http://krisreinke.livejournal.com/ (![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png)
krisreinke.livejournal.com) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
indeedsir_backup2013-02-24 07:24 pm
krisreinke.livejournal.com) wrote in indeedsir_backup2013-02-24 07:24 pm
Entry tags:
Fic: Bad suit.
This is in response to some long-ago prompt. I can't remember who or when ( but thank you anyway ). I didn't finish it - back whenever the story was wanted. I hope you can enjoy it now.
[More of the interminable epic Jooster story that will never be written.]
* * *
Bertie picked at the seam of his jacket, trying ineffectually to smooth the lump where the hem bunched up against the inseam. Clearly the previous owner had likewise owned longer arms, and the tailor, in the process of shortening matter’s for Bertie’s use, had simply rolled the excess rather than going to the trouble of opening the lining and trimming the wool. The result left the lowest button dangerously close to the edge, likely to snag on any random paper or inkwell. Bertie wondered if he could talk one of the women in the kitchen into moving it for him – or at least lending out a needle so he might attempt the operation himself. Maybe he could move in the front buttons as well. If he did, would it make the suit look less like a turnip sack?
Pulling out the lapels, Bertie leaned back from the gray-specked mirror, twisting his narrow frame in hopes of seeing the outfit in some more flattering light.
No luck.
He slumped on the bench with a sigh.
It was ugly. But it was warm and ugly – so better than last years suit which had been equally ugly (and how could so many differing forms of ugly be at once present upon the earth – that was a question for the philosophy class) but it had also been thin as a worn sheet and useful as a rice paper rain cape against the wicked drafts that whistled though the chipped pane in his dormitory window.
Warm did not mean warm enough. Nothing was ever warm, up here in the rafters where the least favored students huddled in unheated rooms.
He occasionally dreamed that someday – somehow – he’d be like the older Wooster boys, toddling off to the city tailors on school holidays, returning with pasteboard boxes filling the rumble seat of a bright black motorcar. Lads like that had fireplaces stacked with coal, toast in the morning and a pot of tea at night.
No chance of that.
Uncle George had no use for him as a standard bearer for the Wooster name. Not with three sons of his own marching arm in arm down the line of succession. No use for him period, really.
Not that his mother’s family was any warmer.
He smiled to himself, caught by the pun. Certainly even the cold dowager who had whispered to Uncle Cuthbert what a pity it was Bertie hadn’t been in the car with his parents would have to be warmer than this bench. On the wrapper, at least, however chill her heart proved.
Bertie pulled out the workbook.
The candles were finished, with none more to be had until the new term, but there was still light enough if he sat with his back to the window and squinted a bit.
Best swot up. Not that Uncle Henry was impressed with Bertie’s ministerial skills, but maybe… just maybe…. he’d pay the freight to India. Not that Bertie felt any great urge to convert the heathens. He didn’t figure he’d be persuasive enough to convert a tenner to two fives (given that he had no influence on his own classmates, and he couldn’t imagine a pack more savage) but if they dispatched him off to India? Maybe he could see his sister again.
India, he told himself, would be warm.
[More of the interminable epic Jooster story that will never be written.]
* * *
Bertie picked at the seam of his jacket, trying ineffectually to smooth the lump where the hem bunched up against the inseam. Clearly the previous owner had likewise owned longer arms, and the tailor, in the process of shortening matter’s for Bertie’s use, had simply rolled the excess rather than going to the trouble of opening the lining and trimming the wool. The result left the lowest button dangerously close to the edge, likely to snag on any random paper or inkwell. Bertie wondered if he could talk one of the women in the kitchen into moving it for him – or at least lending out a needle so he might attempt the operation himself. Maybe he could move in the front buttons as well. If he did, would it make the suit look less like a turnip sack?
Pulling out the lapels, Bertie leaned back from the gray-specked mirror, twisting his narrow frame in hopes of seeing the outfit in some more flattering light.
No luck.
He slumped on the bench with a sigh.
It was ugly. But it was warm and ugly – so better than last years suit which had been equally ugly (and how could so many differing forms of ugly be at once present upon the earth – that was a question for the philosophy class) but it had also been thin as a worn sheet and useful as a rice paper rain cape against the wicked drafts that whistled though the chipped pane in his dormitory window.
Warm did not mean warm enough. Nothing was ever warm, up here in the rafters where the least favored students huddled in unheated rooms.
He occasionally dreamed that someday – somehow – he’d be like the older Wooster boys, toddling off to the city tailors on school holidays, returning with pasteboard boxes filling the rumble seat of a bright black motorcar. Lads like that had fireplaces stacked with coal, toast in the morning and a pot of tea at night.
No chance of that.
Uncle George had no use for him as a standard bearer for the Wooster name. Not with three sons of his own marching arm in arm down the line of succession. No use for him period, really.
Not that his mother’s family was any warmer.
He smiled to himself, caught by the pun. Certainly even the cold dowager who had whispered to Uncle Cuthbert what a pity it was Bertie hadn’t been in the car with his parents would have to be warmer than this bench. On the wrapper, at least, however chill her heart proved.
Bertie pulled out the workbook.
The candles were finished, with none more to be had until the new term, but there was still light enough if he sat with his back to the window and squinted a bit.
Best swot up. Not that Uncle Henry was impressed with Bertie’s ministerial skills, but maybe… just maybe…. he’d pay the freight to India. Not that Bertie felt any great urge to convert the heathens. He didn’t figure he’d be persuasive enough to convert a tenner to two fives (given that he had no influence on his own classmates, and he couldn’t imagine a pack more savage) but if they dispatched him off to India? Maybe he could see his sister again.
India, he told himself, would be warm.