A/N: Once again: Eddie, Nadine, Mae, Madeleine, Kate, the implied Jackie, the mentioned Queenie, Phil, Oscar and his boycrush belong to Joseph Moncure March and Michael John LaChiusa. Cameo-OC's belong to me.

A Note of explanation: In a separate piece I am writing for Madeleine, she was raised in a suburb of Chicago, where her mother, Maggie, owned a bar. She left for New York City when she was 15. Hence her awkwardness about going to tour there. Please review.


It was a week after that meeting that Eddie and Nadine returned to Manhattan. Madeleine True was called away again, this time to Chicago. Why the assignment made her brisk and pale, her protégée didn't know, but certainly a change had come over her. She felt vaguely restless, melancholy. It was her age, and Chicago was almost a home. She put her life in perspective, and like most women, didn't wish on her childhood self what she saw now.

Harper Greene-angel, a stripper in a fine beaded disguise, traveled with her all the same. To Mae, any escape was welcome. She tagged along. Isaac, Harper's husband, went his own way with the men. Their daughter Suzanne, caught in the vacuum between the two, went with her mother, dreaming all the while that her home was not of this earth.

On their return to New York, Eddie went to the track with Oscar Caligheri. Only before they did, Oscar asked to meet her.

He had a sweet smile, she thought, genuine and potent. There was something very earnest about him. He took her hand when she offered it, spread the first two fingers, bending each back and forth and over the other. He closed her hand, folding it into her palm and letting go. As he reached the door, almost as an afterthought he asked her, "What do you play?" He was watching her eyes.

Startled, repeating the question, "Piano?"

The smile reappeared like a flame, "Knew it. You've got the build, doesn't she?"

"Sure." Eddie was putting on his coat, and he smiled toward the door. No matter, for the smile was meant for the girl, and she knew it.

"No," Oscar protested, touching his arm, "No, look at her," He tried to lead him forward. Eddie yanked it free.

"Nice guy," the girl would tell Eddie when he got home.

"Oh, sure." Eddie was hanging up his coat, "A little crazy, but a good guy all the same."

"Is he the-?"

"What? The queer?" He gave her a vague, what-have-you sort of gesture, "Best not mention that's how he was introduced. He prefers the bard and messenger of music."

Nadine laughed, "What about the future of a dying art?"

"I'll tell him. C'mere." He pulled her arm, lifted her up and embraced, "He's got a show coming up. I'll take you, if you want."

It was a gentle, glowing moment, in which he wished he could say hold on, it's all over soon. But he couldn't, so instead he took a pack of Madeleine's cards from his coat and promised he'd drink tomorrow. He sat next to her and she, a better storyteller than poker player, made up her history until she fell asleep.

***

Kate Shoshina was beauty in ebony. Liquid hands, sharp, shining nails, black dress up around her thighs, she was just shy of vulgar. It was a certain arrogance or class in her movements that granted her this advantage. And this advantage made all the difference. She was smoking on the street corner, hand on her hip. Eddie slipped his arm through hers, "Shiva."

"Hey stranger," she said this without looking at him, smiling at the corner of her mouth. She tapped the ash off her cigarette. They watched in silence a hearse drive slowly down the main road, a small trundle of lit cars following it into the morning mist. "I love a parade," she said dryly, nodding up the street "Wife at home?"

"Chicago."

"Shame." Distractedly smoking, considering what he wanted to offer her, and what she could offer him without sacrifice. Abruptly she set off, slipping her arm out of his reach, casting back a smile or two at her admirer as she led him home He followed the shadow of her, shimmering like the rain on the concrete, like gold dust. Fool's gold, he followed her to his home, the bed he shared with his wife, numb to sound, to time, to place.

Kate had a certain contempt for every man she had ever been with, at her theater, among her adoring public, wrapped in the sheets and the confusion of limbs. It was deeply tedious, the sex, when it came as something owed. Which is why she always made them wait, buy her dinner, buy her diamonds if they could. Made them pay.

It hadn't always been so. Kate, sleek now, displayed feline battle scars and was determined not to be ashamed of them. Like Eddie, she knew that dealing the blows could only bring you pride if you could take what you gave. And, better, if you could come through fighting.

The sex, long from being something owed, was now a matter of routine, a matter of sickening comraderie. Eddie was more constantly aware of his race than she. Felt it more poignantly. Dragged her to him out of desperation, some form of love, and deep, abiding, disbelieving envy. "The fastest legs in lights," he would say to her with a smile, taking her chin in his hand and looking long before he kissed her. Her headline had long ceased to be clever in his mouth. He sounded sad.

