Excerpt: PAPER MOON

Okay, so Kerry / @uppington talked me into growing a pair and doing this. Those who know me know I’m a little sketchy about posting stuff from WIPs here, though I don’t really worry about the random one-off snippets I do for writing exercises. For me it’s a bit strange to post something from a draft that might change completely by the time I finish and edit it. But I haven’t posted in over a week and it’s either this or a long rant from editor-Adri (who spent this morning buried in the slush pile and is too cranky after the past week to say anything helpful) about knowing your genre, so…I guess I’ll be posting a chapter from the rough draft of PAPER MOON.

It’s dystopian, YA, fantasy – not swords-and-sorcery or urban fantasy, but just a darker world. To be blunt, it’s a gender-swap story that takes place in a totalitarian future regime with strong flavors of Paris under German occupation, and it explores gender perceptions by completely swapping male and female roles with the understanding that it’s not considered strange or abnormal in their society, nor a reflection on their sexuality, but simply part of daily life. To them the roles aren’t reversed; this isn’t cross-dressing, and there’s no fetishization of the reversal.

It’s something I’m really enjoying writing, because by placing men and women in opposing gender roles without trying to justify it based on preconceived notions of masculinity and femininity, I’m discovering a lot about common gender perceptions in society and my own thoughts about them. On LJ, it sparked a really interesting discussion about how certain characters are perceived, certain assumptions made because they don’t act the way they “should” for their gender. Might be a little heavy for YA, but the classification fits with the story progression I have outlined for my 16-year-old protagonist.

But I should probably stop talking about it and let it speak for itself. So…yep. Chapter.

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Sebasien wondered if he would die tonight.

Like a swallowed scream the mournful song of the air raid siren cut across the sky, mere minutes before his set. It strangled the saucy cello and mellow clarinet of the house band, turning sweet sad jazz into a death-march ballad. Swearing under his breath, Sebasien stubbed out the remnants of his cigarette, slipped his cigarette case under his garter strap, and peeked out through the curtain.  Beyond the spotlight’s stark white glow the lounge drowned in darkness, the silhouettes of soldiers as still and square as pasteboard cutouts. Reflected light gleamed from polished black boots, sharp caps, brass buttons, weapons, martini glasses. The siren’s howl mingled with the clink of ice on glass like a mad gypsy melody.

Pierre flung his nanopore eyelash extensions down on the backstage dressing table and, with a little toss of his waxed and pomaded curls, threw his hands up. “Always the raids. The fucking raids! How do they expect us to make a living when – ”

“Shh.” Parting the curtains just a fraction more, Sebasien watched the crowd. All attention in the room trained on the largest table, near the stage; they waited for a signal like a hangman’s crowd watching for the platform to drop. The siren’s banshee wail continued, crying a repetitive warning into the frozen silence. Sebasien held his breath for the earth-tremor, the distant thunder, the burning screams.

Instead “Please,” came from the table, silky and cool. “Continue, gentlemen. I’m quite sure we were all enjoying your lovely performance.”

On stage the band exchanged uncertain glances, followed by a nervous trill of clarinet. By the four-count cello and saxophone and slip-crash cymbals joined in, Vaudeville verve subdued to a jangling croon beneath the constant ululating howl. At the table the speaker straightened, boots slipping off the table and hitting the floor with an at-attention click. Square and trim in her uniform, Marie Cavendell beckoned to someone at a nearby booth. The soldier scurried to Marie’s side, snapped off a quick salute, and leaned in to catch the murmur from slick red lips. After a moment Marie dismissed the girl with a flick of her fingers; with another salute, the soldier dashed for the exit with as much haste as propriety would allow.

Marie leaned forward in her chair. The harsh monochrome light caught the tight blonde sweep of her hair and turned it to sterile platinum. Her eye caught Sebasien’s, and she raised two fingers to the bill of her hat in taunting acknowledgement. He stepped back, tugging the curtain back into place.

“The Fifth are taking care of it. Help me with my gloves.”

