The Contract

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POV: Camille

“I’ll be your father figure. I drink that brown liquor. I can make deals with the devil because my dick’s bigger.”

I groaned, the noise echoing through my ears, my sleep mask still tucked over my eyes as I blindly reached over feeling for my phone on my nightstand.

If even remotely possible, the song started to get louder, as I blindly tapped for the stop to the phone’s alarm, praying that it would miraculously turn off. But alas, I couldn’t be so lucky. My fingers fumbled, missing the stop button, and it took me three times before I was able to finally silence it.

When I did, I groaned, plopping back first into bed and tugging off my sleepmask.

I should have been pressing my black skirt and ironing starch right into my collared blouse for my first day tomorrow, but I was doing anything but.

Instead, I was thinking about the crippling mounds of debt I had acquired, and wasn’t anywhere close to putting a dent in. Not with my first check at Vanderbilt Technologies. Not in a year of working there either.

Because the thing about Harvard Law School is—it’s expensive, really fucking expensive and it’ll put you in debt for life.

And right now—I was thinking of ways in order to chip away at that debt, before I even started the job I went to school for.

I know, I know it’s a bit premature—but your girls’ always been a dreamer, that’s why I went to law school in the first place.

When I was seventeen years old, my parents told me that they gambled away the money they promised to save me for college. I had graduated a year early from school, so all my hopes and dreams went down the literal gutter. But I’ve never been one to give up, hence getting admitted and graduating from Harvard.

I moved out, using the babysitting money I saved since I was fourteen to pay the deposit to a shitty studio apartment in the outskirts of Chicago. It wasn’t much—and it sucked eating instant ramen noodles every single night, but it was still my own. I worked as a waitress whenever I didn’t have classes at the community college.

I went to community college for two years, then applied to Northwestern for my undergrad and Harvard for law school. Somehow, I managed to earn two scholarships and financial aid while juggling a job as a waitress five days a week.

To say I didn’t sleep more than five hours a night—maybe six on weekends—would be an understatement. I practically lived off caffeine and sheer motivation for the last six years of my life.

When I grabbed my phone, fumbling it in my hands, before deciding to doom scrolling on a social media app, a call came through—a name lighting up my screen.

Jenna’s high pitched tone cut through the phone. “Good morning!”

I groaned, lifting the phone away from my ear. “You sound like you’ve already had three cups of coffee.”

I could practically hear Jenna smiling from behind the phone.

“That’s because I did. Did you just wake up?”

“Uh-huh,” I nodded, squinting my eyes from the glare of the sun.

“It’s your last day of freedom before your big girl job!” She sang out. “You should be awake—full of adrenaline—treating yourself to a mimosa or something not still laying in bed, Camille.”

I didn’t respond.

And of course Jenna knew what that meant.

“You’re thinking about your debt again, aren’t you?” she groaned.

Another beat of silence then, “Camille. Seriously?”

“I can’t help it,” I muttered under my breath, turning over to my side, pushing myself up against the backboard. “I think I’ll never be free. I might always live in this studio apartment…a permanent renter.”

“Cheer up, buttercup!” she clapped. “Your first day at Vanderbilt Enterprises is tomorrow and you’re going to be making over six figures. You’ll pay off your debt and then you’ll get a one bedroom apartment!”

“When you put it like that, it actually sounds like there’s hope,” I laughed, shaking my head.

“There is,” she reminded me. “Stop being so…glum. It gets me the ick.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’m so sorry that my internal agony gives you the ick.”

“Sorry,” she laughed. “I just think you need to do something else today—not think about debt for once. It consumes your every thought.”

“Before I even start my first job, I’m thinking about looking for a second,” I replied.

And it was true. I signed up for notifications on a job posting app. None of them paid well, and were probably physically impossible for me to work along with my first job. My best bet was getting a job as a bartender on the weekends.

“Girl, you’re not becoming a bartender. Imagine if your co-workers see you one weekend!”

“I’m not going to bartend.”

Another lie.

But Jenna knew better.

“Sure you won’t,” she said sarcastically. “That’s literally your only option.”

“Gee thanks,” I groaned. “But you’re right. You know me so well, Jen, and I—”

“Absolutely love me for it?” she laughed, and I could practically see her smug smile from behind the phone. “If I tell you something you promise you won’t judge me?”

I gripped my phone tighter. “Judge…YOU?”

“Promise you won’t, Camille.”

I tugged my hair back into a ponytail, like that would somehow prepare me for whatever admission Jenna was about to make. “I promise. I could never judge you, Jenna.”

“Fine, then I may have a solution to your money problems.”

I cocked an eyebrow. “Spill.”

Jenna took in a long breath, letting the exhale rush over the phone’s receiver, “a month ago I found this website. A website for contractual relationships with millionaires—billionaires. It focuses on discretion. These men value discreet relationships. You sign a contract based on certain stipulations and at the end of it you receive a lump sum of money for the arrangement. It’s unorthodox but that’s how I paid off my debt. In full.”