Amelie ran a hand down her skirt, meticulously smoothing out the wrinkles caused from sitting as she tilted her chin skywards to take in the glowing lights of the building before her. Along the outer walls were pasted posters on brick, extravagant illustrations and bold words announcing performers that housed their acts here, each one more exciting and extraordinary than the one before it. Though it was early with the sun just barely beyond the horizon and a half hour before the show was to begin, a steady crowd was already gathered around the outside of the music hall - young boys with their sweethearts draped across their arms, married couples freshened and giddy with their first night out in weeks, tittering groups of young women fawning over the fresh young man selling tickets with a blinding grin and chiseled chin - as they slowly filed in. It was a mixed group of individuals, all from different walks of life it seemed, yet even the brightest reds were faded and the shiniest pearls were frauds.
Amelie fidgeted with her own pearls that hung loosely around her neck, running a satin glove over the smooth service. "I feel dreadfully overdressed for such an occasion."
Behind her, the carriage finally took off with instructions of when to return and soon she was joined by a man not much older than her. He followed her gaze to the crowd before grinning broadly and reached for the hand that fidgeted with her necklace, giving it a gentle squeeze. Amelie looked over to her fiance, taking in the stubble on his chin that he hadn't shaved off prior to their evening out ("It will be dark, who will see, ma cherie? Besides, I find I'm rather dashing with a little shadow, don't you think?"). She watched as he brought her knuckles to his lips and pressed them together. It was not quite a kiss, but the sentiment was all the same and Amelie found it charming nonetheless.
"I think you look just fine, ma petite."
Amelie scoffed and pulled back her hand, swatting his away when he reached for it with a chuckle. "You are to wed me in four months. If you only see me as 'fine' by this point I fear to think that you've engaged the wrong woman."
At that he gave a thoughtful hum with a quirk of his lips. "Perhaps I have." He turned his gaze towards the long line of people steadily filing into the building, his eyes sweeping across the crowd. "You don't suppose a frenchman like me would have a chance with a Brit, would I?" Amelie frowned and followed his gaze towards the crowd, missing the sly glance he shot her with a twinkle of mirth in his eye and mischief in his hidden smile.
"It'd be quite the downgrade if you ask me," she replied tartly, a sour scowl on her lips, her brows knit together. "'Scraping the bottom of the barrel' as my mother would say."
"I wasn't aware your mother had such strong feelings towards the British."
Amelie turned her head a fraction, brow now uplifted in amusement, a coy smile on glossed lips. "I was referring to you," she said and sidestepped away when he reached out to prod her side with a ring of laughter in her voice.
"Are you telling me I should be wary of you running away with an Englishman?"
Amelie turned to her fiance with a softness in her eyes and reached up to cup his cheek, her fingertips lightly skimming the line of his jaw while the pad of her thumb ran across his bottom lip. Mon Dieu, did she adore this man. The absurdness of his previous statement made her want to laugh but she subtly bit her lip to keep it in before locking eyes with him, a husky sincerity taking over her voice.
"Oh mon cheri, you do not have to fret over such impossibilities." She leaned up, because even with her height she still did not amount to his, to better reach his lips before giving him a chaste kiss, one that conveyed her love and devotion to him and only him and refused to part until it was clear he understood. When she pulled away she saw her own love reflected in his eyes and knew that nothing could ever drive them apart: not distance, not hardships, and not even death itself. She would latch onto this one with every fiber of her being and never let go.
She stroked his bottom lip again and smiled, so happy to be here, safe and happy with her true love.
"There is not an Englishman….no, not a man out there that would ever take me from you."
Gerard smiled, so broad and genuinely happy that Amelie felt her heart soar from her chest. He cupped the back of her hand with his and turned his face so that he could kiss the palm of her hand. "And that makes me the happiest man in all of Europe to hear."
