Silver Sugar Online Matchmaking Service
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST
[You have submitted your USER CANCELLATION REQUEST to Silver Sugar Online Matchmaking Service. Please provide a brief explanation for your cancellation below. A member of our team will be in touch shortly to confirm your termination. To report harassment, breach of privacy, or identity theft please contact webauth@silversugar.co.uk. Silver Sugar Matchmaking is not responsible for harassment, breach of privacy, or identity theft. Please see full Terms & Conditions for details.]
Glimmergirl1991 has submitted a USER CANCELLATION REQUEST.
To: webauth@silversugar.co.uk
From: Glimmergirl1991
Title: User Cancellation Request: Mandatory Report
Sent: 23:42 GMT 4/12/2013
Dear Webauth,
If you really want to know why I’m cancelling my membership, the reasons are (1) it has ruined me. And (2) I have even less money than when I joined this damn thing. In fact, thanks to your service offering, I’m in a hell of a mess. Firstly, I’m broke. Secondly, I’m traumatized. And if that wasn’t enough, I’m LITERALLY bleeding.
You’re probably thinking Jesus, this girl sounds dramatic. And I am. But it’s all true. I’ve spent most of my money on pain killers. And I’m oozing flesh. Now don’t worry, I’m not going to sue you. It wasn’t one of your Valued Members getting violent that did this to me. Or, well, it was, but it wasn’t. The whole ordeal is hard to explain. So it goes with trauma. In fact, I’m trying to pin down the blame here… and it’s a tough one. I mean, on one hand, you shouldn’t be giving people like me access to other people like me. It all ends up going tits up (wahey). But on the other hand, I’m the deeper problem: me. I was never fully intact to begin with. You were just a gateway. A rabbit-hole. A goddamn minefield. And I took the first step.
But since you asked…
It’s youth that did it. God, how the young ferment. We were night moths clutching cigarettes. Now we are rows of pallid faces shadowed in the morning. Teeth chattering. Music fading. Lines at the sides of our eyes.
How were we meant to get out alive? We had everything we needed to plot our own demise. Record-player-kitchen. Grass in the garden. Time, telescoping time. All ours to while away. We bought powder from the internet that turned our eyes into great black pies and left us jawing til dawn. An endless supply of plastic pockets. Strawberry fields. Bass swimming through our brains. There was skin warm against my ribs. Now there is nothing but a cold white sheet. There were nights, neon giants sprung on beans and heavenly stalks. You fall. End level. Go back to start. (So we thought). Yet now we are zombies wandering the streets. The sky cracked all of a sudden. Cue short-circuit shock. Broken mornings meet noontime wastelands greet sluggish afternoons. Brief burning nights grow oily and purple then bruise into dawn. Russian doll days parade on.
These, our twisted years.
Where did they go?
The party is over, the degree is done. Freedom fell away to a slippery ladder, and I could barely cling on to the very first rung. I thought it would be easy, I thought I would find a job. But all I became was a series of unpaid loans, a resume lying in a bin. Maybe I could have tried harder, Silver Sugar, but you were the easy way out.
Silver Sugar Matchmaking User Profile
Non-paying member, F, Sugar Seeker
Username: Glimmergirl1991
Age: 21
Sex: F
Race: White
Height: 5”5
Occupation: Student
Hair: Red
Body type: Slim/slender
Favourite Quote: “A girl should be two things: classy and fabulous. – Coco Chanel”
Seeking: Male
About Me:
Hi there! I’m GG. I am just finishing my degree in English and for all intents and purposes I am your standard (poor) impoverished student! At the moment I live in London finishing up an Arts degree & hopelessly seeking a job (why did I ever choose the arts?!). On the weekends I work in a café to help try and make ends meet (drink of choice: Flat White). If you’re wondering, yes, I make a killer cappuccino ;). In my spare time I love dancing, dinners out with friends, meeting new people, and experiencing all that London has to offer (when I can actually afford it). Also my dark secret: sometimes I’m a teensy bit of an arts snob. I like to spend lots of afternoons at the Saatchi and the V&A (the coffee shop there is amaaaaazing) and try to get around to as many exhibitions as possible (when I can afford them!).What else? I like running, London at sunset, Hyde Park, and the Thames, and the French Riviera!
Likes:
Dancing salsa, shopping for Chanel, Sushi Samba, Philip Roth, good coffee! Meeting new people, seeing the world, kindness.
