Disclaimer: I do not claim to have created the characters, only the situations they find themselves in, in this particular story.

Author's Notes: Thank you for all the sweet reviews and comments. I'm so glad that you like the story the way I'm writing it. I hope you continue to enjoy it.

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To Dance Beneath the Diamond Sky
by Kristen Elizabeth
****

"So, you can't dance? Not at all? Not even one step? How can you say that you've taken any trouble to live when you won't even dance?" -Hermann Hesse

"When you do dance, I wish you, a wave o' the sea, that you might ever do nothing but that." -Shakespeare (Winter's Tale)

****

Relena woke up on Saturday morning with her cheek pressed against something wet. It was a minute until she realized it was her pillow, soaked with her own tears. She sat up in bed and rubbed her eyes. The tears didn't seem to be stopping, like the rain that poured outside her window.

Thunder rattled her gilded mirror as Relena threw the covers off her bare legs and got up. She walked over to the window and pushed it open. The cool mist of morning rain dampened the oversized button-down shirt she had worn to sleep. It had belonged to her father, discarded by him for having a tiny coffee stain at one time. Gerrard Dorlian did not have to put up with imperfections in anything or anyone.

Which explained why he hadn't protested when his only child had decided to flee to America with her mother after the divorce.

Relena sat on the cushioned bay window and drew her knees up to her chin. Her nose tickled under the light pressure of her tears. It seemed like a lifetime since Heero had climbed to her window to take her out to the Park. She shook her head suddenly. It wouldn't do her a damn bit of good to remember him like that. It only made it hurt worse. She would rather remember him in the locker room, hurtling horrible accusations at her. At least that way she could almost make herself hate him. And hating him was so much easier than missing him.

The muffled sound of the grandfather clocking striking the hour filled her ears. Nine a.m. There was to be an informal rehearsal at noon, but Relena knew in her heart that neither she nor Heero were ready to dance the way they were expected to. Even if she pulled on clothes and headed over to his apartment now, nothing would be accomplished in the short amount of time. She only really had one choice.

There was a knock on her door ten minutes later, right as she hung up on the call she had just finished making. Treize's assistant had been sympathetic when Relena told her about the stomach bug she was experiencing and had assured her that Treize would understand and cancel rehearsal.

"Who is it?" Relena asked.

"Your mother, Relena."

She sighed softly. "Come in."

Helen entered, fully dressed, her hair and makeup flawless. "Good morning, darling."

Relena picked up an oversized stuffed bear. "Wow, you're a bit overdressed for breakfast, Mother."

"Actually I thought I'd sit in on your rehearsal today. I've been fairly dying to see you dance Odette." Her mother's eyes shone with excitement. It was rare to see her mother excited about anything that wasn't distilled and served on the rocks.

She spoke with near regret. "I'm sorry, Mother. Rehearsal has been canceled."

Helen's smile literally dropped off her face. "What?"

"I just called in sick a moment ago."

"And just why would you do something like that?" her mother asked, her voice like daggers.

"I woke up not feeling too..." Relena stopped. This was her own mother; why should she lie? "To tell the truth, Mother, I'm not sick." She sat on her bed and looked down at the bear in her hands. "I'm having a bit of a...personal crisis."

Helen's manicured fingers dug into her palms. "What does that have to do with your dancing?"

New tears slipped down her cheeks. "Oh...Mother....I can't dance with him today. He hates me! And I don't know why!"

"Who hates you, Relena?" Her mother's eye twitched.

"Heero," she whispered. "Who else?"

Helen's mind barely registered the name. "Relena Marie Dorlian..."

"It's not necessary to use my full name, Mother." Relena sniffed. "It's not like I'm really hurting here or anything."

"Relena," Helen began again, her jaw painfully tight. "Men come and go. They never last long. Your dancing....your talent....that's all that matters."

Relena shook her head. "No, it's not. Loving Heero...it meant more to me than anything. Even dancing."

"I don't see how you can say that, Relena! After all the sacrifices I've made for you! Why the hell do you think I stayed with your father for all of those dreadful years, if not to give you the advantage of beginning your career in Paris and the money give you everything else?!"

"I wouldn't know, Mother." Relena lifted her eyes to meet her mother's glare. "I suppose I always made the crazy assumption that you loved him."

Helen wanted to laugh, but managed to keep a straight face. "Relena, don't you let some teenaged boy in tights distract you from everything you've tried so hard for! You can't...not after everything I've had to do...you just can't!!"

"I'm sorry, Mother!" she cried, shooting to her feet. "I didn't realize this was all about you!"

"Don't be a brat." Helen's heavily-kohled eyes narrowed. "And don't...*don't* hurt your career over this Heero." There was a long pause. "Have you slept with him?"

"Mother!"

"Have you?"

Relena held up her hands. "I am not having this conversation with you."

Just in time to save her from Helen's returned wrath, Lucrezia peeked her head into the room. "Relena, I just got a page from Treize saying rehearsal has been canceled. Would you like to come shopping with me?"

"I'd love to," she replied, wiping her eyes. "Let me just take a shower and get dressed."

