Dylan awoke in his hospital bed dying for a smoke. It'd been a while since he'd had a good drag on a joint or even a cigarette.

Forget the last time drops of booze had caressed his lips. He'd been hooked up to an IV that tugged at his arm whenever he tried to move. The pain meds made him feel woozy and gave him nightmares about being stalked by a faceless stranger on a deserted road.

But then what had happened to him anyway? His own memory proved sketchy and he sensed the most important details were missing. None of the visitors who sat by his bedside filled in the details. There was Kelly who looked like she'd lost another 10 pounds and any gust of wind could blow her over.

Brenda showed up dressed in black, wearing a matching hat with some dead flowers glued to it. He didn't get the girl he'd deflowered on prom night so long ago. She'd become someone else, a total stranger. No longer running to his side out of breath when he needed to counter one of Kelly's threats to leave him by making her jealous enough to rethink her position.

This Brenda would slap him if he even tried to do that.

Brandon showed up a time or two looking grim and Dave and Donna were like there though not so nearly as attached to the hip as they had been. Yeah Dylan knew all about how Donna teased her boyfriend with skimpy outfits that molded to her body but if that's what she needed to control her younger boyfriend, it was all groovy man.

Andrea read him stories from angry writers and Nat promised to bring him mega burger platters as soon as he woke up. All of them had sat by his bed and confessed their deepest secrets, their darkest sins thinking that it was safe talking to a comatose patient who couldn't hear or respond to them let alone judge them.

But he'd been listening and storing intelligence on all of them the entire time. He'd been playing that angle because he owed the feds for looking into his father's death. All this time they'd looked upon him as some anti-establishment rebel when that hadn't been entirely the truth.

But then someone had tried to snuff him out like a light bulb and maybe it'd been one of them, the people who'd kept vigils by his bedside.

"Oh you're awake."

He saw the nurse with dark curly hair looking down at him, seemingly bored. She hadn't been his favorite, Candy who was the blond with the shapely figure who'd been giving him his sponge baths.

"Yeah I'm awake and I need a smoke."

She frowned.

"You can't have one Mr. McKay," she said, "You nearly died and your lungs have the equivalent of road rash."

"I feel fine."

"You aren't fine," she said, "and the police have been waiting for you to wake up so they can talk with you about why someone tried to kill you."

That quieted him as if he needed a reminder.

"We have a guard outside in case someone comes in to try and finish the job."

Dylan sighed.

"I proved to be too bad and tough for them," he said, "No one can take me out. I'm invisible."

She chuckled.

"No one's that and if someone wanted to get at you…say inject poison into that IV of yours…they could have done it without your guard."

He digested that.

"Or smother your face with a pillow why you lay unconscious or asleep…you shouldn't take that life of yours for granted."

She adjusted his covers.

"Or cut off your oxygen…."

He held his hand up weakly.

"Okay I get it man…why are you being such a downer?"

She leaned closer to him.

"Because there are evil forces in this world that will take you down if you let them…you and the others who come here."

His face wrinkled.

"What do you know about all that?"

"I don't…you have a shadow all around you like a shroud," she said, "I can read auras…"

That reminded him of course of his mother Iris, who was totally into the new age lifestyle. She hadn't shown up yet so she couldn't be as psychically connected to him as she claimed.

He didn't know how to respond.


Kelly nearly passed out because she'd been living on celery wrapped up in lettuce and tea but she showed up at the Peach Pit to meet Steve who'd ordered up a monster burger plate. He wolfed it down before saying anything to her about what'd been troubling him.

She leaned forward when he'd licked the last crumb off his plate.

"What's the matter Stevie..?"

Angst filled his face.

"Now Steve if this is about me not wanting you back I…"

He shook his head which miffed her a bit.

"It's not about you Kelly. Why must you always think of yourself?"

She shrugged.

"With no father and a mother like Jackie you ask me that question?"

He bit his lip and she sighed.

"Stevie if you don't want to bore me tell me what's wrong."

He paused.

"I met a woman…"

"And that's news…it'd be if you didn't sleep with her for a change."

He sighed.

"I didn't…but I came close," he said, "My father goes to this…escort service and I wanted to check it out for myself so I did."

Her face wrinkled up like a prune.

"Eeew…Stevie now that's just gross."

"It gets worse," he said, "They sent a woman in to talk with me…you know to go out clubbing and I…I knew her."

"So who was she?"

He paused.

"I can't say…some lives would be ruined and I don't want the responsibility…god this was just so awful like a bad movie."

She sighed.

"If you won't tell me who then just get over it," she said, "Really Stevie I don't know why you waste my time with your silly problems."

He nodded.

"You're right Kelly…just forget I mentioned it," he said, "It's better that no one knows her name."


Andrea sat in the newspaper room at West Beverly editing a page but thinking of the expose she'd been working on about her stint as a pole dancer. The three decades that she'd spent on this planet had made her wiser than most people even if they hadn't aged her face.

She hadn't seen Brandon lately and figured he was out charming some pretty thing on the cheerleading squad since making it clear to her he just didn't see her that way.

Gil walked up to her.

"I need to talk to you Zuckerman."

She blinked her eyes beneath her glasses.

"What about Gil?"

His face grew stern.

"In my office…the walls have ears here."

Suddenly she knew that this would have nothing to do with talking about AP English or the next issue of the newspaper…she knew it had to do with why she'd been seeing him in the smoky atmosphere of the strip club.

She followed him in his cramped office and he closed the door.

"So what is it again?"

He sat down at his desk and stared at her.

"Cut the crap…I know you know that I've been hanging out with the pole dancers on the strip. What I don't know is what you're doing there."

"I…I…"

"You care to share that with me before I go to Mrs. Teasley?"

Oh god no, she though quickly, if he did that, she could kick being valedictorian and going to Yale goodbye in a single breath. But what was she to do now?

She knew she had to come up with the best lie of her life built on them.