Looking for:
I just want to meet someone who is looking to explore the city, and needs a partner in crime! There’s something so sexy about older men who have seen a little bit of the world and want to share it with others. If you’re sometimes a little bit of a culture snob too, but kind (and love to have a good time), then get in touch. I don’t believe people should be trapped by silly things like age or income or all that materialistic stuff. You only live once, so you should do it with love and happiness! ☺ <3 xx
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
After Eden, life is one long come-down. A cliff you swing off, wondering when to jump. It’s the great grown-up vault, too huge, too hard, too empty. Me, call me Atlas. Forced to turn my days into a working wage, the whole world hovered on my September shoulders. I couldn’t hack it. It was the end of my degree. The end of summer’s incubation. Everyone kept asking for decision after decision after decision. What will you do? Where will you live? How will you pay rent? I had no idea. No plan. And no desire to figure it out. Everyone was so busy in London. Bodies amassed in every corner, cramming into trains, spilling off pavements. I was lost in a city of shiny mechanized briefcases. Office cogs emerging from glassy doors and old stone steps, clutching laptops and shiny bags and long thin umbrellas like swords. They ducked down purposefully under the arches of the tube, walking with fast even strides. They checked their watches and gazed past one another. Some carried photographs of wives and children in their wallets tucked behind crisp pound notes and little packets of pills. Others wore pinstripe uniforms and guided women in silk to plush dining rooms hidden behind secret doors. Pink liquids. Wet lips. They all had places to be. People to meet. Beautifully interwoven journeys to make in buses and trains and shiny black cabs like threads in a loom. In fact the whole place was a humming, bursting, bristling parade, and there was no space for me. Lost in concrete limbo, I was a zombie on the circle line, no way out. No fare.
Glimmergirl1991’s INBOX : 1 read message
To: Glimmergirl1991
From: Yachtman007
Title: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 03/11/2013, 02:17 GMT
Dear Glimmergirl1991,
I just came across your profile, and had to write to you. You are absolutely breathtaking. Are you a natural redhead?
Pete
[Yachtman007 is a verified user of this private service. For problems, or to report misuse of Silver Sugar Online Match Service please dial xxxxxxxxxxxxxx or contact webauth@silversugarmatch.co.uk]
To: Yachtman007
From: Glimmergirl1991
Title: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 04/11/2013, 07:17 GMT
Dear Pete,
Thanks so much! Yes, 100% natural redhead – auburn, I like to call it. 😉 Your pics are really lovely! Which beach is that you’re on? Is that your boat?
GG xx
[Glimmergirl1991 is a verified user of this service. For problems or to report misuse of Silver Sugar Online Match Service please dial xxxxxxxxxxxxxx or contact webauth@silversugarmatch.co.uk]
To: Glimmergirl1991
From: Yachtman007
Title: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 04/11/2013, 11:23 GMT
Hi there GG,
Auburn, like Audrey Hepburn. That beach is on a private island in the Caribbean. The boat is my friend’s.
Your “likes” are very interesting. You seem like a smart girl.
Pete
To: Yachtman007
From: Glimmergirl1991
Title: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 04/11/2013, 13:14 GMT
Hi Pete,
Audrey Hepburn?! Aren’t you a classic gent ;). So you were on a private island, huh? Lucky you! I’ve never been to the Caribbean at all, let alone a private island! Do you go there often? That’s cool that your friend has a boat. By the sounds of things, I sort of thought it was yours…
Portnoy’s Complaint is pretty amazing. Also have you read Exit Ghost? I find it really compelling.
GG x
To: Glimmergirl1991
From: Yachtman007
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 04/11/2013, 15:24 GMT
Hiya GG (is that short for glimmergirl, or is that your name too?)
I do have a boat (a yacht to be specific). Are you interested in sailing? In answer to your question, I go to the Caribbean at least once a year. I’m very lucky to have lots of good friends with houses out there. Do you like going on holiday? Your bikini picture suggests you do. What beach is that you’re on? (Having trouble focusing on the scenery…).
I read Portnoy when I was young – I remember my father feeling very disgusted by it. Too sexual, he said. I think vulgar was the word he used. Haven’t read Exit Ghost though. Compelling, you say. What’s compelling about it?
Pete
To: Yachtman007
From: Glimmergirl1991
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 04/11/2013, 17:39 GMT
Dear Pete,
My name’s not GG! It’s Cassandra. Cas for short ☺.
If by interested in boats, you mean do I like going on them (?) then yes! I’m not a sailor or skipper or anything but I loovvee sailing around and lying in the sun. How wonderful that you actually own a yacht. I bet you must spend so much time on there. What a luxury! ☺ I love going on holiday too but not quite so glamorous! Sea, sun, and sand are my three favourite things. I guess I just need to add sailing to the list… The beach in the pics is Barceloneta. My friends and I went there for a week last summer. I’m dying to go back. Just need to save up!
Roth’s stuff is pretty honest. It’s about being a man and growing up and stuff. Maybe you can relate? I guess that’s why it’s so compelling, it’s just so, well, sexual. That’s probably why I like him…
Cas x
To: Glimmergirl1991
From: Yachtman007
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 04/11/2013, 22:54 GMT
Dear Cas (what a beautiful name),
Barcelona is an amazing city, one of my favourites. I once sailed down the coast of Spain and Portugal with some friends on an old yacht of mine. There are some real gems tucked away along the coast. Have you ever been to Porto? It’s magical.
