Disclaimer: I do not own the X-men or anything related to the X-men. I do not own the chapter title song. The X-men are owned by Marvel, and Disney owns the title song 'Once Upon A Time In New York City'.

The chapter title song is 'Once Upon A Time In New York City' from Disney's 'Oliver And Company'.

This story was sitting in the back of my mind, and I figured it might be a nice piece to write when my other X-men Evolution story becomes overwhelmed with action scenes. This will have some drama, but it is going to be on the lighter romantic-comedy side. This is an AU story so there are no powers and Rogue, Remy, the other X-men, and cannon characters will meet each other throughout the story.

"Ah don't even look like her!" Anna Marie Darkholme protested for what felt like the umpteenth time.

"Oh please," Katherine Pryde, better known to her friends as Kitty, held up the bright blonde wig and the small case that usually housed Bella Donna Boudreaux's green contacts, "You look more like her than she does!"

Anna stared at the items and tried to think of some other way to protest her best friend's craziest idea yet. Sure, she had been born with the same eye color that Bella had paid a nice chunk of change for, but that didn't mean she needed to slap on a wig and impersonate her cousin. They were just going to have to cancel the show and try again at another time.

"Oh no!" Kitty jumped on her before the words could even come out of her mouth, "We are not quitting."

"We, have no singer," Anna mumbled and plopped down on the only available chair in the broom closet/dressing room.

"Look, is it like our fault Bella ran off with Taylor the latte boy?"

"No. And his name is Rick."

"Not important," Kitty shook her finger at her best friend and took a noble stance. With the wig placed against her heart, she demanded, "Is it our fault Bella dumped us to run off to who knows where with Rick the latte boy?"

"Again," Anna sighed finding the over dramatic acting a tad annoying, "It isn't our fault."

"Right!" Kitty beat the wig against her chest as if she was making her bid for electoral votes and not a one-night stand-in job, "And is it our fault that no one wants to hire two inexperienced, but like amazingly talented, artists?"

"No."

"Then why should we be punished for everyone else's stupidity?" Kitty slammed the wig on the counter and grimaced when the item slid off and onto the dirty floor.

Despite the lack of a compliant wig, Anna had to admit she was somewhat impressed by Kitty's determination.

The last time anyone had seen Bella Donna perform was during her stint as a 90s' child star. She had spent a grand total of six weeks as America's sweetheart and then faded into obscurity. It was her lack of anything resembling star recognition that had convinced her to hire a waitress/part-time songwriter and a community college student/on call make-up artist. She needed help to launch a comeback tour, as horrible as it was destined to be, and the girls needed a chance to get their feet in the door.

With Bella racing off at the last minute to some South American country with a barista, whose dad was apparently some kind of millionaire, they were indeed stuck in a difficult place. But why should they lose out on the money this one show would bring in? The bar's owner had promised them a 60-40 take on the ticket profits. It wasn't much compared to the fortunes real industry people received, but it was more than either of them saw in their part-time jobs.

"If," She held up a hand when Kitty squealed, "I said, if, Kit. If we do this, how in the world am I supposed to fool all those people out there?"

"You know her songs, the wig will cover any trace of your brown hair, and the stage is small so you won't have to even try dancing."

"At least that is on my side," Anna sighed and rubbed her eyes as a sudden, stabbing headache began to form in her right temple. "I just can't believe that people will actually think that I'm Bella. They have seen her on television, remember?"

"And that was how many years ago, Anna?" Kitty ignored any more complaints and began to twist Anna's hair into a tight bun. "Let's just say that she changed a lot over the years. Stop squirming!" She pulled the hair tighter and stuck in a few bobby pins, "Besides, whatever they don't believe will be called plastic surgery."

"At least tell me that I'm not supposed to say it was botched surgery."

It took Kitty a total of ten minutes to bind Anna's wavy brown locks tightly against her head and slick back her rather bizarre white bangs. She had never been able to figure out how or where the strands of ivory hair had come from, but Anna always promised she had never died her hair. When the unruly strands were settled in place, she plopped the wig onto her friend's head and began to unmercifully plunge pins in each hidden space.

For her part, Anna tried in vain to sit still while her teeth created painful bruises on her bottom lip. Although she had never considered herself a girly girl, she knew enough about makeup and fashion trends to get by. Strapping a blonde wig on her head that Kitty began to curl and plump with abandon, did not qualify as just getting by. Each glance in the dusty mirror, made her feel more and more like some prize show dog.

