Hoping to steel her nerves, Belle took a steaming gulp of coffee from her Styrofoam cup.  It did not help.  The bitter liquid scalded her mouth and made her throat drier.  An odd assortment of women filled in the circle of folding chairs behind her.  Although it was easier to think of the other group members as virtual strangers, Belle had to admit she had much in common with them.  Over the archway beside her hung a crisp banner proudly proclaiming "Disney Damsels".  

"Oh, Belle, dear," crooned Cinderella, "are you almost ready? You are the star of our show this evening "

Belle turned around, startled at the sound of her name, and focused on Cinderella.  As the President of the support group, she sat primly in her seat, a complex tiara of silver and diamonds glittering atop her honey curls.  Resisting the urge to backhand her and knock the smug look from her face, Belle sat down in one of the empty chairs.  

Not waiting for her response, Cinderella continued, "Good, now that we are all here, we can begin our meeting.  Both Mulan and Ariel have sent their regrets.  Apparently Mulan is off fighting another campaign, and Ariel is busy lobbying for governmental controls on tuna harvesting in the Pacific Ocean."  

A good-natured snicker filled the room as everyone imagined Ariel, Champion of the Dolphins.  Wendy, who, had chosen not to remain in Neverland, took this moment of distraction to take a swig from the tiny metal flask she kept hidden in her velvet purse.  Like her ex-boyfriend Peter, she too refused to grow up.  She wore a hot pink Hello Kitty T-shirt and a leather mini skirt.  Rumors proliferated that her alcoholism directly resulted from all the medicine Nana gave the Darling children in the nursery so long ago.   

"As you all know, Walt, our benevolent creator, formed groups like this to facilitate discussion about the special hurdles and challenges we face as part of Disney's elect."  Cinderella's face flushed with excitement as she spoke.  "We all play a special part in the world of Disney.  Each of our contributions to Disney's mystique is unique and irreplaceable.  Whether we are princesses," she self-assuredly patted her blue silk gown, "or paupers, all of us are important."  She turned her attention again to Belle.  "This evening we have the privilege to hear Belle's humble story."

The room grew quiet.  Belle began in a rush, hoping to fill the silence left after Cinderella's homily.

"My name is Belle, and I am a Disney Damsel."

"Hello, Belle," they all warbled back.

She cleared her throat and continued, "I never really felt like I fit in my home town..."  Looking at her fellow group members, she felt even more out of place here.  

"It was rather provincial, and my father was labeled the town's "crazy inventor".  Most of my time I spent reading and avoiding the advances of Gaston, the gun-toting town redneck that had his heart set on me."

"Oh, Gaston.  I've heard of him, " Aurora said, rolling her eyes, "the typical male."  Sleeping Beauty's crewcut and combat fatigues diametrically opposed her past princess garb, and was far removed from her days of living as Briar Rose.  "Let me guess.  He thought he was Walt's gift to women and couldn't understand why you didn't swoon under his affections."

"Well, yes...  That's basically it."

Aurora crossed her camouflaged legs in a huff.  "What is it with these Disney men?  They act like we are all trophies to be won!  They don't take 'no' for an answer and totally disregard our opinions!  I think Prince Phillip would have been much happier if he had not kissed me, and I would have stayed in a mindless slumber forever."

Their messy divorce almost expelled them both from Disney's dynasty.  Aurora subsequently joined a militant feminist group, putting her under even greater scrutiny.  She still came to the support group faithfully, but everyone weeded carefully through her rhetoric.

Cinderella's pleasant expression soured.  "Well, Aurora, dear, that may be your experience, but we are hearing Belle's story this evening."  She smiled condescendingly at Belle and said, "Please, continue."

"Well, one day my father decided to enter an invention in a village contest, hoping to reverse our current financial misfortunes."  She smiled to herself.  It really was a crazy invention.  Her father designed it to chop wood at lightening speed, and the machine very likely would have maimed anyone who tried to use it.  Until recently, Belle always imagined him to be open-minded, especially from so many years of destitute living. But after a year of marriage, he still did not accept the Beast as his son-in-law.

"Becoming lost on the way to the festival, he stumbled upon a seemingly abandoned mansion and was captured by the Beast.  After I found my father, I offered to stay with the Beast in my father's place, so he could return to town and receive the medical attention he obviously needed.  The Beast was happy to accept me as a substitute prisoner."  

Snow White piped up timidly from the far end of the circle.  "The Beast probably wanted you to live there so he could protect you from your evil stepmother."

Belle was confused.  "My evil stepmother?"

"Yes, who wanted the kindly huntsman to cut out your heart and bring it to her in a box."
  
"I don't have an evil stepmother.  I don't even have a mother."

"No evil stepmother?"

"No."

"Then a witch perhaps?  A witch who was jealous of your beauty and plotted to feed you a poisoned apple."  

"No witch, either."

Snow White looked at Belle like a freak of nature.  "A dragon?"

Aurora retorted, "Oh, shut up, you codependent twit! Don't you have some Prozac to take or something?"

With a frightened squeal, Snow White started rocking back and forth in her chair, planting her hands firmly over her ears.    

Belle resumed her story.  "I had no huntsman, angry stepmother or witch to be afraid of, but at first, I was very frightened of the Beast.  Dark and brooding, he spent much of his time in the abandoned West Wing of his house.  One night against his orders, I decided to investigate this forbidden area of the mansion.  In a shadowy room I found a single red rose enshrined under a bell jar.  It was wilting horribly and I decided to water it.  But just as I lifted the jar, the Beast came in and threw an alarming fit."  

