You go home

You're tired after more than half a bottle of wine and a long day, so you give Julia a kiss on the cheek and say goodbye, planning to pay a call on her at work tomorrow. Returning to the cab, you give the driver your address and suffer a moment of irrational panic at the thought that thanks to your machinations with the Rulebook you may not actually live there after all. A quick check of your driving licence confirms that your place of residence is unchanged though and you're able to relax for the rest of the short journey.

In fact, you're so relaxed that you're half asleep when the taxi pulls up outside your house and you have to stifle a yawn whilst paying the driver and leaving the vehicle, which departs without delay. Taking your keys from your pocket, you walk up the path to your front door, glad to be home.

You switch on the lights to find the hall much as you remember, a bit cleaner and tidier, perhaps, but otherwise unchanged. You're looking forward to your bed, but when you go to the kitchen for a glass of water, you see a beautifully handwritten note on the work surface:

Professor,
I've cleaned the house and tidied the garden,
but if there's anything else I can do for you tonight,
please don't hesitate to call me.
Imogen. xx❤ xx

The message seems a little too personal for a student to her supervisor and you make a mental note to nip it in the bud if she's starting to develop a crush on you. Belatedly, you notice that the curtains and blinds are closed, although you'd have opened them before leaving for work this morning, and the kitchen is spotless, your possessions free of dust and dirt. Slightly more alert than when you arrived home, you decide to check what other changes having a grad-student acting as an unofficial maid may have caused, beginning systematically with the cellar.

Formerly used solely for storage, your cellar is now dry and clean, with a rough concrete floor and unplastered, whitewashed walls. There are doors at both the top and the bottom of the stairs (the one at the bottom is new, or at least new to you), making the room effectively soundproof and electrical cables have been tacked to the walls, leading to a pair of powerful wall lights, which illuminate the room with a harsh white glare. The jumble of boxes that you're used to seeing on the rare occasions you come down here have been neatly stacked next to the walls, to make room for a sturdy wooden whipping post, bolted firmly to the floor, apparently for when you decide to inflict a punishment so severe that the recipient can't be expected to submit without disturbing the neighbours.

You make your way back upstairs and find that the ground floor has undergone no such reconfiguration, then continue upwards. Again, the place is a bit tidier and cleaner than you're used to, especially in the bathroom, but the only major change is in your bedroom, where you find a cabinet containing all manner of spanking accoutrements and even some bondage gear, which you find a little worrying given that you're single. Still, there's no need to worry today, so you return to the bathroom to get ready for bed, before finally slipping beneath the covers (freshly laundered, as it turns out) and drifting into a sleep so deep that you don't even remember dreaming.