The Firefighter and the Virgin Princess

by Jemma Harte

  "Thanks, Peter. It'll go to Stacey though. The director loves her. Singles her out a lot lately if he comes into class."

  He shrugged. "Sometimes being the target of high expectations is not such a great thing. Paradisi pushes her real hard and she's been out sick a lot. Her bulimia is raging."

  Ah, the B word. Funny how anorexia and bulimia were always referred to as if they were a dancer's pet. She had to dash home and feed her bulimia.

  Lily felt a spasm of guilt for having thought about that earlier and seeing it as her way to a part. What sort of person wished an incapacitating illness on another so she could snag a role in a ballet? She felt sick suddenly, ashamed of herself. She did not want to be that sort of person. When had it happened that she became so cutthroat?

  Dear god, she was stagnating here. Lily could no longer deny that her career had stalled and this made her hope, viciously, for bad things to happen to others. She used to be restless, always on the move and motivated, always knew where she was headed. But her view of the future became less assured the higher she went, the competition getting tougher as the field narrowed. Now it felt as if she'd reached a plateau and life was moving on without her. Couldn't seem to put a foot forward anymore without turning in a circle. If she wasn't careful, this discontent would get heavy and pull her down.

  The sweaty-handed fireman, however, moved and breathed and lived with determination. That was what had made him seem so "real", so vital, so full of energy. He knew where he was going, no doubt. She wanted some of that. She'd missed feeling that way.

  "There is absolutely nothing but bone to get hold of on that girl anymore," Peter added, wiping his forehead on a towel, still talking about Bulimic Stacey. "I can lift her one handed and forget she's up there."

  "That's too bad. She has so much talent."

  "We all have talent or we wouldn't be here. People handle it in different ways. A dancer has to look after themselves, look after their instrument, you know? It's her choice to eat and throw up. No one's making her do it, are they?"

  Ouch, the lack of sympathy in their world was tough, ruthless. Not just for others, but for themselves.

  Lily thought of how hard she was pushing herself, even through injury. Meanwhile, Stacey Glasson threw up everything she ate and everyone knew it, except those who didn't care to know and so turned a deliberate blind eye.

  Maybe Peter was right and sometimes it was better to fly under the director's radar. There was certainly enough pressure even without his attention and the jealousy of others.

  Even so, she longed for that notice. In her desperately shy way, she longed for it and dreaded it at the same time.

  And here she was, stuck in place. Somehow she had to get herself moving again. Maybe it was time to try something different.

  Chapter Three

  "Hey, Joey! Some girly's here looking for you."

  Soda can halfway to his mouth, he stopped. For some reason the idea that it might be Donna flashed through his mind. Oh, shit. He didn't feel like talking to her.

  It was as if every man in the room suddenly inhaled and held their breath. Did someone just mute the TV? It was suspiciously quiet for once.

  Mike nudged him so hard he spilled coke on his t-shirt. Good thing it was dark blue. "Joseph! What are you waitin' for? Move it, dope!"

  He twisted around reluctantly to look over the back of the old couch.

  And there was Princess Blue Eyes standing in the doorway, stained coat over one arm. He had never moved so fast, even when the alarm sounded for a call out. The half empty soda can dropped to the floor and he tripped over it, then over his own feet.

  Someone chuckled. Someone else whistled the tune, "If I only had a brain..."

  "Lieutenant Rossini," she said. "I changed my mind about the coat."

  Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he tried to get his pulse in order. Why was he so at a loss? He was usually the outgoing one in the family, not the sort to get tongue-tied.

  Play it cool, Joseph.

  "You found me," he said, as nonchalantly as possible.

  "Well, you did tell me where I could." She looked around the roomful of sprawling firefighters. "I see you're busy," she said drily. "Don't let me keep you."

  Aware of every eye watching them, he gestured for her to walk out with him into the engine bay where they could have some privacy. "I'm glad you came by."

  She held out her arm with the soiled coat laid over it. "I wouldn't have bothered, but my grandmother gave this to me shortly before she died. So it's special, you see."

