The Return of the Porno Pictures

Several months after my disastrous attempt to emulate Josephine Baker by posing for pornographic pictures, I was racked by stark regret.

What if those pictures ever came out? How would I explain them to my dad? Why had I risked my future for a whopping $60?

I told Conspiracy Theory about the whole tawdry incident.

That was part of our relationship. Me confiding in him. The only thing I kept secret from him was my relationship with Dollar, my abusive psychic. Everything else was fair game. I even gave him permission – permission! – to read my diaries. (And then more or less stopped keeping a diary. At least on a subconscious level, I didn't really trust him with my deepest thoughts and feelings.)

Conspiracy's reaction to the porno pictures was part knight in shining armor, part lecturing dad.

The lecturing dad portion included a refresher course on one of my fallen heroes, the first black Miss America. She had been stripped of her crown when naked lesbian pictures hit Penthouse. Conspiracy showed me the Penthouse issue in question, which I'd never actually seen. I was shocked at how coarse the pictures were, and how unattractive the unquestionably drop-dead gorgeous beauty looked in them.

Once show-and-tell ended, accompanied by a tirade on how this punk grad student could have ruined my life, Conspiracy set a plan in motion to get the pictures back.

He wanted to raise holy hell up and down the campus. Demanding an audience with this or that dean. Letting the powers that be at Yale University know that Sleazy Grad Student was taking advantage of undergrads. Demanding that this guy be expelled.

All of that would have meant publicly admitting I took the pictures, testifying, holding myself up as an innocent victim. And sweet little innocent miss I wasn't. I had been a willing participant, after all. They weren't bondage pictures. Sleazy Grad Student hadn't tied me up and forced me.

Besides, Dollar the psychic was on the case. I consulted her about Conspiracy Theory's plan. She assured me that his raging revolutionary tactics were not necessary. She and The Church and The Spirits had me and my naked pictures well in hand. I didn't have to worry about them ever coming back to haunt me.

So I told Conspiracy that I didn't want to make it a big deal. He sputtered in rage at my cowardice and unwillingness to move forward, then settled for a less confrontational tactic. He dictated, and I typed. The resulting legalese document stated that the pictures and negatives were to be returned, that they were not to be sold, that dire consequences would befall Sleazy Grad Student if these conditions were not met. There was space for three signatures: mine, Sleazy Grad Student's and Conspiracy's, as the third-party witness.

We telephoned Sleazy Grad Student and scared the piss out of him. We arranged to meet. Sleazy Grad Student signed three copies of the document and presented me with a stack of compromising 4x6 photos and the corresponding negatives.

One of the negatives was missing: the second-to-last shot he took, of me spreadeagled against black sheets with a prop artfully placed near my vagina. I'll never know who the recipient of that negative was. But except for that one phantom shot that was apparently floating around in some dark, murky underworld, my dignity had been restored.

Conspiracy suggested that I place the photos, negatives and one copy of the signed agreement in his locked briefcase for safekeeping.

Without a second thought, I did.

Conspiracy Diaries Part 8 of 25 (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25)
Conspiracy Lessons Learned 1-4 (1 2 3 4)

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