idiot or what? I was overthinking this shit.

The front door opened and everyone turned. ‘And there she is! Beautiful girl…’ Rick headed over to greet the wide-eyed starlet entering the apartment.

I couldn’t help but notice how scared she looked. And young. Holy shit, was this girl even eighteen? I watched as Rick helped her out of her jacket and steered her by the shoulders over to the makeup chair.

When Alexa returned I was seated on the exam table, the paper gown loosely closed around me. Rick hadn’t offered to leave while I changed. He and a whole room full of people had already seen me buck-naked though, so I figured it didn’t matter much at this point. This whole night just needed to fucking end.

Alexa washed her hands and carefully arranged an ice pack over my groin. I shifted and let out a grunt at the surprise of the coldness, and Alexa’s eyes flicked up to mine. ‘Is it okay?’ she asked, softly.

‘Fine,’ I muttered and bit back the string of curse words I wanted to let rip and adjusted the ice pack so it wasn’t sitting directly on my nuts.

Rick leaned against the exam table and chuckled to himself as if he found our interaction amusing. It was clear I was intrigued by her and the way her eyes wandered the room, desperate to look anywhere but directly at me, or rather at my swollen appendage, she was clearly uncomfortable.

‘You can see why we hired him, huh, sweetheart?’ Rick grinned proudly and elbowed her softly in the side.

Her cheeks flushed pink and she tucked her chin to her chest.

‘Let’s just get on with it,’ I growled. I didn’t care about the exam or being exposed, I just wanted to end her embarrassment as quickly as possible.

I didn’t know why I’d listened to Rick and taken those damn pills. I was attracted to the model he’d hired, that wasn’t the problem. She was very pretty, petite and trim, but she’d looked fucking terrified. I’d tried to make polite conversation before the shoot began, but even small talk was too much for her. She excused herself to the kitchen, where she sat perched on a bar stool, her eyes closed tight, chest rising and falling as she took deep breaths. After she finally talked herself into going through with it, I was so weirded out that I couldn’t even keep my erection up—something that had never been a problem for me before.

I wasn’t about to fuck some girl who was terrified of me. Sorry, not a turn-on. Rick had assumed it was a performance issue, and stupidly I’d accepted the pills from him rather than explaining why I didn’t want to go through with it. Eventually I had to man up and explain the situation to him, but not before the damage was done.

‘So, you’re a porn star?’ Alexa asked, her eyes flicking up to mine briefly before darting away again.

She was as nervous as a field mouse in a stampede. ‘Does that bother you?’ I bluffed. She didn’t need to know that this was my first ever film and I hadn’t even followed through. Besides, she’d already judged me. No sense in trying to defend my honor.

Her eyes met mine again and held. ‘No.’ Her voice sounded sure, but I couldn’t help noticing the blush creeping up her neck to color her cheeks. I wouldn’t be all that surprised to learn she was a virgin, with how self-conscious and unsure of herself she was. All the more reason to stay the hell away from her.

Watching her work, her small hands moving about to care for me stirred something inside. It’d been a long time since someone had taken care of me.

The doctor strode into the room—male, late-forties, and strait-laced, which put me at ease.

After covering the basics—that I’d taken two of little blue pills even though only one was recommended and yes, I’d been fully erect going on four and half hours now—the doctor, thankfully, got right down to business, opening my robe. The swollen appendage jutted out in front of me, proudly saluting the doctor and Alexa.

‘There he is!’ Rick beamed proudly. This dude was twisted. Why the hell was he so interested in my cock? Sure it was above average, I knew that much. After Rick had approached me about starring in one of his movies, I’d looked up the statistics online and measured myself, just out of curiosity. It was much larger than average according to what I’d read online. But still, his interest was creepy. I reminded myself that he dealt with the human body all day long and that he was just thinking about the money I could make him when he looked at it, but that didn’t mean I liked another man eyeing my dick with such enthusiasm.

My eyes flicked up to watch Alexa’s expression. Bad fucking idea. Her mouth had dropped open, and her chest was heaving with shallow breaths. I practically felt her gaze caressing me.

‘Is he family?’ the doctor asked, gingerly inspecting me.

‘Nope.’

The doctor tipped his head to the door, motioning to Rick. ‘Would you mind stepping out of the room, sir?’

‘Sure thing, Doc.’ Rick nodded. ‘I’m out of here just as soon as you tell me there’ll be no permanent damage to the money maker.’

The doctor looked up at him, not amused. ‘He’ll live. Now please go.’

Apparently satisfied by the doctor’s answer, Rick gave me a wink, patted my shoulder and exited the room.

‘So how exactly do you treat this?’ I was almost afraid to ask.

Alexa’s eyes shifted to the floor, like she knew I wasn’t going to like the answer. Not good.

‘I’m going to give you a dose of medicine—a combination of a steroid and a muscle relaxant to see if that will return things to normal. You’ll take these orally and we’ll wait about thirty minutes. If that doesn’t work, I may have to insert a thin needle into the shaft and extract blood manually.’ The doctor made a few notes in my file and left the room.

I swallowed down a lump in my throat. The fucking pills had to work. I wouldn’t be able to handle him bringing a needle anywhere near my dick without punching the poor guy in the face.

Alexa returned a few minutes later with a tiny plastic cup containing two pills and a cup of water for me. I downed the pills and water in a single gulp. Once again, she arranged the ice pack on my lap, her hand brushing against my dick, which made it jump. I saw her bite her lip to avoid smiling.

‘Thanks,’ I muttered, passing the cup back to her.

‘You’re welcome. Sit tight and I’ll be back to check your progress in a little while.’

I’d never been so happy to go soft in my entire life, but twenty minutes later my erection slackened and I hopped down from the exam table and began dressing. Just as I was pulling on my jeans, Alexa came back to check on me.

The look of surprise on her face stopped me short.

‘I think I’m good to go,’ I explained.