Rock This Christmas Read online

  Rock This Christmas

  Mia Madison

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Epilogue

  15. Chapter 1

  16. Chapter 2

  17. Chapter 3

  18. Chapter 4

  19. Chapter 5

  20. Chapter 6

  21. Chapter 7

  22. Chapter 8

  23. Chapter 9

  24. Chapter 10

  25. Chapter 11

  26. Chapter 12

  27. Chapter 13

  28. Chapter 14

  29. Chapter 15

  30. Chapter 16

  Epilogue

  Afterword

  Also by Mia Madison

  1

  Lana

  New York at Christmas. It’s every bit as magical as they say it is.

  Which is why I take myself out on the streets to absorb the atmosphere and try not to think about how alone I am for the holidays. Strictly speaking I guess I can’t claim to be literally alone, not when I’m sharing an apartment with seven other girls the same age, weight and height as me. All clamoring for the bathroom at the same time day or night.

  “Kaila, you’ve been hogging the mirror twice as long as anyone else,” Eloise squeaks in fake outrage.

  “That is so unfair,” Kaila complains in her Southern drawl, like me she’s also from the south. Texas in her case whereas I’m a New Orleans girl. “Pimple emergencies don’t count as making-up.”

  It’s my one day off in the week and I have to get out of the crazy vibe in the cramped apartment with the other girls pushing for the mirror as they fix their false eyelashes and outline their lips. So many girls from all over the country, living and working together for the season. We all get along just fine but still, on a work day, which is every day for the duration of the run. The tiny space fills with a pent-up energy fit to go nuclear.

  As soon as I see the snowflakes lilting side to side in my window on their gentle path to the ground, I know I have to be outside. The girls will be leaving en masse in a few minutes, and heading down to fiftieth Street. I really ought to take a chance to catch up on some sleep.

  I’m already exhausted and energy-drained and it’s only the start of the grueling schedule. But I’m determined to get used to it, along with the pain in every muscle at the end of every day. This is my first time in New York, my first time in real winter and I want some Christmas spirit.

  I tug on some boots I bought specially to deal with the Manhattan winter, and wind every scarf I own around my neck. I absolutely cannot afford to get sick.

  “Good luck y’all,” I call before I leave. “Break those legs.”

  “Have fun Lana, meet us later at the Lava Lounge,” Astrid shouts back, doing a step, ball change, pirouette in the mirror as a flourish.

  I laugh and head down the steps of the brownstone. For the first time in my life, snowflakes land on my cheeks and the end of my nose.

  That small thing fills me with wonder and immediately I’m sad that I can’t tell my dad about it. Losing him this year still hasn’t settled into my bone memory as fact. Every time I remember all the things he’s going to miss, the sorrow seeps back into every cell. This is my first Christmas alone without him. I can’t even complain that I’ll be alone on Christmas Day. Not when there’ll be six thousand people with me, all with their own families and having a wonderful time. I won’t be able to see them across the footlights but I’ll know they’re there.

  I walk along Fifty-Ninth Street, skirting the edge of the Park where the carriages are lined up, the horse’s nostrils releasing plumes of steam in the cold.

  As soon as I reach the corner, it hits me. That tingly feeling of Christmas, with the lights strung across Fifth Avenue all the way down, the people absolutely everywhere loaded with beautiful shopping bags and the sounds of music, bells. I don’t have anyone to buy a gift for and although I’d love to step into Tiffany and treat myself, I don’t dare. This gig only lasts three months and I have no clue what happens after that.

  I’ve pretty much lost my home in New Orleans. I know for sure that going back there will mean a fight with my stepmother and her two daughters who have already contested my father’s will, saying he made a new one in his final moments. Dad would never have cut me out like that, not without coercion but I can’t bear to get into a legal battle over his remains. It just feels dirty somehow. My eyeballs sting as tears threaten but I push them back down.

  “Merry Christmas,” a real old Santa outside St Patrick’s Cathedral rings his bell at me with a wink.

  I dig out my wallet and drop some cash into his bucket before heading further downtown. The sudden scent from a corner food stall causes my stomach to let out a growl I’m sure must be audible to everyone on the street, except they’re all bustling along too fast to take any notice. I inhale the wonderful aroma of hot chestnuts again. I’m starving - I haven’t eaten a thing today except half a banana this morning. Dinner last night was a handful of diet pills. It’s not a healthy way to eat but it’s what I’ve been used to ever since I joined ballet school when I was eleven.

  “Five dollars for ten,” the vendor tempts me, detecting my ravenous gaze at his coals.

  “I don’t dare,” I mutter, scurrying away before the temptation overwhelms me.

  Chestnuts are carbs and I need strength to get through the high-kick routines of the Spectacular show five times a day, six days a week. I also need to fit into my tiny dancer costumes.

  The store windows at Lord & Taylor are cute village scenes, full of detail and I press my nose up against them like a kid. Then I take a right, heading to Macys to check out their decorations, avoiding the main cross streets. The lesser streets are slightly less jammed with crazed shoppers.

