The next three hours went by in a blur. A painful blur. Editing is not as glamorous as writing. Yes, she got to answer special questions about character and where the plot was going. She was an influencer. But she didn't have the power. And writing words is much more fun than searching for incorrect or missing words.
It's also more difficult than one would think. Autocorrect and word processors have made it easier and harder at the same time. Writers make less mistakes now, but it's harder to find the mistakes you do make. The human brain is incredibly powerful. As such, the mind can easily scramble words like cofmrotable into comfortable. You may never tell the difference. Your brain autocorrected it for you. But for most readers, that typo can take them out of the narrative and make Miss K look like a fool.
This is what copy editors were for. They helped the author not look like a fool. They helped keep the audience into the flow of the narrative. They trained their brains not to autocorrect mistakes, but to find mistakes and fix them. It's incredibly painful work for the mind. It goes against what the brain wants to do. It also wasn't terribly difficult. Typos are easy to fix. But you weren't allowed to zone out. If you did, your mind would go back to autocorrecting and you would miss most of the errors. It was like having to do incredibly basic math problems non-stop for three hours. If you let your mind wander, you'd start getting them wrong.
Luckily, Nikki kept things interesting. The girl practically purred next to Laura as she was handed pages that were annotated. Laura had never seen a girl so happy to read a book. While she waited, her legs bounced and her hands fidgeted while she waited for her next fix.
Again, The Magician's Mistress struck Laura as mostly unoriginal. She appreciated Nikki's opinion that Camille wrote about love and not lust, but she felt she had to disagree. There was a lot of lust in these early chapters. The magician was having an affair. His wife was having an affair. The mistress had a girlfriend while seeing the magician. There were hints at threeways approaching with one of the key members of the love triangle. It was all steamy, if you were into wild infidelity, but Laura didn't find many signs of actual love in this story.
However, she felt compelled to keep reading. There was something about Camille's words, some power they had over her. She didn't need to know what was going to happen next; that was rather obviously telegraphed. Instead, she was hungry for Camille's description. She wanted to read a future scene just to see how Camille would paint it with words. What description would she use? Would she be sparse with her adjective and adverbs (she often was) or would she dip into flowery and flowy metaphors about each thing (which she did occasionally)? It was beautiful prose and weak story, but the effect was powerful either way. Laura wanted to keep reading. She didn't want to put the work down. Neither did Nikki.
The redhead whined when Laura finally took off her glasses and started to rub her eyes.
"I need a break," muttered Laura. "I could use some food."
"Come on," whimpered Nikki. "Just a few more pages."
"You said that two chapters ago. And the chapter after that."
"I won't say it after the next chapter. I promise."
"Why do I have my doubts?" asked Laura.
"Cause I'm lying?" Nikki smiled. Laura smiled back. "Exactly. Let's go stretch our legs."
"Fine," sighed Nikki. The two girls got up and headed out into the mansion. They didn't have a location in mind, and somehow the walk became an impromptu tour. Nikki showed Laura a few shortcuts that existed between her apartment and the kitchen, the dining room, and Camille's quarters. She also showed her the servant's passages which were used so staff could get around important rooms without special guests seeing them. It helped them to appear magically wherever they were needed and kept them invisible when they were unwanted.
Speaking of invisible, they didn't see anyone else while they walked through the building. Nikki explained that when one of the staff was off (she indicated herself) the others tend to have to be doubly attentive. That means when one has the day off, you can normally find no one. They are either staying close to Miss K or doing a dozen other chores they normally have help with. Nikki only got one day off a week, but she got paid overtime for the sixth workday and anytime she had to do anything after four o'clock, which was everyday.
"All in all," said Nikki as they rounded yet another corner. "I get paid pretty damn well for a maid."
"You know, I never really asked how much I get paid."
"Really?" said Nikki, stopping in her tracks.
"Really. I was too shocked that I got the job at all. Asking about money seemed rude."
"I get that." Nikki kept walking. She was showing Laura to the pantry so they could get a snack without needing Jacque's permission. "I'm sure you get paid pretty well."
"More than 20k?" asked Laura, nervous. She hated money.
Nikki laughed. "Hun, I get almost 50k. I'm sure you get much more than me."
This time Laura stopped in her tracks. "Shut the front door."
Nikki turned around and smiled. "What?"
"You get almost 50k for being a maid?"
"Like I said, I work a lot."
"But still."
"I know." Nikki shrugged. "That's part of the reason everyone is so loyal to Miss K around her. We either love her or love her generosity. She's a really good boss to have."
"I'm just trying to figure out how much she spends on staff," said Laura, doing the calculations in her mind. "I mean, she pays you, Grauman, Jacque, me, Miss Lancaster -"
"And a bunch of other part time people like her lawyer and accountant," added Nikki.
