Miss Baxter's Girls Box Set

Book 1: Julie the Pianist-2

“Posture, dear,” she said. “Your playing is lovely, but your posture does not convey the confidence that I know you have inside you.”

“Yes, Miss Baxter.” I straightened up and started again.

I made it about halfway through the piece before I felt her hands on me again, coaxing my spine into a more proper position. I frowned. I hadn’t done it on purpose, it’s just that my previous teacher had never made much of a fuss about it, and I got into some bad habits.

I stopped playing. “I’m sorry, Miss Baxter.”

Miss Baxter touched her finger to my cheek and I felt myself flush. I quickly checked the corners of her mouth, but saw no disappointment there. Apparently, I was still getting a solid ‘A’ for effort even though I felt as if I had let her down.

“My dear Julie, I have an idea that I think will help your posture. Are you interested?”

“Yes, Miss Baxter.”

“Anise, would you take Julie up and have her fitted with a corset, please?”

Anise popped her head around the corner. “Yes, Miss Baxter.”

I stared wide-eyed at Anise’s sudden appearance. Had she been hiding out this whole time, knowing she might be needed again, or did Miss Baxter have some kind of psychic connection with her girls? And would that connection extend to me someday? Would Miss Baxter’s desires simply float through the air and deposit themselves into my subconscious mind so that I had no choice but to heed her calling?

Rather far-fetched, that anyone could have that kind of influence. And yet, here I was, rising from the piano bench prepared to follow Anise and be fitted for a corset to improve my posture.

“Hurry back, my dears.”

“Yes, Miss Baxter.”

* * * *

“She’s intense, huh?” I said, as I stood in the middle of my tiny room, half into my corset, with Anise behind me, hands on the laces. “Miss Baxter, I mean.”

“She can be,” Anise said. “Inhale.”

Anise gave a sharp tug on ends of the laces, cinching me up tighter and squeezing me harder than I had ever experienced. I groaned and tried to remember what it was like to breathe.

“Anise.” I gasped. “My goodness you’re strong.”

“Mmm,” she said. “Snowboarder. Just turned pro.”

“No s**t?” I squeaked as Anise yanked again.

I heard a small chuckle. “No s**t,” she said.

“Is that where you got that bruise?”

“Hmm?” Anise yanked the laces again.

“The bruise just above your butt.”

“Oh, that. That’s nothing.” Anise gave two more sharp yanks before pronouncing me properly cinched up and helping herself to a seat on the edge of my bed. “You want to see an injury?”

I watched her extend her left leg and pull on the hem of her jeans. There was something oddly shiny about Anise’s calf, and when she made a fist and rapped on her shin with a hollow sound, I understood.

“Prosthetic,” she said, “from the knee down. Looks pretty real though, doesn’t it? This is my dress-up model.”

“Holy s**t,” I said. “And you snowboard?”

“I do.” Anise beamed. “Got a few medals to prove it.”

“Anise, you’re amazing.” I leaned forward to wrap her up in my arms until the tightness of the corset put a quick stop to that plan. “Um, a little help?”

Anise chuckled, then stood up to pull my head to her shoulder. “Thanks,” she said, “but it wasn’t just me. I couldn’t have done it without Miss Baxter. She believed in me, even when I’d stopped believing in myself.”

I squeezed Anise to my corseted chest. “I have a lot to learn about living here in Miss Baxter’s house, don’t I?”

“Yes, you do, Julie.” Anise held me at arm’s length and I followed her gaze as it dropped to the floor for a moment. “But it’s all wonderful, I promise you that.”

“So that bruise? It’s from snowboarding then?”

“No.” Anise grinned. “That bruise is my reward. My reward from Miss Baxter for getting my s**t together and getting back on the slopes. But don’t tell her I said that. The getting my s**t together part. She doesn’t take kindly to crude language. That’s exactly how she says it, too. ‘I don’t take kindly to crude language, girls. No one will take you seriously if you rely on such words to get your point across.’”

The two of us stood there smirking. Anise’s impression of Miss Baxter was absolutely perfect. As we took a few minutes to get the giggles out of our systems, I got a strong feeling that Anise and I could become very good friends, or maybe more.

As if to prove it, Anise took me by the hand. “Come on, Julie. We don’t want to keep Miss Baxter waiting.”

Anise’s touch gave me confidence. Not enough to ask her if she liked girls like I did, or to ask her about what happened to her leg, but enough to broach the subject of the bruise again. “Tell me about your…reward?”

“I’ll give you the two-minute condensed version.” Anise smiled and tugged me toward the door. “Come on.”

In the time it took us to get down the stairs and back to the parlor, I learned that not everything that hurts should be considered bad. Some hurts can be what Anise called a good hurt. The leg injury was a bad hurt, but the bruise over her butt was a good hurt. That’s what I got from the two-minute version anyway. I found it a bit confusing, but Anise said I would learn more as I settled in here.