Pierre sniffed and stabbed his cigarette in Sebasien’s direction. “Black-booted pigs, and you’re nothing but a lemming.”

“Be quiet!” Sebasien glanced towards the curtain furtively, then stalked over to Pierre, his heels clicking on the floor like a metronome marking time for every chord the band flubbed. He slapped Pierre across his rouged and powdered face. “You know what will happen if you’re heard, you brainless little bitch.”

“I don’t care.” Sulking, Pierre rubbed his blooming cheek and turned his nose in the air. “Let them pluck me from this false throne and throw me into a factory. I’m tired of playing golden songbird when I long to be a plain and common pigeon!”

“You long to be a corpse.” The siren stopped, sound snapping off like a broken thread. Sebasien looked up at the ceiling, then yanked on his gloves, smoothed his gown, and checked his hair in the mirror. He pursed his lips, testing the gloss of his lipstick, and flicked Pierre a disgusted look. “I’m on. Try to keep your loose little mouth shut until they leave.”

“Perhaps I’m loose, but at least I’m not a whore for the Fifth.”

“At least a whore survives,” Sebasien hissed, then ducked through the curtain and onto the stage.

The silver lamé shimmered closed behind him like raining stars. The spotlight centered on him, turning the audience into a dark mass through which the dim shapes of waiters swayed from table to table amidst blinding flares of light. Deep scents of whiskey and smoke coiled around him like silent dragons, creeping into his throat in sinuous curls. The band trailed off, ending their solo set with a palpable air of relief. He smiled for the crowd, lowered his lashes, and curled his fingers around the microphone.

“Sounds like we had a little hiccup out there,” Sebasien purred. “Good thing we’ve got our girls in the Fifth to take care of us.”

A ripple of laughter passed through the crowd, along with a few catcalls and war cries. Only Marie remained silent. Despite the glare from the lights, he could see her clearly; she leaned forward, elbows on her spread knees, mouth set in a tight smile. Her eyes stared into his, pale grey and intense. Waiting. Wanting. He played to the crowd, but the performance was for Marie. It was always for Marie.

The house catered to rank, after all.

“I see some familiar faces in the audience tonight – but for you new gals, I’d like to welcome you to Le Roux Lounge. I’m Sebasien, and I’ll be your first act for the night. I hear the Seventeenth is with us tonight, back on shore leave after six valiant months on the front.” The words were sour in his throat, yet he smiled his prettiest smile. From the back of the room a discordant chorus of roars rose; Sebasien laughed. “Thought so. This song’s for you, ladies. If you’ve got your boy with you tonight, hold ‘im close, enjoy your drinks, and get ready to take a walk with me under the light of a paper moon.”

The band took their cue to launch into the opening chords of “It’s Only A Paper Moon,” jaunty and gay strains hiding sadness like a weeping smile, a song from another time and another world. Sebasien met Marie’s eyes, slipped her a slow little wink, brought the microphone close, and began to sing.

“I never feel a thing is real, when I’m away from you.” The words poured like wine past his lips – sweet little lies that he spun so beautifully, obedient bird that he was. He whispered rhyming temptations into the microphone, swayed across the stage, sent hot little glances around the room until every girl there thought he sang just for her. At the end of each song they demanded more, pouring whistles and applause over him with liquored spontaneity. He gave; he gave until he couldn’t remember another word of Ella Fitzgerald and wore out Peggy Lee, until the spotlight made sweat slick down his neck, until his voice broke and his throat turned raw, until he couldn’t squeak out another note and his lungs threatened to collapse.

He blew kisses as he begged off, flinging them from his satin-gloved fingertips. “Tomorrow!” he promised, laughing and flipping his skirt as if shooing off clucking chickens. “Tomorrow, mes amours!” With a last kiss thrown out into the crowd, he pursed his lips and ducked back behind the curtain. Pierre waited in their dressing room with his scotch and a pout.

“Thanks for warming them up.”

