So, kinda big news week on the AMC front. Congrats to them on their new TV deal!
And, happy upcoming birthday USA!
There might be some fireworks coming up, but not necessarily in the sky...
####
"He was even more of a disaster than me, if you can believe that. Couldn't start a fire. Couldn't catch a fish if it jumped right into his hands. He was probably the only person in the world who couldn't even grasp the fine art of burning a marshmallow. And the tent, forget it. I think we finally had something one might call a tarp by the time we left on the third morning. But none of that mattered, really. I would have gladly gone on that camping trip a hundred times over, because it was just the two of us."
Angie had a dreamlike smile that was probably attributable to the ongoing effects of the serum. David could not blame the serum for the unfamiliar tug on his own lips.
Her awareness had already lasted much longer than usual, which he had to take as a good sign. All they could do was wait - wait for what would hopefully become her last 'sleep' before she awoke to her new life.
Her old life.
The conversation was a logical way to pass the time and to keep her disjointed mind in a relaxed state. He could claim that's why they had been talking for the better part of two hours, or he could admit that the words just came...naturally.
More naturally than at any time in his life.
The exchanges had not been filled with the intensity, the confusion, or the emotional confessions of previous conversations. Rather, they had spoken of the trivial, the inconsequential: best books, most hated mores (an admittedly long list for him), even favorite colors. His last story had arisen from a debate about ideal vacation locales. Angie favored mountainous locations on a crisp fall day; she had expected him to argue the merits of a crystallized beach and a five-star hotel. To her surprise,, though, he had agreed. The few precious days he had retreated to the mountains with his father - minus the sharp tongue and even sharper glares of Vanessa -remained the images that would likely be seared on his eyelids in his final moments. He might even admit that the cabin he could never quite sell was an attempt to preserve this small, but still ever-present part of himself.
"And what, Dr. Hubbard, is your ultimate wish: the one that defies all reason?"
In spite of the question, those eyes were no longer dream-like. They were as clear, as crisp, as the fall rainbows he remembered. "To help my granddaughter see that the boogeymen in her dreams really aren't so scary after all. Mostly, to help her see that behind every monster is really just a man...a human being."
The statement accomplished its own impossible task and made him look away.
"And yours, Dr. Hayward? What is your ultimate wish? An idol in your honor? World domination?"
The teasing words had managed to capture him again.
A soft smile graced her face. That smile remained even as her eyes closed.
He traced that smile, softer still, with his lips as his thumb brushed her cheek.
"To love unselfishly," he whispered.
Moments later, David's gaze lingered one final time before he closed the door, leaving the sleeping beauty to reawaken to her life – and, soon, to her family.
To the love she deserved.
####
He had left the note on the counter - out of the boys' reach - and gone out the back way. The nobleman or the coward: his lifelong cross.
Kendall read one line, a quiet, forceful "Hell, no, not this time," escaping her before she followed him out the door.
Twenty steps behind. Silent, but firm steps.
Stealth, but determined.
The Kane way.
Her way.
#
Zach had taken to examining his hands: the novel minus the ending. Mystery, dark comedy...genre undefined.
He looked up and saw her.
Love story.
Tragedy or otherwise, to be determined.
"You tailed me." Not a question. The tiny, bemused smirk, he could not help. This was his wife, after all. He could not have expected, and perhaps he did not want, anything less.
"Yeah, I did." The unspoken and what are you gonna do about it?
What he could do was nod. "I didn't –" He cleared his throat, tried to twist the words out with a roll of the neck. "I wasn't sure you would—"
I didn't want to hurt you anymore.
I wasn't sure you would care.
"You did, and I do."
She squeezed his hand, her gold glinting atop his. The rings created their own kind of screwed-up infinity.
He looked back up, saw that same promise reflected in oceanic eyes he could drown in on a good day.
"I always will," she said.
Epicly screwed up, or maybe just epic.
####
Beneath the white coat, the shorter hair, the creases that life always created, and the puzzling smirk he'd worn and 'of course, it's kismet' he'd uttered when she had first spoken of her family, David was still the guy who had saved her life.
Now, she had quite literally cut open a vein for that guy.
Somehow, someway, these strangers had become Jenny's most trusted confidantes.
Her mind still couldn't quite wrap around that fact, any more than it could absorb the fact she was now listening to the man who had saved her engage in a spirited discussion with someone else he had apparently saved: one of her oldest, dearest friends.
Even through the barrier of the door, she and Leo were privy to every increasingly loud exchange.
"You need to be monitored longer. We still don't know the long-term -"
"For the first time in so long, I actually 'have' a long-term to think about….to dream about. To remember!"
"Angie, I just want you to be –"
"I know." The words had leveled off, nearly inaudible. Neither Jenny nor her companion were shame-faced when they both cupped hands to the door.
"I already had one wish granted today. I saw the man behind the monster."
For just a moment, all trace of the physician was gone. "You remember -"
"Yes." The words, barely a whisper now. "Everything, David."
