now is the time to seize the day

The grin on his face was infuriating, enough to nearly make her lose her cool again, and she found herself clenching her fists, fingernails digging into the soft bed of her palms. She had to remain calm. She couldn’t blow this job up for herself. Unlike Luca, Taylor couldn’t smooth anything over with a wide smile and a quick ‘oopsy daisy!’ Those privileges were reserved for people far wealthier than she could ever hope to be.

“Yes, sir. Luca McGrath,” she stated through gritted teeth. 

Given Luca’s easy smile, all toothy and white and perfect, Taylor figured that he was in one of his usual good moods. Which was to say, he was probably about three seconds away from shitting out flower petals and befriending the sun. It was no wonder that he and Cora got along so well, and while Taylor secretly envied how easily they fell into affection with each other, in a way Taylor could only manage with Gloria (and even then, she struggled), it grated on her nerves after a while. The sunshine twins, everyone in their class liked to call them, sometimes with fondness, often with a hint of ridicule. Rarely were the two of them seen with a frown on their face and whether that was to do with a sincerity she couldn’t comprehend or an absurd degree of naivety, Taylor couldn’t care less. She only hoped she could use it to her advantage right now and push herself to the limits of Luca’s good mood to try and get him to see why this was such a big deal to her.

“Right now, you’re Mr McGrath. A guest at the hotel where you’ve figured out I clearly work,” she said stiffly. “And I’m the housekeeper.”

She wanted to swallow the words as they rose like bile in the back of her throat. The idea of demeaning herself to the help in front of Luca was enough to make her blood boil. Just because it was true, Taylor wanted no part in helping her rich classmate look down on her. She’d come so far in convincing her peers that she was on equal footing - bar the times she attempted to excel beyond their talent. Now, it had all gone to waste.

Unless she debased herself further.

“I know it’s not my place to ask, but I didn’t tell anyone I worked here for a reason,” she said, without actually asking anything. Surely he would understand what she was trying to say though, if not from her words, then maybe the angry set of her jaw and the blaze of her eyes as they fixed themselves on a spot above his head, doing what she could to still stand tall despite the circumstances she found herself in.

“Oh. Right, I understand,” Luca nodded, features scrunched into an expression of pure concentration. Only, he didn’t actually understand at all. 

He could see quite clearly that Taylor worked here – that’s why he was so excited! – but he wasn’t entirely sure why that should change the way they spoke to each other. He knew her name and she knew his. Just because he was a guest, that didn’t suddenly grant him special titles and some sort of superiority over here. 

Or did it? Maybe he should text Maia. She’d probably understand what was happening better than he did. 

As he mulled over their strange little conundrum, he waited patiently as Taylor tried to catch him up. She was really quite brilliant, he thought. In class, she always seemed so resigned with him, but it never stopped her extraordinary talent from shining through. He’d always enjoyed that about her, and loved that she made him better too. She didn’t always seem to think so, but her critiques of his performance always helped him work out just where he was going on. Some days, it felt like his teachers and classmates were too afraid to correct him. It was as if they thought they might get into trouble for telling Andrew McGrath’s son how things were done, but Luca was always eager to learn. 

As Taylor explained herself further, a light ding echoed through Luca’s ears, finally alerting himself to something he could actually help with. 

If she didn’t want anybody to know she worked here, he would guard her secret with his life. That was one thing he liked to think he was good at! He hadn’t even told Cora when he’d first landed the role of Jack Kelly, even though it had given him a tummy ache that lasted six whole weeks. He’d finally broken about 3 hours before the announcement was due to be made, still wanting her to know before the rest of the world! 

“You can ask me anything,” Luca noted, uselessly. He’d long since forgotten his severe state of undress, his shirtlessness an afterthought as he wandered ever close to Taylor, a warm smile brightening his face. This time, he wasn’t grinning maniacally but was directing the sweetest, sincerest, and altogether dopiest smile at his pretty classmate. “Your secret is completely safe with me.” 

It was a promise he held to the highest regard, and he proved as much by swiping his forefinger across his bare chest, right above his heart in a cross my heart and hope to die motion. If Luca was a little brighter, he might have understood just how suggestive it looked right now, him half-naked and approaching a pretty young housekeeper. If Davey had found himself in this position, cutting a similarly ripped figure to his younger brother, he’d have been fashioning his smile into a smirk, flirtatious and seconds away from making a move. But where Luca was concerned, he just wanted to help his friend! 

“I’d never tell anybody anything you didn’t want me to. And I don’t ever want to get you into any trouble, I swear,” he promised. 

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The question was asked with so much poorly-disguised delight that Taylor had no idea who to bludgeon to death first with the mop in her cart: Luca or herself. 

