03 - Nina in Secrets and Surprises
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By Doctor George
by Doctor George » Fri Feb 07, 2014 7:55 am
Secrets and Surprises Part 1: The Librarian
It was just after 3:30 one Tuesday afternoon. Nina was in her classroom at the end of the school day, putting the books she would need for homework into her schoolbag and chatting to her friends. She had just closed her bag and picked it up when her form teacher called her back
“Nina, I’ve just had an email from the librarian. She wants to see you before you go home.”
Nina glanced at her watch. “Do you think it would be all right to leave it until tomorrow, Miss?”
“It sounds quite urgent from the wording of the message. Do you want me to email back and ask?”
“No thanks – it’s probably just as quick if I go along and find out what she wants to see me about and less bother for you, but thanks for offering.”
“No problem – see you tomorrow, Nina.”
“See you, Miss,” Nina replied as she left the classroom. She hoisted her schoolbag onto her back and went to her locker, which was in the corridor outside. She tucked her scarf and gloves into her cycle helmet and fastened its strap so she could carry it in one hand and slung her yellow cycle jacket over the other arm.
As she made her way to the library, Nina wondered why she had been summoned. She had been in the library at lunchtime, but couldn’t think of anything that could have happened for her to be called back and she was quite sure that none of her books were overdue.
Although she knew the librarian by sight and had exchanged a few words with her, Nina didn’t really know her as a person. She knew that her name was Chloé and that she was a French student librarian substituting for the regular librarian, who was on maternity leave.
The lights were on in the library, so Nina let herself in, closed the door behind her and looked around for the librarian.
“Un moment, s’il te plaît!” came a voice from behind one of the bookshelves.
Nina followed the voice and found the librarian standing on a library stool with a stack of books cradled in her left arm as she reorganised a high shelf. One thing Nina liked about the librarian was her style in clothes. Most of the younger teachers dressed in styles slightly older and more conservative than their years, presumably to reinforce their authority, but Chloé embraced a style all her own, exuberant and often bordering on the eccentric. That day she was wearing a tan coloured hip-length leather waistcoat with fake fur trim at the collar and arm holes over a turtle-necked sweater in cream-coloured unbleached wool. The black woollen tights she wore under her denim shorts were mostly hidden by a pair of charcoal-grey thigh-length socks. Another pair of socks, matching her sweater, were folded down over the top of her black Dr Martens boots.
As the librarian turned and stepped down from the stool, Nina could see the broad leather belt she wore over her sweater, echoing the glossy black of her boots.
“You wanted to see me, Miss Badelaine?” Nina said tentatively.
“In my office, young lady,” the librarian said, sweeping back her shoulder-length red hair, which had flopped forward over one eye.
Nina followed the librarian into the small office in one corner of the library. She closed the door behind her and waited nervously.
Chloé went behind her desk and sat down. “I have something of yours that I found in the library earlier on,” she said bending down and unlocking one of her desk drawers.
As the librarian reached down and rummaged through the drawer, Nina noticed the tails of a floral silk scarf peeking out of the sweater collar at the back of the French girl’s neck. She also noticed bulge of a knot showing through the sweater collar at the front, almost as if the scarf was used as a... Nina shook her head, dismissing the thought; she was obviously imagining things.
The reverie ended abruptly as the librarian deposited Nina’s scrapbook on the table. The outside of the book was plain blue cardboard so Nina knew that she had been identified as the owner by the contents. The front of the book contained cuttings from comics, some originals, some photocopies or scans and a few downloaded from the internet. All showed female characters tied up or restrained in other ways and often gagged. The sheer number testified to the length of time Nina had been collecting these images. Some were annotated in Nina’s small neat handwriting. The back of the book, however, made Nina’s ownership unmistakable. There was an increasing collection of photographs of Nina herself, either tied up or in the process of being tied up.
Nina racked her brain for anything she could say. The librarian broke the uncomfortable silence. “I think we ought to have a talk about this,” she said, not unkindly. “Why don’t you sit down?”
Nina nodded numbly and sat down on the chair at her side of the desk.
“I take it this is something of a hobby of yours?” Chloé asked.
Nina nodded, still unable to trust her voice enough to reply.
