Emergency Model (Patreon)

I've been a long time fan of the JD sports online webshop models, where they don't shy away from rougher looks and tattoos. At one point I got them in my tumblr ad rotation, so now I always get some bonus images of models with scally clothes on sale when I browse tumblr. So I saw this guy who looked very clean with a buzz cut and imagined that he really just was a university student earning some extra cash, and wrote a small caption for a discord.

So you get drafted into participating in a photo shoot almost by accident. Someone became ill and you happened to walk by the right person and had some hours to spare. They have a ton of clothes to shoot, so they need a certain minimum number of models to circle through the collection before the deadline. They have stylists on hand, so they give you a quick do-over. Buzz cut and fade, and someone with a tweezer pulling hairs from all over your head. You are handed a pack of socks and underwear to wear after your quick shower. Then it's a hectic cycle of dress, pose, undress, over and over. The shoot is over just in time for the deadline a few hours later. The shoot director thanks you and says you can keep the set of clothes you are wearing. In fact, he would like you out of there as soon as possible as they only rented the studio, so that's how you ended up walking home looking fresh but completely different than usual.

I didn't really know where to go after that. Someone suggested "Would be interesting to think about a group of lads coming, and they mistake you for one of their mates because of the gear you're wearing, but you decide to go along with them anyway" to which I responded with

Oh, no. You forgot your clothes, wallet, keys, and phone somewhere in that studio. Now it is locked. You did leave your email, so they probably contacted you through that. You ask the lads if they can help you with bus fare. At first they snigger about you wanting to pay, but then someone says he'll help you. Just a little favor first...

As I was thinking about it I preferred him making a faux pas and the guys deciding to mess a bit with him. The last part of the story isn't really that realistic, though still physically possible chain of events.

I toyed with the idea of shifting POV to Iwan at the end of the story to have him tell the other boys his plan that by the time the healing studs would come out of the ears after 30 days our main character would be out of school and part of their gang, or something similar. As always I prefer ominous prospectives over clearly spelling out a specific.

As always a ton of meaningless research. I went looking for some Welsh names this time and realized I had named like three people Rob in the story. I also completely misremembered the borders of Wales, so when I looked up bus routes and fare prices and looked at Exeter when something like Swansea would have been much better. And while 20G are more common for healing studs, 18G are possible. 18G are larger in diameter than 20G. Americans really shouldn't be allowed to make any measurement systems.