She stared at him as he jumped up from the bed, everything from the look of horror on her face to his basically undressed state seemingly a secondary thought to him as he called out a greeting to her. All she could do in response was stand there, clutching her cleaning cart like it was the only thing tethering her to the land of the living as everything she’d worked so hard for over the past few years suddenly came tumbling down all around her.

Nobody she danced with knew. Of course they didn’t know. While there may be a few Cora Baileys dotted here and then in the land of dance, it was a community largely made up of notoriously bitchy people - Taylor amongst them if she was being honest. In a cutthroat industry, you did what you could to stay ahead and so she had lied through her teeth about her background, where she’d come from, who her parents were, all so she could stand a head and shoulders above the rest of her peers, talentwise. They all thought she came from money, from a good and decent family, that she actually stood a chance of being someone.

Now, she was face to face with her dance partner in a hotel room the rest of her classmates could easily afford with a little help from Daddy’s paycheck, and suddenly she was no longer the one to watch in class. She wasn’t Taylor Hathaway, future prima. She was the maid.

Naturally, her first instinct was to jump to anger and all she wanted to do was wipe that stupid smile off of Luca’s face. He had ruined everything. Now everyone would know her secret and she would never be respected as a dancer again.

“I called out!” she insisted, jabbing her finger through the doorway she had just walked through. “I called out and you didn’t answer. And there was no sign on the door telling me not to come in. You need to put the sign up!”

It occurred to Taylor, through her anger and far too late, that technically speaking this was a guest she was giving an absolute mouthful to. Just because she knew Luca from dance, that didn’t mean the higher-ups would look the other way if they caught wind of the attitude she was giving him right now. Then, it would be so long to not only her reputation at school, but the job she had that had made it all possible to begin with.

She blinked and tried to reel herself back in, drawing her chin closer to her neck as she swallowed the last of her pride.

“...Sir,” she finished, coldly.

As she berated him, his nose crinkled in confusion, before slowly settling on realisation. It took him a pretty hot minute to understand what she was getting at, but as always he got there in the end. 

“Oh! Whoopsie daisies, that’s on me!” Luca admitted, as though anybody else could be to blame. He smiled a little sheepishly, before shrugging with indifference. “I didn't hear you, but it’s okay! I don’t mind you being here, it’s a-okay with me!” 

He meant it, of course. He was only getting ready for his dad’s stupid party, so why should it matter if she needed to get into the room? It wasn’t like he was up to anything nefarious – it would be another story entirely if she’d accidentally stumbled into Davey’s room! And it was just Taylor. He liked Taylor a whole bunch, so he didn’t exactly have anything to hide from her. Besides, it looked like she must work here – though, surprisingly, it hadn’t gone amiss to him that she hadn’t answered that question – so he understood she needed to do her job. If her job involved checking on all the rooms, then he wasn’t about to get in the way of that! He already knew how hard Taylor liked to work, and how passionate she was when she set her mind to a task. 

He’d been just about to tell her as much, when Taylor appeared to shrink back into herself, discomfort etched across her features. Not that discomfort was an unfamiliar look for Luca – he always seemed to make her uncomfortable – but this felt different. And she’d just called him sir?! Taylor had never called Luca sir. The only people that called Luca sir were the people his father hired, and it always made him feel icky, squicky inside. 

“Why are you calling me that?” Luca asked, blinking stupidly. 

For a brief, idiotic moment, Luca thought maybe she hadn’t recognised him. Maybe it was his state of partial undress, or the fact that she wasn’t used to seeing him outside of their dance class? He wasn’t sure, but something didn’t seem right at all! 

“Taylor? It’s me! Luca! McGrath! From dance class,” he explained, plastering his usual, goofy smile on his face. Maybe that would settle matters! 

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Taylor blew a stray curl back from her forehead as she stretched up on her tiptoes, hooking the hanger for her dance gear against the back of the closet door. As soon as the heels of her combat boots hit the floor again, she stripped off her leather jacket and turned to Mike.

“Real good,” she told him, knowing there was probably a light sheen of sweat still clinging to her skin, even after she’d managed to steal a quick shower at the studio. Draping her jacket over her leotard, she turned to inspect herself in the mirror of Mike’s tiny janitor’s office. It was smudged and cracked in the corner, but did the job of reassuring her that, as soon as she changed from her boots to her sensible plimsoles she had tucked into a cubby here, she’d look presentable enough for work.

“Morgan says he thinks he can make an argument for me to be in a principal role for the spring show if I work on my arm placement,” she said, gathering her hair into a scrunchie. In the reflection, she spotted Mike’s proud smile and felt a smile of her own tug her mouth upwards. It was quickly interrupted by the shrill beeping of her watch.

“Shit,” she hissed, her finger scrabbling to hit the button that turned off her alarm. “I have like, three minutes to grab my cart and get to the top floor. And I still need my - fuck, where’s my–?”