Chloé paged through the photographs in the book. “It looks as though you enjoy being tied up,” she said. “You seem to be smiling in all the pictures where you aren’t gagged.”
Nina nodded again.
“Does your mother know about this scrapbook?”
Another nod.
“Does she know you took it to school, today?”
Nina cast her eyes down in shame and gave a tiny shake of the head.
“It is as well it was I who found this and not one of your classmates. I think you would never have heard the end of this if some of them saw those pictures of you.”
Nina looked up, her eyes wide with horror at the thought. Her bottom lip started to quiver.
“Don’t cry, Nina,” Chloé said, laying the scrapbook on the desk and handing her a tissue. “I am not angry with you and you are not in as much trouble as you think you are.”
Nina blew her nose noisily then said, “Thank you, Miss,” in a very small voice.
“I think if I were to follow the rules, I probably ought to pass this to your guidance teacher. She’d probably look at the pictures and worry about your safety and before you knew it you’d have all sorts of people poking their noses into your life. I’m not going to do that, because I’m sure you’re not in any danger and I don’t think most of them would understand what this is about.”
“Do you understand, Miss?” Nina asked, feeling a little relieved.
“I think so,” the librarian replied with a smile. “Not so long ago, there was a little girl with red hair who lived in France. She loved books and spent as much time as she could reading. Even when she could read quite grown-up books, there were some children’s books she still loved to read. Have you heard of a character called Fantômette?”
Nina shook her head.
“Well in these books, there was a French schoolgirl named Françoise Dupont, a very intelligent girl, well read and able to speak several languages and a champion swimmer, skier, sailor and lots of other things. This girl Françoise had a secret identity as Fantômette, a brave crime fighter and righter of wrongs. The little French girl with red hair that I’m telling you about adored Fantômette and loved reading the books about her. Things didn’t always go smoothly for Fantômette in the stories and quite often she would find herself tied up by the villains and have to escape. It was the stories where Fantômette was tied up that the girl with red hair liked best. She liked to dress up as Fantômette in a yellow tunic with black tights, a mask and a hood and sometimes she would play at being Fantômette tied up and having to escape to save the day.”
“And the little red-haired girl who liked being tied up was you?” Nina said, smiling.
“Oui, c’était moi,” Chloé admitted, also smiling.
“So you really do understand,” Nina said, relieved.
“And you, young lady, need to understand that things like that scrapbook need to stay at home and not be left where anyone can find it.”
“Yes, Miss,” Nina said, reaching for her scrapbook.
“No, you still have a lesson to learn about taking good care of valuable – or sensitive – property. The scrapbook stays with me until Friday.”
Chloé picked the scrapbook up and returned it to her desk drawer, leaving Nina staring at the spot where it had lain.
“Come back and get it after school on Friday,” Chloé said firmly. “Now off you go. Ouste!”
“Yes, Miss,” Nina replied standing up and reluctantly leaving the library.
As she walked along the now deserted school corridors, Nina reflected on the position. She concluded that she trusted Chloé, and didn’t feel at all threatened by her but nevertheless felt very exposed having the scrapbook in someone else’s possession. Maybe that was the point that Chloé was trying to impress on her, she acknowledged. Still, there was nothing she could do about it other than to accept the situation, so she picked up her pace and went to the cycle rack where her bike was parked.
She put her yellow cycling jacket on, wrapped her scarf across her face and put her helmet on, fastening the straps under her chin. She unlocked the bike, secured her schoolbag to the rear carrier, switched the lights on and swung her leg over the saddle. Finally she pulled her gloves on and pedalled off into the late afternoon twilight.
* * *
Through the rest of the week, Nina remained anxious about her scrapbook, although she managed to put it to the back of her mind most of the time. School ended at 12:30 on Fridays and as soon as the last lesson was over, she quickly organised the books she would need for the weekend’s homework. She went to her locker in the corridor outside her form teacher’s classroom. It was a grey duffel coat rather than her usual yellow cycling jacket that she took out of it. She slid her arms into the sleeves, but left it unfastened then hoisted the black rucksack she used as her schoolbag onto her back. She hung her purple and white school scarf around her neck and pushed a purple knitted cap into one coat pocket to put on when she got outside. With her outerwear out of the way, Nina turned her attention to the small pink wheeled suitcase occupying most of the space in the locker. She heaved it out onto the floor and closed the locker door. She extended the telescopic handle on the case and set off for the school library, trundling it behind her.
