This will make more sense if you have read the previous part of Justine.
The headings giving an idea of the timeline of this story have been adjusted through all the parts, to give a more accurate idea of the sequence. Not that you care.
You possibly do care that there is no sex at all in this part. Apologies. It just came out like this.
Southern France, evening, Decision Day minus 4
That evening, despite her exhaustion, despite the consternation deep in her at the knowledge, the certainty, that something huge was being done to her, that all the strangenesses since Sir Stephen had recruited her (all but abducted her, she now saw— given no time to think, to consult, even to speak to anyone, say goodbye to anyone)— and perhaps even before that, unless it was a coincidence that she had had encounters with three of her new employers over the preceding months— that all these strangenesses meant something significant was going on, undercover, unacknowledged, something sinister— despite all that, she had found herself energised, focused, fully present, almost hyper-alert as she had served drinks on the terrace.
The idea building in her that they were all in on it, that they had plans for her, sinister as those plans might be— sexually perverse, abusive, even, as seemed likely— the idea that should have horrified her, did horrify her, filling her with trepidation, that idea also had her fascinated, excited— sexually as well as emotionally— seemed to have awakened something in her, something urgently needy.
She was at war with herself, appalled at the hunger in her for whatever might come next, frightened by her own weakness in the face of the smiling, casual certainty of these people, their confidence as they manipulated, humiliated and abused her (the fear, as she all too clearly saw, serving only to chip away at her diminishing confidence, making her even weaker, intensifying the fear, an accelerating downward vortex), the hunger at war with that part of her which knew that something huge was at stake, that her weakness was not just shameful, but dangerous— that even if she did not have a clue what was coming next, that if she could not escape it, something momentous, something life-changing would happen to her, something definitively bad.
Something that she was not going to be strong enough to resist.
Worse; something that she was going to walk towards, allow them to do to her; she could see it so clearly— the sickness and power of her attraction to the idea of no longer being responsible for her own destiny, no longer being required to work, to strive— that attraction growing in her all the time; to be kneeling at Mme. Danica’s side, for her; for all of them; passive, accepting, obedient, pleasing, absolved of all choices— even choices about sex; the unfolding sense that it all felt as inescapable as it was unknown…
All of that made just serving them, ignored as usual, taken utterly for granted, into an intense emotional experience for Justine; she was no longer clumsy, no longer distracted, but instead urgently focused on performance, on being just exactly what they wanted her to be. It was the only strength she had access to— to manage how she performed for them.
The seats on the terrace were low loungers, her employers were in a loose, wide circle, so that serving any one of them, bent from the hip, was certain to mean that she was putting on a show for the others, should they be interested, and Justine found herself working hard to make that show as perfect as possible; placing her feet a little wider apart then before, bending more exaggeratedly, arching her back, offering her cleavage, shifting her feet still wider while she was bent over, letting her hips roll a little as she did so, all her dance training put to the service of communicating just how willing she was to serve them as they required.
As far as she could tell, not one of them was in the slightest interested. On her way up to her garret room that evening, the intensity of serving them done with for the day, that reality took her down another vortex— a hard glow of pride at the certainty that she had done better than ever before serving only to ignite despair at being so ignored, at it not making any difference to them at all, leading to shame at her weakness and sickly fascinating self-disgust at the ways her sexual imagination kept taking her.
Neither part of her could win; neither part of her would retreat. In vain did she struggle to convince the sensible, moral part of herself that it must listen, must accept that she needed to move on from the little girl who had been moulded more by her mother’s power than grown from within— that suppressing this need was impossible, would result in anguish and dangerously suppressed desires.
Equally useless were her attempts to frighten herself into doing the right thing by forcing herself to imagine the likely outcomes of letting Sir Stephen and his friends trap her in their psychological web of control and subordination. The reality was that these imaginations were just as likely to end up as disturbing, seductive fantasies as fearful warnings.
Reaching her room, she could no longer sustain the contradictions, the whirling, high-strung thoughts, and exhaustion took her as, once again, she simply collapsed onto her bed, and into sleep.
Her awakening was utter confusion; she was groggy, her thoughts slow, vague; she was frightened too— some noise, getting louder; it must be morning, her mind told her, but something was wrong about the light. Fear and uncertainty multiplied, so that she jerked herself upward, looking around, just as the door opened and Mme. Creux entered; certain, measured and hard-eyed as always.
As it dawned on Justine that it must be late evening, that her chin and shoulder were damp with half-dried drool, that she had smeared her make-up on the bed linen, and creased her costume again, she was taken by a wave of humiliation and fear, flinching back into the corner, lifting her knees so she could hug them, eyes jammed shut, certain that a harsh tongue-lashing was coming, unable to bear even the thought of it, all her strength used simply not to let her internal whimpering become audible, sure that an even more obvious display of weakness would invite sharper criticism.
But there was nothing; nothing but silence. A silence that extended, a silence which she could not fathom; did it imply a gathering storm, something worse than she had expected— or was it a silence of calm, an allowance of time, an acceptance of the stresses and strains that had been imposed upon her?
