Except she wasn’t her own person around Jake Devila.
She had to face up to that, put a stop to it and move on.
Soon.
Or she’d fritter away what was left of her good child-bearing years, consumed by this dreadfully compulsive attraction to a man who’d never think of sharing the kind of future she really did want deep down in her heart.
‘Merlina, what are you doing?’ her sister called out. ‘The pancakes I cooked for you are getting cold.’
‘I told you I didn’t want any, Sylvana,’ she answered in exasperation, grabbing her handbag from the bed and heading out to the living area of her small apartment.
‘You’re too skinny. You need feeding up.’
Merlina gritted her teeth. Everyone in her family said that and she was fed up with hearing it. Just because they were all happy to be well padded did not make her skinny. She was simply thinner by comparison. The image she had to maintain could not be done with any excess weight and her figure was naturally curvy, which made following fashion trends challenging enough as it was.
‘I had some yoghurt and fruit earlier on. I don’t want anything else,’ she stated, more than ready to say goodbye to the sister who’d come up to Sydney from Griffith to have laser treatment on her eyes, and who was staying overnight so she wouldn’t feel rushed this morning.
Sylvana was seated at the kitchen servery, focused on feeding herself a stack of pancakes dripping with maple syrup. Already plump and working on getting plumper, Merlina thought as she said, ‘I have to get going. I hope your short-sightedness gets fixed so you won’t have to wear glasses any more.’
A fork loaded with pancake was halfway to her mouth which stayed gaping as she stared in shock at Merlina. ‘You’re not wearing that to work!’
That was obviously the outfit she’d so carefully put together; the long floaty skirt in a pretty floral pattern of greens and pinks, a woven pink-tan belt circling her hips, a dark green cropped cotton singlet, several long gold chains dangling from her neck, gold hoops in her ears and high-heeled dark green sandals on her feet.
Of course, her sister was wearing her usual respectable black: tailored pants right up to her waist and a long, loose T-shirt that covered up unsightly rolls of flesh.
‘I’m expected to dress like this for my job, Sylvana,’ she bit out, feeling her cheeks flame at the implied criticism.
‘With bare skin around your waist?’
‘It’s a hipster skirt which happens to be very fashionable right now.’
‘Your navel would show if the belt slipped a bit.’
‘So what?’
‘Papa would have a fit if he saw you displaying yourself like that in public.’
‘This is the city, Sylvana. I don’t have to answer to the Italian community in Griffith. No tongues are going to wag about me here, and yours had better not wag when you go home. Understood?’
Sylvana huffed. She was two years younger than Merlina, but being married and settled properly with a husband and young family apparently gave her the right to pick her wayward sister apart. ‘It was bad enough when you got your beautiful hair cut in that raggedy fashion,’ she started in again. ‘I don’t think this job is doing you any good.’
‘It’s my choice,’ Merlina fired back, though she’d been coming to the same conclusion herself. For different reasons. ‘I’m going now. Please make sure the door is locked when you leave. And give my love to the family when you get home.’
‘Now you’ve got all snippy,’ Sylvana threw at her.
‘I wonder why,’ flipped off her tongue as she passed the kitchen servery on her way to the front door.
‘Wait!’ Sylvana scuttled off the stool she’d been sitting on, rounded the bench and enveloped Merlina in a big squashy hug. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you. I just care about you, that’s all.’
‘Then please stop trying to put me in a box where I don’t belong. We’re different people. I like my hair style. I like my clothes. I like my job. So just let me be. Okay?’ She kissed her sister on the cheek and eased away. ‘Goodbye and good luck at the eye clinic.’
Sylvana said she was sorry for upsetting her and thanked her effusively for her hospitality as Merlina finally made good her escape.
Almost.
‘Merlina, did you know you can see through that skirt? You need a petticoat on,’ Sylvana called after her.
She waved and walked faster, rolling her eyes at her own scandalous behaviour in daring to break the rules of respectable dressing. All Jake Devila’s doing, though he didn’t know he’d done her a favour in stipulating his image requirements. Fulfilling them had actually been liberating, forcing her to shed inhibitions about showing off her body. She’d always secretly envied girls who did, wishing she could feel as free about it.
Her job with Jake was the excuse, the permission, the goad to actually do what she’d wanted to do. Not that she went overboard with being sexually provocative. At least, she didn’t think so. She wasn’t wearing a G-string under this skirt. In fact, her hipster panties were far more modest than the bottom half of a bikini, which was something she’d never made the leap to wear, still sticking with a one-piece maillot for swimming.
Sylvana was just being stick-in-the-mud-Italian respectable. Merlina decided there was no reason to feel guilty about any of the changes she’d made to her appearance.
Having her hair cut had been a shock at first because it had always been long. Not that it was all short now, only the fringe and the wispy bits that feathered her face. The top layer ended just below her ears and actually waved because it wasn’t carrying so much weight. The bottom layer was shoulder-length and it had a wave, too, making the style easy to keep looking good. It also definitely complemented her modern clothes.
Jake Devila had been the driving force behind her more modern makeover but this was her now, and she did like it. What’s more, she wasn’t going to revert to stodgy suits when she left him, though she might have to tone the pop culture clothes down a bit. Bare midriffs could be frowned upon in other work environments.
Whatever…the experience of working for Jake hadn’t been all bad. In fact, it had been stimulating on many levels. Nevertheless, as she travelled on the train from Chatswood where she lived, to Milson’s Point where Signature Sounds was located in a prime position overlooking Sydney Harbour, Merlina kept telling herself it had to end.