My name is Calix. I'm a staggering 5' 6" tall, Hispanic, and have jet black hair. Throughout my high school years, I was mocked for being shorter than most of the boys around me. They called me "femmy" and "weakling." It got so bad that when a guy took genuine interest in me, I said no because I knew that people would just make fun of me for being a feminine boy with a masculine guy. After I graduated from High School a year ago, I deeply regretted it. I missed my first chance to have a relationship with someone and now I am alone in the world. I got a job at a smoothie bar and have been working there for a whole year and make $13 an hour. It's really not terrible. I can pay my rent because I have a roommate. She doesn't really like to talk to me or socialize and stays in her room when she's home. I have no prospects or anything to secure my financial future. I just hope that one day I can make the manager position at my job.
I discovered the term "femboy" in my senior year of High School. I learned that it was the word that best described what I am. I don't try to be, but it came sort of naturally to me. In an effort to get an extra revenue stream I started posting paid-for photos of myself online when I turned 19. Ones that were safe-for-work and ones that were not so much. It never really took off though. I theorized that I was being outplayed by the femboys who take female hormones and therefore look cuter than me. I have naturally feminine features, but I can't compete with the boys on hormones. And getting on hormones is not for me because I don't want to grow boobs or anything. I make about an extra $200 a month from selling pictures of myself to strange men on the internet. In one of the few times I talked with my roommate I made the mistake of telling her about it and she was disgusted. That is perhaps why she hasn't spoken to me since.
One day I was posting an album of photos of myself when I got a message from someone on the site. It said his name was DomDaddy681. I guess the first 680 DomDaddies were taken. It read the following:
DomDaddy681:
Hi. You look really cute in your photographs.
CalixBoi:
Haha, thanks.
DomDaddy681:
Do you happen to live in the Houston area by chance?
CalixBoi:
Ummm.. Yeah.
DomDaddy:
Good, good. I have something to offer you and don't freak out. I know it sounds crazy, but would you be interested in meeting me at a park? I promise it's nothing shady. I have an offer that could change your world.
I was hesitant at first to say yes, but I agreed to it. We chose a local well-known park in our city. He told me to wear normal clothes to make me feel better about meeting an online stranger. The prospect of something positive interested me, and I followed the orders he gave.
A week later I took the bus to the park. He told me to go to a certain bench in the area with a table. I did. I got scared that I was the first one to arrive, so I prepared myself for the worst.
A few minutes of waiting later and a tall man started walking towards me. He was wearing a grey coat and a white shirt underneath. He appeared to be around 40 years old. My stomach dropped as he got closer to me and waved.
"Hi. Are you CalixBoi?" I stood up and shook his hand.
"Yeah, it's me. Nice to meet you."
"Let's sit down," he said. He sat on the other side of the table-bench. "Now I know that you might be a little scared. I know it's a bit unusual for me to ask to see you. But I promise my intentions are good. To ease your mind, I brought you this." He put a brown knitted basket on the table. Inside was an assortment of candies, a teddy bear, a few sodas, an energy drink, a video game console with a game included, and two freshly made sandwiches.
"Woah!" I spoke. "That's a lot of stuff. Why would you give me all of this stuff?"
"If you're worried about the cost of it all, don't be. And don't take this as a token of goodwill that I'm going to use to pressure you into anything. This is purely to let you know that I mean no harm at all. I want you to feel comfortable and to know that you got something out of this even if you decline my incoming offer."
"Okay, you got my attention," I laughed. "May I?" I asked pointing at the sandwich.
"Of course," he said and grabbed the 2
nd
sandwich. "I hope you like salami."
"I love salami." The man laughed.
"Oh, how could I forget? How rude of me. My real name is Daniel."
"Calix," I said. "But you probably knew that."
"It's nice to know. It's a pretty name, Calix." Him saying my name made my heart skip a beat.
"Anyway, I guess we should get right to it," he continued. "I represent and am apart of a certain group of liked minded people. We are a group of middle-class women and men who all live together in one giant home. Some of us were friends growing up, some were co-workers, and some joined when they heard about our group. We are all people who wanted to be able to live a more comfortable life. None of us are rich on our own, but we all came together to purchase a beautiful home in River Oaks. It has twenty-five rooms, a bar, a pool, and all the amenities you could dream of. We also have a collective investment account to make sure that our money grows. It all started 10 years ago with me and four of my friends and it's only grown since. Our purpose is simple: to live a life of comfort our money alone could not afford. To live like the wealthy. And it's all been going really well. We all work good jobs with reliable income and overall, we're happy. If someone gets sick, we take care of each other. If someone needs help we're there."
Everything he was saying sounded like a fantasy come to life. But also sounded impossible. But despite that, I wondered why he was telling me about it. "That sounds pretty cool. But what does any of this have to do with me?"
"Well, Calix. My friends and I who live together are a little bit more than friends. The initial group of 5 that started the collective including myself were friends because we were all... experimental with our interests in romantic desires."
"Oh my God," I said in shock. "It's a big polyamorous house."
"You could say that. Everyone in the house is bisexual or pansexual, but not everyone is interested in everyone else. It's a polycule. However, recently some of us realized that there were some issues developing in the group you see. Because none of us have a single shared interest, we were beginning to drift apart."
"I'm sorry to hear," I said.
"This was until we found your photos online. I found you first and shared some of your pictures with my in-house friends. And then they shared it with the rest. In only a week everyone in the house was looking at your photographs."