She put up with this. In her way, on her terms, she loved him. She conceded to the role of mistress, lower than an ex-chorine wife bleached to what she thought was beauty. She never found out if he was in love with her. She didn't want obligation, and so she didn't ask.

Now they lay between the sheets, hastily, minimally stripping though she'd been careful not to wear perfume. They changed, turned, neither and both on top. Chest hot through her black dress. Bodies together in stifling cold. Kate used him. He needed her.

It was a minute after it happened before she realized the door had opened, that a girl stood in the doorway for a fraction of a second before turning away. He hadn't noticed. She hadn't cared, and when he raised his head at her tension she shushed him, covered his mouth with hers. Maroon possibilities had flashed through her mind, but now again she thought of the absurdity of such an affair, the secrecy, the sex, the need for it at all. She was anxious to leave.

He wanted her to stay, but when at last she had coaxed herself out of his arms and left without a better look at the child who had interrupted them he, remembering her presence in his house, went into the next room and saw her. Pretending to read, ill-disguised and unreasonable betrayal emanating from her as he lingered, uncertain of how much he was responsible to heal. It seemed foolish to apologize, heartless not to. She was a child. Not his, to be sure, but his by obligation. Obligation. He resented the word. And when he thought of it, or thought of using it, it only made him resent her. It was painful.

Both knew they were being unfair. Both laid the blame on the woman who had run. Both knew it as they looked up at each other. It was understood, then, that neither would be angry with the other, or with themselves.

He would have gone then, as eye contact was broken, as she settled back against the wall, an open book against her knees. But he had to speak.

"Nadine," mouth dry. A vague, dry feeling of hatred as he spoke. Kate's dress had smelled of cigarette smoke. The smell lingered in the room, the sheets… Nadine was looking at him, waiting for him to speak. She knew what was coming. In practice, she would have no trouble obeying him. Conceptually, intellectually, she could have hated him.

Who was that? She thought of asking. Eddie lingered still, awkwardly, selfishly hovering between request and command. He had the power to do neither, truly, for what did he know about her…?

Nadine stood up, closing the book, pulling down the hem of her skirt and brushing it free of dust. Convulsively he reached out to seat her, but she ducked under his arm and said, "Don't," she went to the door. "Don't worry. I won't tell." Comrade or charge, gratitude, necessity, or entitlement. He could not speak. "I'm going to see Madeleine," she told him, rather gently. He should go with herNo, she said, I'll be all right, I know where to find her.

He oughtn't have let her go out on her own. But in truth, in part, he wanted to see how she fared. He didn't watch her go, silent in her black coat, face pale even with the stinging cold.

***

Timid footsteps, timid knocks. Madeleine was half-asleep, vaguely hungover, a bottle in her hand like a shotgun. Shivering next to her was a woman, blonde hair disheveled, the skin on the back of her hand torn up, ruptured, a scar on her wrist. Sally had crawled up next to her during the night. Now she had twisted Madeleine's coat around her shoulder. She was asleep, but just barely.

Now the knocks on the door grew louder. Sally, her bloody hand on Madeleine's chest, moaned at the noise and drew further into the coat. Madeleine, from long night's practice, took Sally in her arms, squeezed, rolled gently to the side. Sally lay still. Madeleine deposited her gently, surrendering the coat and covering her with it. She was careful to shut the bedroom door behind her.

The knocks were loud, ineffective, childish. Then they grew less frequent, discouraged. Madeleine opened the door without the chain lock.

"Hey, sunshine," Nadine slipped inside and rushed her, laying her head on her breast. Madeleine stroked her and was silent. She held her a moment, but when the edges of her vision remained blurred and indistinct she let her go, as gently as her lover, and guided her to a seat. She took the bottle from her coat. She poured what remained into the coffee. "Long night," she explained, without provocation. Her half-smile was tense. Nadine, her face pale, looked vaguely haunted. Madeleine only glanced at her. She didn't often look people in the eye. A sidelong glance was enough to tell her what she needed to know.

"Can I stay here awhile?" The question came abruptly. Nadine took the handle of the chipped mug and turned the cup around a ring in the table,

"I'm here 'till ten and open all night," Madeleine rubbed her eyes with the blue sleeve of her shirt, haphazardly buttoned over her black corset. The sleeve was fading, dried with too many tears. "Or isn't that what you meant?" Nadine drew her finger around the rim of the cup and was silent, "Chickadee," Silence. "What's he done?"

"Who?"

"The man who might have changed me. The ex-husband I never wanted. The guardian of all lost and twisted souls, himself in need of a jailer." The girl's lips twitched into a half-smile. "Thank the gods, I made her laugh." She took her jaw in her hand, rough but affectionate. "Tell me what the man's done, and I'll the determine the necessary punishment. Hot oil or the rack?"

