I Went Down (NaNoWriMo Read-Along)

5 Emmy Jane

The feathers tickled.

They were pink and yellow and orange—brighter colors than any dress that Emmy Jane had ever had at home in Ibai. Delta Mouth was strange like that. The fog made everything gray, but then there were these spots of color that would burst through like a crocus pushing up through the snow. Here is something alive!

The day before she had seen such a splash of color. It was in the afternoon, when the other girls woke up and when Helen had grudgingly admitted that there was little left to do in the kitchen. Luessa had taken her arm and suggested that they go walking by the canal. If they went out together, they’d be safe enough and Harlan would let them out. Luessa had led her towards a part of the city that was richer by far than anything in Ibai, where the white stone of the buildings made even the glory of Minnie’s look shabby. The people on the street in that neighborhood had been dressed in fine clothing, like the magazine advertisements that had occasionally reached Ibai. And then, bobbing through the sea of people was a beautiful woman in a scarlet hat. The brim was so wide that it hid her face entirely as she swept by, and Emmy Jane had only been able to stare until Luessa prodded her.

Now she eyed herself in the mirror. The vibrant feathers affixed to the form fitting short pants and bandeau top were surely the first step towards the day when she would have a scarlet hat herself. And a hat would be better for the street than this outfit, which covered very little. Thus the tickling, where the plumes brushed against her bare skin.

The close confines of the dressing room were full of feathers at the moment. The mirror showed her the other girls also pulling on their costumes, transforming from human girls with laugh-lines and tired eyes into the exotic creatures of the stage that the men of Delta Mouth came to see. She had seen a few women in the audience on the previous night, when she’d sat in the back to watch the spectacle that she’d soon be taking part in, but mostly it was men. Pelago men.

There were few Pelagoans who made it up the long river to Ibai, but Delta Mouth was full of them. The chorus girls, on the other hand, were a mixture of Angiers and Ibai, with one dancer who claimed Gosutti heritage. Luessa did not believe her claim, but Emmy Jane watched the girl in the mirror with curiosity. She had high cheekbones and tightly curled hair of a deep red color. Her hair was not so different from Emmy Jane’s, except for the color, so she might have been Ibai. But her angular face was like no one Emmy Jane had seen in Ibai. Was it Gusotti?

Her view in the mirror was blocked by Luessa. “Don’t you hear the band? That means we have to be ready.”

The chorus girls were lining up at the door, adjusting each other’s headdresses. Only Contessa Marietta still sat bare-headed in front of her mirror, painting her eyelids with a pale blue powder.

“Don’t be nervous,” Luessa said. “You’ll do fine, I know it.”

Emmy Jane reached up to run her fingers over the soft feathers on her head. She could hardly admit to being nervous to her new friend, but there was a stark feeling in her stomach and her palms were sweating. It was true that she had sung at the county fairs in Ibai, but always with a group of her siblings. They had sung at home in the evenings, and to sing on a rough plank stage in front of the people of town—many of whom were friends and cousins who had already heard the songs, and who would sing along—was a different thing than she was about to do.

Luessa gave her an encouraging smile and motioned her into place in the line.

“Don’t worry,” said the Gosutti girl, Pearline. “They’ll all be drunk soon enough, and no one will notice if you forget the words. All you have to do is shimmy.” She wriggled her hips in demonstration, making the feathers wave back and forth.