I write erotica for a living. I have, on a number of occasions, received emails from people telling me how much they enjoyed my stories and asking what happened to me afterwards. I usually assume that they’re just looking for a little bit of bespoke pro boner bono jerkoff material, but some of them seem to genuinely not grasp the fact that they’re fictional stories. That I made up. With my brain-meat. For money.

I got into a discussion with one guy early on who wouldn’t let the idea that I was just writing up my sexual misadventures drop. I even pointed out that the girl in the story had a different name to me, at which point he replied: ‘I just thought you were shy.’

He genuinely seemed to believe that I’d written up something like an eight-person true-to-life BDSM gangbang scene (or whatever it was), but I hadn’t put my pen name on it (not even my real name, my pen name) because I’d suddenly come over all bashful.