Post by ARI ♏ on Nov 18, 2012 23:19:43 GMT -5
| [atrb=border,0,true] [atrb=width,400,bTable] [/style][style=float: right; margin-top: -8px; border: 4px solid #2E1B0F; height: 68px; width: 70px; border-radius: 3px; background-image: url(http://i1101.photobucket.com/albums/g439/dezerare/Ryoushi%20Morino/o21.png);] {{ AND I'VE LEARNED TO LIVE – HALF- ALIVE. [STYLE=margin-left: 0px; padding-left: 13px; padding-top: 40px; padding-bottom: 3px; font-family: helvetica; font-size: 10px; line-height: 12px; color: #171007; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: -1px; border-left: 15px solid #2E1B0F; margin-top: 40px; margin-right: 0px; text-indent: 10px;]█ The maid retained her steady scowl as she flicked the feather duster this way and that, attempting to brush off the most of the dust from the delicate display of china on the shelf. Lilith couldn’t understand the point of owning a tea set and not using it, but apparently, when you were rich, all you wanted to do with your teapots and teacups was put them on display and leave them to gather dust. It was utterly pointless, in her opinion. When the lady of the house had ordered her this morning to attend to her precious collection of china, it had been all Lilith could do to not ask her why they didn’t just simply use the cups instead of leaving them to become dirty. Only by pressing her mouth in to a thin, firm line had Lil been able to keep herself from telling the lady just what she really thought. That was her problem; her inability to keep her strong opinions to herself. It was one of the main reasons why she had lost so many jobs before coming to the Nakamura manse. In the end, she had always ended up telling her employers just what she really thought about them and the stupid, pointless tasks they set out for her, and been fired instantly. It didn’t help that she considered the wealthy class spoiled and useless, and felt that they gave themselves airs. No matter how much money they had, that didn’t make them better than her, even though they all seemed to think so. Lilith might have gone ahead and told the Nakamura lady just what she thought of her anyways. But, in the end, the reminder that she had been working here for six months had held her back. Six months was a long time, especially since she was used to jobs that, if she was lucky, ended up lasting three months. Already, she had toed the line far too much, but Lil knew that if she did directly talk back to the mistress of the house, then she would most definitely lose her job. She told herself the reason why she hadn’t been fired yet was because the Nakamuras recognized what a hard worker she was, but secretly, she suspected a different truth. It wasn’t that she was such a good worker that she remained a part of the household; more like because of the intervention of the youngest son of the gentleman and lady of the house. She couldn’t really understand why he would do such a thing, and demand no payback. When rich people did something for you, invariably, they always wanted something in return. Nothing came free from them; there was always a price. And yet, six months later, the green-haired boy still had yet to ask her for anything. The rest of the family ordered her around like no tomorrow, as they did with the rest of their maids, but he scarcely ever asked anything of her, and when he did, it was always with utmost shyness and politeness. Lilith wasn’t used to being treated that way by the wealthy. The daughters always made the most ridiculous demands and treated her as if she were some kind of dog, while the sons were more interested in getting her out of her maid outfit than in treating her with respect. To be honest, his mannerism confused her. And try as she might, she couldn’t seem to shake off the memory of his bright, warm, deep-green eyes looking at her, or the odd little skip that her heart seemed to do whenever he was around. Giving the duster one final flick, Lilith gave the china one final inspection before nodding to herself. It would do. It was only china, who really cared anyways. It wasn’t like anyone was going to be drinking out of the cups anytime soon. “Lilith!” She heard an imperious voice call out her name. The female mentally groaned, before crossing her arms across her chest and turning around, not even bothering to hide her scowl which oh-so-boldly proclaimed her discontent. Sure enough, the matriarch of the family stood behind her, a little bit away so as not to come too close to the lower-class maid. As usual, she dressed with utmost care and style, her high-collared shirt and jacket matching perfectly with the long, sweeping skirt. Lil spotted a pair of buttoned-up shiny black boots peeping out from below the skirt. Lilith hated those boots with a fiery passion; the last time she had had to clean them, it had taken her near half a day’s work to scrub off all of the mud. Judging by the ensemble, the lady was going out riding. Lil could only hope that she wouldn’t be going anywhere muddy. “Yes, ma’am,” she said, her tone unimpressed. The lady of the house eyed the girl discontentedly in return. The difference was, she was allowed to express her displeasure openly. Lilith was supposed to hide it, put on a pretty smile, and bob out a curtsy whenever the Nakamura lady appeared. “I don’t like that tone you’re using. Also, get that horrific scowl off your face,” “Yes, ma’am,” Lilith replied, attempting to tone down her tone and expression, and only succeeding a little bit. “Are you done with your dusting?” the lady inquired, before moving right along. One daintily gloved hand came up to adjust the veil