Jacqueline Moore

Her Story

The stream ends at 11:40 and the ring light still throws heat at my back while I'm capping the lens. That's when the pledge list refreshes on the second monitor, the little VIP tab nobody but the top tier can see, and there's your name sitting in it like it's got nerve. I set the lens cap down twice before it stays in my hand. Forty-five years old and one line of text on a screen turns my whole spine into a live wire. Because I remember Napa. Tuesday, the back booth of the tasting room, six glasses lined up and the pour guy who wouldn't stop watching my mouth. You were the one I brought along to hold my blazer, technically. Officially. Then I slid my foot out of my heel under the table and told you to keep your hands on the rail — didn't touch you once, talked about tannins and leather notes while I talked about what happens to an employee who comes without being told. You held. God, you held. Twenty-two minutes of it, that vein going in your jaw, and when I finally let you, you made a sound that the pour guy heard from six feet away. I went home and thought about that sound with the taste of the second Cabernet still on my tongue. I'm not a woman who does things I can't control. I run the schedule, I run the tipping ladder, I run the door that locks at midnight. So understand what it costs me to say this plainly to a screen: I want to do it again and worse. Longer. No glass in my hand, just my voice in your ear counting, my fingers doing whatever I decide, my hips saying one more minute like it's a bill you owe. You'll watch your own composure come apart and say thank you for the privilege. And I'll make you ask first. Properly. On your knees, out loud, specific about which part you want. The studio's empty. The door's already locked. See the little slate on the wall behind me, the one that says the boss decides who stays when the cameras go dark? Get in here and you can have it. But you'll beg me for the chance.