“Oh, don’t be churlish. God, give me that; I’m parched.” Sebasien took the glass and drained it in two quick gulps; the scotch burned his throat, then numbed it, leaving him gasping and slightly dizzy. “Get out there before they get bored. I saw Kathleen with the Ninth in the audience tonight.”

“Did you?” Pierre’s face lit up; his breaths caught. He really was much more attractive when he smiled; Sebasien found his usual sulking affectations tiresome. Tucking a brilliant red curl behind his ear, Pierre stole a peek through the door. “Do you think she came to see me, Sebasien?”

“Likely,” Sebasien murmured, when what he truly meant was I don’t care. Tugging at the teardrop garnets dangling from his ears, he stalked across the room and flung himself onto the couch atop a pile of crumpled gowns. “Go on.” He wiggled his fingers at Pierre. “While they’re still drunk.”

Flushed as a virgin, Pierre checked his reflection again, fluttered his ridiculously long eyelashes, slipped one strap of his gown down a smooth shoulder, then dashed from the dressing room and out the stage. The jovial chatter of the crowd burst into roaring acclaim, quickly blending into the bawdy, brassy notes of Pierre’s set. Burlesque little tart. Sebasien slipped his cigarette case from beneath his gown and fumbled for a slender, unfiltered cancer stick, fingers clumsy in the gloves. As the soothing draught of mentholated smoke filled his lungs, he closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the couch. The lazy twirl of the ceiling fan cooled the sweat on his skin, drying it to a sticky glaze.

“Whiskey and cigarettes,” Marie mocked. “Surely not the best lubrication for those luscious golden pipes.”

Sebasien opened his eyes. She stood in the doorway, the faint amber light of the lamps making razors of her cheekbones and slicking like oil from the pistol at her hip. Sebasien’s heart skipped a beat – yet he took his time in plucking his cigarette from his mouth, arms stretching along the back of the couch in languid, studied motions. Just another performance, as much of an act as the silken whisper of sheer hose when he crossed his legs and “accidentally” let the slit in his gown fall open.

“Corporal Cavendell,” he murmured, favoring her with a bored glance through lowered lashes. “You aren’t allowed backstage. You know that.”

She laughed low in her throat. The door closed behind her with an intimate snick, locking them away together; she removed her cap and set it on the vanity. “Doors rarely remain closed to me, little songbird.”

“So it seems.” Feigning indifference to her presence, Sebasien leaned forward to fiddle with the delicate silver buckles fastening the straps of his heels. After a moment long fingers covered his own, warm through the gloves. He caught his breath and raised his eyes to find her on one knee before him, her hand curled around his ankle in a possessive grasp. Her cool grey eyes held him, steady and utterly unreadable. He wondered how many lives she’d ended with the black-gloved hands that unfastened his shoe with such a sure, nimble touch. “Let me,” she whispered.

Hiding his unease behind a cynical little twist of his lips, Sebasien shrugged one shoulder and leaned back. “If you wish to play servant, Corporal, who am I not to indulge you?”

She smiled; it never reached her eyes. Her fingers lingered, grazing the arch of his foot as she withdrew the first shoe, then reached for the other. “Is that what you do now? Indulge people?”

“Sometimes.”

“You stand up there making eyes at every woman in the room, singing your heart out like you mean it.”

“What makes you think I don’t?”

“I’ve known a dozen boys like you.” The arrogance and contempt in the hot look she threw him made his cheeks burn. She thought him little more than a whore, just like Pierre. “On the make, every last one of you. You lie like your tongue’s made of silver.”

“Mine’s pure gold, Cavendell. Isn’t that why you keep me here?” He let her remove his other shoe, then pressed his stockinged foot against her chest and pushed her back.

“Perhaps.” She stood and, resting one knee to the couch, leaned over him. Her fingers slowly wrapped around his throat, stroking at the frantic flutter of his pulse, briefly pressing – then easing, sliding up, touching him with loathsome familiarity. Cupping his jaw in her palm, she tilted his face up. “One day you’ll sing just for me, Sebasien. And you’ll mean every word.”