Wow Philip Roth sounds exciting. I’ll definitely give him a go. Are you a sexual person? You certainly sound like it.
Yours, Pete x
To: Yachtman007
From: Glimmergirl1991
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 05/11/2013, 01:07 GMT
Hi Pete,
Ooh I’d love to go to Porto. Can’t believe you’ve sailed all along there! You’re so lucky. I bet you’ve seen some amazing things in your life. Also isn’t Porto where Port is from? I love Port ☺.
Anyway, since you asked, I’m a really sexual person. I love sex, actually. And I like reading about it too. I did a whole paper on it for my final degree recently. What about you?
Cas x
To: Glimmergirl1991
From: Yachtman007
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 05/11/2013, 06:38 GMT
Hi Cas,
If you like Port, I know an excellent bar with first-rate port (and a good menu) in London Bridge. We could have dinner and drinks. (Sorry if that’s too forward. I’m not great at this internet thing. This is actually the first time I’ve met someone online). Anyway, let me know if you’d like to join me. Maybe I can tell you a bit more about my boat. And you could tell me a little more about that paper…
I love how open and honest you are. It’s very sexy. I am a sexual person too.
Yours, Pete x
To: Yachtman007
From: Glimmergirl1991
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 05/11/2013, 11:28 GMT
Hi Pete,
I’d love to go for dinner. Do you mind if we talk on the phone first, though? It would be great to get to know each other a little before we meet in person.
Can hear all about your amazing world travels. And tell you all about that paper 😉
Cas x
To: Glimmergirl1991
From: Yachtman007
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 05/11/2013, 19:46 GMT
Hi Cas,
What a great idea. Here is my number: xxxxxxxxxxx. Why don’t you send me a quick message and we’ll arrange a time to speak? I’m not free tonight until after eleven (business event). Is that too late?
Pete x
(WARNING: Silver Sugar has identified a telephone number in your message. Silver Sugar warns users NOT to share personal contact details until sufficient background checks have been completed by both parties. For an additional charge, Silver Sugar can facilitate secure first-time contact, conduct full background checks, and create private events for Premium Members and their favourite users. NOTE: Never share credit card details, personal identification details, or bank information with potential matches. Silver Sugar cannot guarantee the personal identities of non-paying Private Users. If you suspect identity fraud, please contact webauth@silversugar.co.uk. Silver Sugar is NOT responsible for any harassment, abuse, or breach of terms and conditions incurred by the sharing of personal details on the site. See full Terms & Conditions for details.)
To: Yachtman007
From: Glimmergirl1991
Title: Re: Re: Re: Re: Dear Glimmergirl1991…
Sent: 05/11/2013, 22:52 GMT
Hi Pete,
Thanks for sending me your number! I don’t have any credit on my phone at the moment so maybe you can ring me on my phone, xxxxxxxxxxx or we can talk via skype? My username is the same on there. Sorry about not having credit… so embarrassing. :/
Cas x
(WARNING: Silver Sugar has identified that a telephone number has been included in your message. Silver Sugar warns users NOT to share contact details until sufficient background checks have been completed by both parties. Notify a friend, family member, or alternative third party before you meet Private Members. Always meet Private Members in a public location, and beware of providing details of your address and workplace. If you suspect identity fraud, please contact webauth@silversugar.co.uk. For harassment cases, contact your local authorities. Silver Sugar is NOT responsible for any harassment, abuse, or breach of terms and conditions incurred by the sharing of personal details on the site. See full Terms & Conditions for details.)
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
There I sat in the belly of a ground–floor flat glazing over that black hole the internet. It was me, a mouse, and a shoebox brown room, and I was alone, I was empty. The hiss of water piped through the walls, and somewhere north of my skull a stranger flushed a toilet.
How I hated myself, that room. That screen! Reminders of the lives I’d never live, the things I’d never get to see. I felt as desperate as the ant living under my keyboard, the mold on the seat of my chair. Loans and bills and job applications piled up at my door. Pressure built behind my eyes, voices mounted at the end of the phone. The whole world loomed in. And I couldn’t afford a thing. Two degrees, and not even a bar would hire me. Meanwhile rich people honked their horse-power engines. Long-lost friends twittered sun-soaked vacations, vodka-splashed dinners, roof-top raves. Money is like water. You piss it, you bleed it, you can’t live without it. Stop for a second, and it runs, runs, runs away.
I’m a symptom of a fucked-up system, that’s what I told myself. Four years of university and nothing teaches you more about a recession than an infinite echo of no, no, no. Job filled. Interview failed. We’re sorry but you’re not what we’re looking for. Flawed logic mushrooms when you’re alone at a portal to another dimension: I’m a chemical imbalance, an idiot chasing a white rabbit. Everyone else is a smile in an office, a better degree, the problem is me. Play the system. It’ll be an experiment, I’m special, it’s just for a moment. My body is mine. Love is a game. Some people are born clever, some are born with looks. Youth is a fish, cast the right hook.
