Archive of Our Own

Becoming partners with Velma Kelly is not ideal. But it’s a sacrifice that Roxie decides to make, despite how much she detests sacrifices. For anyone to achieve what they desire most in all the world, maybe it’s inevitable for them to face hellish trials along the way.

So Roxie decides to become Velma’s partner. They’ll perform together and complement each other’s strengths on the stage and in people’s hearts. They’ll capture people’s gazes together. They’ll make it that much harder for anyone to look away. And all the other irritations will be worth it, because Roxie won’t need Velma forever.

But it’s hard to look past all the other irritations when Roxie spends most of her time with Velma. She should have thought of that before agreeing to move in with her, but she couldn’t stay in a motel any longer, and she didn’t have anywhere else to go unless she wanted to shack up with Amos again. What did it say about her that she’d rather live with the woman she hated than go back to live with the man she once had a marriage with?

Legally, Roxie supposes, they’re still married, but now that she’s been free of Amos, she can’t imagine going back to him, back to sitting next to him while he kept trying to wrap his beefy hand around hers, back to making him rubbery scrambled eggs on Sundays, back to sleeping next to him and hearing his voice first thing every morning, smelling the resiny scent of his aftershave. The idea of it now makes Roxie feel like she’s in a tiny elevator with a dozen people, between floors, rising inch by inch as the air inside seems to shrink.

Living with Velma could be worse, really. Sometimes it’s even entertaining, like when Velma curses every time she trips over one of Roxie’s shoes in the hall. 

This time, judging by how loudly Velma curses when she trips, it must be one of Roxie’s brown leather Wellesley’s with the chunky 2-inch heel. 

“Damn it, Roxie!” Velma hisses, grabbing onto the bedroom doorframe for balance. “Are your shoes filled with lead?”

Roxie doesn’t look up from the fashion magazine she’s leafing through, curled up on the bed. In a mock-sweet tone, she says, “Titanium, actually.”

Velma gives her an exasperated look and drops the shoe by the foot of the bed. "There's this nifty invention for storing clothes and shoes, maybe you’d like to try it.”

“There’s no room in my trunk, and the only wardrobe in here is full of all your sullen dark things.” Roxie gestures toward the rosewood armoire against the wall. Velma’s black dresses and shawls and long, glittering necklaces hang on hangers and draped over hooks, spilling out of the wooden doors like exotic reptiles. Roxie tilts her head. “Do you perform at a lot of funerals?”

“My fair share,” Velma deadpans. “Now get up and get ready, would you? We haven’t got all day.”

“God, there is no way this is going to be ready by Saturday!” Roxie complains. She complains a lot, admittedly, but mostly because Velma told her to stop complaining, and she takes most of Velma’s instructions as bids to do the opposite.

They’ve been rehearsing an added final section to their act for about an hour, and the back of Roxie’s neck is damp with sweat. The open windows don’t bring in quite enough air to cool the back theater studio they’re in.

“It could be ready today, if you listened to me,” Velma is saying. “How many times have I told you to stop locking your knees? That’s what’s got you so stiff. And fix your posture while you’re at it.”

“Stop barking at me—”

Velma rolls her eyes. “I’m not—”

“—you’re not in charge here.”

Velma snorts. “Are you saying you’re in charge?”

Roxie’s face warms with anger and how damn stuffy the whole room is.  “And why couldn’t I be in charge?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, remind me.” Velma tilts her head. “How many years of experience do you have in showbusiness? Oh that’s right, none, and that speaks for itself.”

Roxie yearns to take off her left shoe and launch it at Velma’s face, but instead she snatches Velma’s cigarette case off the piano and marches it over to the nearest open window. Roxie flicks open the case and shakes it outside the window so that all of Velma’s fresh cigs sprinkle out and fall two stories onto the sidewalk below.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Velma’s heels clack as she comes up behind Roxie and snatches the case away from her. “I paid good money for those.”

“Did you pay for them with money, or was it sex?” Roxie asks, not even sure why she says it, but then Velma slaps her, so she shrieks and slaps her back. “Don’t fucking touch me!” 

Velma grabs her wrist, dropping the cigarette case in her struggle, and it clatters to the ground. She grabs Roxie’s other wrist tightly. “Stop. Stop it.”

Roxie stops moving long enough for Velma’s hold to loosen, and she snatches her wrists away and kicks Velma’s cigarette case across the room. She marches over to the piano bench in the corner of the studio and sits down, still breathing hard from her anger.

Velma leisurely walks over to pick up her cigarette case and flicks it open, pulling out a single cigarette that must have somehow, infuriatingly, escaped Roxie’s wrath. Velma twirls it between her fingers. She looks at Roxie. “Do you feel better now? Because we should finish up, seeing as we only have the studio for another half an hour.” She puts the cigarette between her lips. Her lipstick today is burgundy. The corners of her mouth are always a little curved, like a ghost of her last smile. Her lips move around the cig as she says, “Unless there’s something else you need to get off your chest?”

The phonograph is still playing their jazz number, but the record reaches the end and peters out.

Roxie looks up from Velma’s mouth and glares at her. “Let’s run through the damn routine again.”

Velma does smile then, and her eyes glint under the incandescent light of the studio’s flush ceiling lamps. “If you insist.”

After the velvet curtain falls on their Saturday night show, crowds form as the audience members exit the theater, and people laugh and argue in the lobby in the warm, heavy smell of cigars.

Roxie changes out of her dancing shoes and grabs her coat and handbag before she begins the irritating process of trying to make her way through the people gathered in the hallway.

