Laif rummaged through the heaps of documents with a drunkenness that only exhaustion can bring. His eyes were hazy and already sloping down from all the work that had piled on his desk the past days.
Muscles were starting to string along a pain almost musical as every movement pulled on the strings of his body. His fingers were silent, only the turning of pages resounded through the big office with a panoramic view.
The sky outside the big windows had settled into night. The slowly falling snow was like uncountable white threads trying to make a blanket to cover the world for sleep. But he would not let this world, his world, fall asleep and die.
A knock came at the door, although whoever it was didn't wait for an answer and just came in.
"Lafayette. What is it?" his voice, much like the grinding of rocks, pierced the silence.
The woman that entered was stunning even to his dozing off eyes. She had short blonde hair, the left side falling over her ice blue eye and freckled cheek. Because of the Siege most people dressed provocatively, baring parts of their body that would only be seen behind bedroom doors before. But now was a different time, yet Lafayette wore modest clothes. High heels, dark leggings with no decorations, a tight pencil skirt and woman's coat with no tie. One could not say however that she was not exuding sex appeal.
Laif definitely noticed how she never left anything unbuttoned but always wore just slightly lower cleavages so that her gracious neck could be seen at all times. Sonnets could be written about her collarbones and the curve of her nape. He was not a writer or a composer though. He was a bureaucrat.
"Just checking in," she said," My shift is over in about five minutes and I wanted to remind you of the appointment with Miss Gelshtrad." She went to stand by one of the windows that overlooked a city of yellow street lights and smoke and snow.
Laif sighed deeply and stood to join her. He clasped his hands behind his back, striking an imperial pose next to her significantly gentler frame. They stared over the empty midnight streets as snowflakes collided with the glass, a silence between them, both comfortable and uncertain.
"Why don't you just take in a couple of women and do the exact thing you and this government of yours have been propagandizing all this time?" she asked, her tone soft, but prying nonetheless.
"I'm too b¬--"
"Don't even start with busy. You are, but that doesn't mean you can't find comfort in a family. "
"Why haven't you started a family then?"
"I don't want to and thanks to my "previous" circumstances I don't have to," she said, followed by a shrug and a crossing of her arms.
"I don't need a family, Lafayette. I need to know that Desdem and everyone in it will survive this war. That will bring me peace!"
"What if we don't?"
"We will."
"What. If. We--"
"Enough, Ms. Silver!" he said, his voice strong and thick, immediately putting an end to their conversation. "I believe your shift has ended. Good night and I'll see you tomorrow."
"Good night, then," she said a little hurt and left him standing by the window.
His gaze trailed back over the city, his city, and the huge, huge walls surrounding it. The watchtowers flickered in the distance, barely visible, but unquestionably there.
He remembered to revise the guard protocols and supplies transported to their stations and check on that peculiar report about the illegally held orgies in the lower cities.
He was just about to sigh again when a sudden knock at the door came from behind.
"I told you to..." he turned to see someone who wasn't his secretary standing in a grey fur coat, wearing black heels at his door.
"Good evening Mr. La Row," the red haired woman said with a slight curtsy. Laif noticed her cheeks were a little red from the cold outside when she reached up to remove her hat.
"Miss Gelshtrad, I presume," he motioned for her to come in. She seemed a little shy and even more so when he politely took her coat off.
It wasn't too puzzling why as beneath the coat she was dressed only in black lingerie with roses that covered only her pussy and had tight straps fashioned across her thin waist and ass. Black leggings with the same flowery pattern went from her feet all the way up to her thighs while her modest yet beautiful breasts were bare, nipples hard from the cold as well.
Her skin was as pale as the snow outside and was probably just as cold. She couldn't be very warm, having come here like that.
Laif reached out a hand and traced it across her skin, just above her chest.
"You are a little cold, ..."
"Sophia. My name is Sophia, Mr. La Row," the young woman said, her ears turning red as well.
"Might we sit by the fire for a while? I myself am feeling a little chilly," he smiled warmly and gestured at the hearth behind his desk.
Laif pulled up a chair for himself and let the naked Sophia sit in his own leather one. The fire crackled as the quietness of the two of them nestled in the room. They were two people who had nothing to talk about. Two people meeting for one reason and one reason alone.