Honestly, it didn't make sense that they even had a blonde wig to begin with. Her cousin had never been the easiest person to understand or get along with either. Anna had known of Bella Donna since her freshmen year of high school in Mississippi, but the blonde beauty had never even glanced her way until her father married the cousin of Anna's mother, Raven Darkholme.

After that little disaster of a family event, Bella and her father had suffered a major falling out, to put it mildly. She had stayed with Anna's family for the middle part of her junior year and throughout her entire senior year of high school. Anna would never have expected years of bathroom hogging, random late night parties Anna was conveniently not invited to attend, and an endless parade of boyfriends who seemed unaware that a thing called personal space existed would have landed them here.

Maybe she should have been more grateful for her distant family connection to Bella. That small glimmer of familial love had gotten her the job. Well, familial love and her willingness to take an extremely cut-rate pay curve. And since Bella had decided to spend what probably would have been the rest of Anna and Kitty's paychecks for the next six weeks, on a new wig and different colored eyes, they should probably get some use out of the items.

"Alright," Kitty let go of the mass of golden hair and held up her fingers as if she was surveying a mine field, "That will do for today. Next time, I'll start earlier and make a few changes."

"Next time? What next time?" Anna wheezed out behind a cloud of hair spray before a loud rap on the door nearly sent her off her chair. The man behind the jolting noise shouted out a warning time that Anna could barely hear and left before anyone could question his orders.

Kitty raced from her friend to the other side of their cramped room and grabbed Bella's dress. Thankfully, she hadn't been too concerned with packing her stuff up before running off with her newest friend. No, apparently, as she had said in her fleeting note, Rick would take care of everything and she would merely send for her things later, if they were absolutely needed. Which of course, she doubted they ever would be.

It wasn't a bad dress in Kitty's opinion. With its slinky body style and midnight blue color, it was bound to offer almost any girl a few interested glances from eligible bachelors. But Anna, who continued to clutch at the hem of her sweatshirt awkwardly, seemed hesitant to try it on either way.

Bella had the tan and the curves to fill the dress with ease, but Anna doubted she was going to come even close to filling the same cup size as her cousin. But Kitty, determined to make this last minute change-up work, unzipped the dress and flung it at her poor friend.

"I will look dead you know," Anna grumbled as she pulled off her sweatshirt and tight jeans.

"Then you should visit that wonderful thing called the sun more often, instead of staying cooped up inside." Kitty retorted with a small smile coating her own lightly tanned face.

She waited till her friend had the front of the dress straightened, and then zipped the back all the way to the top. She noticed how much easier it was to get the zipper past the normally tight spots on Bella, but didn't mention it to Anna. Her friend needed all the confidence she could muster today, and mentioning that her cousin was able to fill out the dress a little easier wouldn't help.

She could at least offer one piece of comfort, "You know, I think she must pad her bra like crazy to fill out that top."

"Yeah," Anna nodded and tried to snap on a simple black necklace, "You should have seen her at the senior prom. One of the water bags sprung a leak and well…"

Despite the juicy tidbit that promised to start a hilarious tale, Kitty reigned in her curiosity and gave Anna a quick once over. It was true that she could pull off Bella's new green-eyed look easily, but the real test was going to be on stage. There was only so much voice differences that they could pretend were normal effects of aging. If Anna busted out a note that Bella would never have been able to hit, they would be bound to attract unwanted attention.

"Are you sure we can do this?" Anna felt her internal critics begin their usual taunts and tried to take slow, deep breaths. "If we back out now, no one will ever have to know I was considering walking out in public with a show dog strapped to my head."

"It is a very fashionable hairstyle, for one." Kitty folded her arms tightly across her chest and gave Anna a sunshiny smile, "And two, you can do this Anna. One song and it will all click together in your brain… Hopefully…"

"Hopefully?" Anna gawked at her with wide eyes, as the door to their dressing room opened and the stagehands began to usher her out to the waiting public.

Kitty was spared any further explanation thanks to a rather determined stagehand, whom grabbed the reluctant star's wrist and led her through the maze of the dark backstage. He rattled off bits of information about the sound set-up and the band, but Anna's mind was already swirling. She found herself unable to think of anything but the image of her cousin bursting into the bar and ripping the wig right off of her head. If this went sour, Bella would officially kill her.

"Alright," The stagehand let go of her and grabbed her shoulders when the unsteady girl tripped forward, "You are going to get a quick intro and then head on out. You got this?"