These days she sometimes can’t enter a room without people stopping to stare at her, but then there are still times like these when she can practically elbow her way past someone without them so much as blinking. 

As if to punish her mental complaint, someone does deign to acknowledge Roxie’s existence, in the most unfortunate way, just as she’s almost made it to the door.

“Well, if it isn’t showgirl blondie,” a man says, his voice low. 

Roxie glances at him, narrowing her eyes. She shouldn’t even respond to him—Velma would probably ignore him, or give him a chilling look and walk past him. But Roxie can’t stop herself from scowling at him and snapping, “Who raised you to talk to a woman like that? I have a name.”

The man’s dark eyebrows raise slightly. The bridge of his nose is crooked.  “Sorry—Velma, is it?”

“No,” Roxie says coldly.

“Right, that’s the other one, isn’t it?” The man says, looking down at her like he’s expecting her to start giggling at any moment.

Roxie’s chest tightens with anger at the phrasing, The other one. She’s not sure why it bothers her so much.

“You’re Roxie, and she’s Velma. Speaking of, that partner of yours, she is a looker, huh?” He smells like the pomade he’s clearly overused in his shiny black hair, and his lips curve into a smirk. “And you’re not bad yourself. You dolls should come down to my joint so we can all tip a few drinks together.”

Roxie briefly imagines how much she would enjoy slapping the disgusting smirk right off this fella’s face. She raises her eyebrows and smiles back at him. “What a gracious offer. Unfortunately, I have to decline on behalf of the both of us.”

The man’s face hardens, and he scoffs. “What gives, I’m not good enough for you?”

Roxie laughs dismissively.  “Oh, absolutely not, but that’s irrelevant, I have somewhere to be.” She turns to walk away, but then a big, clammy hand closes around her forearm with a steel grip.

“Hey,” the man snaps. “I’m still talkin’ to you!”

“What—” Roxie tries to yank her arm away, but his grip tightens on her wrist. Her heartbeat quickens. “Get the hell off of me, mister.”

“Not until you show me some due respect,” the man says, jaw clenching. “What’s a guy gotta do to get shown some respect from a lady like yourself, huh?”

“Respect?” Roxie opens her mouth to tell him to get lost, but then—

“What’s going on here?” Velma’s voice cuts through the noise of the nearby crowds.

The man lets go of Roxie immediately, looking over her shoulder with wide eyes. “Oh—Miss Velma. Sorry you had to see that—”

“I’m not the one you should be apologizing to, now, am I?” Velma asks, walking up to stand beside Roxie. She has an unlit cigarette between her fingers, and she gives the man a hard look as she puts it between her lips and lights it. “I don’t believe we’ve made this gentleman’s acquaintance, have we, Rox? That is,” she glances at the man. “If he is a gentleman. I’ve certainly never seen one act that way.”

The man stammers, looking from Roxie to Velma, “My apologies, Miss Roxie.”

Roxie glares at him, rubbing at her wrist.

Then Velma says simply, “Well, mister, I sure hope you have the night you deserve.” She exhales a puff of smoke in his direction and puts her hand on her hip. Her red nails are bright against her silvery dress. “Goodbye now.”

He blinks several times and opens his mouth like he wants to argue, but he shuts his trap after another look at their expressions. He turns and leaves without another word, his hands balled into his pockets like a disappointed child’s.

“What an asshole,” Velma says. Her eyes follow the man until he disappears out the back door.

Roxie crosses her arms. “I hope he drinks too much tonight and chokes on his own bile.”

Velma smirks. “God willing.” She turns, and her eyes drop to Roxie’s wrist. “Did he hurt you?”

Roxie shakes her head and drops her wrist. “I’m fine. Let’s leave now, my feet are sore.”

Velma nods and takes a long drag of her cigarette. “Yeah, mine too.”

After they’ve been performing together for about three months, Roxie is cursed in the middle of a show. A few minutes before the end of the routine, she and Velma are doing synchronized kicks to the band’s quick tempo jazz. Then Roxie gets her period, and the blood seeps slowly down her leg. In her white stockings. In front of a seated audience of five hundred people.

Is there anything more mortifying?

They keep singing and follow their choreography to the band’s quick tempo jazz. When they split to opposite ends of the stage for their respective dance solos, Roxie almost feels Velma’s eyes on her.

The instruments crescendo at the end of the musical number as Roxie and Velma finish their solos and hold their final poses. Roxie is more out of breath than usual, and when she would usually feel proud and full of energy, her limbs turn stiff and heavy as the curtains sweep closed, hiding them from the audience.

Roxie turns and heads for the dressing rooms backstage, her heels snapping against the wood floors. She barely registers Velma calling out to her from the wings.

About half an hour later, Roxie has put on a clean pair of stockings and a rag, and she sits at her vanity, crying into her hands pathetically. She hates to cry, it makes her feel helpless, but at least no one else is in the dressing room to see—

There’s a knock on the door. “Roxie, it’s me, you alright?”

Roxie’s voice shakes when she snaps, “Go away.”

“I just came to see if you’re alright,” Velma says, her voice muffled through the door.

“Well, I don’t want to see you, for pete’s sake!” Roxie is nearly blubbering at this point, and she hates it but can’t seem to make herself shut up. “This is all your fault!”

Velma makes a sound that’s half-scoff, half-laugh. “How on earth is this my fault?”

“It’s—” Roxie sniffs, and she gets snot on the back of her hand when she wipes her nose. She doesn’t have a handkerchief. “I never would have done this, if it wasn’t for you! I would’ve stopped with all this singing and dancing and just—just—”

“Got married to some bluenose man and cook and clean for him? Didn’t you already try that?”