  "No problem." He took it swiftly, inhaled a deep breath of her perfume and smiled. "I'll get it cleaned, like I said. Where shall I bring it to you?"

  She'd been staring at his hands, but now she eyed the rest of him cautiously, up and down. Finally she said, "I'll pick it up here."

  "Okay. Can I even know your name?"

  The blue eyes shone bright, widened. "Why?"

  He propped one shoulder against his locker, hugging her coat in both arms. "So I can ask you on a date." May as well leap in with both feet. If he fell on his ass it wouldn't be the first time.

  She blinked. "It's Lily, actually. Lily Keene. But I can't go on a date."

  "Oh, right. You've got a boyfriend. Or you're married, even though you don't wear a ring."

  "No." She looked confused. Her gaze had once again tracked lingeringly over his hands, then his arms and shoulders. "I mean, I don't...date. Men."

  "You're a lesbian."

  "No." Her eyebrows flew sky high. "Not the last time I checked."

  "You got a terminal disease."

  "No. I'm a dancer."

  He waited. There had to be more, right? Apparently not. That was her reason. Just that. "I didn't come here for anything else," she added hastily. "I merely brought the coat. Like you said I should. No other reason."

  "Why do you keep looking at my hands? Afraid I'll try to touch you with them and get you all..." he grinned, "...dirty?"

  Her lips quivered. She put her own hands behind her back. He noted that she stood very straight, heels together and toes turned outward. "I have to go."

  "Wait a minute. I get off shift tomorrow. Let me take you to dinner tomorrow night." Joe, you are one crazy son-of-a-bitch. You know she's not your type. His pride had decided that was a more palatable idea than "out of your league".

  "I told you I can't. I dance tomorrow night. I dance every night. In the theater."

  "Which theater?"

  "NYBT," she replied scornfully, as if he should have realized. As if there was only one theater in New York. "I have to go now." The tone of voice suggested she expected him to try and stop her again.

  He didn't.

  With a toss of her dark ponytail, she turned and walked away through the open bay doors, disappearing into the dusk. One of these days, he was definitely going to grab that hair and pull her back. A jolt of arousal made his pulse quicken again.

  He lifted her coat to his face and took another deep inhale. Man, he wanted to lick that fragrance off her skin. If she ever let him close enough.

  "Who was that?" his brother called out when he went back into the TV room.

  "She's got...er, she's a dancer," he muttered.

  But the TV was up too loud and Mike, who was focused on the Giant's game, couldn't hear. "What answer?"

  He grabbed a fresh soda and leapt over the back of the couch to flop amid the tattered cushions.

  What the fuck was this NYBT place where she danced? He'd bet his nuts it wasn't a strip club.

  * * * *

  Saturday she danced the matinee and the evening performance. It was grueling, but they were short of dancers due to a flu outbreak. Three girls were down from the corps, in addition to Pregnant Carrie.

  Lily heard the other girls talking a lot about the dancer who'd wandered off on a new path so suddenly. Oddly, Carrie had gone from an average dancer known mostly by what her body couldn't do, to what it could, and had. Lily had seen her that
morning in the corridor, when she came in to pick up her paycheck. Smiling and laughing, Pregnant Carrie looked like a new person. The mantle of sadness and struggle was gone, a weight lifted. She'd found another purpose for her life and didn't need to keep measuring her failures.

  Lily had thought she ought to stop and say something, but she chickened out. It felt awkward. What could she say? Congratulations? Wouldn't it sound false to suggest she was happy for someone who'd given up on the one thing they all strove toward? Besides, she didn't know Carrie as a person, only as a dancer. And now she was no longer that. To be honest, she felt quite awed by Carrie's shining new confidence and bravery, so she had slipped through a door into an empty studio to avoid having to say anything at all.

  "What's up?" one of the girls asked Lily, seeing her resting between acts with her foot on a chair and an icepack over it.