hanging down from her top hat. “I should hope so. The ballroom floor needs scrubbing. See that you attend to that quickly. I’ll be going out riding,” With those curt orders given, the lady turned around and swept out of the room, her skirt swishing softly as she did so. Lilith breathed in deeply through her nose. Fantastic. More work. Just what she had wanted. Never mind the fact that she hadn’t eaten since six o’clock this morning and it was early afternoon now. No, who cared whether her stomach was full or not; she was, after all, just a maid. Returning the duster to a nearby cupboard, Lil promptly retrieved a battered wooden bucket and filled it with water. Lugging it in to the ballroom, being very careful not to spill a drop, she set it down and then departed to find a scrub brush. If memory served her right, the last maid to use it had left it in the kitchen. Lilith figured that she might as well coerce the cook in to handing over some food while she was there; she wasn’t going to starve herself just to scrub some floors. Upon entering the kitchen, however, it turned out the cook wasn’t there. Instead, a group of young men lounged about, leaning against the counter, sitting on the worn wooden table, or resting on a chair. It was immediately obvious that they were well-born. Only the rich could dress so well, and only the rich could have the same high-and-mighty, smug attitude these boys had. A quick glance told her that they had left a mess of everything; crumbs everywhere, half-eaten food, cluttered cutlery. Lilith decided to just cancel her plans of getting a meal and get out of here as quickly as possible; anything to avoid having to consort with spoiled rich brats. The green-eyed boy sat quietly in his seat amongst the rest of the males. He quickly glanced up at her when she entered the room, bangs brushing across his green eyes, but just as quickly glanced back down when her gaze flickered briefly to him. The rest of the men in the room weren’t as shy. Lilith felt their eyes on her as she marched across the room to the cupboard, flinging it open and mercifully finding the scrub brush inside. Her scowl fixed firmly in place in case they should keep looking her way, the female closed the cupboard and turned around, only to find her path blocked by one of the taller members of the group. Rich brats. They were all the same. “Excuse me,” she told him bluntly, looking him directly in the eye, non-too amicably. Of course, he didn’t move. Bloody rich brats. Tilting his head to the side, he smirked at her. “Excuse me, what?” She was very tempted to just stomp on his foot right then and there, shove him out of her way, and stride right out the door. After wrestling with the idea for a moment, she gritted her teeth and forced out, “Excuse me, sir,” The male laughed, but remained implacably in her way. Looking over his shoulder, he raised his eyebrows at the rest of his group. “Rude one, isn’t she? Is she yours, Deki?” The green-eyed boy’s gaze darted nervously to the other male. “N-no- that is to say, y-yes- she, uh, she works here-” The other male laughed again, as did the rest of the boys. “Obviously, she works here,” he said with that smirk again. It made Lil want to punch him in the face. Just because she was a maid, didn’t mean she didn’t want to punch people sometimes. “I meant, is she yours? Or are you just not man enough?” Lil knew it was common enough for maids to get involved with the families they worked for. Most of the time, it made working there easier for them, as well as giving them a bigger salary. Lilith, for her part, had made it a rule very early on to never, ever get involved with a wealthy idiot like that, and had been sure to kick anyone who had chased after her. It had invariably ended up with her getting fired, but in her opinion, she’d rather get fired than end up fooling around. Besides, kicking rich people was always incredibly satisfying. “I-it’s not- uh, I’m not-“ The green-eyed boy stuttered out, flushing slightly underneath everyone’s attention. The other males chuckled, and one even punched him playfully on the shoulder. Lilith was fairly sure that she was the only one to see him wince. “Come on, Hideki, it’s not that hard,” the man who Lilith had mentally dubbed as ‘Arsehole-Blocking-Her-Way’ (or A.B.H.W., for short) said. His smirk really was the most infuriating thing. It was difficult to keep her urge to smash her scrub brush in to it in check. “Are you just too spineless, is that it?” “Obviously!” one of the other males yelled out, resulting in yet another round of laughter. They sure were a giggly bunch, Lilith noted dismissively. What really got to her, though, was the green-eyed boy’s reaction. Instead of yelling at the other males to shove off, or coming up with some sort of insulting reply, he merely looked back down at the table, almost as if he were used to this kind of treatment, green eyes uneasy. Lilith felt something coil up inside her. Those arseholes, treating him like that. Drawing herself up, she shoved her way past A.B.H.W. and marched right up to where the green-eyed boy was sitting. He barely had time to look up, emerald eyes expressing confusion, before she grabbed on to the front of his shirt with her free hand and pressed her mouth against his. There was dead silence in the kitchen when she stepped back. All Hideki could appear to do was blink in shock. Not even stopping to think of what she had just done, Lilith turned around to face the rest of the males in the kitchen. “Lay off him already,” she told them all bluntly, before turning around and exiting the kitchen with her scrub