She had just been about to retort when a shriek of excitement sounded from within the crowd, startling her. Both her and Gerard turned to the source of the noise to see an bouncing girl, fair-skinned with dark hair draped in a braid around one shoulder. She was pointing at one of the posters on the wall while clutching to the shoulder of the girl next to her who looked a mix between amused and annoyed. They had much the same face and hair, with the bouncing girl's hair a touch darker than the other's and the calmer girl a bit taller with a more pointed face. Amelie immediately supposed them as sisters or family of a sort.
"Nancy! Nancy, look there!"
"Oh would you calm yourself, Kitty? You're giving the rest of these poor people a fright with all that shouting and jumping around. They might think you're right mad."
"Oh, but Nan, would you look? It's Lena Oxton! Here! In London of all places! Would you have ever guessed that she'd perform here in our theatre?"
Nancy rolled her eyes and raised her hand to press down on Kitty's shoulder in a placating gesture, but there was a small upturn of her lips. "Be careful now. With all your ravin' and screamin' you might just scare her off."
This seemed to damper most of Kitty's actions as she stopped her bouncing, but she still rocked back and forth on her heels and the balls of her feet, her grin never wavering. "Bridgette over in Canterbury says that she throws a rose to a girl in the audience when her performance is over. Oh Nan! We have to sit close enough so that she might throw it my way!"
Nancy only laughed as she handed her ticket to the employee working the door and the rest of their conversation was lost as they disappeared inside the building. The rest of the crowd seemed mostly unperturbed by the disturbance, but Amelie noticed that an excited buzz of chatter had risen amongst most of the girls as well as some of the young men. She hummed thoughtfully as she looked for the poster announcing this "Lena Oxton" but before she could find it a short burst of laughter sounded to her left.
"Well, it seems as if we're in for quite the show tonight! We'd better head on in to get some good seats." Gerard offered out his arm and Amelie took it with grace and followed him towards the doors of the building where the ticketmaster was waiting for them.
The theatre was only half-filled when they arrived inside so finding seats wouldn't have been an issue, but they had been recognized immediately by the coordinator. It was one of Gerard's new colleagues that had gotten them these tickets free of charge as he was cousins with the owner and event coordinator of the music hall. After they had exchanged greetings and pleasantries the coordinator, Mr. Tony Reeves, had all but shoved them into one of their box seats, elevated from the crowded common seating and in clear view of the stage. When they had politely tried to decline his offer, insisting they hadn't even paid to get in to begin with, he had brushed them off with a scoff and hearty laugh.
("Any friends of my dear ole' Freddy are revered guests of mine in this theatre! Just relax and enjoy yourselves! You're in for the best show in all of England!")
Amelie smoothed out her skirt again once they had sat down in the chairs, sinking into the plush of the soft velvet. She was pleasantly surprised at its authenticity, almost fully expecting a cheap imitation or lack of luxury to begin with. Yet once her gloves had been removed and sat on her lap, she ran her hand over the soft cushion of the chair, immediately confirming that it was the genuine article. A quiet pang of humiliation hit her when she had realized that perhaps she had judged too quickly.
Gerard had seemed to pick up on the exquisite furniture himself. His hand reached over and covered hers, giving it a comforting squeeze accompanied by a wink. "It would seem that you dressed perfectly for the occasion, mon cœur."
Amelie offered him a small smile and they fell into quiet chatter as they waited for the show to begin. Below them others did the same and up at the stage in the pit the orchestra crew were getting into their places, testing and tuning their instruments while the conductor sorted through his pages of music. They were dressed in black and white tuxes and their hair was slicked back in a professional and formal manner, yet Amelie noticed how stiff and cheap the fabric was, even from the distance of her elevated box seat. Some wore sizes too big and others had on sizes too small. She clicked her tongue and turned to face the stage as Gerard went on about how his job was finally picking up after a month there in London.