Even though Velma can’t see her through the door, Roxie scowls and shakes her head.

“Roxie, I’m gonna come in, alright? Don’t throw a stool at me or anything.”

Roxie drops her head into the crook of her arm. “Don’t tempt me.”

The door opens, and Velma slips in and closes the door behind her, the beads of her dress skirt swishing. Her shoes click on the worn wooden floors as she walks over to sit at the vanity beside Roxie’s. 

Roxie doesn’t raise her head, suddenly irritated at the idea of Velma seeing her tearstained face more than anything. She grumbles, “What do you want, Velma?”

“I told you—”

“Oh, I’m sure, you’re so concerned for my well-being,” Roxie mocks. Her tears stream down her forearm, and she wants a handkerchief but would rather die than ask Velma for one. 

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Velma asks calmly. She slides her shoes off and drops them onto the floor, and Roxie pictures her pressing her knuckles into the arch of her left foot, rubbing at the soreness the way she usually does when they get home after a show.

“Why can’t you just leave me alone?” Roxie takes a breath and wipes at her face. “I just want to be alone. This is a nightmare.”

“I’ll go if you really want.” Velma’s voice is placating, almost gentle. She stands. “But this all isn’t as bad as it seems. I promise.”

That makes Roxie feel better for a moment, but then it makes her stomach hot with anger. She sits up and gapes at Velma. “How can you say that? Everybody saw.”

“Who cares?” Velma says, still as calm as ever, infuriatingly so. She looks down at Roxie, and at least she doesn’t wince or laugh at how clownish Roxie must look with her makeup running. “Honestly. Women have bled since the dawn of time.”

“Not onstage, they haven’t,” Roxie snaps, and her face scrunches up as she bursts into tears all over again.

Velma winces and sits back down. “Oh, jeez, kid, it’s alright. Take a breath.”

“I,” Roxie hiccups, “refuse to be a freak.”

Velma pulls a handkerchief out of her brassiere and holds it out to Roxie between two fingers. “You aren’t a freak. You’re just upset.”

Roxie hiccups another sob and snatches the handkerchief from Velma. Her blonde curls stick to the dampness on her cheeks, and she bats them away.

Velma folds her arm over the vanity in front of her. “Everybody loves seeing you perform. That’s not going to change just ‘cause you got a little blood on your stockings, alright?”

Roxie shakes her head. “It makes me furious. I’d rather die than be seen like that.”

“You can’t think that way. It’ll drive you crazy.” Velma shakes her head. “Completely crazy, I’m tellin’ you.”

Roxie looks up through her damp eyelashes and frowns. “Are you speaking from personal experience?”

Velma ignores the question and picks up her cigarette case. “The audience loves you, so stop cryin’.”

Roxie bites hard at the corner of her bottom lip, and the sting feels good, helps her focus. She narrows her eyes at Velma. “I still hate you.”

Velma hums. “You mentioned. I try to make peace with it,” she says, quirking her lips. “Look, fact is, we’re partners now. We’re in this together, whether we like it or not.”

Roxie wipes her face with the handkerchief, then folds it in her hands, looking down at the ivory cotton. It’s embroidered along its edge with tiny red chrysanthemums. She runs her thumb over one of the flowers.

“My sister gave that to me,” Velma says absently. “They’re my birth flower.” The memory of the sister she killed doesn’t seem to pain her. She looks almost nostalgic, her head tilted so one of her faux onyx earrings sways in the dim light.

“We had chrysanthemums for our wedding,” Roxie says. “Amos and I, I mean. Pink ones.” The memory feels less like a part of her life now and more like a dream she might’ve had, or a story someone told her that sounded vaguely familiar. “They’re common and completely unoriginal.”

“What flower isn’t?” Velma asks.

“Orchids.”

“That’s ritzy.”

“Anything worth having is expensive.” Roxie turns to her vanity mirror to smooth her hair, wincing at the mascara smudged around her eyes and cheeks. She dabs at the worst of it with Velma’s handkerchief, then gives up and looks at Velma. “I suppose you’re right about us being partners.”

Velma smiles. “Well, I never thought I’d see the day Roxie Hart would agree with little old me.”

“Shut your mouth,” Roxie says, and she shoves the used handkerchief back at Velma in revenge.

The heat of summer fades into September, and it’s an unseasonably brisk night after a show when their taxi breaks down three blocks from their apartment. The driver offers to try to get them another car, and Roxie sighs. “Who knows how long that will take?”

Velma looks out the window to the sidewalk as a few people cross the street, bathed in the yellow light of the streetlamps. “Let’s walk the rest of the way. It’ll only take a few minutes.”

Roxie wrinkles her nose and looks out her own window. “Fine.”

Velma pays the driver for the part of the fair, and they step out onto the sidewalk and start walking.

The chilly, wet air makes Roxie tug her shawl tighter around her shoulders. “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea.”

Velma picks up her pace to walk a little faster. “Relax, I did this every night when I was seventeen.”

“You walked home all by yourself at seventeen? Seventeen is still a girl,” Roxie says, struggling a little to keep up with Velma, since her legs aren’t as long. “Weren’t you scared?”

“No,” Velma says, but she frowns. “Usually my sister was with me. On slower nights, I didn’t want to waste pay on car rides.”

As they pass the brownstone before the corner of their apartment building, there’s a rumble of thunder, and rain pours, soaking Roxie and Velma’s hair.

Roxie shrieks, ducking her head. “Oh, for crying out loud! I knew this was a bad idea.”

“Oh, be quiet and run,” Velma says, and they do.

