The first round of phone calls was immediate. Low voices whispered "Have you heard?" and spread the news with fresh rounds of liquor. "No, tonight, the second show." Gossip ran through the lower levels of the Broadway community as dressing room doors closed and back stage exits cleared. "No one knows, no one's seen her." Circles closed around her friends and coworkers, split and fractured as concern, worry, sympathy dispersed into the night. "It's Ivy. They think she'd been drinking."

The air thrummed discordant, one jarring note against rehearsed cacophony. No way to take it back.

Two men sat, phones gathering lists of unanswered calls and ignored texts. There was only one thing they wanted to know, and only two numbers it could come from. They waited on the steps, in the diner, riding the subway pretending to be going somewhere other than waiting, waiting, one thin barrier between Ivy and the world.

They weren't her parents, but they were her friends.

As dawn cracked somewhere above them, Sam yawned and stumbled towards the hissing door. It was past bedtime even for those who lived after sunset. Tom grabbed his arm, holding him back as the doors eased shut.

The second round of phone calls would be starting soon. These voices would not be hushed or gleeful, casual or worried. They'd run up and down the hierarchy, and the final, firm word would be "consequences."

The barest hint of cold light through the window went unnoticed. The sharp wail of the phone did not. A groan of protest accompanied an awkward turn, hand fumbling towards the noise.

The caller held their own phone away, braced for a bellow. But when it came, it was without an edge, sleepier, softer, the beginnings of a sentence "I've..." before a thump of head hitting pillow, a sound recognizable even though grainy reception.

"Sorry to be calling so early, but you need to know. It's about Ivy Lynn..."

Her head was pounding when she woke up, but not nearly as badly as her hazy memories suggested it should. She rolled her forehead against her blanket, easing a crick in her neck. Her bedding could do with a wash. And the floor could use a vacuum, she concluded, peeking over the edge of her bed. And then she remembered.

Her chest constricted in an instant, panicky flame expanding and then yanking her body into itself in the way that sounds melodramatic in books, until it happens to you. Up and off her bed, she was turning towards the door before she realized the weight on her shoulders hadn't been her covers, or her guilt.

Heaven On Earth. They'd never forgive her. No one forgets a chorus girl who brought down a performance. No one forgets a chorus girl who stood out.

Just another way life seemed determined to mock her, in a voice just like her mother's. Ivy peeled the wings down over her arms, remembering Karen's voice following her down the street, hands holding out a pair of goddamned sunglasses. Karen couldn't deal with spending one week in the ensemble without pushing herself forward. And still everyone remembered her, held her up for universal acclaim.

Ivy pulled her white boots off, methodically, the backstage ritual performed for the last time. She messed up, she lost it, she knew, she knew there was no one else to blame. But after ten years she cracked, just once in ten years, and lost everything.

Naked, she reverently folded the costume, and went to scrub the makeup from her face. Warming light waved at her through the window, but she took no notice.

They went above ground, eventually, so Tom could answer calls, wandered the streets in random pattern. It was almost like fresh air, this early in the morning. New York was a city that never slept, but there was a minute, sometimes, when it yawned.

Sam tried not to listen but there was nothing else to do, and his jaw clenched every time Tom used his patient tone, reassuring whoever the hell was on the other line that he was "making sure she's okay first, and we'll deal with that later."

"You okay?" They were both tired, worried, increasingly grumpy, but this time when Tom pocketed his phone he rubbed at his eyes, ruffling the fall of hair over his brow.

"Look, I know you think I'm babying her-"

"Tom-"

"And she needs some space. Okay."

"Tom-"

"But this isn't just about Ivy breaking down. This is real, this is serious and I-"

"TOM."

"What?" Startled, he stopped suddenly, forcing a jogger to veer into a line of taxis, and turned to look at Sam.

"It's cool. I agree: if she needs us, we'll be there. Right?"

"Right." Tom slipped his gaze across the precise planes and curves over Sam's face. "And?"

"And," Sam gave him a grin, somewhere between relief, and an emotion he was too tired to decipher. "Ivy texted."

