She didn’t do it.

When the dark sedan finally did pull away, it arced widely in the opposite direction the van had taken.


Both cars were gone, the street in front of the house empty. But the moment had not really passed. There was something about it that had left Lance transfixed, unable to move away. Something just on the edge of reality. They were gone, but a strange sort of anticipation remained. That they might sud-denly reappear, like a fish that jumps, breaking the surface of a lake, the unspoken promise that it could happen again.

Lance stared at the spot by the curb where the sun had now moved to fill the space. The air rippled with heat, then settled.

Like nothing had ever been there at all.

-::-

At first, the idea of spending the summer in LA had not appealed to him.

Both JC and Justin lived there full-time. But they were gone more than they were home. That didn’t leave their houses empty though. There were always people there. People Lance didn’t know well, if at all. They had different lives now, all of them, and separate sets of friends. Friends who fit together like nesting dolls, one on top of the other.

Lance belonged to the Orlando set. He knew that.

And that was allright. Especially now, when he actually wanted to be by himself.

He didn’t need much room, and he wouldn't be there the entire time. There was Vegas and the people he knew in Palm Desert. He'd be in and out. But when he was home, he wanted quiet. Solitude. So it also made no sense to rent a place of his own. Too many people just in town for the weekend would find their way to his door. And it would be hard to say no.

The house in Westlake Village had virtually dropped out of the sky. Its owner had been gone since February, living on the east coast. Lance had felt guilty cutting Linda Sweetser loose from A Happy Place, but there was no work right now. She was a talented producer and was willing to wait. She was also loyal. Lance knew that she wouldn't leave on her own, so he had forced her into it. It had been a good move. Still she hadn't wanted to give up her home in LA until she was sure that things in New York would work out.

She had needed a housesitter. Lance had needed a place to stay. It was a perfect fit.

The house itself was also perfect. It had a large kitchen, a master suite, and an exercise pool. But the balcony off the study was his favorite place. It was cloaked at one end by eucalyptus trees. There was a table with four chairs and an over-sized chaise lounge. At night, he would take a glass of wine and his laptop, and settle in. The neighborhood was supernaturally quiet for a suburb and sometimes he drifted off and would awaken hours later, the screen saver rolling soft waves of blue across the open screen.

Twilight had been his favorite time on the balcony.

That is, until the the day that the woman in the black jetta and the man in the panel van had invaded his consciousness.


-::-

The idea of writing his own screenplay had been something he'd kept to himself. Otherwise it would have become the sack lunch from high school, snatched then tossed back and forth over his head until he gave up, exhausted from chasing after it. Even now, he could hear Chris and Joey whooping loudly somewhere in the background. On top of that, he wasn't writing music. So neither Justin nor JC would understand. Lance loved words, not just how the words sounded together or whether they rhymed. He wanted to write a story. Then a treatment for the big screen. Just to see if he could do it.

So he needed time alone. Uninterrupted. In LA that meant flying under the media radar.

He'd scheduled a little of what Johhny Wright had always called busy work. Appearances. Charity events. Movie premieres. Things that would fit into his schedule and still provide photo opportunities. If he was visible to a point, the people he'd once paid handsomely to raise his public profile would leave him alone. At least for a while.

It had taken him almost a week to settle in. He'd been used to new things on tour, beds that were too soft, rooms that were colder than he liked. At some point, he'd started carrying his own pillow and a pink bulb for the lamp by the bed. Even in the best hotels, the lighting was too harsh to read by. So sleeping in a strange place every night wasn't a problem anymore. But sleeping in the same strange place every night, was.

He'd been restless and up earlier than usual, the second time the black jetta appeared.


It was parked in almost exactly the same spot, only one house down and to the right. The sprinklers had come on and half the car glistened in the morning sun. The front tire was tucked snugly against the curb and Lance wondered to himself for a moment how the woman with the long dark hair could make the sweeping turn this time without backing up. And why she had chosen such a small car in the first place. From what remembered, she was tall. Easily taller than he was.

