chapter 8

How had Lilliannot recognized the blue hair and that swagger? The sheer impossibility of it maybe.

“No.” Lillian spun around so she was hidden behind Kia’s Afro puffs. “Did you know?”

“Of course not.” Kia was beaming like she’d bluffed her way into winning a poker tournament. “But I remember her.”

Lillian felt her face heat up.

“Why is she here?” Lillian asked, although the answer was obvious.

The woman—Blue—was awful. She was the kind of self-absorbed, Instagram-famous performer who signed women’s breasts. How had Lillian not noticed? Because she’d needed to get off and she’d needed another woman to help make it happen? Because Blue had recognized Lillian as the kind of person who wouldn’t sleep with a douchebag and had adjusted her behavior accordingly?

“Maybe you two can hit it again,” Kia said.

“Do you know how unprofessional it would look if I slept with one of the other contestants?” Lillian hissed. What would Eleanor say? A Black ballerina must be beyond reproach. That’s what she’d say.

“It’s kind of romantic. You spent one night together and here you are.”

“You sound like your dad.”

Uncle Carl loved romance and stargazing and magical coincidences. He’d named his yacht Serendipity, for God’s sake. And he liked lots and lots of spaniels. He didn’t live in the same universe Lillian and Eleanor lived in.

“I have to talk to her,” Lillian said.

“Mm-hmm,” Kia hummed suggestively.

“Not. Like. That.”

Had Blue seen her? Had Blue talked about her? Lillian hurried toward the crowd of people surrounding Blue.

“Excuse me,” Lillian cut in.

Blue turned.

The oil slick suit was made out of some liquidy fabric that flowed over every curve of Blue’s body, absorbing light and shining at the same time.

“You,” Blue said, her voice almost inaudible beneath the sound of the party.

For a second, Lillian could have sworn she saw delight in Blue’s eyes and the word how? form on Blue’s lips. For a moment, Blue held Lillian’s gaze, her eyes dark, as though she was remembering everything they’d done in a time-lapse sex scene.

Then she tipped her chin up.

“Sup?”

She managed to swagger without moving.

It looked good on her. The open front of her suit jacket revealed the swell of her large breasts, squeezed to their limits in a corset that looked like a bustier had mated with body armor. The whole outfit screamed, I am going to ravage you in a steampunk version of Cabaret.

“Do you like what you see?” Blue tongued the words, like she had just taken a bite off someone’s edible panties. She trailed her fingers down the front of her corset.

Lillian was not speechless. She just couldn’t quite find the right words for the moment. Blue had been sexy. But this incarnation… this was like the woman she’d met at the Neptune if the woman had gotten high on some of the synthetic fertilizers Eleanor refused to put on her orchids because they gave them an unsustainable opulence.

Before either of them could speak, a woman in a crew T-shirt rushed up to Blue.

“Oh my God, you’re Blue Lenox. Your shows—” The woman drew a deep breath and held it as though Blue’s performances were beyond expression. “Will you write beautiful wanderer?” She pulled a Sharpie out of her back pocket.

Blue eyed the Sharpie, then pulled a marker out of a secret compartment in her bustier.

“It’s all vegetable ink.” Blue held up the pen. “You could eat this.”

The woman pulled the neck of her T-shirt down and closed her eyes. Blue deftly wrote Hello, you beautiful wanderer. XOXO from Blue. It was impressive that she got that much legible writing on a woman’s chest.

Lillian felt Blue’s attention focused on her even as Blue smiled at the woman. Lillian tried not to trace the lacework of binary tattoo on Blue’s chest with her eyes, tried not to follow it down to the deep V of her cleavage.

“Oh my God, thank you. Thank you.” The crew woman bounded away, hand pressed to her chest.

One of the camera operators called over, “Never, ever do that on camera.”

Blue shrugged and turned away from him.

“Would you like me to sign your breast?” Blue dropped her voice to a velvet innuendo.

Lillian took the pen Blue was still holding and drew a line across the back of her hand. The ink disappeared on her dark skin.

“Sorry, your name wouldn’t show up on my breasts.” Lillian meant to sound curt, but it was such a ridiculous sentence to speak aloud it came out with a little chuckle.

“I’ll buy a different marker,” Blue said.

“Will it be made out of vegetable ink?”

“For you, it’ll be made out of gold.”

How did this act work on women? How were there people who actually wanted their breasts signed? In public. By a woman in a steampunk corset. Who was grinning like a cross between a wolf and a porn star. And why did part of Lillian whisper, I totally get it.

“I need to talk to you.” Lillian pulled her eyes away from the swell of Blue’s breasts. “Somewhere… else.”

Lillian looked around for somewhere to escape. At the far side of the hall, a staircase led to a mezzanine. Lillian strode across the floor, not looking at Blue but feeling Blue behind her. Thank God no one had found the mezzanine yet. Upstairs, Lillian moved to the back of the mezzanine, where they’d be out of sight.

