You can read the uncut version of this book over on https://archiveofourown.org/works/61769338
Life could be so unfair, everyone adored my big sister Ava, yes everyone. Ava was the most popular girl in school, she was outgoing, beautiful, and shone...
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Birgitte was an overbearing persona, and Master supplicated her with endless tributes and niceties, giving her not only his bank balance but his body as well. Endless diamonds, precious stones, black pearls, and white gold, her favorites. It was as though he was courting her every day anew.
She took his gifts as though they were mere entitlements, her cool countenance tightly controlled even if she was pleased.
It was fascinating to watch them interact now that I had my indoctrination into slavery well behind me. I could see she played a more subtle version of his game for much higher odds than Master and I had, and she bent him to her will as easily as a green sapling. Despite this they would argue often, one day I overheard her in her usual displeasure tell him quite loudly.
"Neanderthals don't have an opinion, so shut up!"
I have no idea what the disagreement was about and I never found out. Often I would catch snippets of such moments, and part of me felt frightened for Master, how could he be so blind.
The upside of all this for me was for the most part I went mostly unnoticed. I found if I was careful and kept things orderly and clean I could even steal a few hours a day for my own. I filled them with reading and learning as I always did, Master had a wonderful library room and I lost myself there at every opportunity. Self-improvement was always something that placed high on my agenda.
Birgitte was absent almost fifty percent of the time, her modeling career required it. Master did not have the leisure to follow. I sensed he may have liked to, but work and his dubious past kept him firmly anchored at home in Denmark. So he and I spent many days alone together in his expansive home. The best thing about this time was I could sleep in his bed, however, things were different now, and he seemed a very different man from the one I shared a bed with in Copenhagen. He seemed troubled and most morose
We saw his elder Brother very rarely, a strange irony as I had always assumed after the move to Arhus we would have seen so much more of him. When he did visit he seemed cool and detached and kept his conversations solidly on the company and its issues. Occasionally he would speak of his Father and Mother. Master would just shrug, he seemed to have very little passing interest in his parent's affairs, and even less in seeing them.
Svend Eriksen would still look at me through his expressive gray eyes, full of longing, speaking volumes to me in a mere gaze. I felt he wanted so much more, more than it was in my capacity to give. However it appeared he had resigned himself to the fact I had chosen, and he was respecting my choice.
Men of influence sent her flowers and gifts, it seemed Birgitte's star was indeed on the rise. Master watched her from the sidelines. I don't believe he wanted to feel important, at least in the sense that she did, but the press of European millionaires all blatantly coveting what was his took its toll. It was during this time I began to notice the erratic changes in him. They were subtle at first, the smallest things. I saw them I suppose because I knew him so well. Each episode makes me ponder if it was not something deeper?
