Fairest Of Them All (03/?)
Copyright 2000
By Bonnie Rutledge

     Vachon was fiddling with the petals belonging to one of the sunflowers that rested in a 
vase on the left corner of the kitchen bar. It had been a long time since he had really 
looked at a sunflower, touched one, or experienced one outside the vestiges of someone 
else's memory. While he was waiting, and since they were there, he figured he would 
take advantage of the opportunity to study the sunflowers. It hadn't taken very long.

     Vachon came to the conclusion that sunflowers weren't all that great. Definitely not 
something to be missed. They didn't have an exceptional perfume, nor were they 
especially pretty. Sunflowers were simply odd, attention-grabbing things. They reminded 
him of a kid he'd known growing up - a funny-looking boy who talked trash louder than 
anyone. All that 'Nyah! Nyahing!' didn't go unnoticed. Vachon remembered routinely 
kicking his ass because the jerk wouldn't go away and shut up.

     No, Vachon wasn't a big fan of sunflowers.

     He scanned the living room, his gaze momentarily resting on the Christmas cactus 
planted in a stand between the bedroom and bathroom doorways. <Nope, not going to go 
there, no matter how bored I am.>  On the tail of this perusal, Vachon suddenly realized 
that Tracy's apartment had a strange degree of disorganization happening.

     There were papers scattered across the surface of every table. Half a dozen pairs of 
high heels had been deposited like land mines in different areas of the floor. Clothes 
draped over every available surface. The way their hangers drooped to the floor reminded 
him of shoulders slumped in defeat.

     "On the phone," he called out, "you mentioned an emergency." He considered the 
cluttered living room again. Maybe this was the crisis - Trace had found her inner slob.

     "It is. It is an emergency," Tracy called back. She emerged from her bedroom, arms 
laden with more clothes. She still appeared equally harried and wired as when she'd let 
him into the apartment over twenty minutes ago.

     Tracy stopped in the middle of the room and surveyed the layout. Her face scrunched 
up in disgust. She gave a heavy sigh. 'I am so put upon' screamed from her every pore. 
"Okay, here's the deal: through no fault or encouragement of my own, I've been given 
the assignment of working undercover as a contestant in the Miss Metro Toronto 
pageant."

     Vachon thought he did a good job of hiding his initial reaction, considering the 
circumstances. He almost maintained a straight face. Almost. All that escaped was the 
tiniest of amused twitches.

     Tracy still caught it. "I know what you're thinking," she said, her voice carrying a tint 
of annoyance.

     <No, you don't,> Vachon countered silently.

     "It's lame and stupid," Tracy said, "and I'm going to be completely humiliated."

     While he believed these sentiments contained merit, this was really a reflection of 
Tracy's mindset. Vachon's imagination had a wider focus, one that coupled a pair of the 
nosebleed heels stationed on the floor with a pair of long, strutting legs. He kept those 
thoughts to himself.

     "But I have to take this pageant seriously," Tracy continued, blissfully unaware that 
she only had Vachon's attention from the waist down. "I have to become a competitive 
contestant if I'm going to draw the killer's attention. That's why I need your help."

     Vachon glanced up and gave her a long stare. <Do I look like a beauty pageant 
contestant to you?>

     "Five out of the seven judges are men," Tracy went on to explain. "Therefore, I need 
you to offer a good, old-fashioned, sexist male opinion."

     Ah. Yet another example of Tracy being subtly insulting, but amazingly perceptive. 
Vachon put one hand on his hip and methodically rubbed his chin with the other. "I can 
try."

     "Great!" She held up two dresses. "Which one screams 'Give me the crown!' more? 
Blue with no back, or black with no skirt?"

     Vachon lifted another gown that had been slung over a chair. "Why not red with no 
front?"

