Anyone who is anyone is there among the sweeping, vibrant cloths of silk and satin.  Anyone who is anyone will be dancing to the musicians as they pluck their double basses, blow into their trumpets and saxophones, and let their fingers dance like fire across the strings of their violins.  Anyone who is anyone will be dancing with a partner dressed in either a ball gown of the finest make with lace, ruffles, bows and pearls, or a suit as black as night and a shirt as white as an angel’s wings.  Anyone who is anyone will socialize with the hostess, her enormous shell earrings glittering in the light, and her husband, standing tall and proud with his pants perfectly pressed, and tell them both how lovely the refreshments table is, with the little sandwiches one could eat in a bite but choose not to, or how much money they both must have spent to decorate the ballroom in such deep reds and golds.
And being the polite people they think they are, they will smile, their eyes hidden by masks that match the scenery perfectly and tell that anyone who is anyone that it had been no trouble at all and insist that they continue to enjoy the evening.
That anyone who is anyone will kindly take their advice, adjusting their mask a little as on to let their face show, and continue to enjoy the night.
Ah, yes.  The masquerade.  
Hide your face so the world will never find you.
And then she walks in, a look of confidence in her exposed eyes rare in girls her age.
Fashionably late she is, but of course, no body notices her.
Her gown is simple.
Black like the space between the stars with no ribbons, lace, bows or pearls.
Her dark hair is down and falls in tresses across her shoulders.
Rivers.
And her eyes sparkle with no real colour as they sweep across the room as if looking for someone, yet finding no-one.  Two diamonds in the rough of her black eyeliner that, although generously applied, make her that much lovelier.
She is heartbreakingly beautiful.
Yet still, no-one notices.
She descends the stairs to join the party, her face still naked like a new born baby.
People she passes offer her masks, extras they have brought along just in case.
“Here, dear, you look silly without it.”
“I brought an extra, you can wear it for tonight.”
“Keep it.  You need it more than I do.”
“Everyone’s wearing a mask.  I don’t see how you can’t be.”
Politely, because she is always polite, she turns down the masks offered, a twinkle in her eyes and a smile tugging at the corner of her apple red lips.
She is in the center of the ball room now.  The music is blaring and the people are dancing.  A lively, catchy song that makes even the worst dancers at least tap their feet.
She looks around again and spots a lone figure in the corner, her mask brand new, yet her gown old and worn.
The girl walks over and smiles and extends her hand.
“Dance with me?”
“But you’re a girl.”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes!”
“Really?”
“Of course, we’ll be laughed at!”
“Does that matter too?”
“Yes!”
“Dance with me and then tell me that being laughed at is important.”
“No.”
“Suit yourself.”
And the girl walks away, a smile still on her face, and then she begins to dance by herself.
The others have never seen such a dance, it is different, not what they are used to.
So they stop and laugh, not caring that she is keeping the beat, and not noticing that she looks like she is having fun.
“It’s that girl without a mask.”
“What’s she doing?”
“It’s strange.”
“Does she want to be laughed at?”
They whisper around her, but she keeps dancing, a smile on her face and the knowledge that the musicians have not yet ended the song in her mind.
“What’s wrong with her?”
Pushing her way through the crowd, the hostess and her husband make their way towards the girl, still dancing to the music.
“Stop.”
She looks at the hostess and does as she is told, still smiling.
A mask is extended.
“Take it.  It’s a masquerade.  You were supposed to come in a mask.  I can’t have you ruining my party.”
“But I’m not ruining it.”
“You don’t have a mask.  That’s enough.”
“I am who I am.  No use trying to hide it.”
“That’s not the point.”
“Then what is?”
The music is still playing, a softer melody now.
“I remember when I was younger I decided I didn’t need my mask, but how wrong I was.  I was laughed at and teased.  I don’t want that to happen to one of my friends.  Take this mask.”
“Who says I’m your friend?”
“You’re at this party, aren’t you?”
“I am who I am,” The girl repeated.  “No use trying to hide it.”
The hostess leaps at the girl, her hands extended like claws as they scratch at the girl’s petal smooth face.  Blood emerges from the gashes and begin to flow in rivets like her hair from her face and neck her neck, onto and into her dress, staining the black.
But no tears.
No cries.
The girl gently backs away from the woman as her husband tries to calm her down.
“I don’t need a mask.”  The girl whispers, and begins to dance to the music once again.
Blood or not, she is still beautiful.
Her eyes still sparkle.
And she is smiling.
Around her, masks drop to the floor unwanted.  The clatter of the facades coming in contact with the floor is lost in the sounds of feet tapping against the cold marble floor in their own pattern an in their own dance, along with the rustle of a girl in a simple black dress like the night with eyes like glaciers and lips like the blood spilling from her face still pulled into the most genuine smile to even shine on earth falling dead to the ground, surrounded by paper faces.