"I'm sorry. Can you come over?"

Ivy sent the second text and huddled on her couch. The bedding was already stripped and wadded in the closet; she didn't want to look at it. The costume lay on top; she didn't want to look at that either.

She was still trying to let only one small part of the previous night exist at a time. One moment in her dressing room, unsure which way was reality. One moment on stage, a mixture of shouting and silence. One moment in a liquor store. One moment dancing. She knew how this would work. One by one the moments would join up, until she could remember it all and try to move past it.

The other thing she knew was that she didn't want to be alone. She was better with people, and everything always felt a little less bad, if someone was there to share it.

Her reddened eyes sought out the bottle of pills on her dresser.

She wanted Sam. The world around him was always certain, always manageable. He knew her, he knew how hard she'd worked, and he knew she'd never have ended up like this on purpose. ("This" being left undefined.) But he'd known, he'd almost told her to stop. To stop-

Her hand was on the bottle and she wrenched it away. He'd told her to be careful, but she thought she knew what she was doing. And look how she'd turned out. Just like Marilyn.

She wanted Tom. He was warm and soft and funny and sweet, and every time he looked at her she felt like maybe she was meant to be someone, after all. But he'd be disappointed, so disappointed in her. Not just for screwing up his show - maybe he could forgive that. But for not being the star he thought she was.

A few more tears crawled down her cheeks as she flushed every single pill she had down the toilet.

She'd asked them both. They were the two people who loved her the most. Had loved her. If she showed Sam the empty bottles, and gave Tom back the costume, maybe she could prove it wasn't the end of her.

They'd wandered far, and by the time they got to a station and navigated the complex lines, the morning commuters were bleeding out into their respective offices.

The purpose and conviction of the night dissipated as Tom climbed the stairs up to Ivy's apartment. Before, it had been about being there and hugging her and giving her whatever she needed. But she'd done all that with someone else, it was morning, and now he didn't even know how she was. A brief text could mean anything. It was like the uncomfortable conversation after a first "date;" a little too late for casual conversation, a little too early for serious talk.

Sam prodded Tom forwards every time his feet began to drag. Ivy was still Ivy He'd seen her off her game before, and she'd seen him through some rough times of his own. Friends like that were rare, especially in a business of instant, superficial bonds. It takes more than a little insanity to break a friendship, he mused, and grinned at Tom's back, glad the other man couldn't see.

Tom picked up his resolve as he opened the door to the hall, and was two steps in before he exclaimed, stopping short and causing Sam to walk straight into him, knocking them both off balance.

Pushing himself off the wall, Sam looked up to ask what was wrong now. As it turned out, he didn't need to ask.

Sitting against the wall facing Ivy's door, binder propped open and one leg stretched out, was Derek.

Sam has texted back almost immediately. She let out a breath she didn't know she'd been storing, deep in her lungs. He was still awake, he still cared. The only reasons he would stay up were related to sports or worry.

It was completely inappropriate given her current state of devastation, but she read the text again and giggled. "We'll be there in 40." Ever since Sam had come back, she'd thought her two best friends were protesting over a little more than just her. They were starting to feel like the beginnings of a family. If they'd forgive her.

"What are you doing here." He'd meant to speak calmly, but he found it hard enough just to work with Derek. That he was with Ivy – well, most of the time he just tried to ignore it. But this was about as far from "ignore" as you could get, and his voice was as close to a demanding growl as it could get.

"Trying to block your new bloody song. Do you mind?" Derek's typical, infuriatingly sardonic tone wasn't helping.

Tom bristled under Sam's warning hand. "And let me guess, your apartment's being fumigated so you chose-"

"I think what Tom means," Sam interjected, "is that we didn't expect you to be here."

"Neither did I, until my phone rang." Nothing had changed, except a tiny note of something – a tightness of the throat, an anxious push on the consonants. Sam looked away quickly, the way you avoid the eyes of a growling dog.

"Is Ivy here?"

Derek shrugged, making a notation in the margin. "You'd have to ask her."