Nina was surprised to see that most of the lights were already out in the library but relieved to find the door still unlocked. She let herself in and made her way to the librarian’s office. She paused and rapped politely on the office door, although it was standing open by a few centimetres.
“Come in,” the librarian invited.
Nina pushed the door open and stepped inside. She had not seen the librarian that day, but was delighted to note the usual combination of style, practicality and individuality in her choice of clothes. The high collar of a light grey sweater was visible at her throat. Over that she wore a thick tunic-length v-necked sweater in a slightly rusty shade of red that complemented her red hair. A wide black leather belt was visible at her waist. The layer on top was a heavy hooded cardigan in a darker shade of reddish brown and open at the front. As the librarian had one foot up on a chair, her black denim shorts were clearly visible under the long sweater. Nina noted the usual combination of woolly tights and over-the-knee socks covering the Frenchwoman’s legs. Today, the tights were light grey to match the innermost sweater and the socks a deep chestnut colour to echo the cardigan. Chloé was working a thick knit legwarmer up over the heel of her black Dr Martens boot. As she smoothed it up her leg almost to the hem of her shorts, it was revealed as being striped in fuchsia pink and purple.
“Don’t worry, Nina,” the librarian said, noticing Nina’s attention as she brought her foot down and straightened up, “the colours will co-ordinate when I get the rest of my outdoor things on.”
Chloé sat down at her desk and reached down to one of its drawers. She fumbled with a key for a moment then slid it open. Nina was relieved to see her scrapbook as it was laid on the desk. She unslung her schoolbag from her back ready to receive it.
“I think you should have a little look inside before you put it away,” the librarian suggested.
Nina glanced at Chloé’s face, but her expression revealed nothing. She opened the scrapbook and leafed through the familiar collection of illustrations until she reached the last few she remembered pasting in. Instead of blank paper, there followed several extra pages of pictures. They were all of the same masked young female character. Some were black and white line drawings but many were in colour and showed the character’s yellow tunic and red-lined black cape. In every single picture the character was tied up and in many cases tied to something.
Nina looked up to see Chloé smiling at her. The pictures were all labelled in the librarian’s precise, angular handwriting, but she still asked, “This is Fantômette that you were telling me about?”
“That’s right – I’m sure you see why I liked her.”
Nina nodded her agreement and turned the page. She gasped as she saw what was there. Following the book illustrations were several photographs. Some looked to have been scanned from quite old photographic prints while others looked more like prints direct from a digital camera.
The images that Nina took to be the older ones all showed a small girl, aged perhaps 10 or 11, she estimated. The girl was wearing what was clearly an improvised Fantômette costume with a yellow sweater worn over black tights and belted at the waist. Her black cape lacked the red lining and the tunic did not have the high collar shown in the book illustrations but the black hood framing her face and the black eye mask were there. The girl was securely bound with white rope and gagged with a handkerchief between her teeth in each photograph. Several of the photographs were carefully posed to reproduce situations shown in the book illustrations. The fringe of red hair made the identity of the girl very obvious.
“Fantômette isn’t gagged in the pictures in the books,” Nina pointed out.
“No,” the librarian agreed, “I always thought that was very stupid of the criminals. I insisted on being gagged when I was pretending to be Fantômette.”
The last three photographs were the ones Nina thought were from a digital camera. They showed a young but fully adult woman wearing a much more carefully copied Fantômette costume. The yellow tunic was neatly fitted with the correct high white collar and deep v-neck and the cape had its red lining. The hood appeared to be finely knitted with a long tail at the back ending in a pompom and the eye mask was stiff enough to stick out from the face at the sides. The red Mary-Jane shoes worn over the black tights were a good match on the ones worn by Fantômette in the book illustrations. The first of these three photographs showed the woman standing in s suitably heroic pose while the other two showed her tied to a chair with an enormous amount of white rope and gagged with a red cloth. As with the other photographs, the fringe of red hair made the subject’s identity obvious.