"Right, and the third maid. The one I haven't met yet."
Nikki stopped and turned to her. "There isn't a third maid."
"The one with white hair?" asked Laura. "I saw her the other day in the orchard. And then my first night at a Muse Session, she fled from the room when I came in. I thought she was wearing a maid's uniform."
Nik's eyes went wide. "You've seen her?"
"Yeah. What's her name?"
"Shhh," said Nikki. "Not so loud."
"I wasn't being loud."
"Too loud for this conversation."
"What conversation?"
Nikki looked around them, grabbed Laura by the arm, and pulled her into a smaller room that had a private seating area and a beautiful view of the garden.
"Let go of me," said Laura as she yanked her arm away. "What's wrong with you?"
Nikki went to the door, looked both ways down the hallway, and closed it. "Listen, this place has secrets, right?"
"Sure."
"That's why we live on the grounds. That's why we all sign non-disclosure agreements. Miss K isn't worried about her stories being scooped. She's worried about people asking too many questions about her."
"If she wanted privacy, she shouldn't have us live on the grounds."
"She wants the help. What's the point of being rich if you can't have servants."
"Sure," conceded Laura.
"I don't know anything about the white-haired girl. I've seen her a few times. She's around here, but she doesn't work here, okay?"
"Then why is she here? Is she related to Miss K?"
"I don't know. I know that I was stupid enough to ask about her once to Miss Lancaster, and the lady practically fired me on the spot. She told me my job was to clean, not think."
"Yikes."
"Exactly."
"You think it's something illegal?"
"I doubt it," said Nikki. "Miss K is more strange than criminal, you know?"
"Yeah. Sure." Laura chewed on the inside of her mouth. She had a dozen questions, but all of them were pointless. Nikki wouldn't know, and most of her questions needed more information first. Was the white-haired girl really a child? Was she allowed on the grounds? Did she have a room here? If so, where was it? Could they find it together?
"Wait," said Laura. "If she lives here, someone has to clean it, right?"
"Right."
"Would it be you?"
"I've never cleaned a room of someone I didn't know."
"Damn. So it must be Angelica."
"Or no one."
"Right. But maybe if I followed Angelica and figured out where she went on -"
"Shhh!" said Nikki suddenly. She covered Laura's mouth with her hand and pressed her up against the wall of the small room. Laura slammed into it but didn't cry out. Nikki's eyes were full of panic. Laura listened intently and heard the sound of two people talking and walking down the hallway outside her door. It sounded like Angelica and someone else, but she couldn't make out who the second voice was.
"She's asking too many questions," said Angelica.
"She's curious. They always start out that way," said the second voice.
"She's different. She's smarter than the people you usually hire."
The feet stopped moving. "Are you implying that I'm to blame?"
"No, ma'am."
"Good. If you're concerned, I trust your judgement." The footsteps continued.
"What do you suggest I do?" asked Angelica.
"Nothing for now. Despite what you think, Miss K does want thinkers working for her. She just wants loyal and obedient thinkers. Help her keep focused on her job for now. Help her excel. Miss K doesn't like it when we go through employees too quickly."
Angelica and the stranger seemed to turn a corner and their voices faded. Nikki released Laura's mouth, and they both released the breath they didn't know they were holding.
"Holy shit," muttered Nikki. "That was close."
"Who was that?"
"Angelica and Miss Lancaster."
"Oh," said Laura.
"The real question," said Nikki, her voice was soft and her face wrinkled with concentration, "is which one of us they were talking about?"
"What do you mean?"
"If that was Angelica and Miss Lancaster, there are no other female employees that work here. That means they were either talking about me or you. Which was it?"
Laura gulped. "Shit," she whispered.
"Shit indeed."
"I should get back to work," said Laura. Panic was creeping into her voice. What had she done wrong? She got sick, that was all. She didn't ask questions. She kept to herself. She minded her own business. Sure, she talked with Nikki, but there's no way they knew about that. She hadn't asked about anything else except ...
Marcilla. She had asked Camille about Marcilla. Stupid, stupid girl. Do your work. Keep your mouth shut. Keep your job. It's not hard. Shut up and do your job.
"Right," said Nikki. "I should get out of here. Go for a walk or something. I just need to get out of the house for a bit."
"Right. Okay," said Laura. "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Yeah. Okay."
The two girls hugged briefly, stepped into the hallway, and went in opposite directions.
Laura spent the rest of the day working diligently. She ordered lunch and dinner to her room so she wouldn't have to stop. Maybe if she could present Camille with a completely annotated manuscript at the Muse Session, she would shake off any annoyance or suspicion. She couldn't lose this job. Not after bragging to Claire and her dad about it. Not after finally getting somewhere with her passions and dreams. She couldn't lose this. Not over some unknown lesbian poet. That wasn't the hill she wanted to die on.
***