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[uncertainrelation]

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[originallutece]

She needs--

[There's a long few seconds where Rosalind tries and fails to come up with a proper synonym.]

--models for her dresses. Naturally I owe her a great many favors, given how often I commission her, so . . .

[uncertainrelation]

So you...offered yourself up, as a volunteer?

[originallutece]

She asked. I merely acquiesced. There's a rather large difference, and I'll thank you to notice it.

[uncertainrelation]

The significance of the difference being...?

[originallutece]

Volunteering suggests I was eager for it, and all it entails: dressing up and, and doing one's hair and the like. I'm merely doing this as a way to repay her.

[uncertainrelation]

Which by extension leaves one to surmise that you are not, in fact, eager for it?

[originallutece]

[. . .]

I don't precisely know what it is I feel towards it, to be perfectly honest. Hence my telling you.

[uncertainrelation]

...Meaning that, for the sake of the preservation of the status quo, your official stance on the matter is to not be eager, until otherwise amended.

Which part of it disconcerts you so?

[originallutece]

Yes.

[And this, among a thousand other reasons, is why she'd wanted to talk to him about it. Because he understands, in all the little ways someone else likely wouldn't.]

. . . I'm aware this isn't Columbia, and that the people here are far more intelligent than those at home. But I suppose a part of me fears that to do this would be to destroy everything I've worked for these past few decades.

For god's sake, it's dressing up in order to look pretty. To emphasize the clothes, yes,
and in doing so become little more than a doll to put them on.

[And yet Miss Everett had emphasized the precise opposite. But ah, that doesn't matter right now. This is a fear that can't be quelled by an assurance from someone she barely knows.]

[uncertainrelation]

...Decades.

[He's quiet a minute, but it's entirely possible his silence seems like much longer before eventually his addendum follows.]

You've only been here five months. Not decades.

So who is it destroying something for, really? Yourself?

[originallutece]

You know I meant months.

Yes. I suppose. I don't know. I don't-- I'm not entirely opposed to the idea, I never would have agreed if I were, and it isn't as if I'm

[No. She's being stupid. She's giving into panic, instead of being rational.]

I've never done this before. Not where someone besides you could see.

[uncertainrelation]

I think you meant what you said, my dearest.

Were you not dressed up to look pretty the day you met me at the train station?

[originallutece]

No. That was still practical. More feminine than what I used to dress as, I grant you, but still entirely practical and efficient.

This won't be.

[uncertainrelation]

Impracticality, meaning...pretty, for the sake of pretty.

[Mmmmm.]

...Are you afraid you'll enjoy it?

[originallutece]

. . . yes. Among other things.

[uncertainrelation]

You'll not stop being Madam Rosalind Lutece — Doctor Rosalind Lutece — simply by donning a dress and some rouge on your cheeks, Rosie.

[originallutece]

It's a stupid fear, I know.

[uncertainrelation]

Lay out that fear to me, then. The whole of it, start to finish. You put on the dress, you parade about in the show, and then...?

[originallutece]

[A long pause.]

I become precisely what Mother wanted me to be: an empty-headed, pretty little socialite who thinks of nothing at all, save being pretty.

Or that I'll lose respect. Both for myself and from the general population.

[uncertainrelation]

Is that your opinion on Miss Everett?

As best I can tell, she fits that description to a tee already.

[originallutece]

Of course it isn't. And I see the point you're trying to make, but this isn't about Miss Everett. It hardly matters what other women do or don't do.

I never, ever allowed anyone to have even the slightest reason to think I was anything but a scientist who happened to be a woman, and now I'm about to hand over an entire afternoon's worth of proof.

[uncertainrelation]

An entire afternoon's worth of proof that...you ARE a woman, and a pretty one at that.

Anyone can see that simply by looking at your face, my girl.

[originallutece]

[. . .]

And if they refuse to take me seriously after this?

[uncertainrelation]

...If you could have a guarantee that nothing of the sort would happen. All other things being equal, but in a world that came with the absolute certainty that you would neither lose face nor status nor respect from pursuing this.

Would you hesitate to do it, or wouldn't you?

[originallutece]

I suspect so, yes. Perhaps not quite as much, but yes.