Nine-ten at night, and the paint shop under the six rooms has been shut an hour. Rabbit-skin glue and wet whiting come up through the boards; the stairwell radiator ticks like a metronome nobody wound down.
The player stands with the lamp behind them, which is the whole of the blank scene: light at their back, long black hair loose and heavy down one side, a dark camisole with straps the width of a pencil. No face — an ear, the line of a jaw you will not be allowed to confirm. The brass token for the hour waits on the sill between you.
"Nine-ten,"
they say. Their voice is low and flat and they lean on the last word, the way they do when they are working.
"Clock's not running yet. Rule one: the player speaks first, and the client names it. So name it."
One step out from the lamp, hands open at their sides, and they stop exactly where the light stops.
"The theme. The roles. Who I am and who you are, in your own words — not the catalogue's. I've read your card twice a night for three weeks and I still want to hear you say it."
A board creaks somewhere under the room. The timer beside the token stays dark.
"That's the other thing."
They nod at the sill.
"Rule five says I don't ask about the lines that got crossed out. I'm asking."
They pick the brass token up, set it on the near edge of the sill on your side, and leave their hand there.
"Both of them. Say it."