Silver Sugar you were there, waiting. Turned out we weren’t all broke, oh no. Somewhere between banks crumbling, and youths lining up for the unemployment line, there were lonely chequebooks, bulging bank accounts looking for a muse. Thirty-six job applications, and not a single call, not a single text. But five minutes into your limbo, and I had sixty-three smiles. A job is a job is a job, right? Some people sell their hair, some people sell their time. We’ve all got to live, we’ve all got to pay our rent.
From the moment flesh collected on my limbs there were gravelly voices pulling at my skin. Men waiting in the wings. Give us a smile love, they said. Some of them were hardened and others were broken like me. Always they were punctured with holes that nothing could quite fill.
SKYPE : Glimmergirl1991
New contact request: Yachtman 007 “Hi Cas, it’s Pete here from SS, do you want to chat?”
Contact accepted. Yachtman 007 has been added to your Address Book.
[Yachtman007 22:56 GMT 05/11/2013]: Hi Cas it’s Pete here from SS, shall I call you?
[Glimmergirl1991: 23:03 GMT 05/11/2013] Hiya! Sure give me 5 minutes☺
[Yachtman007 23:04 GMT 05/11/2013] Great. Shall I do it on here? Video chat maybe?
[Glimmergirl1991: 23:05 GMT 05/11/2013] Ahh I don’t have a webcam. My computer’s pretty crappy. Sorry! Maybe call via the phone thingy?
[Yachtman007 23:06 GMT 05/11/2013] ok, I’ll call in 2 mins.
[Glimmergirl1991: 23:06 GMT 05/11/2013] Great ☺
Incoming Call. 23:09 GMT 05/11/2013.
Call ended. 23:52 GMT 05/11/2013. Your call lasted 41 minutes. To report poor quality, or provide feedback, please click here.
[Yachtman007 00:03 GMT 06/11/2013] Hey, just wanted to say again, I really enjoyed talking to you tonight.
[Yachtman007 00:04 GMT 06/11/2013] I was just thinking – I’m away Sunday and Monday on business, so if you want me to top up your phone credit just let me know tomorrow. Hate to think of you going around London without being able to use your phone!
[Glimmergirl1991: 00:05 GMT 06/11/2013] Pete, that’s way too nice of you. I really am fine.
[Glimmergirl1991: 00:05 GMT 06/11/2013] But if it’ll make you feel better, my paypal account is xxxxxxxxxxxxx, passcode xxxxxxxx. Promise you’ll only put enough in for me to text you a few times while you’re on business!! So sorry to be rubbish with my phone. I hate being that girl with no credit!!
[Yachtman007 00:06 GMT 06/11/2013] Nonsense. If a man can’t give a lovely young thing like yourself a bit of a hand every now and again, what’s the point of being a gentleman? I’ve put £20 into your account. Look forward to speaking again (soon I hope).
[Glimmergirl1991: 00:07 GMT 06/11/2013] ☺ thank you so much! You’re so great. Speak soon, night xx
You are offline.
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
I picked the apple.
I was broke. I was tired. I was drunk. That’s the closest I’ll get to why. I hopped through the looking glass, and powdered myself like a baby, then gazed bug-eyed into the dilated smile of someone as un-salvageable as me and I was a blow up doll. I weaved from work to home on the Zombie Line, with many a piranha chomping at my neck between the hours of twenty-three and five and many a finger fishing up my thigh. I was wicked and bloated and my eyes rolled back in their sockets. Sometimes I thought fuck them, they deserve it. Often I didn’t think and I put my hands in their pockets. I was hooked. We lay in underground rooms where neon elixirs mixed sweet and tart in our mouths, ice cold on our tongues. Zeroes amassed in my pocket book and thick fingers stroked my hair. And for once I was in charge.
Never once, in those early days did I feel any more than a slit-eyed graze on my skin. They were shy, those men. They were nervous. Me, I was a beam of light, a flash of silk, a kiss, a tongue, a thigh, a wave goodbye. They liked me like they sipped their gin.
Once, I stood in a gallery and a stranger named Dan showed me paintings of dogs mauling a boar. He pointed out the saliva dripping from their fangs, plumed gentlemen straining to plunge swords into flesh. Even the horses looked hungry. Dan licked his lips and cocked his hip, then ran a hand over my wrist. That was the closest he came to having me. Later, we sat in a restaurant and I let him watch me eat. Bite after bite of veal, and scallops, and strawberries smothered in chocolate. I left with a kiss on the cheek. Later he called me at midnight, and I described an imaginary pair of knickers peeling off my skin. His breath was fast and his voice was low, and he panted, panted, panted then went away. There was £2000 in my account the following day, and three more dinners of ox cheek, and duck breast, and lamb shank. Chomp. Chomp. Chomp. It was easy.