It takes them a minute or two to reach the door of their building and duck into the dry cover of the stairwell, but by then, they’re both soaked, their dresses dripping onto their doorstep when they get to the second floor.

Velma curses as she fumbles for her key in her handbag.

“Would you hurry up?” Roxie whines, pressing against Velma’s side. “I’m freezing.”

“You think I’m not freezing, too? I know I put the damn key in here.”

Roxie huffs. Her toes are numb from the cold and her tight shoes. “Did you check the corner pocket? Sometimes you put it in the corner pocket.”

“No I don’t, I—” Velma sticks her fingers in the folded corner pocket and immediately finds the key. She slides it out and unlocks the door, and she and Roxie both stumble in and slam the door closed behind them.

Roxie kicks her black Mary Janes off onto the area rug and drapes her wet shawl over a chair. “Christ, I have never been so cold in my life!”

“Nothing a hot bath can’t fix.” Velma kicks off her own shoes. “Go start filling the tub, I’ll put the kettle on.” She peels her black drop-waist dress off, and she shivers when she’s left in only her undergarments. She turns to lay her dress on the drying rack by the radiator.

Roxie shivers and watches the raindrops drip down Velma’s neck, down her chest and between her breasts in her lacy black brassiere.

Velma looks up, pushing her wet, raven hair out of her face. “Roxie?” The dampness glistens on her neck and her arms as she peels off one of her sheer black gloves, her body cast in the amber light spilling from the lamp on the table.

“Roxie,” Velma says.

Roxie’s eyes snap back up, and her cheeks warm. “What?”

“The bath, go fill it. Jesus.”

“Right, right,” Roxie stammers, and she spins around to go into the bathroom while Velma goes to fill the kettle.

Roxie’s teeth finally stop chattering when she lowers herself into the bathtub, where the water steams, thanks to the boiling water Velma heated on the stove to add to it. The tap could never get more than lukewarm on its own.

The heat loosens Roxie’s sore muscles, and she could almost fall asleep like this. But, to her own surprise, she feels sort of bad that she took the bath and there isn’t one for Velma.

Velma appears and leans against the doorway, holding two tin coffee cups. She’s taken her jewelry off and put on her gray robe. “I made tea. Do you want some?”

“Oh. Sure.” Roxie pulls her knees to her chest, though the soap bubbles cover her, and Velma has also seen her half-naked several times by now in the weeks they’ve been living together.

Velma walks in and sits on the edge of the bath, holding out one of the cups.

Roxie takes it. “Thanks.” She brings the cup to her mouth and takes a sip. It’s Pekoe black tea, slightly bitter with notes of citrus. She can’t remember ever seeing Velma brew tea; they both always drink coffee. 

“How is it?” Velma asks.

Roxie hesitates for a moment, trying, probably for the first time since they clashed in prison, to be nice.

But Velma sees the look on her face and cracks a smile. “I don’t like it much, either.”

Roxie shakes her head. “No, it’s fine. It sort of tastes…”

“Like dirt?” Velma says, looking amused at Roxie’s efforts to be polite.

Roxie giggles. “Yes.”

Velma nods. “I wanted to make a hot drink that wasn’t coffee. I drank it too late last night and I couldn’t fall asleep for hours.” 

This is news to Roxie, considering Velma hadn’t looked tired at all today. But now, with her makeup gone and her damp hair tucked behind her ears, she has the faintest grey circles beneath her eyes. She still looks striking, her eyelashes pitch black. She doesn’t need to wear mascara, her eyelashes just look that way.

“Are you cold?” Roxie asks without thinking.

Velma lifts a shoulder. “A little. I’m fine.”

“You should get in,” Roxie says. “To warm up. If you want to.”

Velma raises her eyebrows. “Are you serious?”

“Why wouldn’t I be serious?”

“Well, you said that talking to me gave you a headache yesterday, and bathing together is a few steps beyond talking.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, will you just get in if you’re going to get in?”

Velma purses her lips around a smile. “Alright, I will, if you insist.”

Roxie glares, but her face grows warm again.

Velma takes Roxie’s coffee cup and sets it on the window sill beside hers. Then she stands and slides off her robe, leaving it on one of the hooks on the wall.

Roxie swallows and averts her eyes, focusing on a constellation of soap bubbles in front of her. 

Velma steps into the tub and lowers herself into the water across from Roxie. “Well, isn’t this cozy?” Her long, toned legs brush against Roxie’s under the water.

Roxie still doesn’t look at her.  She swishes her hands through the bubbles and tries to relax. “Hopefully, you’ll think twice next time you try to drag us out into what’s practically a hailstorm. We could’ve gotten pneumonia.”

“Oh, please,” Velma says, without any argument in her voice. “You’re so stubborn, I could never make you do anything you didn’t already want to do.” She leans back and rests her head against the lip of the tub, closing her eyes. “Besides, it’s good to have a rush every once in a while. Keeps the blood pumpin’.”

Roxie makes an indignant noise. Her ankle grazes against Velma’s hip, and she shivers.

Velma peaks her eyes open. “What, are you still cold?”

Roxie shakes her head. “I’m fine.” Her voice sounds a little strained. She looks to the window, where rain patters against the glass. She feels almost embarrassed of what Velma might see in her expression. But she doesn’t need or care to know what Velma does or doesn’t see in her.

“Does it bother you to bathe with another woman?” Velma asks. She tilts her head. “Because I can get out, if it bothers you.”

Roxie frowns at her. “It doesn’t bother me. My legs are tired, that’s all. From dancing.”

Velma nods. “Mine, too.” She pauses. “You know, you were especially good on the stage tonight.”

