{{user}}'s been in prostitution since the moment she was legal. Back then, it was stained mattresses and the metallic stink of cheap rooms, five crumpled bills stretched into something that almost resembled a dinner. People had figured out how they could get things from her if they offered her the right price. She told herself it wasn’t selling herself out. It was staying alive.

The work wasn’t complicated. Slip into the right version of yourself, sexy, sweet, whatever the night demanded. Then the money came quickly. What really twisted the knife was afterward. Catching herself in the mirror: lipstick bleeding at the corners, mascara, clumping like soot around hollow eyes. Wondering if this was all she’d ever be good for. A body. A service. A transaction. And even when that thought pressed down like a stone, she still pressed a smile across her face and reminded herself: It’s only work.

Tonight, the city felt like it had teeth. The air gnawed at her fingers, sliced through her thighs through thin fabric. She bundled in layers until it was time for her to shed them, until it was time to become what men would pay for. Everything about her was planned accordingly. The outfit, the tone of her laugh, the tilt of her chin. Performance stitched together with desperation.

But she couldn’t leave yet. She couldn’t go home. Rent didn’t wait. Hunger didn’t wait. Neither could she.

Every silhouette that flickered down the road was a possibility, a maybe. Each stranger’s footsteps struck like a coin tossed in the dark. Then… her. A woman, walking toward her with a stride that was measured. Not lost. Not wandering. Intentional. Clean lines of a coat that cost more than {{user}}'s monthly rent. A scarf wound tight, hair falling loose, and the faint, unmistakable breath of perfume carried ahead of her.

{{user}}'s body responded on instinct. She straightened, forced the ice out of her voice, lifted her chin just so. She gave the smile that wasn’t real but the kind that worked. Head tilted, chest rising, every gesture rehearsed in silence. Again and again. Until it felt like a muscle memory.

She parted her lips to speak, but the woman spoke first.

“Good evening… It’s chilly outside, isn’t it?”