     "Don't move anything!" Tracy snatched the red dress from him and gingerly laid it 
over the chair back once more. "I've got everything categorized alphabetically by event. 
These..." She shook the two selections held in her hands for emphasis. "...are for the 
Evening Gown competition." Tracy pointed at various clothing stations about the room. 
"Then I have the Final Interview, the Initial Interview - that's tomorrow, ick! - the 
Mountie Number, the Swimsuit competition..."

     Vachon found it necessary to interrupt her obsessive-compulsive monologue at this 
point. "You aren't wearing a bikini?"

     Tracy mailed a frown to her hot pink maillot. "You think I should?"

     "Absolutely."

     "Mm-hmm." She seemed to be thinking the suggestion over. Finally, her chin set with 
determined resolution. "Okay." Tracy deftly stepped around her strategically scattered 
shoes to pick up a pen and notebook from the coffee table. "Let me add that to my 'To 
Do' list."

     While she scribbled, Vachon turned his attention back to the favored red dress. "So 
what's this pile for?"

     "I thought I might wear it in the Talent competition."

     That comment gave Vachon a whole new crop of thoughts that he wasn't going to 
share. Instead, he asked, "What's your talent?"

     Tracy made a face. "I haven't figured that part out yet. I don't think it'll go over well 
if I shoot things, even if *I* consider that a talent, and I wear the red dress. I refuse to tap 
dance on principle. That only leaves me with three possible alternatives: riding a 
unicycle, juggling or swallowing fire."

     Vachon was caught off guard. "You know how to swallow fire?"

     Tracy waved a hand dismissively. "It's mostly just show. My college had a 'circus' 
club where we practiced that kind of stuff for fun. Problem is, I haven't eaten fire since 
my sophomore year. A fair amount of confidence is important, and I'm out of practice." 
She assumed a mystical expression as she raised one philosophical index finger. "Know 
fear, but know your fire."

     That decided it. "This I've got to see." Vachon sounded very purposeful.

     "What? You want me to eat fire? Right now?"

     "No time like the present." He spread his hands to either side and egged her on. "The 
sooner you build up that confidence, the better."    

     Tracy scowled, but agreed. "Okay, I'll do it, but it'll take me a while to get the right 
supplies together. It's not like I keep torches in the pantry between the canned tomatoes 
and the tuna. I'll have to make them."

     "What do you need?"

     Tracy ducked into the bathroom, opened her medicine cabinet, and pulled out a box of 
cotton gauze. "This. I also need hangers, snips and some Elmer's glue." She moved 
toward the bedroom. "The glue's in the pantry, and my toolbox is on the floor of the coat 
closet."

    Tracy came back with two wire coat hangers. Taking the cutters from Vachon, she 
severed both at the top of the triangles, just before the twist of the hooked portion began. 
Handing the tool back, she said, "Now, I straighten them. I leave the hooked part and 
loop it closed so I have a handle. Oh, that reminds me - the heat will travel down the wire 
- I'll need something to insulate the loop so I don't burn my fingers."

     Vachon consulted the toolbox again and returned with a roll of duct tape. "You're 
going to stick this in your mouth, and you're worried about singeing your hands?" he said 
sarcastically.

     "Excuse me, but I'm the one with the positive fire-handling experience here," Tracy 
snapped. "You wanted to see how it's done, so observe. I could be teasing my hair right 
now, you know." This statement spawned a frown. "Hmm. I'll have to keep the big hair 
thing on the back burner. Fire eating doesn't encourage vast amounts of hairspray."

     "Do you know *that* from experience?"

     Tracy opened her mouth to answer his question, but she had a lot to accomplish before 
the night was over. Hairspray trivia was not on the list. She got back to business. "Right. 
Now that I have the hangers straight and the handles covered, I'll cut the wire so it's a 
little shorter than the length of my arm. That's a pretty good practice length." Snip. Snip. 
She handed the cutters back to Vachon. "You can put those and the tape away now. And 
don't forget to -"

     "Put them back exactly where I found them. Yeah, yeah. I know."