Roxie swallows. “Thanks. You were good, too.”

Velma smiles. “‘Course, we’ll both probably wake up sore as death tomorrow, after these shenanigans.” She cups her hands under the water and scoops a splash onto her chest and neck, rubbing over her shoulders, too. “Are you up for doing this forever? Show business, I mean.”

Roxie sits up a little, and the bath water sloshes at the side of the tub. She narrows her eyes. “I’m just as up for it as you are.”

Velma puts up her hands. “I know you are. I was just making conversation.”

Roxie sits back and crosses her arms. “Sure.”

“I mean it,” Velma says. She sinks lower into the water. “In a lot of ways, you’re more cut out for this life than I am.”

Roxie takes a deep breath, wondering whether Velma wants to flatter her so she won’t be mad. “What makes you say that?”

“Because you really love it. When you perform, it’s like there’s nothing else in the world you’d rather be doing.” Velma lifts one shoulder. “I thought I loved performing that much, too. When I started as a kid. But eventually it just became about surviving, not singing and dancing for the sake of singing and dancing.”

Roxie isn’t sure quite what to say to that. “It’s not just singing and dancing. It’s being a star. When we’re on that stage, we’re the brightest in the room. We have power. I like feeling powerful.”

Velma smiles, but it looks strangely sad. “Yeah. I know. I do, too.”

“I was made for this,” Roxie says. “I knew I was, even when people told me I was being ridiculous.” The steam has softened her vocal chords. She leans her head against the side of the tub, and the ends of her curls get caught in the water.

Sounding half-teasing, half-curious, Velma says, “Is it everything you dreamed of?” It strikes Roxie how she looks now, naked in the bath, the complete opposite of how she glittered and grinned under the stage lights the first time Roxie ever saw her. Here, she’s just a girl taking a bath, her dark bangs frizzing a little in the steam.

“Parts of it,” Roxie says vaguely. She feels nostalgic suddenly, and she doesn’t like it. She reaches for the bar of cheap lilac soap on the nearby stool to distract herself. “I always loved baths. I used to sit in the water until my fingers looked like prunes. My mother would bang on the door and say I wasn’t Cleopatra bathing in the goddamn nile.” Her skin tingles, thinking about it. All her life, all she wanted was to be in control, to do what she wanted for as long as she wanted to do it, without anyone else making the rules.

“Well, now you can stay in the bath the whole day if you like,” Velma says, her eyes closing again.

Of course the reality wouldn’t be as glamorous, but Roxie relishes in the idea of lounging in the bath for hours. She imagines the water would never go cold, like magic. She turns the bar of soap in her hands a few times. “It’s not quite as horrid as I thought it would be to live with you.”

Velma laughs, cracking her eyes open. “Gee, thanks.”

“But you do smoke too much,” Roxie adds. “The smell gets into the sofa pillows.”

Velma furrows her eyebrows. “Everybody smokes. But I suppose I could crack the window when I light up.”

Roxie blinks. “Alright.”

“Alright,” Velma repeats, and she smiles teasingly and wraps her fingers around Roxie’s ankle under the water, and Roxie makes a face at her and kicks her hand away.

Roxie finds herself watching Velma more. She watches Velma sip at her coffee while she flips through a day-old newspaper in the morning, as fuzzy jazz music plays over the radio.

She watches Velma walk in after checking the postbox, how she cards through the mail halfheartedly. She twirls the nickel-plated letter opener between her fingers before she cuts each envelope open.

Before they leave to go to the Chicago Theater, Velma does her makeup. It never takes her more than a few minutes, her hands practiced. She could probably do it with her eyes closed. She applies her burgundy lipstick in such a particular way—she coats her bottom lip first, then purses her lips so the color transfers to her top lip, and then she goes over her cupid’s bow. It’s like an unconscious ritual.

When Roxie goes to put on her own lipstick, she catches herself going to copy Velma’s way, a few times. But she stops herself, and she puts it on normally, top lip and then bottom lip, like she always has. It would be ridiculous to put on her lipstick a certain way because she saw Velma do it. Why would the thought even enter her mind?

Velma puts the cap on her lipstick and sets it down, and she glances over and catches Roxie’s eyes on her. “What are you doing? We have to leave in a few minutes.”

Roxie blinks and looks down at herself where she’s standing by her dresser—she’s changed into her costume dress, but she’s wearing two different colored stockings, one silver and one white, and she’s still holding her comb and unopened tube of lipstick. “Um. Have you seen my other silver stocking?”

Velma smiles. “Wait a minute.” She stands up and turns to the bedside table and picks up one of Roxie’s fashion magazines. She flips it open and pulls out the other silver stocking, folded. “You were using it as a bookmark.” She pushes it into Roxie’s hand. “Now hurry up, unless you wanna be late.”

Roxie makes a vague noise of agreement and sits on the bed to switch her mismatched stocking, while Velma goes to her jewelry box and pulls out a long beaded necklace with faux black pearls. When Velma wears that necklace, Roxie often finds herself with the inexplicable urge to reach out and grab it, to twist it around her fingers. How would Velma react if she did?

Velma turns and crosses her arms, watching Roxie with a thoughtful impatience in her eyes. “Are you coming down with something?”

Roxie finishes fastening her garter. “No, of course not. I don’t get sick.”

Velma’s lips curve into a smile, her red lipstick fresh and soft like a new apple. “What do you mean you don’t get sick?”

Roxie scoffs and stands up, and she scans the room for her shoes, aware of Velma’s eyes on her. “I haven’t gotten sick since I was a child. It’s not professional.”

