Page 31 of Brave
She looked crestfallen. “I’m in trouble for all that?”
“No.” Heading back to the stove, he stirred the corn and collected the sandwiches from the oven where they were keeping warm. “The negotiation contract you’re not in trouble for. You’re not in trouble for the job application either. You’re only in trouble for the last two. Do you want to tackle the good stuff first or the bad stuff?”
He served her, cautioning, “Be careful, it’s hot,” before returning the empty pot and plate to the kitchen. “What?” he asked, when he noticed her staring as he came back with silverware.
“You didn’t cut my crusts off.”
So, she was a Little. He was careful to keep his disappointment from showing. “I can cut them off if you’d like.”
“N-no,” she said, surprised. “I don’t mind crusts at all. It… it’s just, my mother does it all the time. It drives me crazy, to be honest.”
He sat down beside her. “Have you asked her not to?”
Puppy shook her head. “She cries. It’s easier to let her cut my food or,” she looked down at herself, “buy me this, than to listen to her cry.”
“I know a few Littles who would love to be small enough to wear clothes like that, or even to have someone there to cut their crusts off.”
The look she gave him was the closest to mutiny that he’d yet seen from her. “I’m not a Little.”
He smiled. “I hadn’t pegged you for one. Eat. You’re already a meal behind, so I want that entire plate empty before I take you home tonight.”
She looked at her plate while he spread a napkin across his lap.
“Since you declined to answer, I’ll start with the negotiation contract. Before I do though”—he unfolded the papers and lay them flat between their plates so she could see them too—“I just want to make sure, these are honest answers, right? If you need to change something, I’ll let you and you won’t be in any more trouble for it. But I don’t want to proceed if there’s anything in here that’s less than an honest representation of what you want. These answers aren’t for that other guy,” he specified, pointing out the nearest window to wherever that ‘other guy’ was. “These answers are just for you and me, right?”
She nodded. “Yes, Sir.”
He gestured to her plate. “When we get to the part you had trouble with, let me know. Now, unless you want me to take you back to the bathroom, eat.”
His comment did exactly what he was hoping it would. Her startled look melted into a surprised bark of a laugh and, finally, she relaxed.
They say Helen of Troy went down in history for having the face that launched a thousand ships. Had her smile been anything like Puppy’s, Carlson thought, then small wonder that war lasted ten years.
Smiling now too, he took a bite of sandwich and began to go through the seven-page contract. He checked her hard limits, then soft limits, both of which she’d marked ‘N/A’. That concerned him, especially when he saw where she’d marked ‘yes’ to a willingness for sexual service. What really puzzled him was what she’d crossed out altogether.
“May I ask why you go by Puppy if you’re not interested in pet play?”
She ducked her head, fixing her attention on the soupy creamed corn that she was scraping into a pile away from her sandwich, of which so far she’d taken only two bites.
“That was one of his things, wasn’t it?” Carlson guessed, watching her closely.
She lifted one shoulder. “He was the Menagerie Master,” she hedged. “We all had to be something.”
“And you picked puppy?”
“No, he did. He picked everything.”
“And you just did it, whether you liked it or not?”
Her eyebrows quirked in confusion as she poked at her corn. “It could have been worse, I guess. I could have been Piggy.”
Something he couldn’t quite read flashed in her eyes and then was gone. “What are you thinking about?” he asked.
She shook her head, picked up a forkful of corn and let it fall off the tines again. “Nothing fattens a pig like corn.”
Carlson put his sandwich down. He’d just taken a bite, which left him chewing to clear his mouth enough so he could call her on the disgusting implication that she was a pig. It turned out to be a good thing, because he was still trying to clear his mouth when she shifted in her chair, shook her head again, and said, “It’s something he used to say.” Scooping another forkful of corn, she let it dribble off the tines again. “Eating this used to be a punishment. Not for me,” she said quickly, sneaking a glance his way. “For Piggy. Whenever she did something he didn’t like, he’d tighten her harness until it was cutting into her, it was so tight. Then he’d say, nothing fattens a pig like corn, and he’d make her eat can after can of this until she threw up.”
Carlson sat frozen in his chair, fighting hard not to show how furious and appalled that made him.