The pause was so long that Jenny wondered briefly if they were even still inside. When David spoke again, his voice had resumed its doctorly tone. "I need to get some more work done on this treatment, ideally at the hospital." A deep sigh punctuated the words. "You can come with me. At least then, you'll be in a place where you can be taken care of."
"I realize that my recovery's far from complete. And I will admit myself as soon as possible. But first –"
"She needs to see her family. She needs to face her past." Only when she saw Leo enter the room did Jenny realize the space beside her was empty.
And only when Angie let out a gasp on the examination table did Jenny realize that she had followed behind.
"We'll take her home." She gave Angie a shaky smile. "I have a lot of explaining to do." Her eyes briefly met Leo's, who silently made the same pact. "And it's time for all of us to come home."
####
They were talking about mergers, acquisitions, corporate debt & equity, and every other buzz word familiar to the hob-knobbers.
Difference was, they were having a damn good time doing it.
Erica had all the formalities in order: fine wine, complete with the pinkie-liftm fancy decanters, those little bird-sized drops of food. And, of course, the clusters of dressed-up-to-the-nines humanity.
The woman who brought some much-needed splashes of color to this little black-and-white affair...well, she was the real star. And those little orbital clusters drifted to her, almost as if they had no other choice.
As Opal led Cortlandt Electronics' movers and shakers in a spirited round of Name That Tune, Tad turned to his wife, a welcome lightness blooming in his chest. Finding the space beside him unoccupied, he scanned the room for his other party guest. But Jesse, rather than taking advantage of the rare break from babysitting duties (between Angela, Trevor, and Kathy, they'd gotten a 3-for-1 discount special), was preoccupied by an intense-looking whisper-session with Brot. Tad lifted his glass and sighed. "To good times."
#
Jesse hesitated, not at all sure he wanted the answer to his next question. "And?"
Brot pulled out his phone. Within seconds, a grainy image appeared on the screen. The figure, unmistakably a man. Umistakably a very angry man. And the voice, unmistakably the man Jesse had come to view as a friend.
"And," Brot said, "we may have just found our number one suspect."
####
Zach closed the door to Joe's office. Unlike the other times, the waiting room was not empty.
A significant difference he despised...and secretly welcomed.
He took a seat and waited for his verdict.
#
Somehow, he knew who he would find waiting for him at the nurse's desk.
The man, still flanked by security, crossed his arms as Joe approached.
"David," he breathed more than said.
"Dr. Martin, now that I have your attention, could we please have some privacy?" The question, not really a question at all, was accompanied by a sideways appraisal of the small gaggle of hospital employees surrounding them.
He could have played the power-flexing game with David now, but he had a patient waiting for him who really couldn't afford the time wasted.
Joe motioned into the nearest empty room and David followed.
In stark contrast to his usual manner, the hospital's former star cardiologist minced no words.
"I need your help, Doctor."
What David Hayward lacked in tact he certainly compensated for in unpredictability.
Just as Joe was estimating the approximate time needed for security to toss David out the emergency room door, the man got a reprieve - and Joe's immediate attention - with his next words.
"I need your help for the sake of Greenlee Smythe. And for the sake of your patient, Zach Slater."
####
Their search for Jesse Hubbard had led them to this rather unexpected locale.
They parked in a seldom-used, practically unknown back parking lot. The biggest house on the block carried such amenities. And Leo knew the lot well. He had, after all, had more than a few interesting adventures with Greenlee in this very lot when he called said house home.
He glanced in the rearview mirror. "We don't have to do this now, you know?"
Two sets of determined eyes told him otherwise.
Raising his own eyes up toward the star-filled sky, Leo shrugged and muttered "Now or never."
#
"How is sh – how are they doing?" he asked before Dixie had even come to a full stop.
She had been busted in her secret phone call slip-away.
They had agreed this would be a night to support his mother. A night to unwind. A night away from….from the world.
But they both knew that their real world waited just a few blocks over.
"Trevor and Angie, believe it or not, actually went to sleep without much of a fuss."
Tad nodded, trying to form the question he really wanted to ask.
Dixie smiled, taking his arm. "She's watching 'Rugrats Go to Paris' with the sitter."
His own grin blooming, Tad wished he was sitting on that couch right now. "it's her favorite. She always loves it when I do the accents."
It was a wonderful image, a wonderful dream unaccompanied by worries about weighing the right pronouns or forming the right words for the rest of his family.
Sitting on that couch, laughing, and just...being. With Kathy. With Dixie. With his world.
So helplessly captivated was he by this image that it took him longer to notice that the current world he was occupying had unceremoniously spun off its axis.
All guests had turned to the grand doors, their faces a varied collection of every imaginable expression.
Except Opal, who had collapsed in a dead faint.
Dead. Funny irony, considering the three uninvited guests now crowding the doorway.
Tad might have appreciated the irony better if he didn't find himself grasping the railing for dear life.
If, in a desperate effort to avoid joining his mother on the floor, his hand wasn't reaching out...to his dead sister.