He'd begun to notice small details like that since he'd started writing again. Tiny things. Like the angle of the sun. The exact color of the grass. The setting was more important to him now than it had ever been before. It wasn't just a cut shot in a script. It really mattered. These people had chosen this spot for a reason. It was important that he get it right. It had been a perfect fit for him. But also for them. For some reason, they'd felt safe here. Maybe they lived or worked nearby. Or maybe this neighborhood was so far removed from where they lived their normal lives, they knew they would never be recognized.

Exposed.

Lance paused for a moment, letting the implication of the word roll over him. As much as he'd been around, as much as he'd seen and heard on the road, he’d never actually been party to someone having an affair. A secret relationship that was not supposed to be. There'd been a lot of mixing and matching on tour, but nothing that was secret. Or serious. It just didn't happen.

He looked again at the car. This time he noticed that the window on the passenger's side was not completely closed, and he wondered if the seat was wet inside now, the windshield fogged so that the girl would have to wipe over it before driving away. Ideas were coming at him now faster than he could store them. Lance knew himself well enough to know that if he didn't write it down, it would get lost. All of it. He balanced his coffee mug on the railing and stepped back through the sliding glass door in search of his laptop.

By the time he'd returned from the kitchen, the black car was gone. Lance stared at the dry rectangle where it had been parked, then leaned over the railing looking first up the street, then down.

There was nothing to see.

He took a deep breath and started reciting the details he wanted to remember, then sat at the umbrella table and opened the computer. By the time he'd finished typing, the sun had moved over the house and the deck was bathed with light.

-::-

"Their company's probably going through a rough time, and the romance makes it bearable."

Lance shook his head before speaking as though the person on the phone could actually see his frustration. "They don't work in an office. They look nothing like that."

The voice on the other end seemed confused.

"I thought you saw them only once and even then, just one of them."

Lance looked down at the cars that streamed past the Beverly Center.

"You know what? I've got to go. I'll call you later."

He closed up his phone and made a mental note to work up the characters when he got home. Talking to Beth had made one thing perfectly clear. He'd spent so much time describing where they were that he'd neglected to even think about who they were. He had a pretty good idea who they were not. But they didn't have names or faces. They weren't real.

He'd read somewhere that a good writer fell in love with his characters for a while. He didn't love these two people. In fact, he knew nothing about them at all. But he wanted to. Very, very much.

He pushed through the door to the parking lot and for a minute the bright sun blinded him. He'd taken out his glasses on the escalator, but hadn't even thought to put them on. He stopped for a second. When he looked back up, he was aware for the first time of how empty the mall was at this time of day. There were only a handful of people moving among the cars in the parking lot. And they all looked like strangers. But were they? Could the woman in the Jetta and the man in the van be here, somewhere? Was this another one of their meeting places?

It was something Lance had not thought about before. That they might play out the very same scene in different locations. He let his eyes sweep over the first few rows of cars, but saw nothing even vaguely familiar.

He'd already tossed his phone on the seat and started the engine, when another thought came to him. That he might not recognize either of them here. Away from that setting. It was probably something that they counted on. Blending in. He nodded to himself as he turned out of the parking lot onto La Cienega. He wanted to hold that thought. It was a perfect plot device. They looked like part of the landscape, like they belonged. Wherever that was.

He needed to do a lot more thinking. About the strangers. And about people in general. Even the ones he thought he knew well. He had gone through his rolladex twice before deciding to call Beth. He'd wanted a good listener. Someone who would not ask too many questions. And who thought like he did.

He'd been wrong about her.

He didn't want to be wrong about them.

-::-

Something about the desert spoke to him. Perhaps because it was the exact opposite of all that he had known as a child. It was dry and wild and unforgiving. Reckless and dangerous and romantic. And the people who went there, knew that it was all make-believe. Temporary. They could be inserted like paper dolls. And for a day or two, be someone else, live another life. And still go home. Like time-out had been called and for a few fleeting moments, there were no rules. No one cared.

