Unfortunately for Eleanora, Grell had told Madam Red all about the evening, and now both of them wanted details about what she had been doing with Sebastian. And they didn't want just details, they wanted DETAILS.
"Come on!" Madam Red said in her room. "DETAILS! Give us the DETAILS!"
"Yes," Grell said, lounging on the floor and half-glaring, half-staring at Eleanora. "And leave absolutely none of them out!"
"Leave nothing out, Eleanora!"
"Keep every single disgusting, nitty-gritty DETAIL in there!"
"Leave absolutely everything in!"
"Okay, go!"
"WAIT!"
"What's wrong?"
"We need nourishment! This is going to be an all-night conversation! Grell, go and get as many snacks as possible. Eleanora, tea. And I'll be making this old room friendlier!"
The servants returned a half-hour later, carrying enough food and drink to last a week, and discovered that Madam Red had converted the room to some kind of Persian palace, with pillows and blankets everywhere to ensure maximum comfort.
"Now then," she said, helping herself to a sandwich, "now you can begin!"
"And leave absolutely nothing out!"
"Alright," Eleanora said, feeling more awkward than she had ever felt in her life. She was unaccustomed to sitting down and eating in front of a lady, and even more unaccustomed to talking about her intimate life. "Well, we were in the kitchen…"
"What time?"
"Oh, I don't know…Maybe around eleven?"
"Who was in the kitchen first? You or him?"
"H-He was…"
"And what was he doing?"
"Washing the dishes…"
"How long was he washing the dishes?"
"He finished fairly quickly…"
"How long did it take him?"
"Like…Two minutes, maybe…?"
"Did you say something to him?"
And so it went on.
And on.
And on.
And on.
And on. An hour had passed before she was even able to get to the good part.
"So…"
"So?!" Madam Red and Grell said breathlessly, hanging on to her every word.
"So…So I lay down on the bed and he took his shirt off…"
"Ohh…" Grell groaned.
"And then he sat down next to me and he pulled off my stockings."
"How'd he do that?"
"Well, first he undid my garters with his teeth…"
"OooohHHHHhhh…"
"And then he just slid the stockings off."
"Also with his teeth?"
"No, he took his gloves off and used his bare hands."
"OOOOOOooooohHHHHHHhhh!"
Eleanora shuffled around uncomfortably and ate another cookie.
"Don't stop! Don't stop! Don't stop for any reason! Just keep going!"
"So then he started pulling my top down…"
"AAAAAAAOOOOOOOOKKKKKGGGGHHHHH!"
"Please stop! That's very distracting!"
"Sorry," Grell said, biting into a pillow. "Sorry. I just can't help it—but keep going!"
"And then he unlaced my corset."
"How'd he do that?"
"Just with his fingers, like a normal person."
"So…There was a break while he undid your corset?"
"No—he started kissing my neck at that point. And when he took my corset off, he ran his lips down my back…"
Eleanora's description went on for about three hours, with interruptions. By the end of those hours, Grell had chewed her way through seven pillows.
Once she had finished, and there was nothing else to say, the women were all silent for a few minutes.
"…Wow," Madam Red finally said. "Just…Just…Wow."
"I can't stand it," Grell moaned. "I just can't stand it! It should have been meee…"
"Next time, it can be your turn," Eleanora said, resisting the urge to fall asleep. Damn, she was tired…
"And you're sure that's everything?" Madam Red said. "You're positive? You left absolutely nothing out?"
"Yes…No! I just remembered something else!"
"What? What?! WHAT?!"
"Well…It's a bit embarrassing…"
"We're all ladies here! More than that, we're all women! Full disclosure now, never tell anyone else ever again! Come on, what is it?!"
"Well…Somewhere during the middle of it…Right in the heart of it, I mean…"
"Yes? Yes?"
"He suddenly stopped and he rolled me over and he looked at me seriously and he said that…"
"He said what? He said WHAT?!"
"He said that he loved me."
Madam Red and Grell stared at her.
"…He said that he…loved you?"
"Yes. In all seriousness."
"But that's…But that's wonderful!" Madam Red tackled Eleanora in a hug while Grell looked as if she wanted to kill her. "This is the best news I have heard in a long time!"
"But…But what does it mean?"
"It means that he loves you! It means that he really, genuinely, wholeheartedly, uncompromisingly, unconditionally loves you!"
"…That's impossible," Eleanora said. "He's a demon. He can't love, and he certainly can't love me."
"But he just told you that he did!"
"Well…Maybe he was lying!"
"Men don't lie about things like that," Madam Red said. "Women can, easily, but men can't. Something always gives them away when they try to lie about love."
"Nonsense. Men have said that they love a woman when it turns out that they didn't."
"That just means that the woman was too idiotic to recognize the signs. Men just don't lie about love."
"But he's a demon, which means he's not a real 'man,' which means that he can still lie about it!"
"Well, we can table this discussion for now," Madam Red sighed and leaned in. "But what about you?"
"What about me?"
"Do you love him?"
"NO!" Grell said quickly.
Eleanora didn't answer immediately; she bit her lip and looked away.
"I don't know," she finally said.
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean that I don't know."
"It's a simple yes-or-no question, Eleanora!"
"But I really don't know the answer." She looked away again. "Sometimes…Sometimes I think that he's not that bad. But then he just goes and does something that makes me so furious, and then I hate him. But then he does something else that makes him seem almost human…But then he goes and does something demonic again…" She groaned and buried her head into her knees. "I really just don't know how I feel about him. That's really all I can say—that's the best way that I can explain it."
"But…But you must love him a little bit!"
"What makes you say that?"
"If you didn't love him, you wouldn't have slept with him, right?"
"Men take intimacy so seriously, it's weird. Women don't treat it nearly as important as men do."
"What do you mean by that?"
"You just said that a woman can easily lie about love. So, by that logic, a woman can easily lie about intimacy as well."
"So…So you didn't do it because you wanted to?"
"The young Master ordered me to distract him, and so I did."
"But…But there must be a reason as to why you chose that approach!"
"Do you honestly think I sexed him because I love him?" Eleanora said coldly.
There was a smashing sound behind her. She whirled around and her heart stopped.
Sebastian was standing in the doorway.
He had been carrying a tray with more tea, which he had accidentally dropped. He silently knelt down and began picking up the shattered china.
"Oh, shit," Eleanora said, staggering to her feet. "Oh, shit; Sebastian…Sebastian, I'm sorry…I'm sorry, I didn't mean it…I just…Just…"
He rose up again, the broken tea-things on his tray, and then he walked back down the hallway, not moving faster or slower; not looking at anyone; not saying anything.
Just walking.