Dancing With Velvet Read Online Free

inside the store. After a moment, as she touched the skirt with the tip of one finger, something stirred in her again. She tried to examine the thought, but it eluded her. She shook herself mentally.
    “If I can figure out a way to do it, I’ll be back,” she said as she edged toward the door. “But don’t hold your breath.”
    Waiting for the bus at the next corner, she was startled to hear, “Well, well, the apple lady.”
    She looked up, then back at the sidewalk. “I’m so sorry. I hope you weren’t hurt.”
    “I’m damaged for life since I looked up and saw you.”
    She felt the color creeping into her face.
    “Ah, she blushes like the apple—or maybe a rose. A rose is better.”
    “I’m sorry,” she said again.
    “For blushing? Don’t be. I think it’s nice. Where are you headed?”
    “Home.”
    “I guess it wouldn’t be proper to ask you…”
    The bus squealed to a stop, and Celeste jumped on, hoping he wouldn’t follow her. When he didn’t, she breathed a sigh of relief and dropped into the nearest seat and leaned her head against the window. The boy—no, he was a young man—was flirting with her. She didn’t know how to flirt and didn’t want to learn. But she had to admit, from the safety of the bus leaving him behind, that she liked it.
    She turned her thoughts back to the dress. Fifty dollars! It was insane to even consider it when she made $22.50 a week. Besides, where would she wear it? It didn’t matter what she dreamed. Her prince wouldn’t be at the St. Angelus Hotel Roof Garden, not in a million years.
    ****
    She washed her lingerie in the bathroom sink and hung it discreetly on a line in the back yard, hidden from view by the boxwoods that made a thick privacy fence between the house and the street. Inside, she ran the carpet sweeper in every room except her father’s where, she assumed, he was still sleeping—or drinking—or maybe a little of both, and dusted the unused living room. On her hands and knees, she scrubbed the cracked kitchen linoleum that needed replacing. The one time she’d suggested it, her father flew into a rage and yelled he wasn’t made of money. After that, when mopping didn’t get the dirt out of the cracks, she took to scrubbing the floor by hand.
    The princess in the story Coralee used to read to me scrubbed floors and stairs on her hands and knees and met her prince anyway—or maybe because of her hard work. She earned the right to her happily-ever-after. Maybe I will, too.
    In her own room, the one she’d shared so happily with Coralee, she cleaned and straightened her dressing table, wiping her mother’s picture with a piece of old dishtowel and then followed up with the collection of leprechauns Coralee had rescued from the mantel after their father’s angry outburst about Celeste moving to the ranch. They’d been a set of twelve, but he’d smashed one beyond repair. The other, broken in three pieces, was still missing the end of its pointed cap, but Celeste had glued the rest of it back together.
    She spread a fresh dresser scarf and returned the picture and the figurines to their accustomed place. I wonder why Mamma liked these little things. I keep them around because they were hers, but they’re really kind of ugly, especially the one with the long beard and the frown on his face. Did she believe in the luck of the Irish? Did she believe in fairy tales? Was Daddy her prince?
    Later Celeste made a meatloaf and boiled some potatoes to mash in case her father decided he wanted supper. His door remained closed, so she ate alone in the kitchen. The telephone rang while she was rinsing her plate. It was Marilyn, inviting her to a movie.
    “ Gaslight is playing at the Royal. It’s Ingrid Bergman.”
    “We’ve seen it, haven’t we? Wasn’t that the one where somebody was trying to drive her crazy?”
    “Yeah, but it’s been awhile, and I’m bored. My parents are out of town, and I don’t like staying by myself. After the movie,