The stage seemed ordinary enough with polished wooden paneled floors and a thick heavy red curtain concealed a great majority of it. Golden tassels hung at either end to later tie off the curtains to hold them in places during the show, but they seemed frayed and dirtied. The lights shining on the stage - she was surprised to find they were electric - were dimmed for the moment in time, but they looked rather new. The hall must've just made the switch. She clicked her tongue again.
"It's rather…..quaint here, isn't it?" she mused.
Gerard took a sweeping glance around the hall, making his own observations and coming to his own conclusions. "I find it rather charming. It's more comfortable. A man can be himself here."
"I suppose that's one way of looking at it."
She saw him shift in his seat with a thoughtful furrow in his brow and knew he was going to respond but the lights over the audience dimmed until they were practically visible. The stage lights brightened considerably and a man off to the stage's left stood in a raised booth, a wooden gavel in his hand and top hat on his head. He wore a tux much the same as the pit members did, except his seemed to be finely pressed rather than stiff and moved with his body as it should have.
Amelie sat up straighter in her seat as all conversations came to a halt as all eyes turned to the man now pounding away with his gavel. He grinned at them all, a large boasting grin before his booming voice sounded out for all the theater to hear.
"Ladies and gentleman!" he shouted, his arms outstretched and chest protruding out. "Boys and girls! You all 'ave traveled out 'ere to our lovely Wilton's Music Hall for a show that'll amaze you and blow yer knickers righ' off ya! Well...I'm happy ta say that the acts we got lined up tonight won't disappoint! So, put yer hands together for the first act o' the night, a duo that will flip and toss and turn until yer hearts are leapin' right out ya chest! Give it up...for Jasper King…..and Ivor Beckett!"
Two men in tight gymnast suits ran on stage as the audience cheered the the announcer pounded his gavel some more to rivel them up further. Amelie and Gerard clapped politely with a hint of a smile on each of their faces. The orchestra began to play and the men began their performance of acrobatics. Which each flip they gasped. Each tumble they ooh'd and each rumble they ahh'd. They twisted and turned, jumped and leaped, and Amelie and Gerard found themselves laughing with each bound and trick they pulled off, giddy off the excitement and awe they felt watching them.
Soon their act was over and the audience sent them off with a giant hurrah as they bowed and ran off the stage, one of them throwing the crowd in a tizzy by doing a finally flip before disappearing backstage. The announcer pounded his gavel to regain attention before announcing the next act who entered centerstage while the audience applauded and welcomed them.
This went on for several more acts and Amelie found that she was rather enjoying herself. She had had her aversions to attending such a spectacle, more accustomed to the ballet and opera that was put on in the much nicer grand theatres of Annecy. But Gerard was right: there was a charm to the place that she couldn't shut out or turn her nose up at. It was relaxed and fun and people were encouraged to be as loud as they wanted. They laughed until they cried and an ache settled in their chests, they were encouraged to sing along with some of the acts, and even managed to drag a performer back out once or twice in pleads of an encore.
A man could be himself here, that much was for sure. And so could she as it would seem.
The announcer began his speech for the next oncoming act, but the audience was still reeling with laughter from the departed comedian that his words - though spoken with that deep, bellowing voice - were hardly heard. Amelie wiped some stray tears from the corner of her eyes and next to her Gerard still wheezed with laughter, huffing out choice lines and jokes from the previous act, broken up by more wheezed guffaws.
"-yer hands together for the much awaited and anticipated, a model of class and elegance, Miss Lena Oxton!"
The crowd went ballistic. The cacophony was enough to startle Amelie to hit the back of her chair and she blinked her eyes as a young boy - probably eighteen or nineteen years of age - walked out on stage, twirling a brown wooden cane. A straw hat was pulled over wild and mussed brunette hair, poking out at odd angles from underneath of it. He donned tan slacks and a woven vest over a pinstriped, collared shirt. He stopped in the middle of the stage and looked out over the still cheering audience, lifting his hand to his hat to tip it and then waving at them.
