Macy lay on her back with her laptop on her stomach. The dimly lit screen reflected a woman with severe eye bags who was hunched over. Macy corrected her posture to rid the reflection of the double chin.

Are you wasting my time? Don’t waste my time she typed.

She clicked another message.

I said I wanted the yoga pants in dolphin blue not gray you fucking moron.

She checked her CashApp. @Dave74 had sent her $100. Brandy Melville Pajamas for my goddess read the note. She began to fill up her cart.

Macy did not need her pay pigs. Macy did not need the money. She had a job, one she hardly understood. She was an account manager for a tech company, ZippT, that dealt with selling personal data sourced from other companies. They had her dealing with all the North American partnerships. She had dreamed of getting into something more creative like copywriting, graphic design, or maybe even public relations.

“I think my political science major has given me a sense of creativity,” she had said during her interview.

The interviewer looked at her blankly.

“This is not a creative job. There will be many high level tasks that require focus in order to facilitate effective growth for this company.”

“I’ve used Excel before,” she said

She was hired the next day.

She didn’t know anything about data, she had the suspicion she was hired for her looks and charm. Men ask fewer stupid questions like, “How is any of this legal?” or “Where is the money we were promised?” when a beautiful woman is present. She hated the job. She hated the rote tasks. She hated the monotony. She hated her useless political degree and her 18-year-old self for telling everyone she wanted to be a lawyer. She didn’t really even know what a lawyer did; she just knew people respected lawyers and thought they were very smart. She now found herself as an adult with no interests and a job she hated.

Her boss, Steven, belittled her every day by giving her meaningless tasks because he could. Every day she would sit down at her desk in the open floor plan office in her cardigans and “funky printed” midi skirts. Her boss had a direct view of her computer, she felt his glaring eyes every time she opened a tab. Every day she would complete the ritual of updating excel sheets, update the weekly status meeting documents, and create Powerpoints for “internal use”. Once he made her move the logo on a slide about eight different times to “ensure” that the “branding” was “effective”. She felt the tears well up in her eyes as she moved the logo a centimeter each time. When she thought she finally finished, she heard a ping from her slack channel.

Seriously Macy?? Reliability is misspelled. Slide 4.

She excused herself into the bathroom for a quick power weep after this incident. Macy knew she was smarter than this, she knew how to spell ‘reliable’. She even had a bachelor's degree to prove that fact. 

Every day she would have to send out fifty to one hundred emails. “Hope you had a great weekend!” “Let’s circle back on this one.” “Aligned.” “Happy Friday!” Her boss scolded her once for using a smiley face.

“There’s a professionalism you need to follow as an account manager, people need to take you seriously, that kind of language is meant for the slack channel #awesometoday,” he said.

He also began to make Macy order the snacks for the office.

“I didn’t know that was a part of my job,” Macy muttered.

Steven later sat her down and explained the company was looking for a 'team player’ and that he noticed a “lack of hustle” in Macy. He was right, Macy was half-assing her job. Macy was barely awake most days, except the days she took her illegally obtained Vyvanse. But she admitted it wasn’t all bad. Now she could buy things, important things. Like expensive hand soap. She began to become surrounded by many expensive objects. Each thing gave her a sense of hope, if she kept working, she could get even more of them. She wondered if this mentality was how her own father was able to keep going at a job, he hated all these years. Macy felt guilty that her father had paid for her tuition just for her to slack off and hate her job. As she sat at her desk, she realized would make enough money to have her own child that would go on to hate their job one day. This somehow made her feel better.

Her closest coworker was the software engineer, Bryan, who was in a perpetually bad mood. He never smiled and was always looking at job openings on his monitor. Figurines of Marvel characters and unorganized papers covered his desk. She would often come to Bryan begging him to find ways to make these data companies the money they were promised by Steven. He always rolled his eyes and turned back to his computer with a dismissive, “I’ll see what I can do”. She once peered over his screen and saw him looking at job listings. 