Lucrezia watched her fiancee's mother carefully as Relena grabbed her robe and disappeared into her bathroom. "Would you like to come, too, Mother Helen? You're dressed for 5th Avenue."

Helen brushed past the younger woman in a cloud of Chanel perfume. "I really have other things to do."

"That's really okay," Lucrezia called after her.

The door to her suite slammed behind her as Helen stormed into it. She paced back and forth for several minutes, her spiked heels digging into the expensive carpet. When she thought her nails were going to pierce the soft flesh of her palms, the tiny mobile phone on her dresser began to ring.

"What?" she snapped after flipping it open. A moment passed and her face relaxed. "Why, hello there!" Helen laughed. "Oh, you're terrible! Yes, you are. Terrible! What's that?" She listened for a moment. "You are? Well, that's fabulous, darling! Of course! I'll come in the limo to fetch you. Yes...you too. Bye-bye!"

Helen closed up her phone with a satisfying snap. Smiling, she tucked it into her purse and started out the door.

****

After he woke at six a.m., took a jog around his block despite the rain, worked out with his weights, and showered, Heero started breakfast for himself. His father was still passed out from whatever he had drunk the night before. Actually, he hadn't even bothered to check on him, although the loud snoring from his bedroom at least told him the old man wasn't dead.

He was just adding chocolate chips to his pancake batter when the phone rang. Wiping his hands on a dish towel, he reached for the cordless. When he hung up a minute later, he cursed loudly. Treize had canceled rehearsal. A mere six days before the curtain rose.

Worse than that, he wouldn't get to see Relena until school on Monday.

That thought made him empty the fledgling batter into the sink. He turned the water on to watch it swirl down the drain.

"Damn her, damn her, damn her!"

Heero sighed. He didn't really want to damn her. The whole situation, on the other hand, could go straight to hell. He didn't need the pressure anymore. The guilt. The regret. Plainly put, he didn't need to need her.

Leaving the few dirty dishes he had accumulated, Heero got dressed the rest of the way. The weather outside had been cool for spring; he pulled on a worn, brown leather jacket over his cargo pants and white T-shirt. He grabbed his keys and his wallet, already supplied with his father's American Express card.

If he couldn't spend the day dancing, he could at least spend some of Ethan's money on 5th Avenue.

****

Duo slept through the phone call that canceled rehearsal. His mother hadn't had the heart to wake him up to take it himself. Rather, she let her son sleep in, figuring he could use the rest. And indeed, when he woke up at half past noon, he felt better than he had in weeks. Hearing rehearsal had been called off was another weight off his shoulders, but presented a new problem. What to do with an entire, empty Saturday.

To pass some of the time, he took a long shower, washed and conditioned his hair. He braided it still wet and got dressed in time to enjoy a late lunch with his mother. She was waiting to hear from a gallery about her latest series of paintings; nervousness made her cook too much food, which didn't bother Duo in the least.

As he was helping her clean up, Sara broached the subject that had been nagging him since he had woken up. "What are you going to do now?"

"I don't know." Shrugging, Duo wiped a clean bowl. "Is there anything you need help with around here?"

Sara gave her son a long look. "Duo, get out of this apartment and go see your girlfriend."

He sighed dramatically. "Why, Mom? She doesn't want to see me."

"I highly doubt that," she replied, glancing at her watch. "It's almost three."

"And?"

Sara gestured to him to follow her. Shaking his head, Duo did as she asked. Once they had reached the master bedroom, Sara turned around. "Close your eyes."

"Mom, what are you doing?" Duo asked, squeezing his eyes closed.

"Just...hold on a minute." His mother's voice was muffled for a moment, then became clearer. "Okay. Open them."

When he did so, she was standing in front of her walk-in closet, holding a garment bag up with much glee. "What's that?" Duo asked.

She unzipped the bag to reveal a black tuxedo. "No one should miss their senior prom."

Duo had to smile. "Mom...this is really....I mean, I appreciate it a lot. I do. It's just that...I know Hilde. She won't agree to come with me."

"You don't know until you ask," Sara insisted. "Any girl who could resist my son in a tuxedo offering to sweep her off to a dance doesn't deserve him."

Because he loved his mother and couldn't bear to let her down, Duo found himself in a cab an hour later, clad in the very classy tuxedo his mother had ordered for him, heading for St. John's Hospital. A cold plastic container sat on his lap; he could just see a wrist corsage of white roses through the condensation on the lid.

Sara had prepared and planned this. Next to him on the seat was another garment bag containing a dress in Hilde's size. A duffel bag at his feet held one shoe, a make-up kit and a curling iron. He felt kind of silly carrying it all with him up to Hilde's floor, but that changed as he got closer to her room. Getting swept up in his mother's prom fantasy, Duo approached the nurses' station.

"Duo!" one of the nurses greeted him. "Where have you been hiding yourself?" She blushed slightly. "You look really good."

He instinctively winked. "I've been around. Tonight's my school's prom, so I'm here to get Hilde ready. Can I just go on in?"

The nurse hesitated. "Duo...don't you know?"