     By the time he returned, Tracy was wrapping the straight ends with the cotton gauze, 
gluing intermittently so the fabric would stay in place. "These will be the wicks. They'll 
have to set a little while before I can light them," she said, laying both out on the bar 
counter next to the vase of sunflowers. "Meanwhile, let's see if I have anything good to 
burn."

     "Alcohol?"

     "In a pinch. I have some 151 rum, but that's not as good as grain for my purposes.  
Alcohol burns a smaller blue flame. It's just not as showy. I know I don't have any 
lighter fluid, but I think I had some leftover Coleman fuel from the last time I went 
camping. I might have thrown it out with my summer cleaning, though."

     Vachon watched as she ducked into the kitchen and began to hunt underneath the sink. 
"Isn't that supposed to be 'spring cleaning'?"

     "I don't have a seasonal bias where dirt is concerned." Tracy stood, triumphantly 
holding a canister. "Ta-da! I'm almost ready to burn; I just need some kind of open 
container or pail to hold the fuel while I use it. Something metal."

     "How big?"

     "Not very big. I don't need much more than an inch of fuel. The rest of the depth is to 
contain any miscellaneous flames."

     "So use a coffee can," Vachon suggested.

     Tracy gave him an unappreciative look. This was just the kind of thing that reminded 
her that he was an evil vampire. "But my coffee can is filled with *coffee,* Vachon."

     He shrugged casually. "Fine. Don't dump it. If you don't want to win the contest..."

     Tracy practically growled her annoyance, but she stomped over the linoleum as she 
retrieved her coffee. "I'm still not dumping it," she muttered, jerking open a drawer and 
pulling out a two-liter plastic baggie. "It's Jamaican. You don't just dump Jamaican."

     Once it was empty, Tracy rinsed out the can and patted it dry. She pulled open a 
different drawer and produced a box of safety matches. She tossed it to Vachon, bundling 
the can and the Coleman canister in her own arms. "Grab the torches. We're taking this 
show outside."

     They relocated to an empty corner of her apartment building's parking lot, away from 
any cars. Tracy set down the coffee can, placed the torches inside it wick down, then 
added a couple centimeters of the camp stove fuel. She left the torches to soak while she 
moved the Coleman canister far away from everything. "I don't want to accidentally 
cause an explosion," she commented.

     Vachon nodded solemnly. "Been there. Done that. Not anxious to go hand-hunting 
again."

     Tracy took the box of matches and waved him away. "Everyone who's highly 
combustible take three steps back." She pulled one torch from the can and let it drip off 
its excess lighter fluid for a few seconds. Tracy then flicked the wick as though she was 
swatting a bug with it. "I have to do that so I don't dribble burning fuel on myself once 
it's lit."

     Vachon's eyes narrowed. Wanting to see Tracy to eat fire was all well and good, but 
he was not the guy to handle a human inferno. "Have you done that before? Burnt 
yourself doing this?"

     Tracy struck a match, tossed the box away from the flammables, and rolled her eyes as 
the torch whooshed to life. "*Everyone* gets burnt eating fire now and then. If you're 
good and careful, they just aren't the type of burns that require skin grafts." The torch 
flame was high and bright yellow. Tracy spun the torch in a slow loop around her index 
finger as though she was twirling a pistol, making a flashing circle of fire. Before Vachon 
could offer the suggestion that maybe riding a unicycle would be her better talent option, 
she tilted her head back at a forty-five degree angle. Moving the torch in a circular 
motion, she brought the flame to her mouth and licked the burning tip of the wick with 
her tongue, as though she was cleaning up the melting edge of an ice cream cone. 

     It was quick, but Vachon's attention was arrested. Tracy let out a brief puff of air, and 
the flames leapt forward. He blinked in surprise, and she lowered the torch, sending him a 
mischievous grin. "That was just a tease. Professional fire-eaters sneer if you just lick and 
blow."