brush in hand. As soon as she was sure she was far enough, the maid broke in to a run, and dashed the rest of the way to the ballroom. Her legs finally giving way under her, she sank to the floor right beside the bucket of water as realization of what she had just done rang through her head. She had just kissed the son of her employers. She…had just kissed the son of her employers. She had just kissed Hideki Nakamura, and thus broken her most important rule of never getting involved. Oh Lord, she was an idiot, she was a stupid idiot. She had just wanted them to stop teasing him, and she had ended up kissing him. Why was she such an idiot? You didn’t just kiss the son of your employers! That just led to bad things! It felt strange to acknowledge that she had done such a thing, even stranger to find out that it had been something that she had been wanting to do for a while. Lilith could have stayed there all day like that. But, the scrub brush clutched tightly in her hand was a reminder that she had work to do. So, loosening her grip a bit, Lilith set to work, scrubbing as vehemently as she could in an attempt to forget about what had happened. By the time the ballroom door creaked open, her sleeves had been rolled up and loose strands of hair were twisting out of her ponytail and down her face. Determined to ignore whoever it was, she kept scrubbing furiously at the floor, resolutely gazing at it. “U-um….h-hello.” Her eyes widened, and her scrub brush came to a halt, just for a moment, as her hands became slack. Oh no, oh no, oh no, this was just what she had been afraid of. Lilith would have loved nothing more than to stay quiet, but of course, she had to answer back. Otherwise, he might tell his mother, and she would get fired. Though, after what had happened today, maybe getting herself fired would be a good idea. “Hello, sir,” she replied, going back to her scrubbing. It rankled her, having to call a boy who was little less than her age ‘sir’. The room remained quiet for a moment. And then, “I-I…um….I brought you something,” What? Curious despite herself, the maid left off her scrubbing for one moment to look up. The green-eyed boy stood in front of her, holding what appeared to be the world’s worst-made sandwich in between his hands. One of his fingers was wrapped up in bright white gauze. “I-I, uh, I thought you might be hungry,” he carried on, swallowing visibly, his anxiety plain. “What happened to your hand?” Lilith asked abruptly, gesturing towards his finger. The male glanced down at it in surprise. “O-oh, I, umm…I cut it while cutting the bread.” …Oh. “You can just…put it on the table over there,” Lilith nodded her head towards the side. “Thank you, sir.” He walked towards the tiny circular table to place the sandwich down gingerly. “You know, my name isn’t ‘sir’,” he told her, his back turned. Lilith turned her head back down to the floor and began scrubbing once more, in order to avoid his gaze when he turned back around. She told herself it was because she didn’t want to be at this all day, but she knew the real reason. “I know, sir,” She had been hoping that he would just leave after that. But, of course, he didn’t. Because when did rich brats ever get the hint? She had work to do, she didn’t have time to sit around talking to him about certain t-things. “W-what happened back in the kitchen-” he began, confirming Lil’s worst fears that he did, indeed, want to talk about what had happened. Quickly, she spoke up to cut him off. “Don’t think about it, it doesn’t matter,” she said, scrubbing even harder at the floor, resolutely staring at it. “You don’t have to worry about it. Just forget it ever happened. Like I said, it doesn’t matter. Masters fool with their maids every day, it’s not a big deal. It really doesn’t matter-” A hand gently grabbed at her chin, holding it between index finger and thumb. Lightly forcing her to look up, Lilith obeyed, and felt a mouth press against her own as soon as she did. Her chestnut eyes widened in shock; her heart kicked in to overdrive. She could feel it slamming repeatedly against her chest, making her feel as if it would burst at any minute. Her fingers automatically uncurled from around her brush, causing it to fall from her hands. It hit the floor with a clatter, causing the other person to jump slightly, bumping his nose in to hers. If she had been standing, her legs would have given out from under her. As it was, her entire body felt weak. After a moment, he withdrew. Hideki’s warm green eyes gazed earnestly in to her own plain brown ones. Her heart, already doing back flips, gave an extra kick. “It matters to me,” he told her, before repeating it again, in case she hadn’t gotten it the first time. “I-it matters to me,” Lilith could only sit there mutely, struck dumb. After a moment, she finally managed to find her voice, and spoke up, though she could only manage one word. “Oh.” she murmured, her cheeks finally becoming red as she realized what had just happened, what he was saying. “O-oh.” His eyes expressed nervousness as he searched her for some kind of reaction, anxious that he would read rejection in her gaze. After a moment, his hand released her chin, and, shoulders hunched, he stopped crouching and stood up Lil’s hand flew up to grab at his before he had the chance to get too far. She yanked hard on it, pulling him back down. The green-haired individual fell to his knees, looking at her first in surprise, then in hope. “It matters to me too,” she told him, intertwining her fingers with his. notes: I should be posting. [/style] |
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