  "Oh, it's fine. It's just a sprain." She could only wear the icepack for a short time, because then she had to give her foot a chance to warm up properly before her next entrance. No way was she going to tell anyone how much it truly hurt. Other dancers would flock around like seagulls eyeing a wounded crab on the beach. Just as she herself would, much to her shame.

  After the last performance she wrapped up in a scarf and an old coat and left the theater by the stage door. As usual she was one of the last out and paused at the top of the steps to light her cigarette.

  "Hey, nicotine is bad for you, Lily Keene."

  She squinted through a cloud of grey smoke and saw the square-handed fireman standing there, bouncing on his heels as if to keep them from getting numb. He wore a hat pulled down over his ears, but no gloves. Just kept blowing on his fingers to keep them warm.

  She came slowly down the steps. "What are you doing here?" Was he a stalker? She'd heard about dancers with stalker fans, but always assumed she was so unnoticeable that it wouldn't ever be a problem for her.

  "Oh, I was just passing. Coincidence, huh?"

  "Just passing? At midnight?"

  "Okay, you got me. I tracked you down. NYBT." He pointed at the theater sign, grinning proudly, boyishly. His face was too honest to tell a lie even for a moment. He couldn't even try to pull it off. The boys she knew from the ballet would have made up an elaborate excuse for being there— no more believable, but gaudy, lavish and entertaining. Instead, he explained with a shrug, "I wanted to see you, didn't I? And that was the only goddamn clue you left me."

  Lily felt her heart beating in her toes. How long had he been standing there, waiting for her? No one had ever waited for Lily in her life. Schedules were set and she fitted into them, quietly, without fuss.

  "Since you said no to dinner, and it is kinda late now, why don't I take you to breakfast?"

  She stared. "I have to go home and sleep." And sew ribbons on shoes. And be depressed again about getting passed over for roles. And deeply ponder the ridiculousness of my Oompa Loompa life

  "It's Sunday," he pointed out. "You can sleep in, can't you?"

  He was right. Sunday was the one day she didn't have class in the morning, only rehearsal in the afternoon.

  At that moment her stomach growled and he looked surprised, then laughed. "Was that a yes?"

  Lily stamped out her cigarette. "You look cold."

  "It's November, after midnight and I lost my gloves. And any minute now it's gonna start snowing. So yeah, I'm freezing my balls off here. The least you could do is come with me to get a hot chocolate."

  He was right. What else could she do?

  Finally she took a step forward.

  * * * *

  He knew a 24-hour diner. It was within a few blocks of the theater, but apparently she'd never been there before.

  "I guess you people don't eat, do you?"

  She sat across the table, the scarf still wrapped around her throat, her gaze nervously inspecting the menu. "By you people, I assume you mean dancers. Actually we do eat, but we have no teeth and regurgitate to feed our young. What do you people do?" She paused, looking up from the menu. "What are you staring at?"

  He kept staring at her, because he couldn't really believe she'd given in and come with him. "You. I like looking at pretty things."

  She wrinkled her nose. "Is that how you people talk?"

  "Nah. Just me. I tend to say whatever I'm thinking up here." He tapped his forehead with a teaspoon. "Ignore me. Most girls do. After they've kneed me in the balls."

  "I'm sure."

  There was silence for a moment while she studied the menu. Joe fidgeted, dropping the spoon with a clatter. He wished he had something smart to say. "So how long you been in the city, Lily Keene?"

  She closed the menu with a snap. "I came here to train when I was eleven."

  "That's a Boston accent, right?"

  "I wasn't aware I had one. But...yes...that's where I was born. And where I lived. Before I was accepted into the New York School of Ballet." She spoke very properly, in clipped, impatient sentences, and her gaze traveled around the room as if it tried to avoid him.

  "Eleven, huh? That's pretty young to decide what you want to do with your life."

  "Is it? I never wanted to do anything else." She sighed, looking at the napkin dispenser. "I don't expect you to understand."

  "Why not?"

  "Because you're not a dancer. You're an outsider. You would never fit in my world and so you can never understand it."

  "I'm fitting in now, aren't I?"

