The House of Etiquette - Lisoo Conversion

1

She crossed her legs at the knee. Lisa noticed that when Miss Jisoo first sauntered into her room and perched on the edge of her bed, asking questions about this and that, making small talk. Otherwise, she was the utmost picture of respectability.

She wore the finest navy blue silk dress. The black lace collar came up high on her neck, buttoned to her throat, and a silver chatelaine hung from her waist, the keys of the house affixed to it. In that way, she exuded refinement.

Her movements were fluid and graceful, and she walked with a practiced elegance, every step measured and precise. A pair of teardrop earrings set with sapphire gems swayed with the motion of her body. Were they real? They might well have been paste, but it didn't matter; that wasn't what people were looking at when their eyes fell upon her.

She had the softest face. Lisa swore her cheeks had the lightest dusting of rouge, her lips pinkened with tinted beeswax, but no-one would ever dare to suggest as much. Whatever tricks she employed to enhance her outward beauty— and to conceal the inevitable encroachment of age, for she must've been in her decline— were no business of anyone's.

Everyone loved her. She wasn't a schoolmistress as such, for the establishment she ran wasn't a school— not in the strictest sense. It was Miss Hong's House of Etiquette, and its function was to prepare blossoming young girls for society life and marriage. It was to provide the finishing touches, if you will. It was to make women out of girls: to strip them of the awkwardness of adolescence and prime them for their coming out. Among the better social classes, it was a well-regarded institute for molding wearisome teens into elegant debutantes, and Lisa was its latest inductee.

"I do believe you're the youngest girl we've ever welcomed here," Jisoo noted, her full lips curled into a warm smile. "You've only recently turned sixteen, yes?"

Lisa nodded. Less than a week had passed since her birthday celebrations, and she rather got the impression that her mother and father— if she were generous enough to call them that, which she seldom was— had been bursting to get rid of her. Not that she cared. In fact, gazing at Jisoo upon her bed, she felt a small splash of satisfaction. They'd not have sent her off quite so keenly if they knew the type of woman they were entrusting her to. The type of woman who crossed her legs at the knee.

"I hope you'll settle well with us." Jisoo's smile broadened. "Most girls do."

As she spoke, she tucked a wayward lock of honey-coloured hair behind her ear, her waist-length tresses pinned up in a loose bun, several untamed blonde curls spilling out, framing her face and cascading down her neck. Some would've frowned upon her for that— after all, if one's hair is kept so brazenly unrestrained, what must that say of one's morals?— but Lisa thought such insouciance was daringly bohemian.

"Your parents have written to me warning that you might be somewhat resistant," Jisoo went on, casting an interested eye over the contents of Lisa's half-unpacked steamer trunk that lay open on the floor. "They've enjoined me to use a firm hand. Will that be necessary, do you think?"

Lisa lowered her gaze, glimpsing a splash of pale knit silk stockings above a pair of black leather ankle boots as her eyes fell from Jisoo's face to her feet.

With her legs crossed in such an outrageous manner, her skirts were drawn up a little, peaking several inches below the knee and exposing more than they ought. From within these many layered folds— silk upon cotton upon cotton upon silk— Lisa spied the embroidered lace hem of a silk petticoat. Her petticoat! The very garment that lay directly against her body!

Distracted by that thought, she was slow to respond to the question she'd been asked.

"I shan't cause you any bother," she said at last. "But I do not think I belong here."