* * * *

Miss Baxter was drumming her fingers on the top of the piano when Anise and I returned. I had a hard time meeting her gaze, wondering if maybe she was feeling impatient with me, and also feeling a little self-conscious standing there in a corset and jeans. But Miss Baxter soon put me at ease with her warm smile and a hand laid gently upon my forearm.

Anise mentioned something else to me in our brief stairway conversation about good hurts and bad hurts, and that was Miss Baxter’s enjoyment of a girl restrained. That was exactly how Anise had phrased it too—a girl restrained. And judging from the way Miss Baxter’s eyes darted over my corseted body, I would say she was rather pleased with the way Anise had restrained me.

Miss Baxter turned to Anise and dismissed her with a curt nod. As I watched her go this time, it made me miss her just a little bit. Anise was nice, and she had shared quite a bit of herself with me in the short time we’d been acquainted. I thought it might be nice to share a little something with her, even if it was just Beethoven.

“From the top please, Julie.”

My mind was dragged back to the task at hand. “Yes, Miss Baxter.”

I made my way through Für Elise entirely from memory, even while finding myself completely distracted by the thoughts of good hurts, and girls restrained running wild through my mind.

What did it all mean? And who keeps spare corsets just lying around that happened to be my size?

At least there were no distractions from comments about keeping my back straight. Not surprising, as I really didn’t have a choice in this outfit.

“Julie, that was lovely. Would you mind playing it again? I do so love the way your posture has improved.”

I smiled. “Yes, Miss Baxter. Anise did a good job of getting it nice and tight.”

Miss Baxter’s mouth turned up just a tiny bit. “Yes. She’s quite strong, isn’t she?”

“Yes, Miss Baxter” I said, and began playing again from the top. I felt a little light-headed, and for a moment I couldn’t be quite sure if it was caused by the tightness of the corset or my boldness with Miss Baxter over Anise’s cinching me up. Whatever it was, I liked it.

I played Beethoven with feeling—the feeling that my piano teacher was always trying to coax out of me in preparation for my recital. But it wasn’t for my teacher that I did it. And it wasn’t for me, or for my parents, or for anyone else. It was for Miss Baxter.

At the end of my performance she rose from the bench and took up a position behind me. “It’s simply lovely, Julie,” she said.

I supposed she was referring to the way I played, but I also found myself wondering if she were not also enjoying a better view of her girl restrained, sitting properly at the piano bench. I put my shoulders back as best I could and pushed my chest out.

Rule number two, I decided. My body looked good in this corset and I was going to be proud of it.

I think Miss Baxter agreed. She laid a hand gently on my bare shoulder, but that was all. “One more time from the top please, Julie.”

As I played again, feeling Miss Baxter’s tender touch on my skin, I recalled what Anise had said about rewards and not all hurts being bad hurts. I tried to imagine myself in a situation where I could be bruised and smiling at the same time. And I began to wonder if there would come a time that I would ask Miss Baxter to take me there—to a place of corsets and strong, beautiful girls who smile shyly when they discuss their bruises.

* * * *

My after-dinner performance was absolutely lovely, and Miss Baxter wasn’t the only one to phrase it that way. Several of the girls in the boarding house made a point of praising my performance as they introduced themselves. And I rather enjoyed all the attention I was getting as I stood there, ram-rod straight touching hands and leaning in to kiss cheeks.

I was still laced up tight in my corset, though in the middle of my afternoon of practicing, Anise had taken my measurements, and another girl had been sent to the tailor to fetch me some fitted shirts and slacks for my evening performance. Three of each, so I got the feeling this might become a regular thing.

“Julie, my dear, I cannot begin to tell you how much I admire the way you applied yourself this afternoon.” Miss Baxter had linked her arm in mine and was pulling me off to the side of the parlor as she held out a business card.

“I don’t know if you suspected, but your rushed performance today was a bit of a test.” Miss Baxter handed me the card. “A friend of mine runs a very upscale restaurant in town and is currently in need of a pianist—someone with your skills, and your drive.”

Miss Baxter lifted her finger and laid it lovingly across my cheek as she mentioned my drive. As she looked into my eyes, I began to wonder if visions of my corseted form might be running through her head.

“I’ve taken the liberty of scheduling an audition for you tomorrow afternoon at two-thirty.” Miss Baxter dragged her finger down my cheek and parked it on the tip of my chin. “It’s entirely up to you whether or not you go, but please do have the courtesy of calling to cancel if you’re not interested.”

I shivered. Not because of her admonishment about calling to cancel, but because of her finger, still resting on my chin—the finger that that seemed to have a power over me, plying me to Miss Baxter’s will. Or maybe it wasn’t the finger at all, but just the fact that she was polite, treated me with respect, and seemed to have a great deal of confidence in my abilities.

“Yes, Miss Baxter,” I managed. “Thank you for the opportunity. I really appreciate what you’ve done for me. I haven’t even been here a whole day and it’s just that you, and Anise, and all the other girls here…”