  The snow is coming down harder, starting to pile up on the streets. But it’s still lovely and so evocative of winter with the steam coming out of the manhole covers. I’m almost happy. I got through the audition back in Spring and now have the most glamorous job of the Christmas season, even if it is arduous and a killer on the body. After Macys maybe I’ll walk back uptown and try another first - ice skating at Rockefeller Center. Or maybe I’ll treat myself to hot chocolate, seeing as today is my one day off.

  I’m in a dreamy state of possibility and enjoying the snowflakes so much, I actually open my mouth to catch one on the tip of my tongue. A heavy rush of air grazes an inch from my upturned face, immediately followed by a loud thud on the sidewalk. With the thud I hear a crack that echoes down the empty street. I know that sound and it makes every hair stand up down my back. The sound of bones breaking.

  “Oh my god, are you okay?” I say stupidly as I drop to my knees beside the man lying flat out on the ground at my toes.

  He doesn’t answer and his eyes are closed. Automatically my eyes bat up to the sky, wondering where the hell he fell from. A plane, a skyscraper, Heaven? That last one is not so ridiculous as it seems because this dude sure looks like an angel. I’ve never seen such a gorgeous man. His hair flows back dark and sleek and glossy enough to run my fingers through. His sculpted chin is dusted with dark stubble and white snowflakes that melt in moments on his skin.

  His leg is bent back at a strange angle and for a moment I think he’s dead.

  Shit. Please don’t be dead, I think.

  Please please please don’t be dead.

  “What’s that scent?” He sudden
ly asks, opening his lids and staring straight up at the grey low sky.

  Thank god.

  “Oh, you must mean the exotic aroma of sweat soaked nylon?” I say, only half joking. The smell of my dance leotards always sits in my nostrils.

  He smiles dreamily and his eyelids droop so I’m afraid he’s going to black out on me. Oh god, please don’t die. Jeezus please don’t. I give him a gentle prod, the muscle of his upper arm doesn’t even give, it’s so solid. In my panic I stupidly hope that’s not the start of rigor mortis. I’m clearly obsessed with all things dying at the moment, when I should be focusing on keeping the guy from falling into a coma or something. I prod him a little again and say; “Or maybe, maybe, it’s the delightful aroma of live camel.”

  He smiles again.

  “I can’t feel my legs,” he says.

  Shit, what am I doing? I’m in a daze, stunned by a beautiful man falling from the sky and landing right at my feet. I pull out my phone and dial emergency.

  2

  Noel

  My life really did flash before my eyes on the way down. And what a dreamy journey it was. Plummeting, what? thirty feet? fifty? seemed to take hours not seconds. As though I was on a downward train journey through snow-capped mountains. The swirling white was the magical world of a kid’s shaker ball and then the train slammed into a rock face, or at least my body did.

  Logically I should be lying on my back in agony. But after a brief explosion of pain through my legs, I’m floating. Calmer and more relaxed than I’ve felt in a very long time. Add to that, I’m looking up at the sweetest face I’ve seen in - forever - or maybe ever.

  She’s looking down at me with such concern it makes my insides feel warm and cared for. Her smooth palm rests on my forehead and briefly reminds me of being a boy, sick with a fever. Then she does something my mother never did - she spears her little fingers into my hair and smooths it back.

  Something stirs in my core. I might have thought my wood was pricking up except I can’t feel a thing. My blood is rushing hot around my body though. And there’s an odd smell. I’ve always had the strongest sense of smell.

  “Fresh camel?” The beautiful girl on her knees beside me says, her stained red lips turning up in a smile that doesn’t cover up the concern in her eyes.

  ‘What’s happening?’ I wonder but don’t ask. “What’s happened to me?’

  Oh yes, I fell from a window. And now I’m lying flat on my back looking up at a girl I’d be asking to see more of if I weren’t lying prone on a city sidewalk.

  “Are there camels in New York City this time of year?” I ask.

  “Actually there are a couple brought in especially for a Christmas show.”

  Next thing I’m aware of is her shaking me and her voice isn’t so soft.

  “Stay with me, hey, wake up.”

  I fight to open my eyes.

  “There you are.” Can she really be that relieved? About a complete stranger.

  I guess so because her hand cups around my cheek soothingly and she smiles down. I move to sit up, I can hardly ask her out while I’m lying flat on my back. That would just be rude.

  Argh.

  “Hey, hey, don’t try to move. You’re okay. EMS are on their way and I won’t leave you, I promise.”

  “Who are you?” I croak. Even speaking hurts. Her hand is on my chest, lightly holding me motionless but also comforting.

  “Don’t try to talk,” she says. Maybe she’s a nurse. “My name’s Lana,” she adds.

  “No…” one syllable is all I can get out before gasping for breath.

  “Yes, honestly. I’m a dancer,” she says. Then looks shyly down as her cheeks blush a little. “Not exotic,” she adds quickly. “In case that’s what you were thinking.”

