All the World's A Stage: Lee's Rewrite
By RaizelinPlaid
Disclaimer: "Scarecrow and Mrs. King" is copyrighted to Warner Bros. and Shoot the Moon Productions. The plot is mine but the characters are not. The story is meant for entertainment purposes only. None of these characters belong to me. They belong to Shoot the Moon Enterprises and Warner Brothers to whom I am eternally grateful to for the opportunity to keep their adventurous lives going and to the wonderful actors who brought them to life. No infringement was intended. Any and all grammatical or spelling errors are solely mine.
Dedicated to Lee and Amanda who just never really seemed to catch a break. Break a leg you two!
Chapter 1: The Q Bureau
Lee dragged himself tiredly up the stairs to the Q bureau lost in thought. He had just finished spending the entire day interrogating Carl Valentine and Serge Krutiov. Admittedly, the mind binder was still trying to write his own script. He tried repeatedly to direct his mind games at Lee even though he been caught literally red-handed with the smoking gun. He had somehow figured out that there was something going on between him and Amanda. Maybe it was from something that the limo driver, Mischa, had communicated to him. Maybe it was something Carl Valentine had said since he had seen them together at the theater. Shaking his head, he couldn't figure it out for the life of him what had tipped him off that there was more than a professional relationship between them. He kept managing to turn Lee's questions around on him. Krutiov asked him if always put his hand on the small of her back keeping her close to his side. Or if he often took her hand in his covering it protectively. Krutiov administered his coup de grâce to Lee when he taunted, "Tell me, Mr. Stetson, does Mrs. King enjoy being guided by the elbow?" Krutiov knew he had caught Lee off guard with that one. He probably saw the rising flush of embarrassment spread across Lee's face as the muscles in his jaw began to clench. He had turned away quickly running his hand through his hair in his usual gesture of frustration. Being called out on those physical actions of affection towards Amanda was now playing like an endless scene in his mind. He found he was forced to admit to himself that he did, indeed, frequently find ways to reach out to touch her. It was as if Krutiov had studied in detail all the blocking of different scenes Lee and Amanda had been playing out on their own stage for years.
What was even more aggravating to Lee was that he realized that he was not even sure himself of what was going on between them. Their flirting seemed to be taking on a different tone lately. More and more Lee knew he was looking to take advantage of any situation that would get Amanda back into his arms just to feel her against him. He couldn't believe that he needed to resort to such subversive tactics with all his experience and expertise, but with Amanda, well, it was just different. It was almost as if he was rehearsing with all his flirting for some grand opening night wanting to make sure he got it right.
As he approached the door to the Q bureau, their interrupted rehearsal came racing back again to the forefront of his thoughts. Amanda had seemed more than willing to accommodate his impromptu script change. After Francine had closed that eternally unlocked door, he was amazed to see that Amanda had quickly been able to regain her composure from Francine's teasing. He, on the other hand, had felt frozen with stage fright rooted to the spot. He recollected how, like a jack-rabbit, she had quickly removed herself from his arms, picked up the script he had carelessly thrown on his desk and grabbed her bag from the back of the chair. She, then, made a hasty retreat out the door calling over her shoulder to him that she would be running late to rehearsal because of his improvisations. She had left him standing there slacked jawed staring after her. After she had left for rehearsal, he was still standing and staring at the closed door as he felt a smile slowly widen across his face as he remembered Amanda's words to him from a few months earlier after another near miss-kiss. Now, all he knew was that he was more determined than ever to find out 'exactly' what it was between them and soon.
Turning the knob on the Q bureau door, his shoulder rammed into an immovable force; a locked door. Wincing from the sudden shot of pain, he began desperately searching his pockets for his keys. "Where is Amanda?" he thought to himself in frustration. As he continued to search, he chuckled to himself as he realized that Amanda always knew where his keys were. He quickly dismissed the thought of just picking the lock when his hand landed on them in the pocket of his suit jacket. He pulled them out with a clanging noise. He searched for the right one on the dangling keychain before finally getting the door open with an exasperated sigh.
Opening the door, he found his desk empty. He didn't realize until that moment just how much he had been looking forward to seeing Amanda's smiling face and lovely chocolate brown eyes after the long day. She had left it neatly arranged with piles of files for him to review. As he continued the quick scan of his office, somehow hoping to find her lurking, he realized she must of have taken some time to straighten up the rest of it before she left. She had left a container of freshly sharpened pencils and replaced the flowers she kept in a vase on the windowsill with some fresh yellow daisies from her garden. The color always reminded him of her sunny disposition. He knew it was her warmth that broke through the often cold and stormy clouds that would darken his face. The office looked like the stage had been set for a play, and now it was just missing the actors to make it come alive.