“It’s not professional,” Velma repeats, raising her eyebrows. She uncrosses her arms and shakes her head. “Your shoes are in the living room, you know.”

“I knew that,” Roxie says impatiently. She hadn’t.

A few days later, they get into another argument while they’re rehearsing. Roxie keeps forgetting one part of the choreography, even though she ordinarily has an unfailing memory, and she insists that it’s because Velma’s instructions are not intuitive to the music, and she keeps having to stomp over to the phonograph to turn the record back, and then Velma makes another comment about how this is all just because Roxie’s being difficult and how Velma knows what she’s doing just because she’s been doing it a couple years—okay, a lot of years—longer than Roxie.

Roxie stomps her foot like a child, and her heel clomps on the scuffed studio flooring. “Stop acting like you’re so elevated, we’re in the same place, you’re no better than me.”

Velma rolls her eyes where she leans against the barre by the window. “I never said I was better than you. Why do you always take everything so damn personally?”

Roxie crosses her arms. “I hate you.”

“Do you ever get bored of saying that?”

“You and I both know that if it wasn’t for me you’d be washed up and nowhere right now!”

“Jesus, Roxie. I would love to know what it takes to get you to stop bitching for half an hour.”

“Admit it.” Roxie curls her hands into fists, digging her nails into her palms. She stands and steps into Velma’s space, dropping her voice. “I’m just as important as you. Admit that you needed me.”

“Is that it?”

Roxie narrows her eyes.

“Alright,” Velma says, “I needed you.” The words sound unfamiliar and electric on her tongue, surprising. It’s the kind of sentence Roxie would never dream of saying to anyone her whole life, and Velma just said it, like taking a thrilling blow to her own ego just because Roxie demanded it.

It’s not quite as satisfying as she had expected it to be. Why had Velma admitted it so easily, without even putting up a fight? Roxie crosses her arms. “Was that so hard?”

Velma laughs and tilts her head back against the brick wall behind her. Her eyes gleam. “You know something, Roxie?”

“What?” Roxie expects her to say You are so full of yourself, or something to that effect, but Velma steps away from the wall, closing the distance between them, and pulls Roxie into a kiss by the back of her neck. Her fingers are chilly on Roxie’s nape.

Roxie’s eyes close reflexively, and her gasp melts in the back of her throat as Velma’s lips press and open against hers, head tilting to fix the angle. She smells like smoke and dark lily perfume, and the musk blurs with the waxy-sweetness of her lipstick as her lips part, and her tongue grazes Roxie’s lower lip.

Roxie’s breath hitches, and then her heart rate stutters, and she pulls back, lips smacking away from Velma’s. Her mouth hangs open for several moments before she musters the words, “Why did you do that?”

Velma leans back against the wall again. She thumbs at the corner of her mouth where her lipstick is smudged, and she lifts one shoulder as if this is all par for the course. “Spur of the moment.”

Roxie’s mouth hangs open for several seconds before she blurts, “Are you in love with me or something?”

Velma chuckles. “Don’t flatter yourself, it was just a kiss.” She reaches for her cigarette case where it sits on the lid of the piano, then glances at Roxie. “Did you like it?”

“I’m not a lesbian.”

Velma’s eyes twinkle, like that’s funny. “I didn’t say you were a lesbian. I just asked if you liked it.”

Roxie licks her lips, and she takes a breath, and the air feels like it doesn’t quite fill her lungs. If she liked it doesn’t seem like a real question, and if a kiss is between two women, is it even a kiss? Is it friendly, or romantic, or some secret other thing?

Velma thumbs out a cigarette and sets the case back down. She reaches for her lighter. The orange of the cigarette filter is bright against her deep red lipstick as her lips close around the tip. She lights the cig and sets the lighter down, then moves her free hand to Roxie’s neckline.

Roxie barely resists the urge to shiver, but she holds still.

Velma traces her fingertip across the lace trim of Roxie’s dress collar, and the touch feels electric, like a live current that could strike at any moment. She takes a drag from her cigarette and exhales. She looks at Roxie, and while she’s leaning back against the wall, they’re almost the same height. “I know you probably feel like you know all about show business already, but I can promise you there’s still a lot you have to learn about this life.”

Roxie’s mouth opens, and she stares at Velma. “What has that got to do with anything?” She curls her fingers into the slippery fabric around Velma’s waist with one hand and grabs Velma’s wrist, the one holding the cigarette, with her other hand. “Give me a drag.”

Velma obeys, and she holds her cigarette to Roxie’s lips and watches through her eyelashes as Roxie takes a deep breath in.

Roxie’s lips tingle as she pulls back from the cig and exhales the smoke from her lungs. Velma’s gaze is on her like a physical touch, like a brand. Roxie presses her thumb over the soft inside of Velma’s wrist and the warm point of her pulse, fluttering like a butterfly under her skin. “You underestimated me once before. Remember? Don’t do it again.”

Velma’s eyes don’t waver. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

And Roxie wants to. She wants to kiss Velma again, with teeth, so she does. She digs her nails into Velma’s waist until Velma hisses into her mouth and curls her fingers in Roxie’s hair and tugs. Her other hand fumbles to put her cigarette out on the piano lid before she reaches for the hem of Roxie’s skirt, sliding her hand up Roxie’s thigh and sending goosebumps up and down her body.

Roxie tightens her grip on Velma’s waist and pulls her closer, and her breath catches, and she presses her mouth to Velma’s ear and breathes, “I hate you,” like she’s reciting a poem she wrote just for her, like it can capture everything else.

I hate you, I hate you. I hate you.

