| Masochist |
[04 Dec 2006|02:03pm] |
There was something in her face that could be mistaken for innocence in the right light. Her features were delicate, almost as though they were painted upon a porcelain mask rather than wrought of flesh and bone, resembling human but made of stronger things beneath the surface. There was something in her face that could be mistaken for innocence in the right light but a keen eye could see the rest there, waiting, beneath the surface, as though something far less delicate were simply sleeping and the slightest noise might rouse the beast.
There was perfection there, for those who cared to see. Not the sort that many carried – Elise didn’t have a figure for billboards or movie screens, her face and her hips too round and her mind far too keen and focused for such trifling affairs – but it was still there. So much so that it would seem strange if not altogether disconcerting for many who knew her to imagine her just risen from bed, disheveled and groggy.
Whether or not she ever reached such low points was certainly debatable. On that particularly morning, it would never have been noticed if she had. An early riser, the sun hadn’t lit in the sky by the time she ambled into the cold sterile master bath of the suite she was keeping on permanent reserve in the city. Even Las Vegas had its quiet moments, few and far between though they may be. That morning was one of the few, when the hotel had fallen sullen and dark and even the noise of a casino so many floors below seemed to fade into the very air, a dull drone that couldn’t reach up through the many stories to touch the cold silence of the bath.
The steady low hum of the mirror’s halogen lighting was the only noise Elise heard as she stood before the vanity, inspecting the image before her in the mirror’s surface. Her skin milk white and her suit in the same blank shade, she seemed to blend back into the pristine colorless bathroom tile; only the inky curls of her hair and the emerald in her eyes seemed to show, framing her face and brightening the soft hollows beneath her eyes. Each curl fell in its own perfect way, thick and black and flawlessly placed, her face bright and eyes sharp, as though she was perennially alert with no call for sleep – just another lie a face could tell and a mirror would believe.
Clutched in one small porcelain hand was a tiny red plastic box with a flip-top, that she opened to reveal a spool of palest pink thread. Some preferred peppermint on their breath in the early morning hours, but Elise had always been more inclined to use something with the heady flavor of cinnamon; the exotic burn of the ancient spice was more in line with her tastes.
The noise of the rolling spool seemed magnified a thousand times in the cold bathroom as she pulled a length from the little box and cut it on the provided razor edge. Winding the waxed floss around two fingers on each hand, she got to work. Everyone had their little morning rituals, and this was hers, the only way she knew to properly start the day.
She had never required dental attention in her youth, her teeth perfectly straight and as pristinely clean as the glaring white of the porcelain tiles in the bath. If anyone had thought it unusual during her childhood, it was never mentioned, just as attention was never called to the slightly more sharp than usual canine teeth in her mouth. They weren’t fangs by any means, not jutting out garishly from the gums, simply a little more dangerous than what would be expected, by those who cared to look – and very few did.
( Morning Ritual )
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