Room 2D

Photo feature from Janus 74 and 75 It has been two years since Alice fell under the spell of the enigmatic Selina [ The Pleasing — Part I: The Handmaiden ] . Two years of submissive devotion to her female ‘Svengali’ have changed the girl. But now Selina has moved on, leaving Alice with a new-found confidence. Gone is the gauche late-developer, replaced by an assured and confident, blossoming young woman. Alice has become a model, the perfect job for her vain and admittedly narcissistic new character. Emotionally, she is more stable and less dependent on other people. She now makes her own decisions and working for herself is a rewarding experience. Something is missing from Alice’s new life, however, and of course she knows just what it is. She is constantly reminded on every photo-session she does. Being ordered and commanded by assertive photographers emphasises her need for a master. Someone who will relieve her o...

Story from Februs 25 by Colin Weaver When the Birley Institute was built in 1830, the wealthy businessmen who were financing it out of civic pride and the hope of a mention in the Honours List could not agree about its purpose. Should it be a museum, an art gallery or a library? The local firm of architects and builders who had got the contract under The Old Pals Act tried to please everyone, and the result was a queer, undecided mongrel of a building, like an oversized Nonconformist chapel on the outside, and with an interior which was such a maze of galleries and stairways and rooms and passages that a stranger should not enter without a native guide. At least, that is what Mr Mytton told Lucinda. After a month in Birley, the sardonic, middle-aged curator of the Institute was one of the few people she was on easy conversational terms with. The other teachers at St Jude’s were civil enough, but they were obviously suspendin...

From Blushes 47 ‘How’s that Mr Southfield?’ Bob asks. Jane says a quick and dismissive ‘OK.’ She doesn’t want to talk about Mr Southfield and at once changes the subject. Emma at work. Can Bob guess what Emma said? But as Jane recounts this she is half thinking about Mr Southfield. Mr Southfield is her new landlord. Jane was really lucky to get the flat of course, for what she is paying. Twenty pounds a week is extremely cheap but at the same time it is really all she could afford. Looking at the prices that were being asked it had seemed impossible. She wasn’t going to find anything except perhaps some dreadful little bedsit room. And then when she was feeling really low, rock bottom, with all the hopeless trudging around, there had been Mr Southfield. With his lovely flat. I can never afford this she had told herself, there was no point even asking him the price. But… ‘What can you afford, Miss Nashley? Twenty pounds?’ It was ...