  I was thinking nurse.

  “I’m actually in a show here in the city.”

  She looks down shyly like she won’t say which one. I need to know but my mouth isn’t functioning.

  “I trained as a ballerina,” She’s saying. “I dance, danced, with the ballet theater back home - yep I know, I’m too old to be a ballerina. It’s my current conundrum. What’s a girl to do after Broadway when she’s on the shelf?”

  She laughs a little, awkward, a little embarrassed. I want to sit up and tell her she’s crazy. She’s hardly old - she can’t be more than twenty-five or six and she’s so slender she’s like a gazelle. The kind of creature some men want to hunt down and possess. I want to put my arms around her and hold her. She’s the one caring for me right now but I can tell really she’s the one that needs to be taken care of. There’s something about her that exudes a ton of fragility.

  She reaches up and pulls off a scarf from around her neck. The vacancy left as the cold air rushes in where her warm hand was resting on me is a terribly lonely feeling. I can’t bear it as I watch her fold the scarf into a neat square, doubling it over and over to make a pillow. She cups the underside of my head, again swishing her fingers in my hair as she slides the pillow under.

  “Wet,” I stutter. I feel like a stroke victim or something, the way my mouth refuses to operate.

  “I know,” she says softly. Her hand strokes my forehead, my cheek before resting on my shoulder. “You’ll be warm soon.”

  I meant her scarf would get wet, on the ground in the snow. She’s so sweet, not like other women in the city who care about fashion more than anything else. As though their clothes define their very soul.

  She’s been chattering away all this time, telling me about her life story. I get that she’s doing it to keep me awake, from slipping into blackout. All I can do is gaze at her, enraptured.

  “Is there anything else you need, anything I can do to make you comfortable?” She asks.

  I’m known as a player up and down Broadway, always ready to grab the main chance. And I don’t want to waste this one.

  “Kiss,” I rasp out.

  She laughs and takes my hand in both hers. The size difference is huge, her two hands in no way cover my one.

  “I’m glad you can joke right now,” she says.

  I want to say that I’m the furthest thing from joking. She’s still got that nurse thing going on and didn’t nurses in the Great War, or any war, indulge a wounded man with a kiss. It’s bizarre to be thinking of a kiss from an unknown girl at a time like this but it’s the only thing in the world I want right now. That and for her to take off the wooly hat covering her hair so I can see what she looks like properly. Her eyes are large and blue as cornflowers on a sunny day. So I assume she’s blond. But is it cut short, in an elfin way to match her delicate features?

  Before I make these final requests, darkness wraps over me like someone put a bag over my head and snapped out the lights. Then I come around to the sound of sirens in the distance. a couple of blocks away and rotating angrily, like they’re blocked in. Well it is the crazy time of year in the city. They’re probably gridlocked on Forty-Second Street. My first thought is that I can’t inhale and then I realize it’s because a pair of soft lips are pressed into mine. I don’t care if I never take another breath. I’m in heaven.

  “Ma’am excuse us.”

  All too soon the EMS are on us and pulling the angel woman off me. Rough hands are on my body now, prodding and pressing, checking for vital signs.The men strap my head into a contraption that prevents me moving or looking around. I stretch my eyes back to the girl, standing off to one side, but still here. Still looking down on me like a beautiful elf.

  A stretcher is dropped on the ground and they lift me like a two by four, onto it.

  “Is he going to be okay?” The angel inquires.

  “Any allergies? Any medications?” The EMS guy barks, making her startle. I wish I could tell him to go easy, speak to her more gently. She’s not one of the tough New York women.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” she says. Her cheeks take on another dusting of rose that has nothing to do with the cold. “That is, we aren’t, I’m not - his wife. I’m a stranger,
I was just walking when he fell from up there.”

  She points straight up. To the sky.

  The guy throws her a rough look, as though he’s wondering what the fuck she was doing with her mouth planted on mine when they arrived if we’re strangers. I chuckle inside. It’s our little secret.

  As the EMS hoist me off ground and into the back of the wagon, I notice that a police car has pulled up and they’re questioning my girl in a none too friendly fashion. She shakes her head no in a slightly bewildered state. She can’t tell them anything. And she’s a little afraid of these gruff NYC cops. What they might pin on her.

  It wasn’t her. She didn’t push me.

  But I’m strapped down on the stretcher bed, like a lunatic in the asylum. The doors slam shut on me and we’re moving at speed, sirens blaring. My last thought is how will I ever find my saving angel again?

  3

  Lana

  I don’t get to go ice skating or to drink hot chocolate, or any fun stuff for my day off. I wobble back up Sixth Avenue, shaking still because a man fell at my feet. And not in the good way. In fact, if I hadn’t paused to taste a snowflake, he’d have landed right on top of me. The police didn’t care about that though. They eyed me suspiciously, and demanded over and over to know where he fell from.

  “All I know is he fell from above me,” I insisted. “But I don’t know where.”

  The EMS must have mentioned the kiss because they asked about that also.