Bryan once saw Macy cry in one of the stairwells. He tried comforting her by telling her it was ok because she is a woman and women often cry. He then told her he wanted Hippeas Cheddar puffs for the next snack order.

When she got home from work, she spent her evenings talking to her “little piggies” or the perverts online that sent her money. She didn’t even have to do anything but be mean to them, which she was actually really good at. Macy felt sort of bad for her piggies but she constantly justified her side hustle. So what if she used her sexuality to get men to give her money? That was basically the same thing as being an account manager anyway.

Her first and most important pay pig was a boy Daniel with a Snoopy profile picture. She had opened the message after a night of drinking. Her inbox was flooded with hundreds of messages after she had posted herself with a sword and a Holy Roman bible at the Renaissance Faire. She wore a long white dress and a flower crown. The caption read ‘me defending your offensive joke’. The photo had received a lot of attention on a space of the internet of weird men that really like war but could probably never physically fight in one. She began to read small portions of the endless sexually aggressive messages she had received. Until she saw one that began with I’m sorry. She clicked the message open to view it in full.

I’m sorry would you want a pay pig

What?

It’s a findom dynamic something you’d be into

She googled findom. She looked at her other two tabs MOHELA.com and SSENSE.com.

Send me $100 right now if you really want this

He did. From there, she expanded her clientele to about 11 different men. She earned money through her pay pigs alone to make rent and so often fantasized about quitting her job, but her pigs could not offer healthcare, let alone dental benefits.

She hadn’t heard from Daniel all day, which had made her sad. She had taken longer than usual to respond to his last message, but he had not even opened it yet. He was the most respectful to her. She was so naive back then she had immediately given him her real phone number. Since then, they have talked nearly every day, but never knew what he looked like. Now she picked up her phone and looked through their messages together, opening one exchange from last month.

Why don’t you take a graphic design course?

Yea I should probably or I am going to be stuck at these office jobs like my parents…Thanks for listening….

Are you naturally nice LOL

No, send me $5 for wasting my time you stupid fucking loser.

Macy sighed and put down her phone, hearing her three roommates laughing together from the kitchen. She opened her laptop once more and started googling graphic design courses. She stopped scrolling when she received a phone call from an unknown number.

“Hello?” She said.

She heard a woman wailing. “Is this Macy?” The voice cried out.

“Yes? Yes?”

“Oh Macy…Daniel is… has…. passed away just last night I’m so sorry we didn’t call you sooner,” she said.

“WHAT?” Macy shot up straight, banging the back of her head on the wall. She needed a headboard, she thought.

“I'm so, so sorry. I know we never met but Daniel used to talk so much about you.”

“Wait, who is this?”

“Daniel’s mother,” she said, “I know we never met but Daniel talked so much about you. I saw your number at the top of his texts and I thought I would let you know. Oh, I hate that we’re meeting like this. You can call me Catherine or Coco.”

“Coco…” She said slowly comprehending what was happening.

She and Daniel never talked about his family. She wondered if ‘Coco’ had ever read their exchanges with each other. She wondered if ‘Coco’ understood that her son enjoyed being degraded and humiliated and that ‘Coco’ was talking to the very woman who did this for him. But Macy figured they actually did have an important relationship, and as his findom she should be entitled to know about his passing. She might have been the most important woman in his life. She pondered that his mother may be a controlling psychopath who had led him to develop this sort of fetish. Maybe she herself was the only goodhearted, kind woman in his life.

“Yes dear, now we’re going to try to hold a fune-” She began to choke on her words, “a celebration of life but it was all so sudden, we need time to plan.”

“Of course,” Macy said sympathetically.