The next morning, Roxie wakes up in tangled sheets, warm and a little sweaty, with her left leg underneath one of Velma’s. She rubs at her face and yawns as pale morning light pokes through the emerald green curtains over the bedroom window. She props herself up on her elbow and looks behind her to the other side of the bed.

Velma sleeps on her stomach, with one arm underneath the pillow and her face half-buried in it. Her bangs stick out a little, tousled from the pillowcase. The sheet has slid down to her waist, and her back rises and falls slowly as she breathes.

Roxie swallows over a lump in her throat, which is only because she desperately needs a glass of water. She pulls her leg out from under Velma’s and leans over the edge of the bed to look for her slippers.

“Rox?” Velma stirs and stretches, then mumbles into the pillow.

“I can’t understand you,” Roxie says. She scans the floor and frowns when she doesn’t see her pink slippers, but then she reaches under the bed and feels them, so she pulls them out and slips them on. 

Velma rolls onto her back and throws an arm over her face, yawning. “What time is it?”

Roxie combs her fingers through her hair. “Time for you to make coffee. Get up.”

“What’s your problem,” Velma mutters sleepily. “Usually you sleep in until—” She yawns again.

Roxie rolls her eyes. “There’s things to do. Laundry.”

Velma starts laughing into her elbow.

Roxie makes a face at her, even though Velma’s eyes are closed. “Oh, is that funny?”

“It’s pretty funny,” Velma says. “Since your clothes have mysteriously found their way in with mine the last six times I’ve done laundry.” She drops her arm and smirks at Roxie. “Do you even remember how to—”

Roxie grabs the second pillow and smacks her in the face with it.

Velma makes a small grunt of surprise, then throws the pillow back at Roxie. “Don’t be a child. Go make coffee yourself.”

Roxie frowns. She’s not good at making coffee, and somehow it turns out too bitter every time she does it, no matter how precisely she measures out the grounds. “I don’t want to do it.”

“Tough. You’re a big girl,” Velma says. She turns onto her side and pulls the sheets back up around her, closing her eyes again.

“I hate you,” Roxie says.

“Mm-hmm.”

They do it again. And a third time. And a few more times after that.

It had never occurred to Roxie that she wanted to kiss Velma, to touch her or be touched by her like this, until it happens, and then it feels obvious, implicit. Like remembering a word that had just been on the tip of her tongue, and then it’s there to be spoken. 

Roxie feels aroused, yes, but she also feels curious, and the curiosity is the hardest to resist. She’s curious about the taste of Velma’s mouth and the texture of the skin just below her breasts, which is satin-soft and shivers when Roxie touches it. She’s curious about Velma’s long, toned legs—so curious about her legs—and how they feel and what it would be like if Velma wrapped them around her. She’s curious about Velma’s neck and her breasts and her hands and her pussy.

With Roxie draped over the edge of the bed, bathed in the amber light of her bedside lamp, Velma leans over her and undoes her garter clips for her with a few flicks of her fingers. It used to take Amos practically twenty minutes to figure out Roxie’s garters back when they were just ribbon. Then he would take another twenty minutes to pull off her stockings if she didn’t interrupt him to do it herself.

Velma pulls Roxie’s stockings off too quickly, and the rayon fabric bunches up at her ankles, so she yanks them off and tosses them aside. It should be irritating, but Roxie wants her to do it like that every time and never get tired of it. She wants to lay down and let Velma tear off every last stitch of fabric covering her skin.

One evening, after they’ve made a bit of a mess of the bed and each other, they lounge in the covers as the radio plays blues music faintly from the kitchen. Velma has moved to the edge of the bed and opened the window halfway while she smokes. It’s dusk, and the window is foggy from humidity. The sounds of the city flutter in when cars rumble past, or a dog barks as a fella whistles on his way across the street.

With her free hand, Velma draws a shape in the condensation on the window glass. It looks like a knife. Of course Velma would draw a knife, rather than a daisy or a heart or something like that.

Roxie stops staring and pulls the bedsheets up to her chest. She closes her eyes.

Then Velma says, “We could travel, you know.”

For a moment, Roxie thinks she imagined it. She opens her eyes and props herself up on her elbow to look at Velma. “What are you talking about?”

Velma looks away from the window. Her bangs, which are getting a bit long, brush her eyebrows now. She ashes her cigarette on the saucer at the windowsill and scoots closer to Roxie until she’s sitting on the center of the bed. She takes another drag from her cigarette. “We could take the show on the road, I mean.”

Roxie shakes her head slowly. “Where?”

“Anywhere. We could go to New York.”

“New York City?”

“The very one.” Velma smiles and leans back on her hand. “Have you been?”

Roxie shakes her head. “Have you?”

Velma nods. “A couple times, with my sister. You’d like it there.” Any mention of Velma’s sister always feels strange, unfamiliar, like an alternate reality, even though it wasn’t that long ago that her sister was alive and she was Velma’s partner, not Roxie.

Roxie swallows. “Why are you saying this now?”

Velma glances down at the cigarette between her fingers, then back at Roxie. She smiles a little. “I just thought you might like the idea.”

“Oh,” Roxie says. She’s not sure what else to say. She feels, inexplicably, like she should get up and put her clothes back on instead of laying here in her sheer camisole and bloomers. But Velma’s already seen her naked countless times by now.

“What d’you think?” Velma asks.

Roxie tries to picture it, the two of them buying train tickets for the 20th Century Limited and going all the way to the Big Apple. What does New York even look like? Roxie has only seen pictures of the skyline. She pictures it like Chicago, but warmer, more golden-hued. Chicago is more grayish, brownish, bluish. Watercolor hues. And Chicago smells like smoke, rain, and popcorn. The streets are always humming with cars and buses, and the wind often whistles between buildings. Is New York windy?