Would he have listened if she screamed, no? Anna doubted it with every fiber of her being. The stagehand already looked tired of seeing her face and they had only spent five minutes together max. Instead of a verbal response, she merely nodded her head affirmatively and considered if the pins Kitty had jabbed into her skull would stay put.

The introduction, which was as short if not shorter then the man had explained, began only seconds later. A large spotlight lit up the center of the tiny stage and beckoned for someone to come and steal its glamor and sparkle. It was supposed to be her out there, but Anna kept her two feet glued to the floor of the left side wing.

The introduction repeated once more and a hard shove sent her stumbling into the center of the stage. She glanced back and spotted Kitty with a large thumbs up, watching her from the safety of the wings. The audience remained silent, but their eyes were already roaming up and down her body as if they could sense this was not the real Bella Donna.

Anna cleared her throat, walked up to the lone microphone, and tried to dissuade her nerves by merely talking to the group, "Good evening."

A few of the men in the back chuckled and a woman at the table about three rows back gave her the most depressing sigh of sympathy. The lights offered no way to hide the look of terror attempting to spread across Anna's make-up coated face. Had she really thought that a simple waitress in a run-down restaurant could entertain a crowd of rowdy bar patrons?

"Sing Anna!" Kitty whispered as hard as she could and tried to motion to the bar's resident band.

The music began almost immediately and Anna found herself growing slightly more comfortable on the stage. She knew this tune frontwards and backward, mainly because she had written it only three weeks ago. It was the song that had finally convinced Bella that Anna had true potential to make it in the business. This was the song that easily captured Anna Marie's heart and soul.

It captivated her so completely, that before she knew what was happening, the words began to pour out of her mouth as smoothly as the day she had first written the piece.

Once the young woman's voice began to drift through the bar, the rowdy patrons began to quiet down and turn their full attention to the soulful blonde. Her hips swayed seductively with each note she graced them with. Although she barely moved from her spot in center stage, a majority of the men in the room began to stare her down with fire hot intensity.

In the very back of the room, a man with deep crimson brown eyes watched the girl with a different type of scrutiny. He knew she was beautiful, and he would be the first to admit it was extremely enjoyable to watch her curvy body sway back and forth to the tune, but there was something else about this girl that fascinated him. Behind the nervous exterior lay a diamond in the rough.

With the right amount of training, confidence, and time this girl could really make it in the business. The soulful and silky quality of her voice as she hit a note higher than he expected she could, was more than enough proof that he needed to keep his eyes on this particular starlet.

Up on stage, the girl had already launched into a new song with a slightly quicker beat. He titled his sunglasses down and tried to get a better view of the blonde when a loud rip echoed across the room. The girl stumbled back a step and he noticed a piece of her dress was stuck to the front left side of the stage. Out of pure curiosity, he nixed his companion's plan to go ahead and head out for their dinner reservations and remained firmly planted in his seat. What was the starlet going to do now?

Anna inwardly groaned as she tried to survey the damage to her dress and keep the song going. Not only was she impersonating her cousin, now she was the proud destroyer of a dress that cost more than her life savings. The slit was jagged and had reached all the way up to her lower thigh.

The audience that had once been eating out of her hand, had been woken rudely from her spell by the ungraceful costume mishap. The men in the back began to snicker ever so slightly as the women shook their heads in a mix of disgrace and sympathy.

Anna took a breath and forced herself to woman-up to the situation. She was already this far down the rabbit hole, so why not go all the way?

The moment the guitarist hit the start of the rock finish to the song, Anna reached down and ripped the torn dress right off of her legs. The resulting gown, a short, jagged thing that showed off the curves of her legs, fit perfectly as she stepped closer to the mic and unleashed the strongest ending she could to the song.

The crowd froze as the dress shreds floated off the stage and glittered in the stage lights. Then, every man and women in the bar let out a loud round of applause as well as quite a few whistles from the rowdier men. They cheered along as the blonde ignored her dress issues and continued to fly forward into a smashing finale.

By the time her moment on stage had finished, Anna had found a new side to herself. She had always enjoyed creating songs, but she never knew how powerful the sound of thundering applause could truly be. As the men continued to whistle and even a few women let out cheers, her heart began to swell inside her chest. Maybe, though she would never admit it to Kitty, maybe they should do a next time.

In the far back of the bar, the mysterious man stood up from his chair and joined his fellow audience members by gently applauding the young woman. She was rough, but he had an intuitive feeling that she was going to make something big out of herself. Yes, he was definitely going to keep this little starlet in his sights.

Did anyone catch the Kristin Chenoweth reference? : ).