The hall a void of indrawn breath, Sam knocked on the door, gently. "Ivy? It's Sam." Footfalls moved next to him. "And Tom."

The only response was the click of the lock. He waited for a moment, then went inside. Tom followed, pulling the door closed before he had fully crossed the threshhold. "Ive?" The door closed, then locked, snap snick.

She was sitting on the edge of a bare mattress, eyes locked on fidgeting hands.

Sam crossed immediately to sit beside her, and she threw herself into his arms, burying her face in his shoulder as if she could hide from the world.

Tom hung back, unsure.

"Babe, what happened?"

She rocked her head back and forth. "I don't know, Sam. I don't, it was never supposed to happen, I just wanted to feel... Like I could handle it." Pulling back, she searched his face for judgment, or something even worse.. "I threw them out, I'm done."

He hugged her tightly. Who was he to judge? Some things, people needed to figure out on their own. "That's my girl. I knew you could."

"Thank you," she whispered, and kissed his cheek. "Tom?"

There wasn't much room to move in her tiny apartment, but he stepped closed, crouching down before her. As he did, a pile of clean white fabric and feathers caught his eye and he looked away. This was one of the reasons he wanted to find her last night. Now that it was morning...

"Ivy?"

"I'm sorry. I'm really, really sorry."

He'd wanted, so many times, to talk to her. At first he was giving her space. She deserved that from him. It wasn't his fault Marilyn needed a star: Broadway could be fickle. But it was his fault she was in the production, his fault she was the only one he could see in the role, and her fault he couldn't fight hard enough to keep her there. He took her hands.

She had every reason to hate him, no reason to ever forgive him. When she finally looked at him, he realized they had that in common. "I'm sorry too."

All he wanted was to hold her, as he knew Sam was silently urging him to. He swallowed heavily past a lump the size of China, forcing himself not to cry.

"Heaven On Earth-"

"They called me. I'm fired." The words were delivered flatly, covering pain but level with resignation. Theatre policy would have overridden his objections. They would have let him tell her, if he'd asked. If he'd felt capable of giving her yet another piece of bad news.

"And Marilyn-"

Her eyes widened, she inhaled sharply. She's guessed, from his tone, and his heart broke with her. At the last minute, approaching the building, he'd told Sam. Better for him to know, before – she needed him to say the words.

"It's the investors. We're already having so much trouble getting the funding," his voice broke, "Any hint of scandal, Eileen thinks they'll drop out."

Ivy's hand went limp in his, eyes squeezed shut as a pair of tears slipped down cheeks already shined. Sam was pulling her against his chest, but she stayed upright.

"It's fine," she finally whispered. She repeated it again, stronger, her mantra. "It's okay, Tom." A small, pained smile pushed the corners of her mouth. "It's going to be fine."

In a second Sam had released her, and she slid down until she could wrap her arms around Tom's neck. It wasn't fine, he thought, hugging her tight, but maybe it could be.

He was finished dressing before he remembered why. Mornings had never been his strong suit, and apart from the sleepless adrenaline of prod weeks, he saw no reason they should be.

Head still fuzzy, he shoved his working script into his bag and was out the door with ingrained strides He was never late, no matter how early the call. Not when it was important.

Ivy had talked a little, but not much. That was okay, most of the details were already widely known and she would face questions as soon as she left her apartment. When the silence became oppressive, it had been Ivy to suggest there was a game on. The Mets. They swung the sofa around as far as it would go and snuggled together under a soft blanket, each man holding one of her hands.

The game was in the bottom of the 3rd, no runs. Tom had asceded without complaint, not too surprisingly since it was what Ivy wanted. What was surprising was the interest he took in the proceedings.

Ivy noticed this, bemused, just as she noticed the patient way Sam answered the resulting questions, such as "how do you know if it's a ball or a strike?," "So what's a strike?," and a slightly horrified "Why is that guy spitting on the ball?" They were trying to make her feel better, she knew, as Sam snaked an arm behind her head, so she could lean back against the cushion of his bicep. And they were, she smiled, as Tom pressed closer into her side, and wondered aloud why a batter couldn't just run straight for 3rd and avoid the rush of activity at 1st.

