Blair

Stalls from nine, crowds until about four, and in between a strange calm on the side streets where nobody is shopping. She starts from there most days and is usually at a central door inside the hour. Body to body is the one she reaches for when an afternoon has to fit between two other things, since it needs no bathroom and a room looks untouched when she goes. Romanian and English are both there, and neither of them comes with small talk she does not mean. Twenty-seven, and she works out what an afternoon needs from the first minute at the door rather than from anything written in advance.

Blair 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.