Nina was fascinated by the detail in the images of the adult Chloé as Fantômette tied to a chair. One of the pictures was almost front-on while the other was from slightly behind, so the arrangement of ropes was fully visible. Chloé’s wrists were crossed and bound behind the chair’s backrest. She was wearing black gloves, presumably to protect her wrists. Her upper arms were tied to the vertical side members of the wooden chair. Ropes were fastened to the top of the chair back and came forward over both Chloé’s shoulders, crossing over at chest level and fastened off to the tops of the back legs of the chair just below the seat. A wide band of rope held her waist back to the chair and another encircled her upper arms and chest. Chloé’s legs were lashed tightly together at her ankles, both above and below the knees and at mid-thigh level. The ends of the ankle and knee ropes were secured to the chair legs while the thigh rope was taken under the chair seat. The gag was at first sight simply a bandana tied between Chloé’s teeth but the slightly distended cheeks suggested there was more to it.
“Who tied you up?” Nina asked, intrigued.
“My mother.”
“What about these photos?” Nina indicated the last three photographs.
“Still my mother. We’ve played games together for a very long time.”
“And have you tied her up too?” Nina asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.
“Yes, but I’m not going to show you those pictures,” Chloé replied with a smile.
“Thank you for putting all these in my scrapbook,” Nina said, sensing that the conversation was drawing to a close.
While Nina had been studying the photographs, Chloé had put her second legwarmer on and was fastening the belt of a PVC raincoat in a startling shade of pink. “I like to make sure I’m clearly visible riding my cyclomoteur,” she explained in reply to Nina’s raised eyebrows. She picked up a Middle-Eastern style shemagh cotton headscarf. It was already folded diagonally into a triangle. She centred the folded edge on the bridge of her nose, crossed the ends behind her head, brought them to the front and loosely knotted them at her throat. The shemagh was in a cheerful bright purple but with a skull-and-crossbones pattern printed on it, which seemed to send a slightly mixed message. Chloé added a motorcycle helmet to her outfit. It was in the old-fashioned ‘pudding-basin’ style. The hard part, which covered just the top of her head, was black with a broad white stripe from front to back while the sides and back were soft black leather. Chloé fastened the strap under her chin then pulled down the goggles that were fastened around the helmet. They had circular lenses and added a touch of steampunk surrealism to the Frenchwoman’s already extraordinary outfit.
Nina put the scrapbook carefully away in her schoolbag and lifted it onto her shoulders.
Chloé put on her own bag, a leather satchel hanging at hip level, with its long strap running diagonally across her body. She picked up her keys and a pair of purple skiing mittens. “That’s me ready to go home,” she said. “It looks as though you are going a bit further than that with your suitcase,” she added.
“I’m off to visit my aunt for the weekend,” Nina explained as she preceded Chloé out of the library and waited as she locked the door.
“I’ll let you out through the staff entrance,” Chloé offered, leading the way.
Nina followed the librarian out to the school car park. Chloé went to her Solex moped, a classic French motorised bicycle. There was something hand-painted in what looked like runic script on the front of the cylindrical fuel tank above the front-mounted engine.
“Your moped has a name?” Nina asked.
“Sleipnir,” the librarian replied, adding, “The Norse god Odin’s eight-legged horse,” in response to Nina’s puzzled silence.
Chloé kicked up the moped’s stand and hoisted herself onto the saddle. She turned the ignition key then pulled her mittens on. She set off across the car park under pedal power then let the clutch in so that the tiny engine started with a cough and an angry snarl. She raised one hand and called out, “A bientôt!” as she stopped pedalling and pulled smoothly away under engine power.
A short walk from the school gates took Nina to the local bus station, which was in reality little more than an expanse of asphalt with parking spaces for buses marked out on it. She located the bus that would take her to the next town to visit her aunt and climbed on, dragging her suitcase behind her.
After buying her ticket, she sat down and considered her strange encounter with the Miss Badelaine. She had felt very vulnerable after the librarian’s discovery of her scrapbook but felt reassured by the gesture of trust that the new pictures represented. She wondered where this unexpected friendship might lead but nevertheless felt quite excited by it.
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Doctor George's stories
- 01 - Nina and the Lodger (f/f)
02 - Nina in Christmas Interlude (f/f)
03 - Nina in Secrets and Surprises (f/f)
04 - Nina in Aversion Therapy (F/f)
Index of all stories in the "Archive for Everyone" section