✅ My Cousin's Keeper [NaNoWriMo 2021]

138. My Inside Man

This bonus chapter is for Peter. Thank you for all your support!

I sighed when I got another message from Walthamstone. I didn't really want to stay in touch with the guy, because he kind of creeped me out. But somehow I'd ended up giving him enough information to let him find my profile on FanLibrary. Of course, I did most of my reading on FetishLibrary, rather than the new fanfiction-driven site. But the two shared user profiles, and Walthamstone had at least been satisfied to see that I wasn't sharing pictures of his humiliating interests on any of his fanspaces on there. He probably had no idea which sites I was actually active on.

"You should see the movie," he was gushing now. "It's incredible, it already gets me emotional." But how was that supposed to mean anything? He was working on the movie. Why was he talking about it on a fansite? Was he trying to convince me that I had an inside line on all the gossip, and I'd be losing out if he got kicked off the set? That might have had some influence, if I'd even cared about the movie. I mean, it was going to be fun. But I already knew more about it than anyone else, just from Kernigan's tacit confirmation that it was based on one of the storylines in the three rings, making the plotlines from Canon Flash and The Biker, The Don, and The Pope part of the main story again. I wasn't one to trade in gossip. But his latest line was just too dumb for words. He couldn't even bluff effectively.

"How would you know?" I answered. "You're in the movie, not watching it. I bet you don't know anything beyond your own lines." I tapped 'send', and then went back to worrying about the latest message from Ffrances. She said that she wanted to talk to me about something major while the kids weren't around. By kids, of course, she meant Tess and Spike. The boy was included just because he was currently living in my house. It was a real test of my patience not to kick him out, although I found that I could tolerate his presence a lot better when he was a girl. The hypnosis worked well, and the role apparently felt real to him. I'd been looking for a way to make that a permanent change so that I would never have to feel like he was a threat. But so far, I didn't have any wedges I could use to talk Ffrances into making such a drastic change to his mind without his permission; nor had I seen any confessions that might convince her it was what he really wanted. She'd talked to him a lot more than I had already, so it would be near impossible to use the trick about him being too shy to bring it up with her.

In any case, our home was hectic enough that it was hard to find a time when we would both be free and they would both be out. In the end, we'd decided to discuss whatever it was when they were at their school ball. My anxiety peaked when I learned that Spike would be getting changed for the event elsewhere, and was going to turn up in a suit to pick up Tess. It was hard to keep from panicking when he acted so much like this was a date. A part of me was wondering if Ffrances just wanted to ensure that I wouldn't be snooping around, trying to watch them to make sure he didn't try anything. While they weren't here, the most I could do would be reminding Tess to have an accident if the little punk tried to kiss her. I felt bad giving her suggestions like that, and had only done it a couple of times over the last few weeks. But if they were going to an event where lots of girls were likely to be molested by their so-called boyfriends, the temptation might be just too strong. And if he behaved himself, they would never even know.

I knew it would be better to ensure that they had a chaperone. But Ffrances had insisted that she had something serious to talk about, and she didn't want to do it when they might be around. I might have wondered if she was going to move in with me full time, but surely she would want to talk about that when the whole family was there. Wouldn't she?

Another message from Walthamstone made my phone buzz and derailed my train of thought. He seemed to have nothing better to do than bother me with messages on FanLibrary. If he didn't cut it out, it could cut into my work time, and then I would be the one in trouble. I even thought about turning off notifications for the app; but I couldn't really do that while I was waiting for an important message from Little Vicky, to say if they trusted me enough to invite me to their convention. I knew that Ffrances was supposed to be arranging things, and she'd already spoken to them, but I wanted to at least know that I could get the trust of a bunch of littles without help.

When I saw the pervert's latest message, I froze. I might not be interested in gossip from behind the scenes, but this would be gold. He said he'd already seen the movie. The editors were putting together a mockup, using footage that had been shot so far, storyboard sketches, rehearsals with or without costume, and for some scenes even a rough pencil drawing of where each character should be standing, with the audio track from actors sitting around a table reading the script. And every week, at the end of filming, the editors would bring this prototype movie up to date with new footage. That was what Walthamstone had meant when he said that he'd watched it; they were letting the actors see it so they would know how their parts fitted into the whole.

It was stupid. I knew it was stupid. But I wrote back to him right away. Not like I wanted to validate his delusions of being interesting, but I wanted to see one of those mockup cuts of the movie. I asked about them, and he said that he could get me one of the daily releases. Just so long as I destroy every copy of the incriminating photos. Well... maybe he didn't exactly offer. I might have said that was the only way he could convince me not to share his secret with the world. But that was his own fault for getting into this situation in the first place. I would never have even known those videos existed if he hadn't dangled them in front of me. I hated being manipulated like that, especially by a pervert, so it was only natural that I'd have to take back control of the situation.

Much to my surprise, I found that he was going to be in the area again. Kernigan had found some local landscapes that he wanted to be in the background or something, I couldn't imagine where. I knew the scenery around here was pretty, but I'd never expected somebody would want it to be in a movie. But they were going to be somewhere around here again, he told me that he thought he could get a DVD of one of the daily cuts out, just so long as nobody ever learned that I had it. I told him he wouldn't need to worry about that; I was working with Claughton now, I would be in just as much trouble as him if I shared something like that, and I didn't have an existing fortune to fall back on. And that was all I needed to say; he was going to get in touch again when he knew what days he would be available to make the swap.

When I looked around the office again, I saw that many of the day staff had already disappeared. It was getting late now, time for me to be getting home. About the only person still working was Carter, fingers drumming away on the keyboard. With no tasks assigned to her, I knew that whatever she was so busy with wasn't work. But if I didn't need her to do anything, I didn't really have any reason to complain about the hours she spent pouring her soul into social media or whatever she was doing. I was just eager to see my family again, and glad to know that if I ever needed something typed out at high speed, one of my employees probably had the right skills for the job.

"Good luck," I said with a smile as I left the office. "See you in the morning." And then I was on my way home, hoping that nothing had gone wrong for Tess and her friends today.