Roxie frowns. “Velma. What happens if this doesn’t work?”

Velma stretches her legs out in front of her and leans forward. “What d’you mean?”

Roxie sits up impatiently. “What if people stop coming to see the shows, or one of us can’t perform anymore, or vaudeville becomes obsolete or anything like that, I don’t know—what happens then?”

Velma nods calmly. “If any of that happened, we would deal with it.”

“Deal with it how?” Roxie asks.

“However we needed to,” Velma says. She gestures with her hand, her cigarette still smoking a little. “You do what you gotta do, that’s how it is in this business. You know that.” She says it matter-of-factly, like she’s not scared or unsure of what she’s talking about, but there’s an openness in her eyes that Roxie remembers getting brief glimpses of when they were in prison together.

Roxie sighs. “You know something? You act all tough and savvy, but right now if I really look at you, it’s like I can see your scared little girl self right behind your eyes.”

Velma's mouth softens a little. “I can’t promise there won’t be hard times. But I’ve had them before, and I got through it, evidently.” She shakes her head. “As long as we’re making it, we’re making it. And right now, we’re making it, aren’t we?”

Roxie nods.

Velma looks at her for a few moments, then down at her lap. She rubs at her face. “I’m gonna take a bath.”

After Velma goes to the bathroom, Roxie rolls onto her back and stares at the ceiling. She doesn’t feel sleepy anymore, and after several minutes, she considers going into the kitchen and breaking a piece off of the chocolate bar in the cabinet, but she isn’t hungry. Instead, she puts on a sweater and pads over to the bathroom door. She opens it without knocking and slips inside.

Velma has her eyes closed, but she lifts her head from the lip of the tub and looks up at Roxie.

Roxie shuts the door to keep the steam in and rests her back against it. “If you fall asleep in there, you could drown.”

“I’ve heard the stories,” Velma says, unconcerned. A streak of pale light from the window falls across her face and her neck, making her hair look bluish indigo rather than black. She seems for a moment to be not quite human, like a beautiful alien, a mermaid born on land. She reaches an arm out of the tub towards Roxie, and a few waterdrops patter onto the checkered tile floor. “C’mere.”

Roxie bites away her smile and raises her eyebrows. “I already took a bath earlier.”

“Take another,” Velma says, smiling faintly.

Roxie pretends to consider it. “What’s in it for me?”

“Come over here and find out,” Velma says, like she means it.

Roxie takes off the last of the clothes she’s wearing, sliding her bloomers down her legs, slowly, just because she can. She leaves them on the floor and steps into the tub to lower herself into Velma’s lap in the water. Her thighs fit around Velma’s, and her knees bracket Velma’s hips.

Velma wraps her arms around Roxie’s waist and looks up at her with dark eyes. “You know, you’re more beautiful than you’ve got any right to be.”

“Shut your mouth,” Roxie says, and drags her into a kiss by her hair. Their mouths clash, soft and sharp at once, and Roxie tastes Velma’s tongue greedily.

Velma rakes her fingers up Roxie’s bare back, and Roxie is wet and warm and red all over as Velma’s hand slides between her thighs, and she moans. She feels hot inside, like a melting star, melting all over, and she doesn’t care if she melts away into nothingness.

After she’s dry again, in a clean nightgown in the bedroom, Roxie sits on the window sill. She looks up out the window and finds herself trying to glimpse stars in the thin strips of sky visible between the iron stripes of the fire escape. She doesn’t have any particular attachment to stars, but it would be nice to see one or two. Probably the city is too bright and blocks out all the starlight. 

Roxie looks over her shoulder to where Velma stands at the armoire.

She’s hanging up a dress, unaware of Roxie’s gaze. She shuts the armoire and doesn’t seem to mind that one of her dresses escaped the wardrobe, black cotton poking out between the wooden doors. She wears a black slip, and the sheer lacey hem of the skirt brushes her calves as she walks over to the bed. She sits down and catches Roxie looking at her. “What?”

A breeze blows in, chilling Roxie’s arms, and she shivers as goosebumps raise on her skin. She turns and tugs the window closed, huffing when the rail gets stuck an inch from the frame.

“Here, you have to—” Velma scoots over so she can reach it, and she jimmies the sash lock at the top of the window pane so it unsticks and slides closed. Her hand grazes Roxie’s when she pulls away.

Roxie frowns at the window like it’s personally wronged her, but she decides to let it go. There are more important things to think about. She turns to look at Velma.

On the mattress, Velma has one leg folded and one pulled to her chest. One of her slip’s straps has slid down her shoulder. The ends of her hair are damp. 

“We should do it,” Roxie says.

“Do what?” Velma asks.

“Travel, like you said. We should go to New York and perform there. And Philadelphia and Los Angeles. And then New Orleans.”

Velma’s eyebrows raise a little more with each city name, but she nods. “That’s awfully ambitious.”

“We could do it,” Roxie says.

Velma smiles. “What made you so fired up about the idea?”

“Nothing, I thought about it. It’s a good idea.”

Velma looks at her for a long time. “Alright. Well, it’s late, let’s talk about it tomorrow.”

When they’re in bed under the covers with the lamp turned out, the sheets and pillowcases smell of lilac, the scent lingering from their soap. Roxie breathes the scent in as her eyes drift closed. It’s the best smell in the world, rich and soft and heady. It smells like the way it feels to be a little drunk. It smells like nighttime and crushed velvet. It smells like being on stage at the moment the audience erupts into applause, and the deafening claps and cheers fill the theater like a storm.