"Um...know what?" Panic gripped his chest. "Is Hilde all right?!"

"She's fine. She's just....been moved."

"Moved?"

"To another hospital in Brooklyn. She didn't tell you?"

Duo's good mood vanished. He looked down at his shiny black shoes, almost afraid to keep his head up in case the sudden wave of hurt leaked out through his eyes. "No. She didn't."

"I can tell you what hospital she went to. I have her transfer papers here somewhere." The nurse began searching through a stack of folders next to her computer.

"That's okay. Don't worry about it." Duo looked up, managing the fakest of all smiles. "Would you like a corsage?" He held out the plastic container and waited until she accepted it with much regret. "Thanks for your help."

He exited the hospital through the ambulance bay, stopping next to the wide dumpsters to get rid of the garment and duffel bags. Rather than hail a cab, he began the long walk to Chelsea in his tuxedo. His hands were free; his heart, heavy.

****

"Starbucks!" Lucrezia pointed her arm, ladden with bags from Saks, Macy's, Bloomingdale's and a trendy new maternity boutique called Hot Mama towards the coffee shop at the corner. "I need caffeine."

Relena laughed and shook her head. "You can't. Caffeine is very bad for the baby."

"Oh, come on!" The older woman raised her voice to be heard over the sounds of the crowded New York street. "For hundreds of years, women have drunk wine, worked in the fields, smoked cigarettes, all while they were pregnant and had perfectly normal babies. Do you really think one short latte two months along is going to be a problem?" She waited for Relena's reply. When it didn't come, Lucrezia turned around to see the girl. "Relena?"

She was staring at something on the other side of the street, not even squinting in the glare of the setting sun. Lucrezia followed her eyes and sighed when she saw Heero Yuy through the momentary gaps between cars and vans that zipped by. And it very obvious that he had spotted them as well.

Relena didn't blink for a long moment, not wanting to break the delicious stare. Despite the distance and traffic between them, not to mention the current state of their relationships, his eyes still managed to keep her captive.

His expression was one of a man, lost in the world. Like a homeless person in an alley, only he was standing on 5th Avenue, holding bags from Structure and Old Navy. Relena wanted to smile; she hadn't pegged him for a fashion geek. Somehow he had always just looked like Heero. Handsome, sexy, the dangerous boy next door.

Lucrezia tugged on her arm. "Relena, let's go." She wasn't sure what had happened between the young couple, but she had been witness to their dancing of late. Whatever had gone wrong with them was very bad. "Millardo will be worried. Taxi!!"

Relena nodded. "All right." She let Lucrezia pull her towards the yellow cab she had just managed to flag down. Before she ducked into the back seat, she took one last look at Heero. He was still watching them, but as soon as he noticed she was looking again, he lowered his head and continued down the street.

During the ride back to Park Avenue, Lucrezia kept up a steady stream of chatter, talking about everything from the workshop to the adorable pair of pink booties she hadn't been able to resist buying at Macy's baby department. She was already sure the baby was a girl; it seemed to her as natural as saying the child was hers at all.

Although she smiled and nodded through it all, Relena's mind was still back on 5th Avenue. The image of Heero had been burned into her brain and nothing was going to get rid of it. The way he had looked at her...it only solidified her resolve to talk to him at school on Monday. With enough time, she could forgive him for the things he had said to her. Perhaps she could even clear up whatever misunderstanding had prompted him to say them.

The thought brought a new smile to her face. By the time she and Lucrezia stepped off the elevator and onto the penthouse floor, she was actively listening to the older woman's happy conversation, even joining in with a few observations.

"There you two are." Millardo entered the foyer upon hearing the front door open. "I was about to send out a search party for my credit cards."

Lucrezia deposited all of their packages onto the floor and went to her fiancee, wrapping her arms around his neck. "Good to know you missed me."

After a long kiss, during which Relena made a great show of rifling through the Bloomingdale's bag for the tie she had picked out for her brother, Lucrezia pulled back and glanced at the closed parlor doors. "Who's in there?"

"Oh, my mother has a guest." Millardo grimaced. "She just forgot to mention I'd be hosting this guest for a week."

"Sounds like your mother," Lucrezia muttered. She rolled her eyes at Relena; the girl smothered a knowing giggle. "Should we be sociable?"

Relena lifted her shoulders. "Couldn't hurt."

Millardo lightly slapped Lucrezia's bottom through her black pants. "You two go on. I've had enough of Mother's friend already."

His little sister was already sliding open the heavy panel doors, preparing to greet whichever of the Ladies Who Lunch that her mother had brought home. When the two people in the parlor stood up as she entered and Relena got her first look at the house guest, the blood in her body immediately ceased to flow.

"Ah, Relena! There you are." Helen held out her hands towards her daughter. "Look who's come to town just to see you dance, darling!"

The tall man standing beside Helen smiled with smooth serenity. "Il est bon de vous revior," he murmured, bowing his head slightly. Jean-Paul Chevalier lifted his eyes again to meet Relena's frozen stare with a steady, intent gaze. "I have missed my favorite pupil."

****

To Be Continued