The Sexpert
Cross my heart.
I said that to her. The girl in the videos that has Pierce losing his fucking mind said that in her last post. The girl in the videos has perfect breasts. The girl in the videos was wearing a sleeveless, clingy, cottony thing. The Sexpert was Pierce’s idea. Pierce thinks that whoever this woman is in the videos stole his idea. To steal his idea, she would have to have access to the idea. She would have had to have known what Pierce was cooking up. Like somebody who was working for him.
Why would someone who works for Pierce steal his idea? What would it gain them? What would be the benefit? Maybe Pierce is right, and they have an axe to grind against him. Maybe they want to see him fail. Or at least be embarrassed or…
Or maybe they just need a break. Maybe they’ve worked hard and don’t have much to show for it besides a small studio apartment and a job where they maybe feel unappreciated. Maybe they…
I like figuring out puzzles.
I pop open my laptop and type in my password. I open a browser, go to YouTube, and type in “Sexpert.” The channel has nearly half a million subscribers. Yeah, I know how things can go unexpectedly viral.
There are dozens of videos, dating back about a year. I scroll down to the very first one and click on it. It’s different than the one Pierce showed me this morning. The lighting is different. The background is different. The confidence that I’ve seen in the couple that I’ve watched is less present.
But the tits are the same.
And so is the sound of the voice. Sultry Siren.
“Hi, everyone.” The voice is halting. Not the purring that’s come gliding out in the other videos I’ve seen. It’s the voice of someone who seems …. not flustered. That’s not quite right. Ruffled maybe. The voice of someone who isn’t sure of what they’re doing or if they should be doing it. The last twenty-four months have been all about me listening to voices and analyzing voices and understanding voices, but even if my time hadn’t been spent doing that, it would be easy to pick out the hesitancy.
“So,” Sexpert continues. “So, um, I dunno if anybody is ever even going to watch these, but, um, I am the Sexpert. Hi.” I have to be honest, anyone discovering these early videos might think it was a joke. Her… sexpertise… doesn’t feel awe-inspiring. But somehow that’s part of the charm.
That and the boobs filling the screen.
“So, what I hope to do with these videos is to help people understand sex, talk about sex, appreciate sex, and maybe just make the whole thing a little less taboo. So, to start, I thought it would be fun to ease in with framing sex in a friendly way. Comparing it to something everyone loves. Dessert.” She holds up a Twinkie directly in between her breasts. It’s a sight to see. “So, there are many different ways to get the cream out—”
“Boss?”
Dev poking his head into my office causes me to slam down the laptop screen like I just got caught jerking it. And that’s not far off. Because, to my chagrin, as I push back from my desk to stand up, I realize I can’t. Stand up. At least not as long as I don’t want Dev to know about the more private parts of… No. That’s it. My more private parts.
I wave him in.
“Yeah?” I say, sliding my unexpected erection back under the safety of my desk. “What’s up?”
“Um,” he says, approaching carefully. Because I am acting weird. And I know it. “I just wanted to ask… Why were you asking about IN-VERSE earlier?”
“What do you mean? Why are you asking why I was asking?”
“Because I got a call from Carrie at Justice—”
“Carrie? At the Justice Department?”
“Yeah. Like I said. Carrie at Justice.” He shakes his head a little. “And she says you haven’t returned her calls or emails.”
“Oh. Yeah. I gotta do that.” I get a tight grin, raise my eyebrows, and ask, “Anything else?”
His brows furrow and he draws in his chin, twisting his head to the side. He looks like an otter, kinda. “Nah. I don’t think so. Just… Are you OK, man?”
“Yeah. Yeah. I’m dynamite. What time is it?”
He looks at his watch. “Almost noon. Why don’t you keep a clock in your office?”
“Time is a construct designed to keep us down.”
“It’s really not. It’s science. I could explain it, but I’d need more hours than I have to spare, and you’d probably need a different brain.”
“You think it’s wise to insult your boss’s intelligence?”
He shrugs. “Dunno. Never had a boss before.”
“Okay,” I say, waving him out.
“Yeah. OK. But seriously, what’s going on with IN-VERSE? Is everything OK with it? We’re not going to lose the contract or anything, are we? I’ve busted my ass working out all the bugs.”