His gorge rose. He resisted the need to recoil from her; instead he slipped his cigarette between his lips again, deliberately flicking his tongue against its length, drawing her gaze to the slow tracery of red flesh along smooth paper. Her pale eyes heated.

“I always sing for you,” he breathed. “I thought you knew that by now.”

“Little flirt. Are you even legal?”

“Sixteen. That’s legal, isn’t it? Old enough for what you’re thinking, I’d say.”

“Gold-digger.”

“I prefer ‘survivor’.” With a toss of his head, he pulled free from her grasp and slid from the couch, rising to his feet. Swaying away from her, he dropped his cigarette into the ash tray on the vanity and began to peel away his gloves. He could feel her eyes following him, sliding over his body with tangible avarice, as if she already owned him. “Last call soon. Best go see to your regiment, Corporal.”

“The Fifth take care of themselves.”

Her boots counted out long, breathless seconds as she closed the distance between them. Her warmth singed his back; her uniform brushed the glittering satin of his gown, bright buttons and medals scratching at the cloth. Her fingers slipped down his spine; her breaths warmed his nape, and her words poured in husky liquor-drops into his ear. He almost shivered, almost succumbed to the dangerous lure of power; the scent of her cologne coiled around him, like iron bands threatening to lock him within her grasp.

“Until tomorrow night, my dear boy.” Her lips touched his bare shoulder, leaving behind traces of lipstick as scarlet as heart’s blood – and then she was gone. Sebasien let out his breath and fumbled for another cigarette. His fingers shook as he lit it and sucked in deep.

“Won’t that be wonderful,” he muttered, and wondered where Pierre had left the whiskey. “Just bloody delightful.”

He stayed halfway through Pierre’s set, watching from the wings as the saucy boy paraded himself across the stage with suggestive winks and bawled out lusty innuendo. Then, slipping his jacket on over jeans and sweater, Sebasien picked up the night’s paycheck and let himself out into the dark and the cold.

Streets still damp from rain glistened in planes of white and black beneath the cones of street lamps. The sky spread overhead like matte paper, starless and cloudless, moon nothing but a shadowed disk lying black against starker black. Circlets of blinding white sliced across the heavens like sickles, searchlights seeking, hunting whatever had alerted the sirens, ever-vigilant against enemies of the State. The spotlights made false moons, too flat and cold to wish upon. Sebasien stood on the street corner and watched their criss-cross patterns.

Just a paper moon sailing over a cardboard sea, he thought. None of it’s real.

Nothing in this life is real.

His boots sounded lonely drumbeats on the pavement as he hurried down the street and towards home, hunching into the fur-lined collar of his coat. His breaths rushed ahead of him in thin white clouds, like airy tethers leading him along sidewalks occasionally lit by passing yellow hi-beams. Stillness amplified his steps, the silence of a city muted by curfew, all the good little boys behind closed doors.

Click. The sound of a booted heel. Click. Click. Click. In tandem with his own, separating into two, then one again, quick-march synchronicity that matched his every stride. Click. Click. Click click click click clickclick clickclick clickclickclickclick as Sebasien quickened his step, breaths coming faster. Fear curled around his neck like black-gloved fingers as he glanced back, then looked straight ahead, focusing on the sidewalk as he passed through street lights like ash-gold waterfalls. He’d caught the slick black gleam of cap bills like lascivious, wet tongues. Either the Forty-Eighth Night Watch, or a few drunk soldiers looking for a good time. Either way, he didn’t want to be caught out alone after curfew.

“Going a little fast there, aren’t you, pretty?” The hard-edged voice snapped him back like a leash. “Might want to slow down, show us a little identification. It’s awful late, don’t you think?”

