Chapter Text
She don’t show her face, and the hair could be a wig, but there ain’t no mistakin’ what she’s wearing. Clyde leans in and squints at the screen, and hell if it ain’t exactly like he thought. She spreads her legs, showing a triangle of pale cotton with a dark spot, framed by soft thighs. He makes a fist and turns away, spins all the way around backwards in the chair. Ought not be lookin’ at this, and it ain’t no difference if he’s subscribed or not.
He knows who she is.
Fuckin’ hell, how could he not? She’s wearing his goddamn baseball jersey! Don’t even need to see his name and number on the back to be sure. Ain’t seen it in years, but there ain’t no way it’s a coincidence. He can even see the stitchin’ where Mommy tried to help him fix a tear right before a game once but only had dark blue thread.
He turns back around slowly. Done paid for it, and she wouldn’t be doin’ this if she didn’t want people to watch, right?
His hand shakes as he pushes back the hair from his eyes, and he leans forward again, trying to ignore his own distorted reflection in the old, curved glass of the monitor. Damn thing’s older’n Sadie.
Almost older than the woman on the screen.
Aw, hell!
He feels all manner of uncomfortable, and the chafing of his conscience is about to be overrun by that of his jeans.
He don’t touch himself until after, when the feed’s cut and the monitor is dark, system shut down with a wheeze and the angry whirring of a fan. A wonder the dang thing even connects to the internet at all, never mind that he was able to watch the admittedly grainy, lagging feed. Of course, the main part of the computer’s not quite so ancient as the monitor.
He tells himself he won’t do it again. He don’t cancel his subscription. Hell, maybe he should upgrade it. Certainly got more than he ever expected.
Tuesday.
Friday.
Sunday afternoon.
She always has something new to post or share or stream those days.
Always wearing a big ol’ men’s shirt, worn and soft and very familiar (missing from his own dang closet for years now) and them long stocking things, thick socks that come up above her knees.
Sometimes she has her hair down, and sometimes a thick braid hangs over her shoulder. He’s caught glimpses of ribbons and bows—in her hair, on her underwear, sometimes both and all color coordinated.
He feels a little guilty, but he don’t stop watching.
Wearin’ his old shirts, him knowing who she really is, it’s like she does it just for him. Even in the captions and video titles, things like “missing you” and “your shirt doesn’t smell like you anymore but it smells like me.”
Not…he knows it ain’t really. She done left Boone County while he was on his first tour and ain’t never coming back, and good for her.
Nothing for her here, not like in the city (any city).
So no, it’s not really for him, but sometimes it’s nice to think about. And sometimes it’s just about seeing what she’s willing to show, and a much-needed release. He ain’t obsessed or nothing. Got a real good grip on reality, sadly. But he has to admit, he spends more time than he should on the new laptop and refurbished tablet thing he got at a discount.
And maybe he’s still lonely, but he feels a little less alone.
She’s moved the camera. Just a little bit, not enough to show her face or nothing, but he can see the corner of a shelf behind her, and the scratch in the wood paneling on the wall. He knows that wall. And the shelf. And the base of the trophy at the top of the frame is a match to the one packed up in his closet somewhere.
Whole team got them, when they was state champs in baseball his senior year.
Clyde slaps the laptop closed and launches himself off the couch, pacing the length of the trailer twice.
She’s in Boone County.
Her daddy’s old place, sure as the world, and she’s using her brother’s old room for her channel.
Fucking hell!
He takes a cold shower and gets ready for work, goes in two hours early to start inventory and maybe catch up on paperwork. He needs the distraction so he don’t go over and knock the door down to ask her what the hell she thinks she’s doing.
He don’t forget, exactly, but he’s almost able to push it aside and work.
He drops Earl’s beer when she waltzes in the door, bright smile and little pleated skirt swishing around her thighs so that the lacy tops of her stockings flash every other step. Clyde ducks down, cleaning up his mess, and then gets a new drink ready. “On the house, Earl, sorry about that.”
Earl glances to where she’s hopped up onto a barstool two down and then back at Clyde, but his expression stays blank, and he sips his beer. Clyde takes a deep breath, steeling himself. It’s a mistake, because he gets a nose full of her perfume or whatever it is. Soft and feminine. Flowery, but sweet like candy. Lilacs maybe? She leans forward and he tries not to look down the V-neck of her shirt for the spray of freckles across her collarbones and the faint birthmark just above her right breast.
Honeysuckle, she smells like honeysuckle and a little hint of vanilla and some kind of fruit, like a summer picnic with homemade ice cream. He swallows hard. “Ophelia.” He nods in what he hopes is a polite way. “What uh, what’ll it be?”
She crinkles her nose and dimples up at him, neck all stretched almost like—
Hell, he can’t think about that right now.
At all. Ever. No, nope, hell no.
“Clyde Logan, you’ve known me since I was five, I think you can call me Phee.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She rolls her eyes. “I’m craving something sweet and fruity, maybe with some whipped cream on top?” She gives him a toothy grin and leans a little bit, arms together on the bar and kind of pushing her tits up and out and why is he even looking or thinking about that?
“Coming up,” he says, and tries to remember where he put the blender. Ain’t much ice but he’s got some, and frozen berries, he’s pretty sure. After a few minutes and a lot more work than he normally puts into a drink (there’s more than one reason he don’t usually offer them slushy, frozen things), he presents her with the strawberry daiquiri. “Sorry, ain’t got no whipped cream or nothing,” he mumbles, trying not to look at her as he pushes the glass forward so she can reach it.
“Oh, pooh, guess you don’t do blow jobs here, then,” she says with a pout.
