Harper

In her own hours

Harper crosses a lobby the way a returning guest does: coat over one arm, eyes forward, nothing to declare. At twenty-seven she reads a room without trying.

One language, English, in a voice that carries no further than it needs to, and she makes it feel like a choice rather than a limit. Most nights she starts out from De Pijp and is often at a door forty minutes after the confirmation comes back. She keeps her own counsel about where she has been and who she has seen, which is the only credential worth anything here. People tend to book her for an hour once and for three thereafter, and for the night after that.

Harper 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.