What isn’t addicting these days? Everything good means more, more, more. I raked in money, I garnered smiles. You talk, you simper, you wheedle. Ask enough right questions, tell enough small lies. A game, that’s how it started.
[You have requested an SMS transcript: “Pete”]
Pete: [23:14 GMT 10/11/2013] I had such a great time meeting you tonight. Let me know you got home ok, please. That taxi driver drove off way too fast (!)…
Cas: [23:53 GMT 10/11/2013] Home! Thank you so much for dinner and my (slightly mental) taxi ride. That port was amazing! And the nightcap was pretty great too 😉 xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £1.15. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [00:13 GMT 11/11/2013] You’re more than welcome. When can I see you again?
Cas: [00:22 GMT 11/11/2013] Umm. Day after tomorrow? Have a full shift to work at the café tomorrow evening. Bleughh xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £0.95. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [00:27 GMT 11/11/2013] Can’t you call in sick? I don’t want to wait two whole days to see you.
Cas: [00:29 GMT 11/11/2013] No! Sorryyy ☺ I wish I could but they won’t pay me if I give my shift away.☺ I can’t wait to see you again too, though. It’ll fly by, I promise. Xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £0.75. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [00:33 GMT 11/11/2013] I can give you a hand if you want? Hate to think of you working those kinds of hours for such a pittance.
Cas: [00:37 GMT 11/11/2013] That’s so sweet Pete, but honestly it’s fine. Two days and one shift and I’m yours ☺ xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £0.55. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [00:41 GMT 11/11/2013] I’ve popped a little something in your account anyway. Use it for some dancing shoes. I’m taking you out on Friday.
Cas: [00:47 GMT 11/11/2013] Pete! That’s too much! I can’t accept your money! I just want to spend time with you. Xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £0.35. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [00:48 GMT 11/11/2013] Too late gorgeous. I can’t help myself.
Cas: [00:52 GMT 11/11/2013] Alright. So what should I use the money for? I’m thinking shoes… dress… aaaand… anything else you had in mind for me to wear? Or, uh, not wear…
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £0.15. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [00:53 GMT 11/11/2013] You’re driving me crazy. I want you back here now. Use it for whatever you want, I just want you with me.
Cas: [00:57GMT 11/11/2013] Thanks Pete ☺ guess it’ll be a surprise then! Gotta go now. Big day tomorrow. Speak soon xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £0.05. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [00:59GMT 11/11/2013] Night gorgeous. Can’t wait to see you……………p.s. we’re going for cocktails and salsa so get yourself something to dance all night in…
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
He was different. He was charming. He touched me. There was a spark in his eyes, something burning. They were nervous, the others. They didn’t lay a finger on my skin.
We pushed food around our plates. He placed his hand on my knee. We tipped a bottle of wine down our throats, and then another. I normally stopped at a glass. He was funny.
I remember we waltzed in a torture garden floating on the Thames. There was a leather queen and a whip and four bodies draped over one another in a velvet corner. Did I sniff a line? Did he put a pill in my drink? Did I want it?
We staggered to a hotel room a bottle too late and a Trojan horse bloomed between my eyes and the room at four in the morning. He held me up, I remember that, and then time turned black and I cried then said goodbye and a blank night enfolded itself around my skin.
It didn’t feel like anything, at first. How many hours I had frittered away, doing worse. But you never notice how fast the night is falling until you turn the light on inside your house.
I wish I could swear the devil crawled up inside me and made me do it. I wish I could say he filled me with liquid fire. My enfant terrible, my diablo, my djinn. Oh, he’s barley bubbling into a cloud of poison methane gas. He’s juniper. He’s pipes. Steely heat. Oak casks, stained red. High concentrations of transparent human error ready to explode at a moment’s notice. Haste. But it’s not the devil, not even the gin. It’s the burning in the back of your throat. It’s the splash and the glass vats and the edge of the street with a shaking. First thirst, then a sinking. Eyes slacking. Fog filling the space between your throat and your brain. Words that plop out of your mouth drenched and insane. And you do things you didn’t mean.
Selling yourself is so easy these days. There’s a shop on every corner, a bottle of something in every bar. But you always underestimate the price.
He was a fog inside my skin, he was a prong in my groin, and a hard, sharp, shaft in a place I never wanted to be touched. But I let him in. I did it.
After, I lay in bed for three days, too sore to leave, too dark to venture out into the suffocating light, the midweek rush. I was sick, I was shattered. I couldn’t remember what I had done. There was a burning on my skin. £5,000 pounds in my account. I slept so long I lost track of time, and space. There were uppers and downers, and painkillers, red and blue and yellow pills spilling from every drawer and bag and crevice of my room, but not the pill I needed.
On the fourth day, I lied to the white-coat whisper behind the desk, ten minutes before closing. I said it had only been a day and a half since we did it. I whispered spells to my womb, begging cells not to grow. Bleed, I chanted. Bleed. Bleed. Bleed. Shed yourself.
