Musical Promenade
By Shahrezad1
Summary: A collection of 'Alternate Universe' and 'Current Universe' drabbles, and one-shots, featuring the Wildcat crew.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. You can prove nothing. When all else fails, deny, deny, deny. These are all a product of a fertile imagination.
Chapter 1: Theater
Circa 1920's
His father had warned him about the theater people. They were a rough lot, and lived a life neither he nor his family could ever understand, from their bakery across the street. Most were drunk and disorderly, and the few females he'd seen within the general vicinity wore clothing that made him blush, and false expressions of glee to mask the pain they really felt.
But that was all until he met her. Now he didn't know what to think, to be truthful.
He had just been making a delivery, long length of French bread hot within its packaging, when something had called him to the dancing hall's door. It hadn't been a sound, so much as a feeling. Like life was waiting with hushed breath for him to follow, and he didn't know whether to give into fate, or to continue on the with dreary extent of his current existence. But in that moment he felt like he was at a crossroads, and if he didn't make a choice, he would never get a chance to do so again.
And so it was with one foot in the doorway that he was caught by the sight before, and eternally enchanted.
Her hair had been cut into a stylish bob that just brushed the length of her jaw, and was intended to soften her features while failing to do so. What it did instead was emphasize the flash of brown eyes, while framing a stubbornly strong jaw currently masked with a beautiful smile. And the clothing she wore couldn't help but halt any process of thought, the flapper dress form-fitting while short enough to emphasize the length of her legs without any major scandal.
All together, he couldn't move or think, hands still buried in steaming hot bread meant for the next establishment over.
But he didn't care.
And then she opened her mouth and sang, clear notes filling the hall until the rafters shook.
So this is what love at first sight looks like, was the perpetual thought that ran through his mind for the rest of the day. All as he slowly found himself being introduced to the 'gang' of performers that hopped from speakeasy to speakeasy, before returning home merely to pack up his meager belongs and leave a note of explanation, then running off to become a replacement driver for the gang. But still part of him, the part that had discarded a future of inheriting his father's business and a life of security, could tell that it was worth it. Because at the end of each day, he knew that he would be at her side.
Even if it took years of hardship and lengthy trials for her to notice him, a lowly son of a baker.