The 4th inning closed out with the Mets netting a tidy 4-0 lead. Tom had learned vaguely enough to cheer, and half listened in case the announcer said anything useful or strange. You never knew, he had caged, there might be something in there to inform DiMaggio's character.

Ivy was nested into Sam's shoulder, the better to glance at Tom's various facial expressions. He appreciated her fascination, and was cutting his eyes that way quite often himself. It would have been a nice way to spend the morning, except he knew he needed to tell her one thing that had been nagging at him ever since he knew she would be alright. Especially after he'd taken a brief detour on the way to the bathroom.

"Ivy?"

"Hmm?"

"You know Derek's been hanging out in the hall all morning, right?"

She stiffened, head toward the TV as Tom froze, tensed for any hint of a reaction. It was something he's always left alone, because she'd asked him to. She didn't know the details of what happened between them, and so long as she was happy, there was no reason to tell her. Nothing much had changed, really, any outbursts in rehearsal were only further proof that she could "take care of herself." And it was Derek. How serious could they be?

When the next batter stepped to the plate she relaxed into the sedate then frantic then sedate pace of a baseball game. By the 6th inning it was clear that only a miracle (for the other side) would knock out the Mets, even lacking a single Sam-approved pitcher. It was also clear that Sam was having a hard time choosing between the game and a nap, and even clearer that Tom's phone wanted his attention.

"It's fine. I'm fine, really." She almost looked it. Ivy was strong. It was, they had agreed, one of the things they loved about her.

"You'll call if you need anything?" Tom's hand rested on the doorknob, an oversized duffel filled with her angel costume slung over his shoulder. He's stay if she wanted him too. Hang the meetings and hang the calls.

"I'll call." She crossed over to see them out, but only to the edge of her bed, he noted.

Sam offered one last peck on the cheek. "I'll check in you later, alright?" The TV still on at a low volume, and he stole one last glance, then winked.

As Tom pulled the door open Ivy backed behind the wall, out of view. And held her breath. She didn't know what she was listening for, or if she wanted to hear it. There were no voices, just the tread of Tom and Sam's exit. And a quiet rustle, just as the door shut, which might have been the flip of a page.

A scrub at the sink with a pile of products had removed most of makeup, and a long, hot shower dealt with the rest of the grime. Her body was clean, but she felt far from cleansed. Her head was clear but she felt empty, numbness peppered by pain and guilt as she ran out of productive actions. The tiny apartment, stuffed with too many possessions, usually felt cozy and warm. Today it all felt like lifeless junk, a pretense of company when all she felt was lonely.

She scrolled through her messages in a daze of denial. Nothing would happen, but in case it did... She didn't want anyone to see her find out. The message ended, and she tucked the phone into the pocket of her robe. That was it. She was fired.

At least it meant there was no reason for her to go outside today.

Home felt a thousand miles away, if it had ever felt like home. Not for the first time, Ivy wished she could talk to her mother, safe in the knowledge of unconditional love. Her father would only hand over the phone. Her brother – well, her brother was busy with his own family. It had always been fine, she'd made herself a new family. Only this family would always come with conditions, accepting as they might be.

She ran a glass of water, for something to do, sipped it slowly as she focused on a blank wall and willed the tears back into her eyes. No use in crying for herself. If she didn't like it, she could always quit.

Every time her mother said that, it only made her want to push forwards even harder.

The knocking on her door was a series of soft taps, but she jumped, sloshing a few drops of water over the rim.

She had been wishing for company, but now it felt like the disapproval of the city waited on the other side of the door, ready to pour in as soon as she opened the door.

The knock came again, a little louder. "Ivy?"

A fist pressed hard against her lips, fighting against a sudden fit of giggles. Derek. Of course it would be Derek. The one person guaranteed to turn the world upside down by doing the one thing no one even considered he'd do.