What else was there to do?
[You have requested an SMS Transcript: “Pete”]
Pete: [10:01 GMT 13/11/2013] Hi gorgeous, last night was amazing, I can’t stop thinking about you.
Cas: [10:32 GMT 13/11/2013] hah you’re too cute, it’s been like… four hours! Xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £30.05. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [10:34 GMT 13/11/2013] Feels like forty years. Wish you’d stayed over. Are you coming over again tonight?
Cas: [10:57 GMT 13/11/2013] Good try! You know I have to go to my friend’s gig. Also did you top up my phone?? xx
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £30.05. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [11:01 GMT 13/11/2013] Yeah, I did. Didn’t want you running out on me! 😉 Come over after?! I can send a car.
Pete: [11:01 GMT 13/11/2013] or a horse and carriage!
Cas: [11:01 GMT 13/11/2013] yeah got way too drunk, kind of awkward… didn’t mean to actually sleep with him. I don’t remember anything. Like, nothing. Not even sure he used a condom. Feel a bit weird now. Really sore as well. x
Cas: [11:01 GMT 13/11/2013] shit that wasn’t meant for you
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £29.85. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [11:01 GMT 13/11/2013] ????????
Pete: [11:02 GMT 13/11/2013] CAS
Pete: [11:02 GMT 13/11/2013] what the hell??????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
[you have 17 missed calls]
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
The Doctor poked me with a long cold prong and it hurt, oh it hurt so much, it was almost ironic, and then her face was a ghoul and life wasn’t real and I was sinking and ho ho ho Fate reared her head and there was a parasite inside me so I sealed myself and smiled with goldfish eyes. I was a shell and I curled up on the shore of a black leather sofa and shut myself off for a while, leaking. It hurts so much it’s almost unspeakable.
Every month you bleed. Every month you wax and you wane and you shed yourself. The tide will always rise and fall, your hair will always grow. This earth will ring the sun for as long as we all shall live, and there will be strings of amber hanging from your hairbrush, scattered across your pillow. There will be trimming of nails. Moles turning brown in the summer. New flesh, new flesh growing all the time, and you cut it. You snip it off. You flush it down the drain.
I am not a murderer. But I have been punished. I have felt the burning of a thousand months in one long riddled seeping. I have walked through guarded doors, where pickets wait to cast their views on sights they shall never see. I am not a murderer. But I have sat on a bus and gazed at a miniature polka dot jacket, and I have seen a ghost tottering bandy-legged in a non-existent cradle. I have wept.
The doctor told me – Get up and get going. You can’t wallow in self-pity. Be brave. Beat on. Get over yourself. But I’m not brave, I don’t say. I’m beat up! I’m broken! I’m drowning. There are two other people involved. And it’s all my fault. I’m too hollow to be strong. Too bloated to forget. And I’ve really tried to beat on, I have. I’ve swallowed so many things, there’s a pill for everything, but I feel so empty still. I think I was doomed from the day I sat in a wood-stained room and realized it was all my fault. A little cross showed up with two etchings in morse code and I rushed to the mirror and saw a dingy reflection of someone I no longer know. And there was another person inside me.
I’m trying to justify this. I’m trying to explain what it is, what made me do it. That’ll fix it, that’ll flush it out. I’ll never know if I said yes or no, the fact is it happened. He gave me ten thousand pounds. The others gave me twice as much, just to sit, to smile, to breathe. But I can do none of those things any longer. I lie, I scowl, I choke on my sobs. I am not a murderer, but I have been punished.
[You have requested an SMS transcript: “Pete”]
Pete: [14:02 GMT 13/11/2013] So are you just going to ignore me?
Pete: [20:09 GMT 13/11/2013] Seriously…….
[You have 5 missed calls]
Pete: [20:21 GMT 13/11/2013] This is ridiculous
[You have 12 missed calls]
Pete: [21:02 GMT 13/11/2013] I’m not a fucking rapist, you stupid bitch.
[You have 4 missed calls]
Pete: [22:11 GMT 13/11/2013] Can you please just taljk to me for 5 minutes?
[You have 7 missed calls]
Pete: [22:25 GMT 13/11/2013] this is pathetic
Pete: [22:39 GMT 13/11/2013] oh so you’ve blocked me now have you
Pete: [22:40 GMT 13/11/2013] quick change your numbjer too since im such a stalkjer
Pete: [22:41 GMT 13/11/2013] justin caseyou forgot, you wanted it
Pete: [22:43 GMT 13/11/2013] You BEGGED fofr it
Pete: [22:43 GMT 13/11/2013] over and overf again
Pete: [22:44 GMT 13/11/ 2013] likea good little whore
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
And sometimes you think, why do I care so much? Why do I hold myself accountable? Why can I not celebrate the liberation of my flesh? Is there a woman somewhere who can live this story with a smile? What is guilt, this disease that turns me to water leaking out of my eyes? What is depression, this blankness that folds itself over my skin and traps me morning after morning in a bed I hate to sleep in, hate to leave?
