(I don't own any of the characters etc. etc. those are all Baz's etc.)

I know this is a bit unseasonable, but it came into my head, so I wrote it down. Please tell me honestly what you all think, as any comment is invaluable to me, as I am always experimenting with different writing styles, and want to know what you think. Anyway here goes:

The Weekend Off

Christian wanted to make everything perfect for her. He always did. He could never tell her in public how much he loved her; and Satine's public life was most of her life. So every minute he spent with her he wanted to be special, to make up for it, as there were so few.

Satine rushed off the stage after the Friday night show. It had been a special, to celebrate St. Valentine's Day the next day. The dancers all got the weekend off, as there was no more work to do.

Whereas all the other dancers – and Satine used to be one of them – mocked the idea of falling in love, and tended to think of St. Valentine as the saint of idiocy, Satine was secretly dying inside just to see Christian, to be able to spend the weekend with him. She, encouraged, of course by Harold Zidler, had learnt to laugh at the whole concept of the weekend, but she now saw the true meaning of it.

Why shouldn't people be able to celebrate something so special? It almost made celebrating something such as a birthday, selfish. A birthday was a celebration of one's own existence. Whereas celebrating love is celebrating a feeling, something so personal, yet so mysterious that not even the two people involved in it truly understand what is going on, or going to happen, but how they feel right there and then. It is a freedom of expression, and that is worth celebration.

Satine only just understood that recently. She bustled off to the elephant to get dressed to meet Christian. It had to be perfect.

Christian stood in his garret for a second, and then began pacing up and down again. He had an hour to get ready for her arrival – Satine always took an hour to get over there. He smiled his (heart-winning and –melting, in Satine's case) smile and mused over how well he did know her, really. More than anyone else ever would. So why couldn't he think of what would suit her best? And then it clicked! All she wanted was his love... but he could still do that with a degree of flair!

Satine stood looking in the mirror at the elephant. Christian always told her how beautiful she looked every time he saw her. But it wasn't perfect – she could see that. It seemed that the only gift she could give him was her beauty, because it seemed to amaze him every time he saw her.

She undid her hair and rushed to her wardrobe again. She had already been fifteen minutes, and she thought that Christian might start worrying about her, as she said she would be over straight after the show.

Christian had been to see the show, stupidly, so he had less time to prepare the surprise for her for when she came over. But he couldn't help himself. If he couldn't be with her the whole time, he could try to see her, just to drink up some of the feelings he had for her, to try and stop him sitting at home and then bursting onto the stage to grab her off and make love to her.

Most people have the luxury of not having to hide their feelings, but Christian didn't. It made him so much harder that all he wanted to do was kiss Satine the whole time; but so did a hundred other men – and as far as Satine's career – and her instructions went – these had to come first.

But he didn't mind. He was going to be with Satine for the whole weekend, for the first time. And it was Valentine's Day tomorrow. And it was going to be perfect.

Satine finally managed to get herself so that she thought she looked good. She was, in her mind, becoming more nervous. This was, in a way, her first Valentine's Day, and she felt like, she thought, what little teenage girls would feel like. She swept the trail of her dress off the floor and walked down the stairs, and out into the night. She was wearing a silk white dress, with little white flowers embroidered all over it, and with a small thread of twisted white silk through her hair. She had been an hour and a half getting ready. She panicked when she realised this, and tried to run – but not draw attention to herself.

Christian had been sitting on the bed for half an hour. He wondered where Satine had got to. Had there been some sort of hold-up at the Moulin Rouge? Had their plans been discovered? He swept up his coat, and went to see if everything was alright.

Satine was tottering in her heels down the street as fast as she could go. She stopped suddenly when she saw Christian about a hundred metres ahead of her. Everyone else in the street seemed to disappear, and she could only see him. She hadn't seen him, or spoken to him in a week. She began running towards him, but had to stop, because the heel on her shoe broke. She took a few steps forwards as he came running towards her, and hugged him as hard as she could. She could feel him smiling against her cheek.

Then the heavens opened. Rain was thrown all over them, from the sides, from above, and bouncing up from below. Christian took Satine's hand and led her down the nearest alleyway. Once they got a fair way down, Satine had to stop – she could walk no further with one shoe broken. Christian had sensed this, as he stopped at the same time as her. He thought they were far enough down, where no-one could see.

Evidently, so did Satine. She pulled on his hand that she was still clutching, and threw it behind her waist, using both hands to touch his face on either side as she pulled him into a long, passionate kiss. It was still pouring it down.

Sensing that she was getting cold, Christian pulled his coat around her, so that it covered the both of them, and hugged her body into his to keep her warm, still kissing her with all the passion he could muster, to show her everything he was feeling.

