-Cinderella-
As the night grew later the dance floor tripled in occupancy. Everyone was trying to get out their last dances before the night ended, even the wallflowers grew exhausted of the wall and joined the throng. When the music concluded for one dance, the dance floor became chaos as partners hunted for partners before the next dance.
Ella had narrowly avoided her step-sisters twice as they patrolled the room, scouring every face. The twins had been obsessed with the prince since she could remember and they were looking for him with watchful eyes.
She was exhausted. She had danced all night, and even now had to refuse two dance requests as she leaked away from the group. She left the dance floor and leaned over the bar table to ask for a drink.
"Wine my lady?" The attendant asked.
"No, Water please."
She wouldn't trust herself with another glass of handed her a glass and she left the counter to leave room for the other parched dancers.
The energy in the room was charged with something magical. The masquerade around her was kept at a certain break neck pace where there was always something new to look at. Women and men were mismatched and disguised. Some couples engaged in conversation, others were stoic, and the most miserable looking pairs were looking all around.
"My my, what a wonderful dress." She overheard a woman say.
Ella sipped at her glass absentmindedly before she turned and realized that it was her stepmother who was talking to her.
She nearly spit out the drink and looked over her shoulder before responding.
"Thank you!" She said in a tight, badly disguised, voice.
"Tremaine dear. Lady Arredia Tremaine. It's a pleasure to meet you."
She held out her hand and Ella took it tentatively. If anyone could make her life a living hell it was her stepmother, and if she was discovered here and now by her stepmother she wouldn't make it home alive. She gave her a smile making sure to keep her head angled down so that she could only see her mask.
"I don't believe I know your name." Her stepmother said. She was trying to keep the tone light, but Ella knew when her stepmother was upset.
"I'm one of the Millen's cousins."
"The Millen's? I don't think I know them."
"That's too bad." Ella said, hoping that her response would be the end of it, but she wasn't that lucky.
"You'll have heard of my daughters." She said, "The Ladies Anastasia and Drisella. They are my pride and joy, and most certainly the belle's of tonight's ball, don't you think?" she asked.
Ella looked where her stepmother was pointing to see Drisella step on someone's toes during a hat dance. She always knew her stepmother had a touch of crazy in her, but forcing someone into a conversation about how great your daughters are was a new level of narcissism.
"They are beautiful."
"Yes, Anastasia especially. In fact, just this night she managed to catch the Prince's eye."
Ella wash surprised at that. Her two stepsisters had gone to every event the Prince had attended in the last five years hoping to catch his attention, but after five years they weren't any closer to catching their prince.
Ella hadn't managed to cross paths with the prince all night. She would have loved to meet the man who had apparently caught feelings for Anastasia.
"I'm very happy for your daughter."
"Yes, I'm sure you are." her stepmother said with a cruel grin before walking out of the conversation without so much as an adieu.
On one side, she was happy that her stepmother was oddly cold and hostile to everyone. It made her feel a lot better that it wasn't just her stepdaughter, but on the other side, she didn't know how such a woman could have ever captured her fathers heart.
Ella shook of the icy feeling that her step mother left with her. It was a great success that she wasn't recognized. Her disguise was officially complete, and she didn't have to worry about ducking behind couples in fear of discovery.
She finished her glass and returned it to the bar in time to see her mystery gentleman crossing the room towards her. She had been keeping an eye on him all night. He was never without a dance partner and when each dance ended there would begin a queue to see who would dance with him next. She did not blame them, in fact, she nearly waited with them for another chance to dance with him, but she talked herself out of it each time.
Another dance had ended and in all the confusion and dance partners, he had managed to wade past dozens of women mooning over him, and he made his way to her.
"My lady." He said, bowing slightly.
She curtsied back, "Good sir."
"You must have been keeping a careful eye on me, waiting for me to put my drink down." She said, his timing could not have been better.
"Yes, I am not too prideful to admit that the mere sight of you holding a drink sent me shaking." He shuddered for effect. His playacting was top notch. Everything he did had a dorky sort of charm.
"Now that your hands are finally empty, I was wondering if you would dance with me again?"