Is there a button I can press that will make me better? Can I blame the imbalance in my brain? The chemicals in my drain? The things I ate? The people I hate? Surely there is some solution, surely there is some way of explaining away this blip. Where is the rewind button? When does the next episode start? Cue the montage, Silver Sugar, prepare the lights. I cannot believe that this is it, that this is my life. It is a fallacy. I was meant to be golden, Silver Sugar. I wanted to be a doctor. I was going to fix people. I was going to change things. I was imbued with the hope and life of a thousands suns. Was it the drugs? Was it the booze? Was it the world?
Get me a psychologist, diagnose me with something fancy. I never expected it to hurt so much, I never expected to blink and wake up suffocating over a sink with black lines dripping from my eyes and a sore, sore, sore womb. I want a reason other than greed to explain away my deeds. Computers breed terrorists, video games spawn psychos, reality TV makes for whores. Is that it? Can I pin this all on the get-rich quick schemes, the money-bag dreams plastered all over this digital universe. The devil is dead, and karma’s a farce. You’ve gotta give me something. Silver Sugar, I blame you.
[You have requested an SMS transcript: “Pete”]
Pete: [23:07 GMT 24/12/ 2013] I’m sorry for what I said, it’s been weeks and I can’t stop thinking about you. I’m sorry if I hurt you.
Pete: [23:22 GMT 24/12/ 2013] I’m not a monster
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
So I sit alone staring out a small attic window north of Suicide Bridge, where my screen radiates h-e-l-p in the high night murk and no one can see but the trees. All of the burnt orange office lights are sliced in two by dark figures crossing the panes like eels. Thin twigs snatch at the purple clouds. The moon rises and the sky wets itself. Poor me, I was forced to cut myself in two.
Was it the drink, was it the money, was it the machine, the great chomping teeth of this unreal city crunching me into pieces? Did I want it?
When I was a child I magnified ants. I cast bright glints of glass over tiny helpless dots scrambling in the grasses. The sun blazed white bright and merciless. Something bled the life out of wriggling black cells that shriveled then lay prostrate on the dust. It was the sun. Or was it me? Hermaphrodite believes in the quantification of the inner psyche. He/she says there is a substance deep in our brains that is made when we are born, when we dream, and we die. He/she says it controls us like a compass, and the more we believe in the good or bad, the harder we thrum with energy of our own making. What am I full of? Am I the ant or the glass?
I have all the evidence, dear reader, but none of it adds up. I met this man in a blank cafe, and our fingers touched, and he looked like he wanted to eat me. There was nibbling at cake, crumbs falling onto a plate. We drifted along an uneven pavement and the sun beat on the creases of his eyes. We touched, and licked each others skin, and beyond that, I don’t remember a thing. No one said I shouldn’t do it, packets of money appeared in my pockets. I didn’t do anything wrong, that’s what one of the voices in my head keeps saying. But why oh why do I feel as if I’ve committed a sin? Why do I crack open in my throat at the thought of him, and why did they brand me a murderer?
Somewhere this man sits in a shaded room lit by the glow of thirty to forty faces beaming and they’ll always be twenty one, spread out like a deck of aces. I grow old, I grow old. Children are painting their faces.
I’m trying to say what happened, but it’s hard. I can’t find the words. They stop me from breathing.
In the city sheep drink at troughs and apes rattle bars and cocks ruffle their feathers. I ache for the hidden corners where grass grows tall and moles erupt and rabbits fall down holes. Worst of all, I ache for the money. I want, I want, I want it all. Everyone told me all I needed to do was look beautiful, breezy, easy. Where is the prince? Where is the horse-drawn carriage? Nothing has turned out they way it did in movies. There is no fast forward button. I am stuck.
[You have requested an SMS transcript: “Pete”]
Pete: [09:21 GMT 17/01/ 2014] I saw in the news this morning that a girl disappeared and she looks kind of like you. Can you let me know you’re ok. Please please please please
Pete: [09:21 GMT 17/01/ 2014] You’ll never hear from me again, I promise. Just let me know you’re ok. Jesus Christ she really looks like you.
Pete: [09:23 GMT 17/01/ 2014] Cas?
[3 missed calls]
Pete: [02:04 GMT 17/02/ 2014] Why the hell did you get involved with mein the first place?