"A rose under a jar!"  Pocahontas looked horrified, "How savage!"  It was hard to focus on what she was saying.  As always happened when she spoke in this way, a cloud of Technicolor leaves materialized and swirled around her.  "Does he think the earth is just a dead thing he can claim?  Doesn't he know every rock and tree and creature has a life, has a spirit, has a name?"

"Well, he was very caring with it.  I got the feeling he was trying to protect it."  She was silent a moment, then continued, "But, despite this and my love for my father, I decided that no one should have to deal with that kind of verbal abuse, and I left.  However, during my attempted escape, wolves attacked, and if it were not for the Beast's intervention, I would have been killed.  During the foray, the wolves badly wounded the Beast, so I felt obliged to return to his house with him and nurse them back to health."  

"Ah," Wendy croaked from her alcoholic haze, "you were better off without him.  You should've let that little whore Tinkerbell have him!"

Cinderella glared at Wendy and shook her head disdainfully.

Feeling the sudden need to defend her decision, Belle spat out, "But, it wasn't like that!"  Looking over the motley set of damsels around her, she wondered if there was any way to explain the arc of electric desire that sparked between her and the Beast following his convalescence.    

"As the days I spent with the Beast turned into weeks...  I realized that I was beginning to fall in love with him.  Yes, he was rough and abrupt, but I always knew exactly what he was thinking and feeling.  His moods were electrifying!  Being with him was like standing unbalanced on the edge of a cliff.  It was like waiting for a twister to touch down or lightening to strike.  There was something strangely exciting, knowing that if he wanted, he could tear me to pieces in a second.  It did not bother me that he had fangs and fur.  His passion, his fury, were intrinsically bound to his appearance."  A warm flush crept up Belle's neck.

"That's the way I felt deep inside about my Quasimodo."  Esmeralda, who generally was very outspoken, was uncharacteristically subdued.  "I should have never went off with Phoebus!"

Belle shifted in her chair, causing the metal underneath to creak.  "Then things began to fall apart.  Gaston decided that if he could not have me in marriage, no one, especially the Beast, would.  He incited the townsfolk to attack the Beast's mansion, and during the battle the Beast was gravely injured.  We happened to be in the forbidden room with the rose.  As his breath grew shallower, and the last rose petal shuddered from its stem, I begged him not to leave me and confessed my undying love to him."  

"It was all downhill from there.  By revealing my devotion, I had unknowingly broken the spell that had first transformed him from a prince into the Beast I knew.  A glowing fog washed over us and before my eyes, my lovely Beast changed back into a gawky prince.  He had the same eyes as the Beast.   But this prince had red hair, pale skin, and a totally different demeanor from my precious Beast."

"They always change," Aurora said knowingly.  

"I grew to abhor him.  After his metamorphosis, he spent hours each day singing and dancing joyfully.  He spoke with the mirthful, twittering animals that lived outside his mansion.  He planted garden after flower garden.  An expert was called in to help him and Mrs. Potts arrange our living space with the principles of feng shui.  He wore gaudy frilled silk shirts and velvet stretch pants.  The heavy curtains were swept back and sunlight filled every corner of his home.  Gone was the fretting, troubled soul I had fallen in love with."

Wendy interjected, "Honey, you should've know the minute you saw him mooning over that damn rose!"

"Well, I must agree with Wendy on that," said Pocahontas.  "A rose in a jar.  Barbaric!"

"He's just so...  so...  civilized now!"  Belle moaned, "He spends hours arranging flowers and cooking exotic meals and preening in front of the mirror."

This apparently triggered a memory in Snow White because she prattled, "And if you let me stay, I'll keep house for you.  I'll wash and sew and sweep and cook and..."

Wendy rolled her eyes and took another swig from her flask, no longer concealing the liquor.

With a frustrated sigh, Belle fumed, "Oh!  Sometimes I wish Mrs. Potts was still a piece of china so I could smash her to bits!"

"Belle, dear," Cinderella stammered, turning a sickly shade of gray.  "We need to get our emotions under control.  I'm sure it's not all that bad.  Your prince actually sounds quite charming!"

"Maybe for you, you prissy bitch!"  Wendy roared, "Some of us prefer our men to act like men! Not like fruity little boys!"

"Some of us prefer women..."  Aurora added, sensuously leering at Cinderella.

Snow White violently rocked now, "Lips red as the rose.  Hair black as ebony.  Skin white as snow...  One taste of the poisoned apple and the victim's eyes will close forever in the sleeping death..."

"Girls, girls," Cinderella pleaded, "Walt would not appreciate this behavior!  We need to accept what we are - what we've become.  Our story lines were written with our best interests in heart."

"When she breaks the tender peel to taste the apple in my hand, her breath will still, her blood congeal..."

"Well, I'm sorry, Cindy!"  Belle jumped up suddenly, her chair clattering shut on the floor behind her.  "I will not accept this characterization of myself!"

Cinderella bristled at the nickname and at Belle's outburst.

"The dwarfs will think she's dead.  She'll be buried alive!"

"Can't you see?"  Belle stared intently at the rest of the group.  "They have these meetings to control us! The more we talk about our problems, the less time we will have to fix them!  As long we are distraught damsels, the Disney Empire will keep us subservient!  We will always have somebody like Cindy keeping us down, with her glass slipper firmly planted on the back of our necks!"

Belle drew in a deep breath, hope and determination coursing through her veins.  "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go home to see if I can change my husband back into the beast he once was!"  Leaving shocked silence in her wake, edged with a hint of titillation, Belle swept out of the room.