Throwing his keys haphazardly onto the cleaned desk, the first prop that caught his eye as he sat down was a sticky note dead center. Knowing him so well, she was reminding him that she had left early because she had promised the boys a round of Goofy Golf and a pizza that night. Shaking his head at himself, he now remembered the conversation from early that morning. He should have known. She had also left one folder with her report in it, and the Parisian Intrigue script with the red cover sitting next to it. On top of both was perched his Harmon Killebrew baseball. He picked up the ball and started absently tossing it between his hands. She must have found it somewhere laying around in the office from the last time he had it out. He quickly reflected on the day she had chucked it through the window of Harry Thornton's to create a distraction for him. He had tried to be angry at her for following him, but couldn't bring himself to the full rolling boil that had been simmering after finding the ball. He knew she had saved his butt yet again. Remembering her words to him that she had just followed her instincts had him remembering his inadvertent admission to Harry that he trusted her instincts to the point that he would follow them blind at midnight through a storm. He even went as far to admit how really very pretty she was inside and out. He knew subconsciously all this had been playing on him over the last months. Every time he saw another man's interest in her just had his blood boiling again as well. He knew he had wanted to spend more time with Amanda getting to know her outside of the office. Yet, he just couldn't bring himself to directly ask her. He had even contrived that little scene he played out with her in Billy's office after the Chamberlain case to get Amanda to go to the Verdi concert with him.
Remembering the resulting very enjoyable evening they had shared from that little performance of his had him picking up the script and one of the freshly sharpened pencils. He opened it again directly to the scene they had been rehearsing as an idea began forming. As he began writing, he could see the change in the look of her eyes as she took on the personality of the uninhibited French chanteuse. He could feel the warmth of her touch on his shoulders as she stepped into him waiting for him to deliver his line. Playing to her chanteuse persona, he instinctively had just thrown the script away and moved in closer to her resting his hands on her hips. All thought of reading lines with her left him, and his act stopped. He knew he was not going to let another opportunity to see where their flirting was heading slip through his fingers. He let her know exactly where his thoughts had gone, and she hadn't backed away. He felt the huge smile that tugged at his lips as their acting became a very real silent agreement to take that next step. He was so close to just gently brushing his lips against hers.
"Scarecrow," Billy entered the Q bureau without knocking. Lee looked up from the script cursing under his breath. He couldn't even kiss her in a daydream without interruption.
Catching the look on his face, Billy asked, "Was I interrupting something?" Billy's field agent observant instincts kicked in. The thought crossed his mind that his best agent just looked, at that moment, like a little boy who just got caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
Quickly recovering, Lee improvised, "Ah, no. I was just finishing up for the day."
"Well, I just came up to thank Amanda for her usual thorough report," Billy stated holding a file folder in his hands.
"Amanda left early for an evening of Goofy Golf and pizza with her boys," Lee said holding up the sticky note from his desk. Not knowing why he suddenly wished that he had been invited to join them.
"Ah, well, please let her know. I also wanted to remind you that yours is due by the end of day tomorrow."
"Oh, come on Billy. I just got through the interrogations of Valentine and Krutiov today," Lee whined back.
"I know you will have plenty of help with that tomorrow," Billy calmly replied back ignoring the childish tone and heading for the door. A knowing smile secretly spread across his face. As he reached for the doorknob, Billy turned back preparing to give what he hoped would be very believable performance.
"Oh, one more thing Scarecrow. Not that it was in Amanda's report or that I expect you to write this in yours either, but Francine informed me she walked in when you were helping Amanda to rehearse some of her lines the other day."
Billy tried to hold a straight face seeing the deer caught in the headlights look crossing Lee's face. He continued on by saying, "I just wanted to thank you for taking the time out to do that for her. It was probably very helpful for her to run lines with you to ensure her cover remained secure."
Thinking he just averted falling off the end of a very high stage into the orchestra pit onto the base drum, Lee replied with a relieved smile, "It was all just part of the job on this one Billy."
"Well, thanks again for a job well done," Billy turned to leave again. Hearing an audible sigh of relief from Lee, he turned around one last time for his encore. "Oh, one last thing before I forget."
"What's that?" Lee asked relaxing back into his chair like an audience member oblivious to what was coming next in the play.
"Francine did ask me though," Billy paused for effect and then continued, "when the curtain would be going up on opening night. I told her that I didn't know, but I thought for sure you might. Night Scarecrow."
With that, Billy quickly left the Q bureau so the deep bubbling belly laugh that had been building could finally escape as he made his way back down the hallway.
Wondering what had just happened, Lee looked down at his desk. Seeing the script still open in front of him, he realized he had unconsciously dropped the pencil into the binding of the pages during his daydream. Before picking up that pencil again, he had one last clear determined thought, "That curtain would be going up tonight."