Fortunately, the glasses he drops are already empty and only one of them shatters.
She’s doing more livestreams. Sometimes she doesn’t even announce it, and sometimes it’s just her putting away laundry or dusting (like actual cleaning and not just pretend tickling stuff with a duster). She vacuums in his old t-shirt that he knows Mommy put in the rag pile. She does dishes in the hand me down flannel that was already so faded he don’t know what color is was to start, back when it was his.
Still careful not to show her face, but it’s clear she lives alone in her daddy’s old house.
He should be ashamed of how often he watches, cock in hand while she makes scrambled eggs or matches socks together. Maybe he is a little bit. Especially since she’s been at the Duck almost every night, and they’ve grabbed food a couple times, a late breakfast at the diner before Clyde goes in to meet a vendor at 11, pizza on his day off. Like they’s friends.
She was always a pretty thing, but too young for him, and his high school best friend’s baby sister. Innocent and sweet, and that’s still there, ain’t no act or put on. She’s mentioned “work” a few times, and the guilt of knowing she don’t know he already knows might just eat him alive.
But he don’t stop watching. Ain’t sure he can.
It’s on a Tuesday that she announces it.
An upcoming collaboration with some asshole calling himself the PRINTZ_of_denMark.
A demonstration of some sort.
Clyde don’t have time to look it up before work, and he’s too tired to do more when he gets home than take off his boots and fall into bed. Mellie ambushes him in the morning, dragging him out and hauling him around the county on her errands, and somehow bullying him into a haircut and clothes shopping as if he needs any of that.
He’s twenty minutes late opening up, not that anyone’s there yet. Ain’t the point. He has a schedule to keep, a routine to his life. He’s already all antsy when Phee strolls in, a couple of city fellas on her heels, and Clyde knows his day’s just gone about as bad as it can.
“Hey, Clyde!” she practically chirps as she clambers up onto a barstool.
“Phee.”
Her face falls and one of the men kind of nudges her, all familiar like, and she smiles at him, something soft and kind of shy.
“I brought some friends,” she says. “We met through work. This is Horatio,” she says with a nod to the one what nudged her. “And Hamlet,” she adds, and the other man nods and smirks before giving Phee a look Clyde don’t even want to interpret.
Hamlet.
Hamlet. And Ophelia. And…Horatio.
Shit.
“God damn Shakespearean tragedy,” Clyde mutters to himself and Phee giggles.
“I know! It’s part of why we met, all being named for the play.”
Fucking hell. PRINTZ_of_denMark in his own damn bar.
He sets their drinks down a little too hard. Fruity cocktails for Phee and Horatio, and a beer for Hamlet. Clyde mumbles some excuse he don’t even recall and heads to the cooler. Just needs a minute, is all.
They don’t stay long, just finish drinks and then Horatio says something about dinner and set up and Clyde almost drops a glass. Been doing that a lot since Phee come back to West Virginia. Gonna have to up prices to cover that cost alone at this rate.
After work, he very specifically does not look at any screens, avoids any…notifications.
For about an hour. Can’t sleep. Can’t do nothing but wonder what they’re doing, who’s gettin’ to touch her and how. What if it’s both? Four hands between the two of ‘em to do whatever she likes best.
He takes a cold shower, pulls on some old sweatpants and grabs a beer from the fridge, then sits and glares at the laptop, still closed on the coffee table.
Ain’t gonna be nothing new. Whatever special thing this is, it ain’t going to be for a while. He’ll prove it to himself and go to sleep. That’s all.
Clyde opens the laptop and uses the fingerprint sensor thing to log on.
She’s put up a picture. Something what looks like a whip kind of, only not, a bunch of almost fuzzy strands knotted at the ends, and three paddles. The one on the left has four leaf clovers and horseshoes cut out in the padded surface. On the right, a bunch of tiny…ducks? Like the rubber ducky shapes. In the middle, backwards so it takes him a second to recognize the letters, the word “LUCKY” in all caps. Her caption: Which one first, Daddy?
His boots are unlaced, and he’s still struggling into a shirt as he crosses the driveway. He’s at her door and already knocking before he even realizes he forgot the damn robot hand on the dresser. The deadbolt flips and the door makes a little pop where it sticks in the frame as it’s pulled open. Clyde opens his mouth to speak, not that he has any idea what he’ll say, then snaps his jaw shut when he realizes it ain’t Phee what answered.
Horatio smirks and holds the door wide. “Well, that took longer than I expected. Come in, Mr. Logan.” Clyde ducks his head and walks in, the other man closing and re-locking the door behind him. “You can go on back, if you want. We’re just setting up today.” He pauses, something like pity flashing across his face, and the smirk softens to what seems like a genuine smile. “Everyone is fully clothed, and Phee heard your car before you turned in the drive. She’s waiting for you. I think perhaps the four of us should have a chat.”
Clyde makes his way slowly down the hallway, pausing just before the door. Horatio gives him a little shove—man’s stronger’n he looks—and Clyde stumbles into the room, barely managing to right himself before he has an armful of sobbing girl.
“I’m sorry, Clyde, I’m so sorry, what I’ve done to you is just awful!”
“What you’ve done to me? What are you even talking about about? You ain’t done nothing. Hell, Phee, I’m the one who’s sorry. Never should have looked at your account in the first place, and ‘specially not once I knew it was you.”
“Sweet,” Hamlet says from behind her, and oddly enough…he sounds genuine.
Horatio manages to slip past Clyde and cross the small room, slipping his arm around Hamlet’s waist and kissing his cheek, the pair leaning against one another and smiling. “They really are. His sister was right, it’s almost sickening.”
Clyde frowns. What did Mellie have to do with anything?