When Coco hung up the phone Macy sat and stared at the wall for hours. She couldn’t believe he was dead. Thoughts were spinning in her mind. Her first thought was she would have to get Darrel_Chevy81 to buy the Agent Provocateur set she wanted. Her second thought was disbelief that Daniel was truly gone. She felt an overwhelming sadness that someone close to her had died. She wondered if he killed himself because she had taken too long to respond to his last message. She began to wonder how he had done it. Pills? By cop? Autoerotic asphyxiation? Either way she felt proud that she may have been the only thing in his life that he had to live for. I’m really helping them at the end of the day, she thought.

Days passed; she couldn’t even pretend to be engaged in her stupid job. Memories of their time spent together overtook her ability to think. The one time she called him a worthless roach when he had bought her the wrong size velour sweatsuit. The one time she told him he was a pathetic cuck after he called her crying because she posted about going on a Hinge date. She winced at one memory of her saying he was not going to heaven because he was a genuinely bad person. Even though at the time this really aroused him. If she let her mind wander, she would be overcome with the shock and grief that Daniel was really gone. She started crying during a Zoom meeting with a client.

“I’m sorry I am just so moved by your company’s mission statement,” she cried.

“Oh that's- ok, well, ok,” the CFO of PlentyData stuttered.

She got home one evening and there it was, the invitation to Daniel’s celebration of life. She never knew what he actually looked like beyond the Snoopy profile picture. The picture on the invitation was him sitting at the computer giving an awkward closed mouth smile. He had white pasty skin and messy brown hair. His cheeks were covered with rosacea. His stomach folded over the seam of his khaki pants. He was adorable, Macy thought. She wished she could have saved him. If only she had responded to his last message more promptly.

Macy put on a black dress that Daniel had bought for her to attend his celebration of life. It was a Mui Mui puff-sleeved velvet mini dress she had paired with black knee-high socks and mary jane heels. She posted a picture of herself sitting with her legs tucked behind her in front of the mirror before leaving.

Coquette slay! @Ashhleyy commented. 

Dark angel …. @Mikey_Chang commented

She drove to the non-denominational community event center where Danie’s celebration was to take place. It ended up being an hour and half drive from Macy’s apartment. She never bothered to ask where he or where any of her pay pigs lived. She was surprised by the lack of religion in Daniel’s celebration. After all, he had been obsessed with Catholicism. She often even roleplayed as a very strict nun with him so she had assumed he had attended Catholic school. After she had posted the picture with the Bible he had assumed she was a Catholic herself and often tried to talk to her about it.

The infallible Magisterium of the Catholic Church could not have allowed for the egregious and spiritually barren changes made in the godless name of the Second Vatican Council Daniel had sent

Uh do you ever shut the fuck up? Give me $20 for this toaster on Amazon that I want Macy had replied.

Yes, Sister Deirdre Daniel had said.

Once she entered the non-denominational community center, she began to regret her decision to come. But as she turned around, she felt a warm and clammy hand on her shoulder.

“Are you Macy?” a male voice asked.

Macy turned around to a frighteningly skinny man who looked a bit like Daniel. He had long frizzy hair he had put into a ponytail.

“Y-yes,” Macy stuttered.

“I always joked around with Daniel that you weren’t real,” he smiled, then looked down at the floor in sorrow.

“Oh- I’m-”

“Macy, sweetheart!” Coco came up to Macy and encircled her with a firm hug.

“Coco…..” Macy whispered.

“I’m so happy. Daniel never let us meet his girlfriend because you were so long distance. I offered to buy you a bus ticket so many times, but he was always so stubborn,” she dreamily smiled as she recounted this memory.

Macy’s immediate reaction was to laugh in the mother’s face. Daniel was calling her his girlfriend to his family? She would never even consider being his girlfriend in real life. At best she used him as a therapist. Especially since her third Betterhelp therapist had ghosted her.

A gray-haired man suddenly took the microphone. “Let’s all be seated”

Coco linked elbows with Macy.

“Sit with us sweetheart,” she whispered softly.

Coco guided Macy to be seated next to Daniel’s gaunt brother.

Macy felt a deep sense of love and compassion from Coco. Macy had never felt this type of love from her cold German family. When she got the job at ZippT they didn’t even congratulate her.

