Quick-changing

Vanessa had just gotten upright and was straightening her skirt when Trevor, one of their handful of stagehands, hurried up to her. Red-faced, she stood up straighter.

"Do you know the Enchantress' part?" he said, in his usual northern accent.

"What?" she said. "Sandra's playing her."

"Sandra was under that branch you knocked down," Trevor said.

Oh. Vanessa nervously glanced down the walkway. Admittedly the occasional concussion wasn't a rare occurrence around here.

"Is she okay?" Vanessa said.

"Should be fine," Trevor said. "But we need someone who doesn't share a scene with the Enchantress, and it's either you or Robert in drag again."

"Oh. I'll get to it," Vanessa said.

You had to get good at improvising, working here. Vanessa nodded, and quickly started descending the side of the walkway, vaguely overhearing Chris speechifying on stage. It was probably about time for the scene where he faced down one of the Enchantress' creations, played by Max in an inflated suit that hopefully wouldn't-

There was a loud pop. Vanessa winced, but hurried over to backstage where one of the stage-hands had hung up a spare Enchantress dress. Vanessa glanced around. There were a few people behind the scenes, as ever, but you couldn't get far in theatre without a couple of stagehands getting an eyeful.

She quickly shrugged herself out of the loose fairy-dress, and did her best to wipe off the glitter from her features, before taking the Enchantress dress of the hanger. It was ornate, suitably so for that kind of ruler. The skirt had enough support to it to almost stand up by itself.

She stepped into it, clad in just her underwear, and had almost pulled it up when she glanced at the neckline. That was the downside to the dress not being fitted for her; it was cleavage baring enough as it was, but her bra would definitely be visible if she wore that.

Quickly, she tugged her bra off, covering her breasts with one hand just in case any crew were watching, and lay it over the rack. She glanced from side to side, then dropped her hand to help slowly manoeuvre the ornate dress up.

Then there was a crash. Uncertain, Vanessa looked up.

And saw the audience. She stared for a moment in shock. There was a set there, fake trees, the backdrop, and...

Oh, no, that was currently flat on the floor with a struggling Max underneath it. Apparently someone had knocked that part of the scene over.

Then Vanessa looked down, saw her exposed breasts, and promptly crossed her arms, screamed, and ran sideways, tripping over the skirt and falling out from it, wearing only her panties as she made it to the cover of a more intact piece of set.

She knelt down nervously, reaching out with one arm for the dress only when Max had pushed that bit of the set back up. Blushing, she stepped back into the dress.

It couldn't keep going wrong, could it?

Oh, who was she kidding? She'd starred in Chris's shows before...

She fidgeted with the dress, tugging the bodice up and pulling it tight, before looking around for a make-up artist to give her a quick touch-up. She'd be on stage soon.