Sebasien stopped. Just a second to close his eyes, compose himself, still his pulsating heart; then he turned. The two women stood just on the edge of a cone of light, contrast turning them into poker-slim bas-reliefs. The taller of the two slipped her cap off and swept him a derisively elegant bow; briefly the lamp played off her tightly-coiled hair like moonlight on slick, deadly black water. She smiled and straightened. Her hand rested casually on the club at her belt.

“Don’t need to look so afraid, pretty.” Cold brass stars glimmered on her lapel; her breast read Juarez, stitched next to the insignia of the Forty-Eighth. “Unless you think you have a reason to be.”

“Maybe he does.” The other – McCullen, her uniform announced – looked Sebasien over with a leer that warped her rounded face into a grotesque mask. “Violating curfew, eh? Could be he’s part of it, eh?”

“I doubt it. Limp-dicked little pretty boys don’t have the balls to work for savages.” Juarez ran her tongue against her teeth. “But perhaps the pretty’s seen something.”

“I work at Le Roux.” Sebasien lifted his chin and slipped his hand inside his coat, careful to move slowly, no threatening motions. His fingers shook as he withdrew his identification card, but he kept his voice steady. “I’ve been there all night and I’ve seen nothing, Officers. I was just on my way home.”

“Well isn’t he fancy?” McCullen snatched the card from his palm and slid it into the reader dangling from her belt. As it burped and suckled at the card, its internal scanner tonguing encoded bars that spanned everything from his genetic data to his grade school aptitude scores to his parents’ political leanings, she tapped her foot in sharp, hard clicks like the rap of the hammer against an empty chamber. Juarez simply watched him, waiting with a stillness that bordered on inhuman. Wanting to see him squirm, he thought, and set his mouth in a stubborn line.

“I’ve seen you before.”

Sebasien faltered, and hid it with a one-shouldered shrug. “Have you? Apologies. I usually recognize repeat customers.”

“I don’t frequent that filthy little dive you call an establishment.” Her chill blue eyes flicked over him. “You’re the Fifth’s pet nightingale.”

“I’m not anyone’s pet.”

“Is that what you think, pretty?” Her flat, one-sided smile cut into him. He swallowed, wetting his lips, and made himself meet her dead, empty eyes. He’d seen eyes like hers before, hollow and drained of humanity after months or years of atrocities on the battlefield. She looked at him not as if deciding whether or not to kill him…but simply pondering where to start.

Murderer. Bitter anger flourished in his gut, forcing through the slime of fear coating his innards. It took all his strength to hold still while she looked through him, secure in the knowledge there was nothing he could do to stop her if she wanted to beat him, rape him, kill him and dump his body in an alley to be found by the cleaning crews the next morning. It wouldn’t be the first time it happened; nor would it be the last. Sebasien Marquette would simply disappear like many others: no longer spoken of, no longer spared a thought, swept under the rug at her whim.

I will not be another faceless statistic.

“He’s clear.” McCullen sounded almost disappointed, her growl dissipating the dense stillness. She yanked his card from the scanner and presented it to Juarez, who caught it between two gloved fingers and glanced at the encoded, shimmering print the scan’s bioluminescent filters had activated.

“Hm; authorized. And here I thought I’d have to take you in for prostitution.” Something dark flickered in her eyes as they traced the outlines of his legs within tight jeans. He wanted to recoil, didn’t dare. She presented his card to him with exaggerated courtesy, that razor-lipped smile widening. “My apologies, young sir. Do carry on your way.”

He nearly dropped his card when he snatched it back and slipped it back into his coat. “Thank you. If you’ll excuse me, Officers.”

“Quite excused.” McCullen was still leering at him when he turned away; his back felt entirely too exposed as he took a few shaky steps down the street.

“Oh, and nightingale?”

He stopped, closed his eyes, sent up a silent prayer, and listened for the tell-tale tick-tock of a pistol’s safety.

It never came. “You really shouldn’t be out so late without an escort,” Juarez said. “Who knows what unsavory types you might meet? Perhaps you should call on the Forty-Eighth; we’re here for your protection, after all.”