Amelie frowned and looked past the curtains eyes searching. Had this Lena Oxton missed her cue? Surely with someone so highly anticipated she would be better prepared for her performance slot. And to make matters worse this boy on stage must've been rather confused to have mistakenly walked out when it wasn't even his turn…
She turned to Gerard to point out these glaring mistakes when the boy spoke, his voice high and loud and she turned back to the stage with wide eyes.
"G'evenin', everyone!" He placed his cane down in front of him, resting both hands on the cane and standing with his feet shoulder-width apart. "Pretty smart, don't'cha think?" And with that he struck a pose to which the audience cheered and he laughed - a high-pitched giggle, akin to the chiming of bells. Amelie looked closer at him, squinting against the stage lights until she finally noticed what had been obvious to everyone but her.
"Well I'll be damned," Gerard whispered next to her and she found herself sharing the sentiment.
No mistakes had been made. That voice, the slimness of the shoulders and roundness of the chin, the swell of the vest in the chest area and the fullness of the hips….
Lena Oxton stood right before them, clear as day, dressed as a boy.
Amelie leaned back and pursed her lips as she pondered over this new information. "A girl posing as a boy? The English sure are odd."
She had no idea if Gerard agreed with her or not because the music started up and Lena jumped to a different stance, taking the cane and tucking it up underneath her arm as she began to march across the stage. Her singing was much like her laughter, high and flighty, with an enthusiasm Amelie was not aware could be contained in such a small frame. The audience picked up quickly and began to sing along, swaying to the tune as Lena paraded and skipped across the stage.
By the time the song was over Amelie found herself humming along.
Lena dashed off stage and Amelie was partially disappointed in how quick her performance was, but in seconds she had rushed back out into the spotlight, now sporting a brown paper boy's cap and brown trousers with knee-high white socks that tucked in underneath the legs. The audience cheered for her again and Amelie inhaled sharply at the more casual button shirt she was wearing, the top two buttons loose. Lena started up another song and once again the audience was quick to join in. Beside her even Gerard was finally getting in on the fun, but Amelie found she could not remember the words and the few she did she stumbled over. So she settled for staying silent and listening to Lena instead, watching her prance and skip around stage as if there was nowhere else she belonged.
The music tapered off again when she rushed backstage and Amelie found herself scooting forward to the edge of her seat, balancing there and craning her neck in an attempt to get a glimpse of backstage to see Lena's next outfit. The crowd below cheered and shouted for more in her absence but the noise dulled in her ears, distant and muffled as she looked for brown messy hair and a red-painted smile.
The next time Lena stepped out she was dressed in a fancy black and white tux, two coat tails trailing behind her as she swaggered in polished black shoes and a glossy black cane propped on her shoulder. A top hat, shimmering like genuine silk, sat on her head which she took off as she offered a short bow to the crowd upon her entrance. They went wild and some of the women even laughed and giggled when Lena sent a wink their way. Amelie could only stare, admiring the cut of the suit, how it dipped and curved where it ought to, accentuating her hips and her bust in a way that a gown just wouldn't do. It was odd, indeed, to see a woman pull off man's clothing better than a man could.
With the hat replaced on top of her head, the lights of the stage dimmed until there was just a spotlight illuminating her, and a couple of stagehands hurriedly brought out a white clothed round table and a wire-framed chair one might see in an outdoor cafe. They set it down quietly as the music picked back up and a hush washed over the crowd, while a woman came to place down a bottle of wine, a single glass, and a slim vase holding a singular rose on the table before leaving as well.
The song this time was more somber and slow, her voice and words lilting and yearning as she sung of some woman she had loved that left her, heartbroken and alone. A different mood settled over the crowd, some of the women had gotten misty-eyed. Rose petals fell from above Lena, gently cascading down like a rain shower of scented silk. The whole audience was captivated and Amelie would be lying if she had said she did not feel the same effect.