Dancing once was polite. It was a common thought that every young man should dance with every young woman at least once, but dancing twice was a different ordeal. Dancing twice meant something more.
"I wonder if I dare." She said, mostly to herself. "I might get attacked in a dark corner by one of your adoring fans."
He was fast on his feet and entirely too handsome for his own good.
"It sounds like you're the one who has been keeping a careful eye on me. We might as well dance together. It could save us both from straining our eyes."
She blushed and looked to her toes before nodding in agreement. She held her arm aloft for him to lead her into the center of the dance floor. He spun her around so that she was facing him and both his hands fell to her waist. Her hands looped comfortably around his neck for a much more casual dance.
Couples watched them in passing as they started a square step. They were dancing much less intricately than the crowds around them and it seemed to be drawing eyes.
"People are still watching us." She said quietly no matter where they went, they could not escape the eager eyes of others.
Being watched gave her an unseemly sort of feeling. When she was alone, she enjoyed the privacy that being invisible created. Whenever she danced with him she felt like every move was made under a microscope.
"No one is watching us."
It was a bold faced lie that made Ella laugh from the ridiculousness of it.
"No really!" He insisted, "No one is watching us. They look at us and they see what they want to see, but they can't see us."
"What do you mean?"
He had a mischevious look in his eye and he stopped them in the middle of the dance floor. Ella tried to urge them forward in a dance, but he held the both of them frozen as couples marched on around them. He pulled her a little closer and leaned towards her ear.
"Right now everyone is wondering why we've stopped." She looked out at the sea of couples and saw his words ring true. People were looking up from their dancing.
"No one sees that we've only stopped so that I could prove a point. Instead, they imagine we've stopped dancing because we've had a disagreement or maybe I've suffered a leg cramp. No matter what they conjure up in their mind, they aren't really seeing us."
People avoided her gaze all around them and she saw what he was trying to show her. No one really saw them. They started back into the dance and most of the couples turned their attention back to their own partners.
"I think people like to project themselves onto others. They only ever see what they want to see." He said almost as an afterthought.
She found herself thinking of her own perceptions of the couples that sourrounded them.
"I am sorry for the heavy conversation." He amended after she lost herself in her thoughts. "I am not very good at this sort of thing. I perhaps should have asked you about your family instead."
She met his eyes. He was embarrassed, but she didn't want him to be.
"You can't change the conversation as easily as that. You've shared a small glimpse into your mind and now I'm curious. You've asked me to dance twice now, so I have to know what you want to see when you look at me."
He had opened the door to this conversation, but it would have been more polite to bring levity to the situation and lead them to more frivilous topics. The dance floor was not created for soul searching and bleeding hearts, but she had watched him give pretty words to women all night and his eyes had never looked alive as they did now while he contemplated her question.
"I will only answer your question if you answer it in return."
She nodded in response.
"You look like a Queen." he confided quietly. The idea if her looking like a Queen made her laugh, bit she didn't dare laugh at him. Not when she could tell that he meant every word.
"I could talk about your grace and your beauty, but the truth of the matter is that behind your eyes I see strength. I want to see that you notice me. I want to see recognition in your eyes when you look at me because I think we're the same. I want you to dance with me because I'm tired of dancing alone."
Alone. If he truly thought people projected their troubles onto others. That was his projection. His eyes seared into hers. The entire room could have stopped and she wouldn't know. She would keep dancing in his arms because at that moment she realized the same thing he did.
"It's your turn." He goaded her on.
She organized her thoughts and then did something she had never done before. She made herself vulnerable.
"When I look at you I want to see someone who accepts me. I want to feel safe. I want you to dance with me because everytime we dance you take me away somewhere better."
"We just have to only dance eachother then." He concluded seriously.
She was not in love with him. She didn't even know him, but she couldn't deny that the world felt different when she was in his arms. Even without his grand introduction she would never be able to mistake him for a David or a James or a Richard.
"I am yours all night." She said. She didn't care what anyone else thought. She didn't want to see him dance with anyone else for the rest of the night.
"But the night is nearly over!" He said. "I wish I could have convinced you to go against social norms earlier in the night."