“You said you were a programmer,” Lillian hissed. How was this woman here?!

“By day.” Blue’s expression said, But I’m thinking about the night. “And you are?”

“A dancer with the Reed-Whitmer Ballet Company.”

“I’m dying to see you perform.”

This was not a time to flirt.

“You don’t know anything about me,” Lillian hissed.

“How could I not be enchanted?”

“Could you please not be.”

“Not be enchanted?” Blue leaned against the wall behind her. Her crossed arms managed to lift her breasts even more than the corset already had. Her eyes trailed down Lillian’s body, not looking at her chest or her lips but following the outline of her right side, more suggestive in her discretion than leering at Lillian would have been.

“Could you drop the act?” Lillian gestured toward Blue’s… everything. “I need to talk to you for two minutes, and then you can go back to graffitiing women’s cleavage.”

“Okay.” Had Blue’s light dimmed a little? “What do you want to talk about?”

What could Lillian say? I’m somewhat horrified that I slept with you, could you please not tell anyone? Also I’m not attracted to you. The way her eyes kept darting between Blue’s handsome face and her gorgeous body made a liar of Lillian.

“There’s a clause in the contract that says we have to disclose if we know anyone on the show or the crew.” Lillian crossed her arms, mirroring Blue’s posture, but coldly. “I presume you didn’t know I’d be here. I didn’t know you’d be here. Neither of us disclosed, and I think we should keep it that way.”

“It’s nice to see you.”

“I just want to make sure we can keep our connection private,” Lillian said. “It seems like that would be the most professional option.”

“So I can’t sign my name across your heart?” Blue sang a line of the Terence Trent D’Arby song, her voice dropping an octave, smoky and velvety.

“No.” It came out like a sharp command she’d give her dancers the third time they’d made the same mistake.

“We can still have fun, right?” Blue’s smile looked a little forced. “Maybe I can get you to dance the Zipper. Or the waltz?”

“I’m not here to have fun, and I’d prefer you treat me like a stranger. We haven’t met. We certainly haven’t slept together.” Lillian checked behind her. Thank goodness, no one had come upstairs to eavesdrop.

“You consented to sleep with me.” Blue dropped her arms to her sides, looking down. “You were lovely. Thank you. And you didn’t consent to me telling the world. Or anyone. So I wouldn’t. I promise.”

Thank God, she hadn’t totally misread Blue that night at the Neptune. Blue was respectful. She’d be discreet.

Just to be sure, Lillian added, “Do you know how many cameras are on us? Like a dozen more than you see. They take candids for the show’s social media. People watch that feed as much as they watch the show. We don’t need the show turning us into some queerbaiting are-they-or-aren’t-they thing. We don’t need them making something out of nothing.”

“I get it.” Blue looked hurt, like someone who’d offered up a gift only to have it cast away.

It made Lillian’s heart ache, which almost made her point out that Blue was the one who’d run out of her hotel room like a woman picking up a latte on her way to work. Blue didn’t get to be mournful when she’d been the one to say no catching feelings. But there were so many things in life that could make you mournful if you weren’t careful to keep those feelings bottled up where they belonged.

“Hey, I didn’t mean that that night was nothing.” Lillian fumbled for the right words. “I just can’t get distracted.” Wait. Did that imply she’d thought about sleeping with Blue again and decided against it? The thought shouldn’t even cross her mind.

Faster than the arc of a shooting star, Blue’s sadness disappeared… or she hid it.

“No second nightstand?” Blue grinned.

“No. Never.”

Except the moment Lillian had seen Blue, she’d thought about it. Remembered. Wanted. She shoved the thought away.

“You honored me by sharing your body,” Blue said seriously. “I will absolutely respect your boundaries.”

“Thank you.”

“Let’s start over,” Blue said. “I’m Blue Lenox from Velveteen Crush. We’re a body-positive, LGBTQ-plus burlesque troupe, tamed down for TV, of course. And we’re going to crush you in this competition, you pretentious, dance academy… something, something, something.” Blue cocked her head. “Isn’t that how we’re supposed to talk to each other? Build up some rivalries?”

“You dreadfully woke, steampunk… something, something,” Lillian said.

Blue’s smile lit the dim mezzanine as though Lillian playing along was the most delightful thing Blue had ever experienced. They tossed a few over-the-top taunts back and forth and chatted for a little while longer, then Blue said, “Come on. Let’s get back down there.” When they were back downstairs, Blue added, “Good luck. You’ll need it.”

Lillian watched Blue disappear into the crowd. Either of them could get voted off tomorrow. The thought made Lillian’s chest tighten, but she released the muscles as quickly as they had closed up. She heard her mother’s words echo in her mind. You can choose dance or you can choose distraction. There was no time for nerves, and there was no time for distraction. She was in control of every muscle in her body and every thought that crossed her mind.