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The Woman on the Platform

The letter was written in the formal cursive hand of someone who was well trained and wrote often. The ink was gently raised in the thick bold strokes that covered the heavy cream parchment.

Elaine had the polite message practically memorized.

Miss Corbenic,

I was very pleased to receive your letter and resume. Your questions are very pertinent and not at all forward.

I am single and have no other staff at the house. I am a retired schoolteacher. I recently came into my inheritance and have desired to create a home for myself.

Your duties will be extensive and will include, but may not be limited to:

Keeping the manor tidy (excepting my library and private chambers). I have hired a cleaning service to come once weekly for more extensive jobs and upkeep.

Serving two meals per day, afternoon tea and dinner respectively. You will take both with me.

Spending two hours every evening in my company for conversation, chess, or reading.

Tending a small vegetable garden.

Shopping for food and furnishing the house.

You will be given one day off, of your choosing, per week and are released totally from duties for that day.

I hope to see you this Saturday afternoon at Spinner's End for three o'clock tea. Please do not be tardy.

Yours Sincerely,

Severus Prince

Elaine smoothed her fingers over the edges of the letter from her prospective employer and rehearsed the mental map she had created from the hotel to the manor one town over. She bit her lip nervously but took a deep breath against the doubt. She had come this far; it wouldn't do to back out now. It was a lovely, clear Saturday morning and time to board the train that would take her to the village of Wolden where Spinner's End stood. The spring breeze stirred her bangs and carried the voices of other waiting passengers.

Refolding the letter and stowing it in her satchel, Elaine tapped her sensible, low-heeled, black shoe against the wooden platform worn smooth by years of pacing, waiting, and hastening.

In the distance she could hear the rumble of a steam engine against the chirp and call of the birds, and a glance at her cell phone screen indicated that it was indeed on schedule.

This could be just the change that she needed from the busy days and nights of London. She had been too wrapped up in the career she had carved for herself in the restaurant and culinary world of London's elite nightlife. A break, her doctor had recommended. The stress, her sister had insisted. Her life, she had argued. The conclusion was clear: take time away from the intense existence of being a chef under one of the most demanding restaurateurs in Great Britain or suffer more serious side effects.

Elaine, at least, could admit defeat. So here she was, taking a housekeeping job in a tiny hamlet she had never heard of for a man she had never met.

Cream, #27

Edited en-mass by renaid, who is more than I deserve in a beta & friend May 2nd, 2014 & reposed by chapter, beginning May 29th, 2014.

Inspired by the drabble prompts from the Live Journal fanfiction challenge group 100colors.

This story is an Alternate Universe Tale and disregards much of the last three books, especially Book Seven. You've been warned.

This story is also a drabble fic. This means that the chapters are short (100 & 500 words respectively). I realize that some people don't like drabble length stories & I understand that: and if you don't like the format, that's alright.