The silence gave no clues, only uncertainty, and in the end, Justine had to open her eyes, lift her head, dare to look at her visitor, whose face was just as always; unreadable, but whose eyes were— just possibly— a little softer, more empathetic than usual.
Her voice too, when she spoke, was just a little more human than Justine had come to expect;
“Poor silly fillette.”
“It’s not your fault, you know. You’re young; your head has been filled with nonsense; a stupid idea that your job is to be a someone; the hero of your own story, as they have it. It’s such a cruel thing to do to pretty young girls.”
“Oh, to be sure, feminism has a point; Simone was right— women have just as much right to be their own heroes as men do; it truly is a monstrous imposition to deny women the chance to discover this for themselves, unacceptable and everywhere to be fought against.”
“But here is the trap, pretty— the trap you have fallen into, that feminism has made worse. Because there is a pathetic little secret that men try to keep, which feminists have, all too blindly, helped them with, resulting in a new imposition, just as monstrous— perhaps even worse.”
“You see, fillette, it has never been true of most men that they were capable of being the heroes of their own lives. Just as it is true of most women that they have not the capacity to become so.”
“You, along with most men, and most woman— you, my dear, have been led astray. You are not a hero, not even to yourself. Will never be, no matter how hard you strive, no matter how much you learn. Most people never will be, and it is cruel to require of them that they attempt to be.”
“So I am sorry for you, pretty; truly. It brings a warmth and softness to my bosom to see you in such confusion, such anguish. It’s so unnecessary, so pointless.”
“And it’s so easy to avoid that pain. So simple. It’s a shame to keep suffering so, when it can be so easy, simple, to just stop. Stop trying.”
“Simply, stop trying to be your hero, stop thinking about the possibility of it, even. That’s all it takes. Step in to your reality; that you are not required to be a hero, not capable of it; that you can relax into the role you were born to— that of an extra— a walk-on part— a plot device in the story of others, who are real heroes. Everything will be simpler, I promise you.”
“And, even more incredible, I am sure, to you at this moment, there is something momentous about this; an even deeper secret. That, in truth those people who do have in themselves what it takes to become their own heroes, will find their path easier if they, too, stop trying to achieve hero status. Which makes my advice correct, even if I have you wrong— even if I have misjudged you in assessing you as one of humanity’s born extras.”
“There is one more thing, important to understand. Acceptance of your reality will indeed end the suffering you are experiencing right now— the torment of finding yourself unable to be what you expect yourself to be— the discovery that there is, in fact, no iron in your soul; none at all; that it is made of rubber. That suffering can end.”
“But it would be cruel to let you think that that will be an end to suffering. Sadly, to live is to suffer. But the quality of the suffering will change.”
“Internally, you may find peace through acceptance of your truth as a mere extra, but that will only make it clearer to you that heroes are assholes; narcissists, sociopaths, selfish to a fault. The suffering of others means nothing to them, if it will further their experience of themselves as heroic. Heroes are not the good guys; just those to whom their own journey is the only point of the universe.”
“You won’t be imposing unnecessary suffering upon yourself. Rather— and particularly if you find yourself attracted to heroes (and they are, sadly, all too fascinating to the rest of us), you will likely have suffering imposed upon you by them.”
“Our employers are, of course, all heroes to themselves— authentically, heroes. The suffering they impose on you will serve to further confirm that for them.”
This speech both appalled and electrified Justine. For it to come from a servant— not one of the rich and powerful people she serves, but from a servant who Justine had built a mental picture of as a severely emotionally damaged martinet, almost certainly incapable of interior dialogue, so tightly wound must she be— for this woman to have said such profoundly impactful things to her in such short, pithy sentences; for those sentences to have lanced their way, one after the other, each one scalpel sharp, going direct to the heart of Justine’s struggle with herself— this was beyond comprehension.
I get everything wrong. I think I understand the world, but I don’t have a clue. I’m so lost!
She found herself stilled by thus, stilled and stunned— all tension gone. Her body relaxed, her mouth fell open, her hands loosened their tight clasp about her knees, her shoulders sagged as her thighs fell open; she all but stopped breathing. There was nothing to do but wait. Wait to see what happened to her next.
Which was that Mme. Creux slowly began to smile; a tight, hard, smug smile, which started, almost imperceptibly, at the centre of her upper lip, and slowly, slowly spread, until Justine could see that it carried pain as well as satisfaction, pain, and recognition too.
Justine began to tremble, hard; then, a certainty dawning in her that the dried-up old stick of a housekeeper to the rich was some sort of truth-seer, maybe even a witch; something frightening and dangerous, certainly.
Still, though, no matter what dread assailed her, Justine could do nothing but wait, wait and take whatever came next. She had nothing, was nothing. An empty vessel, waiting to be filled.
The smile faded away, more quickly than it had grown;
“Just so, pretty; just so. It shall be as it is.”
A slight pause, and Mme. Creux was simply herself again as she said, in a voice both the same and entirely different;
“You will take another black mark for having crumpled another uniform, and strip for me now, please— we need to check that this new uniform is a good fit before you are required to wear it tomorrow evening.”
Read the next part of Justine.