A white, cloth-like piece of fabric hit her in the face and she managed to catch it before it fell to the floor. She shot Mike a grateful look before tying her apron around her waist and slipping her other shoes on.

“The missus is making me pie tonight, so you’ll need to use your key to get in here if you work overtime tonight!” Mike called after her.

“Thanks, Mike!” Taylor called over her shoulder, half-jogging out his office and towards the equipment cupboard to grab her housekeeping cart. After wrestling it out the tiny doorway and into the elevator, she rode up all eighteen floors of the Plaza Hotel until she reached the top.

In all honesty, she could see this shift far enough. She’d pushed herself to the brink of exhaustion at rehearsal, just so she could prove to Morgan that she wasn’t some simpering admirer who saw the arts and dance as a hobby rather than the thing that pumped blood around her body. Her bones ached and her feet felt even worse off, but without a job, there was no dancing. Plus, it beat going home and finding her dad in another rotten, beer-soaked mood. At least when her shift came to an end, he’d probably already be in bed, and she wouldn’t have to take her easy mac into her bedroom with a chair in front of the door.

She’d heard tell of an event at the Plaza that night, but hadn’t listened into the finer details. All she knew was that she’d been tasked with the upper floors for her shift, reassured that the guests who stayed there would be in attendance in the ballroom and she would be able to go about her duties undisturbed. This seemed to ring true, as there wasn’t a single ‘do not disturb’ sign hanging from the handles of the doors lining the corridor.

Pulling out her masterkey from her pocket and swiping it against the first fob, she waited for it to flash green before pushing the door open.

“Housekeeping!” she called as she backed in with her cart. It was customary to do so. Her training said it was required, even though it was doubtful for anyone to actually be in the room at that point.

Even more unbelievable, would be for this hypothetical person in the room to be none other than Luca McGrath, but as soon as Taylor turned around and gasped upon seeing her fellow dancer sitting on the edge of the plush hotel bed, she realised her training had not prepared her for this.

Scrubbing less than pleasant stains out of bedsheets? Yes. Bleaching the most horrendous crime scene of a toilet bowl you’d ever seen in your life? Absolutely. Confronting your half-dressed classmate wearing a tux while trying to do the job that was the only reason the two of you were allowed to brush shoulders in barre class? Taylor Hathaway did not have a manual for that.

“I…” She opened and closed her mouth like an idiotic fish. Quickly, her defensive walls shot up from the ground and her expression morphed into a scowl as everything she knew about service-with-a-smile was swept under the rug.

“What the hell are you doing?”

It could be said that Luca was a little... well, scatty. By comparison of his brothers, he didn’t really have his life together. Most days his mind moved so fast that he struggled to catch up. It could get a little overwhelming, but it also meant he didn’t know his arse from his elbow and was constantly losing things. Even in a hotel room that he’d only arrived at an hour and a half ago. Sufficed to say, he’d spent the last hour wandering around in his underpants, fresh from a shower and still-wet hair dripping down onto his shoulders. His tuxedo was carefully laid out on the bed for him (next to the evil bowtie, if you needed him to paint you a clearer visual).  

When the call from housekeeping had cried out, it had fallen on deaf ears as Luca continued to pad around his bathroom like a lost puppy. It wasn’t like his teeth were dirty even – he brushed them dutifully every morning, every night, and even after lunch! – but after Taylor had complained during rehearsals that she could still smell the pesto panini he’d had for lunch, he was a little conscious of his breath. Taylor was pretty good at doing that, actually. She always made him aware of the things that he was in dire need of fixing. She was pretty great like that. 

Padding his way back into the bedroom, Luca sulkily dropped back down onto the bed and stared down at his feet, frowning. He had mismatched socks on. As he wondered whether or not Davey might have a spare pair of socks tucked away in his room down the hall, a flash of movement caught his eye and he blinked in surprise. Oh! There was a housekeeper slowly edging her way into his bedroom! Had she called out? He found himself wondering. Would you have even noticed if she had, dumbo?  Was the follow up thought. He supposed it didn’t really matter. There probably wasn’t any rules about the hotel staff carrying out their duties while a guest was in their room. 

What he hadn’t expected was for her to turn around and reveal herself as the very woman he had a big, fat crush on. 

“Taylor!” Luca gasped as he jumped to his feet. 

As though to completely counteract the look of abject horror on her face, Luca’s features were soon twisted into the widest smile anyone had ever seen. His night could only get better now that Taylor was here, right? He really liked Taylor. 

“This is my room!” he announced, stating the painfully obvious with the air of a child on Christmas day who’d just received the exact gift they’d asked Santa for. “Do you work here?” 

Do I really have to answer this? Because I don't know. I am attracted to a lot of people... there are so many beautiful people in this city! But I get really silly and nervous when I have a crush so I try not to nurture it too much. Um, I don't know... Keegan? We don't have to kiss or anything, do we?

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