     "Snobs." Vachon had no such pretensions. He was pretty damn impressed. He'd 
figured out a while back that Tracy liked to play with fire figuratively. He never expected 
her to be any good at it literally.

     Tracy briefly touched the torch head to her hand, creating a small chain of fire from 
her palm to the tip of the wick as it moved away. "It's all about the alcohol, kerosene, gas 
- whatever - remaining your fuel source. Not your skin, hair or the cotton wicks. That's 
why you don't leave one torch burning much more than a minute." With that, Tracy blew 
her torch light out with a strong breath. After it smoked a few seconds, she deposited it 
back in the coffee can and took up the second torch. As she swatted and lit, Tracy talked 
about a few more rules of thumb. "Never close your eyes. The fear's there, because it's 
easy to scald something, and that hurts, but the prospect of poking a flaming stick up your 
nose because you weren't concentrating on where it was going is much more painful than 
a little tension and toasty taste buds." With the second torch lit, Tracy tried some fancier 
hand work, flipping it up in the air and catching it. "I have to be careful. Tossing the 
torch can sometimes blow the fire out. You look like a klutz if you have to relight. Last 
big rule: hold your breath or exhale. Nothing else." She demonstrated why this was a 
good idea as she tilted her head back, arcing the torch, and brought it to her mouth again. 
This time, instead of licking at the flame, Tracy dipped the wick fully into her mouth in a 
classic example of fire eating.

     As she pulled the flame away and blew it out, Vachon observed, "So you're another 
one of those people who didn't inhale during college."

     Tracy smiled primly. "Exactly. Okay, one more trick. A fireball. It bugs me whenever 
I see someone do this on television - they take a mouthful of wine or something and blow 
it over a torch or a lighter, and suddenly they're breathing a huge golden wall of fire. Uh-
uh. Doesn't work that way. For one, wine is usually 35-proof max. We're talking wimpy 
flames. The gold color just doesn't happen with any drinking alcohol. The reality is blue 
fire that hardly shows up when there's any other light. It's all just a make-believe stunt 
with pyrotechnic cheats. For the real thing, you have to take a mouthful of the strong 
stuff, like kerosene." She demonstrated, twisting off the cap of the Coleman container, 
taking a small sip and holding it in her mouth. She walked back to the coffee can, and 
flicked the waiting torch, and proceeded to light it.

     "I take it another one of the lessons you learned in college was to not swallow," 
Vachon said dryly.

     Tracy gave him a look. She twirled the burning torch around her head, paused with it 
in front of her face, then blew out. The cloud of fire exploded, bursting into a hungry 
phantasm of yellow and amber pulsing for two meters in front of her face. 

     Vachon felt a moment of panic - it certainly looked like she was having a close and 
personal experience with cremation, and he certainly wasn't in the position to do 
anything about it. His fear subsided with the size of the flames. As the cloud dissipated, 
Tracy didn't appear to have a care in the world, much less blisters. She brought the torch 
to her mouth one last time, tasting the fire again. The remnants of the camp stove fuel 
lining the inside of her mouth added a showy touch. For a moment, her lips, tongue and 
teeth all glimmered with a yellow light, until she drew the flame away and shut her 
mouth. Tracy coolly blew out the torch and said, "So that's how I eat fire. Will that work 
as my talent?"

     Vachon thought of the red dress waiting upstairs and gave his honest opinion. "That 
will be incredibly hot."

     "Good." Tracy clapped her hands together enthusiastically. "I'll have to add making 
more stage-worthy torches to my 'To Do' list, but that's a big problem solved."

     "Glad I could help."

     "Not so fast," Tracy cautioned. "I've got an even bigger problem."

     "What?"

     "I need to come up with a social platform. Community service, 'Just say no to drugs,' 
something like that."

     Vachon reflected how spontaneously the fun could be sucked out of an evening. "Do 
the fireball thing again in the red dress and I'll think about it."

****************************************************************
End of Part Three