The Ghost Bar at The Palms had the kind of breathtaking view that made his body feel loose. Like he could fold into the leather chair and sit there till dawn. Waiting. Lance had always liked being seduced. It was part of his nature, letting someone else make the first move. The room around him was dark. Moody. And far enough away from the flesh-pressing night club scene for him to blend in.

The Palms billed itself as the resort that had redefined pleasure, in ways never before imagined. Lance stared at the cardboard tent on the table and flicked at it with his fingers. For the first time in days he thought about the dark-haired woman and her lover. That was how he thought of them now. Not as strangers, but as lovers. Redefining pleasure. Taking a few stolen hours to do exactly what they wanted. Getting lost in it.

Lance jotted the words on a napkin and looked at them. First pleasure. Then lost. He sketched a caricature of a palm tree between the two words, then tucked it into his pocket. He looked back up and caught his own reflection in the window. Then stared beyond it into the darkness, trying to see their faces. What they would look like here in this room. He wondered briefly who had made the first move. And who had chosen to wait. To be seduced. Knowing it was going to happen. He felt a flush color his skin and knew at once how they must have felt. The excitement. He wondered again if he had words for that kind of desire. An intensity so strong that the brush of a hand, any contact at all, was hot to the point of burning. The touch of their lips almost painful.

He was in the elevator on the way to his room when he realized that he wouldn't see them again for a while. That busy work would keep him away. He felt oddly homesick, like there was some other place he desperately wanted to be.

~

He'd only spent three days in Vegas, but there had been sidetrips to Nashville and Floribama. Two weeks away from the house in Westlake. It was the longest he'd been on the road in months. He didn't like it anymore. In the morning, he would call Beth again and work it out. No more long trips.

As the limo turned the corner, Lance felt his senses heighten. There was a new car parked in front of his house. One he hadn't seen before. He stared at the Crown Victoria as if it were a Romulan Warbird that had appeared out of nowhere. Uncloaking in a stunning show of power. It had caught his eye almost at once. Not because it didn't belong in this neighborhood, but because it did. Perfectly. And that made it invisible. A car that would draw no attention at all. It was her. He knew it. The car was different this time, but it was her. He was sure of it.

The limo had stopped only long enough for Lance to sign the voucher. He was on the second floor land-ing just outside the study when he heard the car at the curb start up and he ran for the sliding glass door. In the time it had taken him to open the front door, put his keys on the counter, and walk upstairs, the drop-off had happened. The woman with the long dark hair had been returned to her car by the man in the Heineken van.

And Lance had missed the whole thing. Again.

For a brief moment he thought seriously about getting into his own car, to see if he could find them. If his phone hadn't rung at exactly that moment, he'd have done it. Chased after the Crown Victoria.

And then he would have missed them. Really missed them.

The male was driving a silver porsche this time. And there was no quick drop-off. Instead the man Lance had never seen leaned across the seat and pulled the woman to him. He had only an obstructed view of the car, but he knew that they were kissing. That it was a slow and deliberate kiss like they had all the time in the world. As if this was not a public street and not broad daylight, but instead the other world they had just come back from. The one where they could kiss like this for as long as they wanted.

His hand was in her hair now, long fingers that moved with a kind of desperation. Lance felt like an intruder, but he couldn't tear himself away. He had never seen the man at all and now there was a brief glimpse of him. A darkened profile. He was holding her very still now, burying his face in her skin as he kissed her neck. His hair was short, cut very close and fine. There was no way to tell what color it was. A glint of light had radiated through the window and Lance thought he might have seen a ring, some-thing with a precious stone in it. But as they moved apart, Lance realized that it was something else. An earring.

He was wearing an earring.

The car door opened suddenly and Lance stepped into the shadow of the eucalyptus trees, holding his breath until he heard the other porsche start up. The black one that had been parked one house down, on the right. Both cars pulled away. Again in opposite directions. Powerful engines tearing the air apart.

-::-

"I say it's not like that at all. They probably drive somewhere and he macks on her for a while, then he drives her back. They're not even getting a room. I'd put money on it." Joey pushed the last of his salad onto his fork, then looked up at Lance. "What?"