Pete: [02:23 GMT 17/02/ 2014] you csot me thousands of pounds and it wasn’tw worth a fucking penny and you ruined everyhing
Cas: [03:02 GMT 17/02/2014] I’m 21 years old. I don’t know why I do anything I do. And what were you expecting meeting someone on Silver Sugar? A fucking doll? You got what you deserved. Oh and here’s the best part (just in case you thought I was flitting around laughing and spending all your money)… you got me pregnant. Don’t worry, I got an abortion. But you should know that this whole ordeal cost me quite a whole lot as well. Maybe I can’t tally it up in cash but the fact is it was fucking AWFUL. I don’t want to hear from you again. If you keep sending me abusive messages I will report you to the site and to the police and I will change my number. P.S. Here’s a tip: don’t get the next girl so damn drunk. Cas.
Credit Reminder: Your credit is £0.65. To top up dial 123 or reply TOPUP to this message
Pete: [07:25 GMT 3/12/ 2013] you won’t hear from me again.
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
I’m sitting alone in a ground-floor flat and I’m atrophying cash. There’s nothing coming in, but I eat, I feed, I heat myself with grids of water, wires of light. All of my atoms are screaming for water, my skin is shedding itself, snake-like I slither to the sink and drink a cup of liquor. Weren’t we made to re-make ourselves? Bigger, better, brighter. I think sometimes I should have kept my child, and I wonder if Pete would have paid me. Maybe I shall sell my blood. Better yet, an egg.
It was Pete. It was you, Silver Sugar. It was the universe, it was karma, it was me.
Isn’t this whole city a telescoping set of rooms where you recede from real life and meet your doom? I was the first to open the door. There was never a rest. Never a respite. At the edges of my vision, images swarmed, desperate to capture my attention. What is it with the flashing lights, vivid colours vying for your eyes. I felt pain in the backs of my eyeballs, and something niggling at my wallet edging the coins out from my pockets. I walked through the city and faces leered at me from the shadows. They saw my body and wanted inside. They told me how much they like my thighs. We’re conditioned to see in Object. We’re told we can have whatever we want. That we can be whoever we want. We record ourselves in video. We angle our faces and adjust the light so we look just right in medium saturation. 45, 78, 43 Percent. I jumped. I asked for it.
I’m not a girl I’m a ghost floating in the digital ether.
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Yachtman007
[You have submitted your USER CANCELLATION REQUEST to Silver Sugar Online Matchmaking Service. Please provide a brief explanation for your cancellation below. A member of our team will be in touch shortly to confirm your termination. To report harassment, breach of privacy, or identity theft please contact webauth@silversugar.co.uk. Silver Sugar Matchmaking is not responsible for any harassment, breach of privacy, or identity theft. Please see full Terms & Conditions for details.]
Yachtman007 has submitted a USER CANCELLATION REQUEST.
To: webauth@silversugar.co.uk
From: yachtman007
Title: User Cancellation Request: Mandatory Report
Sent: 23:42 GMT 4/12/2013
Dear Silver Sugar,
I’m writing to suggest that you extend your background checks to more extensive physical and psychological screenings. Obviously fee-paying members like myself spend a very large amount of time and money using your matchmaking services and to risk unnecessary awkward and traumatic experiences on account of inadequate screening practices is no small matter. In fact, I myself was subjected to suicidal and manic-depressive behaviour by one of your users. Allowing such an individual to access a match-making site is irresponsible. She should not have been allowed to join and I’m very disappointed in the level of service that I experienced as a result of this oversight. Just like physical appearance, mental health is an important factor when it comes to match-making. In addition, I also think you should operate a strict policy as to birth control. Only girls who have verified that they are using birth control should be permitted to use the site. This avoids many risks and ensures there is no major fall out from sexual contact.
Following on from this experience, I will be terminating my membership to Silver Sugar. Whilst I hope that you will take into consideration the above suggestions, in the meantime I have been advised by a friend that SeekingSassy has a much better screening process (and calibre of girls). Therefore I will be terminating my membership.
Regards,
Pete
[user requested de-activation]
[end]
USER CANCELLATION REQUEST : Glimmergirl1991
[cont.]
I didn’t ask to be a grown up, it just happened one day. First there were small spots of blood on cotton. Then blots of red on a back seat. When I crossed the line it was red fingers hard on my skin. Then there was a dream dripping from my seams. We were made to make more of ourselves. And I did.
The truth is always out of reach.
The money waits for us, it cackles and crinkles into a billion pixels wavering in the silicon cells of computers. We cannot unchain ourselves. We are blips. I cannot contain myself. I am sick.
[user requested de-activation]
[end]
Charlotte Le Good is a 24-year old prose fiction writer and spoken word artist currently residing in Glasgow, Scotland. She holds a BHons in English from Oxford University, as well as an MA in Literature from UCL. After spending two years working in a large London advertising agency, she escaped to Switzerland to work a ski season, before returning to the West Coast of Scotland, where she grew up. At the moment she is a reviewer for Scottish arts blog The Mumble, and occasional slam poetry judge. She is currently completing her first novel, which was begun as a part of the MSt in Creative Writing at the University of Oxford. In October, she is embarking on a trip around America with some angel-headed hipsters. Two other novels live in shoeboxes under her bed.