She hoped that wasn't true, and he wouldn't, for some reason, try to knock down the door. He'd done it before, but that was different. Before she hadn't been good enough. Not for Marilyn. Now she wasn't even good enough to keep her job.

If she closed her eyes she could picture him, waiting, as she opened the door. Saw he walk in just far enough to protect the neighbors as he informed her, in condescending tones, how she'd messed up and how it was her fault. As if she didn't know. Or maybe he hadn't even heard. He'd take one look at her and she'd have to tell him, waiting for the moment his curiosity became disgust. Or even worse than that, he'd already heard and he was trying to be nice. He'd ignore what she'd done, tell her to buck up, and slip his tongue into her mouth like she was nothing but a toy he liked to chew.

"Ivy." The knocks tapped again as he breathed her name, weary and disappointed.

She was just one giant disappointment to everyone, wasn't she.

The tears welled up at the thought, but she didn't move, not until she was sure the hallway was quiet and he was gone.

Gingerly, she padded out of her kitchen, toweling her hair one last time before slipping into leggings and an oversized sweatshirt. At least her apartment was safe. She was here. Everything else was out there.

She was still lonely. Her biggest flaw had always been her inability to stay alone. She needed people in order to breath. She needed life, and laughter, and love.

Digging her cell out of the pile of fabric, she clicked through her address book. Maybe they'd come, maybe they wouldn't. But if they did, she knew it would be because they loved her, and were willing to forgive her. Nothing else.

Tom stalked past Derek without sparing a glance, though his rigid posture suggested he was taking the high road, rather than cause a scene where Ivy could hear. Sam left more slowly, not sure if he was looking to catch the other man's eye, or not. He saw what he saw, but had never seen the point in telling people what to do with their own lives. Not when the consequences weren't his.

Probably best, then, that Derek kept his head down, pencil ghosting a line down the edge of a page as, presumably, he scanned the lyrics. Two fingers were hooked over the edge of his binder, tension betrayed in the ridges of bone standing out long the back of his hand.

If he'd looked up, Sam might have told him how he saw it. No judgment, just observation. But he didn't look up. Sam shrugged, and walked away.

At first she knew he'd left. The itching in her shoulder blades was just nerves, and the result of her dubious sleepwear. It was a good thing angels didn't have to sleep, unless they could hang upside down like a bat. Still, she was jumpy, edgy, shied away from the company of music or television in case... In case what, there was an ax murderer hovering in the hall?

When Sam and Tom got there, she was already near the door and she heard them talking. What was he still doing here? she'd wondered, irrationally afraid that he was there to turn Sam and Tom around, convince them she wasn't even worth talking to. But the murmurs lasted only a minute, and then Sam was knocking and they were all inside and not everyone hated her and she wasn't alone.

The teams were switching places and she'd heard the pause in Sam's gait, twisted her neck to see him press his eye to the door. The apartment was filled with life, it was warm again, and it still felt like a stronghold. The three of them inside. She didn't want to know what was out there.

When Sam and Tom left, she stopped feeling safe. No, that was wrong, she felt safe and loved. But they'd dragged the outside world in with them, and took her illusions out. She couldn't stay in here forever.

Safe. Ha. What had Derek said to her, once? "There's nothing safe about being a star." She hugged the jersey material against her bare skin, and listened to silent breathing, less sure than ever if she wanted him to still be there, or if she wanted him to have gone away.

All she had ever wanted was to feel safe. All she had ever wanted was to be a star.

The spare key rattled against the bottom of her sock drawer as she fished it out. She should have known you could never have it both ways. Safe or star. Star or safe.

She wasn't a star, but as the night had proven, she could never be safe.

The tooth-bit wedge of metal glowed silver in her palm.

He knew she was in here. She knew he was out there. The ting of the key landing in a bowl with her rings had the cymbal tang of finality.

She wondered how long he would stay in the hallway. She wondered if he would knock again. She wondered what he had planned to say, if she'd opened the door before. And she wondered if he was waiting because he knew all along what she would do.

She swung open the door, wide enough so that she was framed in the doorway, an issue of challenge.

"Hello Derek."