Wednesday – Katyushka Braginskaya Ms. Braginskaya likes them young. Or rather, she likes the seeming that they are young – naively pretty and need of guidance.
Matilda keeps a bag filled with pink lip gloss and VS Pink body spray and a pair of close fitting track shorts. When they got out for a meal, they seem like a young aunt and her niece (both of them quite the pair, as buxom as they are and Matilda takes mild glee in making waiters flustered with a calculated stretch). Never mind that Matilda just turned twenty seven but she could look just shy of legal with careful application of makeup and the right posture.
Ms. Braginskaya wants laughter and sweetness and softness – a complicated sort of thing that Matilda isn’t too awkward about giving, even when those lilac-blue eyes soften in dark memory and occasionally the cry is for “Natalya!”
In another time, Matilda might have been very happy with Ms. Braginskaya as a friend and sometime lover. They would have had proper dark coffee together, not fruit juice for Matilda and hot tea for Ms. Braginskaya, and swapped recipes (instead of Ms. Braginskaya making pancakes and staking Matilda’s plate high). In another life, if they had met in a coffee shop or a grocery store by chance, instead of a connection started with a call to a number on a pay by use phone…
That’s why Matilda checks the single painted nesting doll (the interior dolls all lost somewhere, supposedly) by the door for a neat roll of bills before she leaves.
Thursday – Arthur Kirkland Arthur Kirkland is her most difficult regular. He pays her well for her troubles at least.
He’s a self-professed “upper class twit” with a strange like for sweater vests and hats and carpet slippers. His lip always curls in an odd way as he says it and he looks at her as if expecting her to laugh at him. She doesn’t and she always has the impression that it’s a kind of test he likes putting her through.
Arthur seems to not quite know where she fits into his life. Maybe she’s the hired help; maybe she’s a visiting relation. Matilda has the feeling that he isn’t aware of this confusion.
There are times when he waves her to his library and tells her to “have at it” and disappears to another part of the house. She doesn’t mind too much and generally spends a happy afternoon looking through first editions and doing the odd reshelving in the process. Then there is the Arthur Kirkland who wears well-tailored though somber suits and takes her to concerts and champagne suppers, who has a razor edge smile that utterly transforms his harsh, dour features.
He doesn’t confess anything to her, not about himself, not about what they have. He doesn’t overtly flirt – if he does, it’s a wry banter that he fully expects her to snipe in reply. But there are moments, not necessarily when they are in that warm afterglow of sex - he looks at her with soft eyes and tilt his head and remark quietly, as if mostly to himself, how lovely her eyes are and how he understands soppy poetry a bit better.
She gets quite lovely though ostentatious jewelry from him – Art Deco brooches and glittering cocktail rings – and just as lovely lingerie – Agent Provocateur and custom boutiques. It’s done gruffly and yet kindly – the boxes slid across the table or left hanging by the door.
In her own way, Matilda likes him quite a bit – she realizes this because he gets on her nerves more than any regular client should. She suspects this may change should he ever realize the hovering emptiness of his house and seek to fill it for the long term.
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Roud #19526 [1b/1]
(Anonymous) 2013-09-11 05:46 am (UTC)(link)Ms. Braginskaya likes them young. Or rather, she likes the seeming that they are young – naively pretty and need of guidance.
Matilda keeps a bag filled with pink lip gloss and VS Pink body spray and a pair of close fitting track shorts. When they got out for a meal, they seem like a young aunt and her niece (both of them quite the pair, as buxom as they are and Matilda takes mild glee in making waiters flustered with a calculated stretch). Never mind that Matilda just turned twenty seven but she could look just shy of legal with careful application of makeup and the right posture.
Ms. Braginskaya wants laughter and sweetness and softness – a complicated sort of thing that Matilda isn’t too awkward about giving, even when those lilac-blue eyes soften in dark memory and occasionally the cry is for “Natalya!”
In another time, Matilda might have been very happy with Ms. Braginskaya as a friend and sometime lover. They would have had proper dark coffee together, not fruit juice for Matilda and hot tea for Ms. Braginskaya, and swapped recipes (instead of Ms. Braginskaya making pancakes and staking Matilda’s plate high). In another life, if they had met in a coffee shop or a grocery store by chance, instead of a connection started with a call to a number on a pay by use phone…
That’s why Matilda checks the single painted nesting doll (the interior dolls all lost somewhere, supposedly) by the door for a neat roll of bills before she leaves.
Thursday – Arthur Kirkland
Arthur Kirkland is her most difficult regular. He pays her well for her troubles at least.
He’s a self-professed “upper class twit” with a strange like for sweater vests and hats and carpet slippers. His lip always curls in an odd way as he says it and he looks at her as if expecting her to laugh at him. She doesn’t and she always has the impression that it’s a kind of test he likes putting her through.
Arthur seems to not quite know where she fits into his life. Maybe she’s the hired help; maybe she’s a visiting relation. Matilda has the feeling that he isn’t aware of this confusion.
There are times when he waves her to his library and tells her to “have at it” and disappears to another part of the house. She doesn’t mind too much and generally spends a happy afternoon looking through first editions and doing the odd reshelving in the process. Then there is the Arthur Kirkland who wears well-tailored though somber suits and takes her to concerts and champagne suppers, who has a razor edge smile that utterly transforms his harsh, dour features.
He doesn’t confess anything to her, not about himself, not about what they have. He doesn’t overtly flirt – if he does, it’s a wry banter that he fully expects her to snipe in reply. But there are moments, not necessarily when they are in that warm afterglow of sex - he looks at her with soft eyes and tilt his head and remark quietly, as if mostly to himself, how lovely her eyes are and how he understands soppy poetry a bit better.
She gets quite lovely though ostentatious jewelry from him – Art Deco brooches and glittering cocktail rings – and just as lovely lingerie – Agent Provocateur and custom boutiques. It’s done gruffly and yet kindly – the boxes slid across the table or left hanging by the door.
In her own way, Matilda likes him quite a bit – she realizes this because he gets on her nerves more than any regular client should. She suspects this may change should he ever realize the hovering emptiness of his house and seek to fill it for the long term.