Mama gave up everything for her family, and I give up everything for my work, she thought. Then she shook off the idea fast. What she did was worth it. The stage was where she came alive in a way that she never could anywhere else.

The chicken was skinned, and Lu wiped her hands on the white linen napkin provided by ‘21’ and started to eat. In a few minutes George would come back to her dressing room and they'd dissect the performance that had just ended, looking for any flaws that had cropped up. They did this after every show, because it was too easy to get sloppy during a long run. Lu's daily review with George kept her on her toes.

After George left, she would lie down on the cot in the corner of her dressing room and sleep for an hour, after which she would begin warming up her voice and doing some stretches to loosen up her muscles for the evening performance. She never really danced onstage, although she could move well enough to give the illusion of it, but she needed to be limber for the pratfalls, cartwheels, and splits that were the trademarks of a Lu Lawson performance.

The warm-up, the critique, the nap, and the carefully chosen meal were all part of her regular matinee-day ritual, which she followed religiously every Wednesday and Saturday. And this Wednesday was no different, she tried to tell herself. But that was a lie. Everything was different. Her whole life had been turned upside down.

The skinned chicken was too dry to swallow. Lu pushed her plate away. There was a new role she had to play now: it was called Mommy. And so far she was falling on her famous face.

Her mother had died and her daughter had come to live with her. And the child had decided to loathe her. Or maybe it wasn't a recent decision. Maybe Rose had always hated her.

Lu closed her eyes and remembered an incident that had happened a few years earlier. It was Rose's fifth birthday, and Lu had been in New Haven with a show, so she'd taken her daughter and her mother—Rose called Mifalda Nonna in the old-fashioned Italian way—shopping. They'd gone to Malley's, the best department store in town, and headed for the doll department, where Rose was going to pick out her present. Rose was well known to all the Malley's saleswomen, which did not surprise Lu. The child and her beloved Nonna were regular customers at the store, and given the huge monthly bills Mifalda ran up for Rose's clothes and toys, Lu thought it was a wonder that the staff didn't genuflect when the little girl marched in. The saleslady in the doll department didn't go that far, but there was much carrying on about how much Rose had grown, and how pretty she was. It was clear that Lu's daughter loved being the center of attention.