Ruby

Nothing about Ruby's attention drifts, and none of it has to be asked for. Her English comes and goes without comment, and she never explains a silence.

The evenings where she works are long and quiet, and that suits somebody who begins slowly and speaks only when there is something worth saying. She holds her attention in one place for the whole length of a booking, an hour, or three, or through to the morning if that was the arrangement. Four years in the city now, and she has stopped thinking of anywhere else as home. She is careful in everything, and never changes anything without a moment's warning first.

Ruby decides which bookings she takes and may decline any of them; she sets the limits for what a session includes, says what they are, and may end a visit at any point, as the terms set out.