Ella rolled her eyes. "Your last dance? I wasn't aware you were such a curmudgeon. Do you end all your nights this early?" She teased.
His eyebrows raised, "It's nearly midnight. You just became a lot more interesting if this is your idea of early."
His words shocked Ella out of her idylic mindset. Midnight. He said it was nearly midnight, how nearly is "nearly midnight"? She turned away from him to look at the clock face above the performers and she froze, stopping their dancing altogether.
The hands reached exactly two minutes before the hour. She had to leave this very second. His arm around her waist grew very cold and her stomach shrank. Panic coiled in her like a whip and she stopped their dance by pulling herself away from him.
"I'm sorry." She said, staring in horror as she realized that she didn't even have time for a proper goodbye. She turned tail and ran with everything she had.
She reached the top of the stairs when clock began to chime.
"Wait!" His voice called behind her, but she didn't have time to explain. If she waited any longer she would turn into a ruin right before everyone's eyes and after the public humiliation her stepmother would punish her tenfold.
She ran to the magic carriage that was lucklily waiting out front. The coachmen seemed nervous, and the moment Ella stepped one foot into the coach the horses sprang to life and she had to hold on desperately, losing a shoe as she barely managed to crawl inside.
The horses were running hard, but anyone could tell they wouldn't be running for very much longer. The magic began to fade and every second that passed they began looking more and more like rodents until the magic finally ended and the carriage turned pumpkin came to a skittering halt. The mice all dispered from the wreckage and Ella stepped out of the pumpkin carcass in her tattered dress and singular shoe.
"It was a nice thought to let me keep the shoes." She thought to herself. The fairy godmother probably knew she would be walking home after she danced all the way up to midnight. She slipped the glass slipper off her foot and began walking down the road barefoot. If only she hadn't left her other slipper behind.
-The Prince-
The Prince stood out in the street holding a glass slipper absolutely bewildered. One second the woman of his dreams was dancing with him, and the next second she was gone.
"Are you alright Charles?" His friend Derrick had followed him outside from the dance hall.
"She- Did you see that?" He asked.
"Yes, and so did half the town. I have to tell you how impressed I am. I've been known to put my foot in my mouth around pretty women, but in all my life I've never seen a woman run that fast before. What did you say to the poor girl?" He asked.
The Prince looked between the slipper and his friend.
"I don't know."
"Well you must have said something. She didn't exactly look like she was running home to go tell her family all about how dashing the Prince is."
His shoulders slumped over and his mind traced over every word that was said. Maybe he did offend her. Maybe he was too forward. He scared her away. He should have talked to her about the weather or the music.
"I liked her." The Prince said helplessly.
Derrick walked up and put his arm around his shoulders. "I know buddy."
"No, I really liked her." He said.
"I know. You've never asked any of them to dance twice. When your sister saw the two of you dancing she got very excited."
"Now she's gone." No explanation, not even a good-bye.
"Come on, don't look like that. Maybe it was all a big misunderstanding. Maybe she said a quick good-bye and you weren't paying attention."
"maybe" Charles said, but he knew she didn't.
"How about we just make a house call tomorrow? You know, go to her house and just pretend that it's your friendly neighborhood prince checking in on the fair maidens in the area?"
Charles groaned and ran his hands through his hair out of frustration.
"What? I thought that was a good plan."
"I don't know who she is." The Prince admitted.
"What do you mean you don't know who she is?"
"I meant exactly that. I don't know who she is." He said, ennunciating each sylable.
"Oh this is rich. You dance two and a half dances with her!"
"I know."
"She spilled a drink on you."
"I know."
"You stared at her for the better part of the night!"
"I know!"
"You didn't even think to ask her name?"
"It didn't come up." The Prince said. His heart fell lower than his boots.
"Maybe she ran from your poor manners." Derrick said, laughing at his own joke.
"I didn't even think to ask her name. The entire time I danced with her, it felt like we had known eachother for years."
He was trying to put words to the way he felt, but all his words came out pale in comparrison to the way she made him feel.
"Alright mister poetry. Don't get all feely on me now. How are you going to find her?" Derrick asked.
The Prince looked at the glass shoe and shook his head.
"I have no idea."