This time she laughed. Weak, sputtering, and quickly stifled, but honest. Then Madeleine turned sober once more.

"He asked you not to tell, didn't he?" Once more, there was silence. "Sonuvabitch set up Taminy Ring in his own house?" Maggie's temper, rising in red veins. Oh, how she hated men. "Dine, you can tell me. Weigh your odds, I probably know already."

"There's a woman."

"Of course there is," and then she turned her back completely. Hating him, hating herself. Her hate was like man's, indistinct and formless. It made her unknowingly cruel to those she loved. Nadine often regretted opening up to her. There was a burning silence, then softly, half-smiling, "So what'd she look like?"

Nadine told her, hedgingly, haltingly, what she knew, and Madeleine nodded. Once, twice. "I know her," It was a cue to the girl. She should not ask questions.

Madeleine, once upon a time, had cherished a hope for Kate Shoshina. The hope was gone now. Kate had weakened herself to sex with women only in her greatest time of need. She preferred the control she had over men, who would never unravel her, never solve her, and never want to.

The hope was gone, but not the desire. Beyond lust, brief satisfaction, Madeleine craved intimacy, and this was why Kate despised her. Selfishly, Madeleine did not want to talk about her.

From the next room, there was a sharp, piercing cry, like that of a wounded animal. Madeleine rose, disappeared to Sally's bedside, panicked at the sound. Nadine, from the table, heard a struggle of indistinct words. Madeleine was enduring the woman's struggles. Sally was shivering, striking out at her, crying that she had warned the others about the fire…

Madeleine saw the girl watching from the doorway. She motioned wildly to the floor beside the bed. There was a needle there, just under the bedskirt. For days, she had kept it hidden. But now she filled it without question, without resistance, without protest. Later, when she was alone with the gin, Madeleine would curse the needle and give it her lover's name.

Now Sally cried in earnest. She turned her face into the mattress, hands tight to the back of her neck. She moaned, satisfied at a terrible price. Somewhere in these was Madeleine's name in long memory.

In Madeleine's face was a silent plea. She was weak in the face of the girl's blank, deadly shock. Told not to ask questions, Nadine would obey. Told to keep secrets, she would obey. But the world before her was changing.

Alone with her gin, Madeleine would feel for her. She would imagine how she grieved her parents, feared and loved the city, hurt from trust and confidences and shame. She projected idle empathy, and remained still and alone. Poor child, she would think. Then her mind would drift to morphine. How much was left, how much was needed, how much she could afford, and how much she could give to satisfy a burning conscience and the childish, invalid pleas of her lover.

***

The first fights she'd witnessed had been about women. Many of them were. It was not painful to stay silent about what she knew, but rather about what she didn't.

This fight was different. Poison directed at Mae; about a man. Nadine did not know him. She caught curses, hurled at his wife at close range because he feared the reality of his own infidelity. He seized her by the arms and pushed her to the wall. The girl pictured Mae's eyes, the determined curl of her lip, her disheveled, eye-to-eye guilt, but neither sister made a sound. Eddie did all the talking for them, in absence of a denial.

As they fought he put a hand between her legs and shouted who'd been fucking her in Chicago and he yelled this man's name at her over and over…Jackie…Jackie…Jackie…

It wasn't until the end that she heard skin against skin, force meant to injure rather than move. Punishment rather than fear used to get an answer. At last Mae screamed, calling him a bastard and a coward and when he struck her again she took a bottle from the floor, threw it so it shattered against the wall. And then she ran. Eddie did not go after her. She was bleeding already. Time would do the rest.

He felt deeply sick. Though she had screamed names at him, he wished she would have dared to realize Kate Shoshina was among them. He could have denied it, and that alone would take away some of the strange suffering. For all her protests, he was still deceiving her.

Shortly, he heard the door slam again. The girl had gone past him slowly. He'd not seen her go, though he saw why she would.

Out in the street, she had nowhere to go. Madeleine had gone again to Chicago. She had further business in the suburbs of the windy city. Nadine saw her sister's outline in the distance two blocks away. Arm-and-arm with Harper Greene-angel, who spat onto a handkerchief and held it to Mae's eye. Mae slapped away her hand, only marginally grateful for her sympathy. She merely wanted a soundboard for her revenge.

Wildly, without knowing why she thought it, Nadine found herself hoping Harper's daughter Suzanne was in the back rows of the Bowery somewhere, kissing a boy she danced with, never once thinking of when it would be over and she would have to face her mother again.