“Well now you can buy nicer clothes,” Macy’s mother had texted.

Her father reacted with a “thumbs up” to the message.

“Now we are all gathered here to not mourn the passing of Daniel Michael Norris, but rather to celebrate his life,” the gray haired man spoke.

The projector flashed images of Daniel. Images of him working at a soup kitchen handing out food to the homeless, one of him at his DnD league sitting smiling with his friends, one of him with his arm around his freakishly skinny brother at the bar. Macy couldn’t believe it, she assumed he was some friendless loser whose only human connection was her degrading him.

“Daniel was only 31 when he passed, but his impact will be with us forever. From his service with Meals on Wheels, his recent involvement with St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Church, and his weekly DnD league with his friends Mike, Thomas, and Carlos….. he will greatly be missed….”

Macy tuned out the rest. She was in shock. He had an entire life he had lived- friends, families, love, heartbreak, tears, laughter. What would play in the montage of her life? They would have to screen her vile screenshots of messages between her pay pigs or pictures of her seductively posing for nameless people on the internet. She didn’t even do any charity work, she had only just thought about doing it.

She looked over to Coco. Coco put her hand over her heart as the gray-haired man spoke. She wore a black long-sleeve dress and a chunky silver necklace. She didn’t appear to be a ruthless domineering psychopathic mother. She seemed like she really loved her son.

After the ceremony ended, Macy had stacked up her paper plate with the free hors d'oeuvres offered. She heard a voice as she was reaching for a croissant. She turned around to see Coco and the bony brother approaching her.

“‘I’m sorry for the late invitation, it was all so sudden,” Coco said. “Just one day he was here and the next day….”

“He killed himself?” Macy said, putting her hand over her mouth.

“What? No, sweetheart. He died of meningitis,” Coco said.

“Oh right, right,” Macy said.

They stood silent for a moment. She felt the once sympathetic eyes from his family had become more suspicious. She felt frustrated Daniel had left her to deal with his own lie. But she didn’t want to humiliate him post mortem, even though he might have enjoyed that. So, she decided to keep rolling with it.

“So uhh you guys don't… believe in god?” Macy said, trying to pivot the conversation.

“Um not really,” his brother said, “so how did you meet Daniel?”

“Oh well we met….” Macy tried to think of something believable, “on a Final Fantasy chat room.”

“He never mentioned liking Final Fantasy,” his brother remarked.

“Certainly Minecraft. What was the other one? Skyrim?” his mother began to ponder.

Macy realized she would have to start finding an escape route quickly. What would they think of her if they knew? What would they think of Daniel if they knew? Why did she even come to this celebration of life for a pay pig? She looked around at his family dressed in black, with their mourning faces. Her cheeks began to burn.

“Well Daniel never mentioned that you were a bunch of atheists,” Macy sneered.

The brother and mother looked back at her with their mouths open. She had to keep going.

“This is not a proper burial,” Macy said. “Daniel deserved better than this”

Macy dramatically stormed out of the room, leaving a very confused, agnostic family to figure out what had just happened.

She ran through the parking lot to her car and began to rapidly drive away to flee the scene. As she drove away, she thought about Daniel. She had believed that Daniel and the rest of her pay pigs had needed her. But they were throwing away their money towards a lost cause. Macy needed them.

Macy thought about how if she died she would only leave behind a pile of fast fashion clothing. Her job would replace her with a prettier, younger account manager. Her father would thumbs down react to the text message that alerted him his daughter was dead.

She pulled over to the side of the road and rested her head on the steering wheel. She could change, she could make her life something worth living. She could sign up for a graphic design course. She could make meaningful relationships instead of hiding behind the internet. She could quit her job. She could throw her phone to the side of the highway. She cupped her phone in her hand forming a fist but suddenly felt her phone vibrate.

Degrade me goddess… i have sinned @Impracticaljokersfan88 messaged her

On your knees, piggy Macy replied.