Sebasien swallowed back on his derision. “I’ll keep that in mind, Officer.”

Their low laughter trailed him as he walked away. Pride would let him neither look back nor run – but the moment he turned the next corner, he let his legs fly.

Nearly sobbing out his broken breaths, he dashed the last few blocks to his apartment building beneath translucent false moons, splashing through puddles until his jeans clung to his legs like a skin of ice. The light was on in Mr. Herschwitz’s first-floor window when Sebasien fumbled the key into the unkempt brownstone’s front gate. He thought he saw the curtain flip aside so the widower’s beady brown eye could watch him clatter up the inside stairs. He didn’t care what the old gossip saw; he just wanted to get behind locked doors, safe as he could ever hope to be.

Upstairs he fell against the wall in the hall outside of his single-room loft. Sinking down against the graying floorboards and peeling wallpaper, he hugged his knees to his chest. Mascara smeared against his fingers as he scrubbed at his eyes and choked back the terrified tears that had been building from the moment he heard the bootsteps in his wake. They could have killed him; they could have bloody well killed him, all because he’d been unlucky enough to cross paths on the wrong night. Normally he either left the club earlier, or simply managed to avoid the watch by dint of a short walk and a lot of luck.

Some nights – like tonight – he wasn’t so lucky.

Sniffling, he swiped his knuckles across his eyes and told himself to calm down. He was home now; nothing had happened. His record was clean, his loyalty unquestionable; they had no reason to harm him. Obedience is its own reward, he thought sourly, and dragged to his feet. So is cowardice. His smile felt as painted on as his lipstick. Wiping his face one last time, he slipped his key into his door and let himself in.

The cold struck him first, carried on a wafting breeze. His little loft was usually stifling and stagnant, with no control over steam-radiated heat that Herschwitz kept at boiling to warm his arthritic bones. Sebasien halted in the doorway; his fear resurrected from its shallow grave and clutched him in its slimy, dead fingers. The window glass laid strewn across the threadbare rug, a glittering sea of sharp-edged stars. The curtains draped askew from their rod, tattered edges twisting and flapping in the wind that nosed past the empty frame. Darkness draped the room, the moonless night turning his familiar home into a haunted house of amorphous shapes where every shadow on the wall was the silhouette of a creeping murderer.

Had someone broken in? For what? There was nothing to steal; his bed, sofa, coffee table, desk, and shelves were all junkyard rejects, the most valuable thing in the loft the mandatory data terminal mounted on one wall. Even his utensils were recycled plastics, no metals that could be sold and melted down, and the only decorations were cheap thrift shop knick-knacks and faded playbills for one performance or another, splashed across the walls like curling, crinkled wallpaper. Their only value was to Sebasien; worthless to a thief.

Hovering motionless, holding his breath, he listened for a tell-tale sound: a creaking floorboard, a rustle of cloth. His fingers flexed at his hip as if gripping the weapon he so desperately wished he carried. In the harsh domed light he’d probably find a rock, or a wayward child’s ball. But if someone had broken in, and was still there…

Don’t be a blasted ninny. Where would they be? Hiding beneath the sofa? Turn on the light.

No. He should go downstairs and get Herschwitz, drag the old bat up here in his housecoat and ludicrous pink curlers, a fragile bastion against the darkness. Or call for the Forty-Eighth, if they were so keen on protecting him. Or -

Stop it.

Breathing out slowly, he fumbled around the doorframe, felt for the switch, and turned on the light.

A hand shot from behind the door and locked around his wrist. Inexorable strength dragged him inside. He cried out, but hard fingers shoved against his mouth and sealed the sound behind his lips. The door slammed closed; the light cut. He struggled, twisted, but a heavy body pinned him against the wall like the hot weight of the lion bearing down on the vulnerable gazelle. Heart pistoning, pulse threatening to burst past the fragile layer of his skin, Sebasien stared up at the intruder.

“Don’t move,” hissed a grave voice, deeply accented. “Don’t make a single sound.”