When the rain subsided a bit, Christian opened his coat, and bent down to swoop Satine up, so she was in his arms. He carried her like this, only stopping momentarily, for Satine to kick her broken shoe off with a flourish, all the way back to his garret. He then removed her other shoe, as he said he wanted her to walk up the stairs with him. He took her hand, throwing her other shoe away, and led her up the stairs. They were lined with rose petals. No-one had trod on them, as all the inhabitants of the block had gone out to party at the Moulin Rouge, or Bar Absinthe. They were perfect. Satine let out a small gasp, and Christian looked at her. She was smiling. Even now, he was breath-taken by her beauty, and could only smile at her. When they got into Christian's garret, the lights were all off, and in the centre of the table stood one tall red candle. Every surface was filled with light. It seemed that all of the night sky had landed in this one room, just for these two people.

Satine was seated by Christian. He laid the table with food he had obviously spent hours cooking. Satine leant over the table to feed some of it to him, and he kissed her fingers as she finished. They sat there, and gazed into each others' eyes – each were twin pools of desire. Then, simultaneously, they both stood up, and drew together, forgetting all the food. Christian, still in a long embrace with Satine, led her backwards into his bedroom. Satine panicked momentarily, as they fell downwards almost as soon as they were through the doorway. She broke away from him, but laughed to herself when they landed. Christian had covered the entire floor with mattresses, and sheets, and blankets. He had turned his whole bedroom into one massive bed. She was in awe in her mind, that this one person had spent all this time on her, and not just thrown money and gifts at her. She giggled naughtily and pulled Christian down on top of her.

Christian knew by this time just how to please Satine – and in turn, Satine knew just how to make Christian melt. She had never known someone so completely, yet known nothing about him. She wondered why she had mocked the idea of falling in love before. Had she missed out? She was glad however, that she had ignored the concept of love, however, when she realised this was how she had found Christian.

In the morning, on Valentine's Day, Satine woke up in Christian's arms, and wriggled in delight. There was nothing she could do to show the whole world SHE WAS IN LOVE! So, she just had to lie there in perfection, and smile to herself. She wanted Christian to wake up, just so she could say it to him. Instead, she wriggled out of his arms, and stood up. She couldn't find anything to wear, as her clothes from the night before had been torn in a few places from the night before, in an effort to get them off quick enough. So, she grabbed Christian's shirt, and pulled that on. She wanted to return the effort that Christian had made for her, but could think of no way to do it. So she decided to cook him breakfast in… bed (room!) and hoped that it might also entice his brain into an awake state. She would make him the full English breakfast – she knew what that was, but not quite sure of how to make it. But she would try.

She began thinking that if she and Christian did grow old together, like she fully planned, then he was going to end up very fat! Did all the English eat this every day?

Christian opened his eyes a little more. He had sort of woken up when Satine had left him, but he didn't want to let her know. He had watched her slender form wrap herself in his clothes, smiling. He just had to watch her, without the hectic background of the Moulin Rouge; just being herself. She was dancing around the kitchen, cooking a full English breakfast.

Judging by the smells, she actually turned out to be a fairly good cook, even though she had never really had the opportunity to cook for herself before. Christian smiled as he sat up silently, not wanting to let her know he was awake. He slipped on his undershorts, just so that the neighbours across the road wouldn't be too startled first thing in the morning. He crept to the archway that lead into his bedroom, and stood there for a second, peering around just to check she wasn't looking. Then, as she set down the first plateful of food to pick up the next, he crept right up to her, and hugged her from behind, smiling. Satine gave a little jump, but then smiled and raised her arm to ruffle his hair.

"Is that breakfast in bed?" enquired Christian almost suggestively, "well then, shouldn't we have it in bed?"

Satine grinned as she turned around, and waltzed back into the bedroom, pushing Christian with one hand in his chest as he grabbed the other plate and walked backwards with it. He stepped up onto the bed, and set the food down, giving Satine a long kiss good morning.

They ended up feeding each other the food that Satine had made, which was, in the end, really burnt. It still tasted nice though. Satine had spent too long worrying about how long to cook it for, and in the end, decided that it was definitely cooked in the middle when the outsides started going black.

They laughed as they fed the food to each other, giggling as the last bit of egg ran down Christian's chin, after Satine had attempted to feed it to him. He wiped it off with his finger and then licked it off. Satine decided to use this as an excuse to kiss Christian again, and they ended up spending the whole of Valentine's Day in bed, showing each other how much they loved each other, whether it be making love, or cuddling in silence, or lying on their sides and talking the world by, or falling asleep in each others' arms again that night, in pure contentment, both awestruck, and happy beyond belief, at the powerful feelings they carried.