  Apparently the crooked salt and pepper pots had been annoying her, for she took great pains to straighten them neatly beside the napkin dispenser and to wipe a finger smudge off the chrome holder. She finally looked at him again and scowled. "I hope you don't think this is a date."

  "What would you call it?"

  "I'm humoring you."

  "Humoring me?"

  "You wanted me to come out, so I did. Hopefully, by the time we're done eating, you'll realize that our worlds are too far apart, that I'm not very interesting, and you'll be saved from the trouble of future attempts."

  "Jeez. So you're doing me a favor. And here I was thinking maybe you liked me."

  "Why would I?" she asked flatly.

  Good thing he had a tough skin, he mused. But it wasn't the first time Joe Rossini was on the outside when he wanted in. He was tough, a fighter. People didn't mess with Joey, unless they mistook his cheerful, generous demeanor for weakness. Then they soon learned differently.

  Her lashes flickered. "I meant to say, I don't know you. How can I like you, if I don't know anything about you?"

  "That's why people meet and go out on dates, Lily Keene. That's how they get to know each other."

  A waitress came over to take their order and pour coffee. Lily asked for grapefruit juice, a plain yoghurt and some granola. Joe ordered pancakes, sausage and two eggs over easy, bagel and cream cheese. His dining companion's eyes grew wider as he continued reading from the menu.

  "And a hot chocolate with whipped cream. Lots of it."

  "Sure." Scribbling on her pad, the waitress wandered off again.

  They were the only customers in the place and looking across the bright orange table at his beautiful companion, he had to pinch himself again to believe that this was actually happening. He hadn't made any plan for this. After he got off shift and took a nap that morning, he'd woken with the urge to find her— as if he had to make certain she existed. Then he remembered her coat. There was proof that Lily Keene did exist. He took it to the local dry cleaner and then started looking into NYBT. Finally, he made up his mind to get on the ferry, go to the theater and wait for her. Like he'd said to her, it was the only clue she'd left of where to find her.

  Now here she was. Snooty Princess Blue Eyes, honored him with a little of her precious time.

  No, he hadn't planned it because he didn't even know what she'd do when she saw him there. She might have made a run for it. Or there might have been someone else waiting. He was actually surprised there wasn't.

  But there wasn't.


  Outside, fat flakes of ivory snow had begun to fall over the grimy city and inside— where everything was bright neon —there was softly piped Christmas music, just to make it all that more surreal.

  "Are you a stalker?" she demanded.

  He was taken aback by that one. "I'm just a regular guy, Lily Keene. A regular guy who liked the look of a girl he met in the street and decided he had nothing to lose by going for it. Don't worry, right now I don't even have room in my trunk for your body parts. It's full of Christmas presents for my brother's family."

  She studied him with that cautious gaze. "You shop early."

  "Early? It's November, twinkle toes." He grinned. "You must be a last-minute shopper."

  From the sharp hitch in her breath he must have said the wrong thing. Her lips tightened, rolling inward.

  "So what do you want to ask me?" he said. "Now we're here, we may as well give it a try. I stood out in the cold waiting for you for four hours, so you can see I ain't giving up that easily."

  Her lips parted in a skeptical gasp. "Four hours?"

  Well, maybe more like one, but that was long enough for a man who'd never waited anywhere for any woman before. No one who knew him would believe it. "What can I say? I must be nuts."

  "You could have bought a ticket and gone inside."

  "They said it was sold out. Maybe they just didn't like the look of me." He winked. "Maybe they could tell I was an outsider who didn't belong. Too stoopid to understand the fucking ballet."

  A smile threatened to show itself and she began to unwind her scarf finally. "We are very popular, and performances do get sold out. But if you ever want to go, I can probably get you a ticket."

  "So I could see you dance?"

  "Sure. If you wanted to."

  "Kinda like a date, but not. 'Cos I wouldn't be with you. I'd be sitting alone. You'd be on stage. Where I can't touch you."

  "Right," she replied, back to cautious again. "Or I could get you two tickets so you could sit with someone."