Soon enough the song had ended and a burst of applause, not raucous like before, sounded out. Lena took off her top hat again and bowed before striding over to the table, picking out the rose from the rose and twirling the stem between her fingers. With the hat and cane in one hand and the rose to the other, she walked back to the front of the stage, rose lifted to her lips while she thoughtfully gazed out into the audience.
"Ya know," she began, a sweet smile on her lips that brightened her already rosy cheeks. "Now that I think of it, there's a lot of pretty girls out 'ere tonight, too." An excited yet hushed chatter overcame the audience, girls tittering and fidgeting in their seats. Amelie noticed the girl from earlier with her sister in the front, frantically patting down her hair and shifting happily in her seat.
With only a second of further hesitation, Lena decided to have come to some choice or another because she pulled the rose from her lips and grinned brightly before pulling her arm back and whipping it forward, tossing the rose into the crowd. It arced in the air before dropping into the middle of one of the further back rows, where a girl in a dress dress caught it, her eyes alight and lips turned up into an impossible grin.
The moment was broken when the audience erupted into applause once more as Lena bowed off stage, waving and sending air kisses before disappearing behind the red curtains for the last time. Amelie slunk back into her seat as the announcer introduced the next act, words she hardly heard, and a woman stepped out, a person she hardly noticed.
There were only a couple of acts that followed, but Amelie found it hard to pay attention, her mind still stuck on the absurdity of a girl posing as a boy. It was peculiar and certainly unheard of, but she supposed it did have a charm to it and a uniqueness that set her apart from most. It gave it that extra spunk that most of the previous acts had lacked and had a captivating aspect to it that made it quite difficult to put out of one's mind. Compared to the rest of the night's show, everything else had seemed lackluster and unoriginal.
For the next few minutes Amelie sat in complacent boredom before the last act took their bows and the announcer officially ended the show, wishing everyone a safe departure and pleasant evening. Gerard gathered their coats from the spot beside the door to their box, helping Amelie stand from her seat before helping her shrug her coat on. They joined hands as they walked outside into the night's chill with the rest of the leaving crowd. Around them was excited talk replaying favorite moments of the show, laughter drunk on glee, a flush in everyone's face from a successful night out.
Gerard cleared his throat and Amelie snapped out of her own musings to gaze up at him, nodding when he gestured to where their carriage awaited them just outside of the theatre. He helped lift her into the carriage before climbing in himself and soon they were off, headed back home to turn in for the evening.
There were a few seconds of silence before Gerard said, "I understand that it wasn't quite the ballet or opera that you're used to, but it was entertaining nonetheless, non?"
Amelie sighed, her mind drifting back to rosy cheeks and mussed brown hair. "I should say so. It was a wonderful evening, Gerard. Thank you."
Her words seemed to give him some reprieve as his shoulders relaxed and his grin returned, following the strong line of his jaw. She felt a faint flicker of adoration in her chest at how boyish he looked. "I'm glad you think so. If you'd like, we could return here again for another show whenever we need to unwind a bit. What do you say?"
Her eyes lit up and she leaned forward eagerly. "Oh, could we?"
He laughed and leaned forward to plant a kiss on her forehead, his hand tucking a stray lock behind her ear. "Of course, ma cherie. Anything your heart desires."
They spent the rest of the ride discussing their favorite acts and quoting lines from some of the comedians, singing songs from the singers, and retelling to one another the awe-inspiring stunts that had been pulled in front of their very eyes.
Not once was Lena Oxton mentioned.
A/N: So this is my contribution to the OW Big Bang. I'm late. I have no excuse really. I could say that I was busy (which I was), but I also procrastinated a ton so that negates that. So yeah. My bad.
I'll try and get the other chapters up when I can (they're all planned out just not written...whoops). I've got roughly over 10 planned (no more than 15 tho). But we'll see.
The more feedback I get though, the more motivation to keep dishing these chapters out. 'Cause I main reason I kept putting this off is because I rewrote the first chapter. So many times. Because every version sucked. I'm somewhat content with this one.