Within This Frame

by Zart, Lindy

  He studied her features. “I don’t like last chances. It implies an end.”

  “Everything has to end.”

  Lance sat up. Head lowered, he looked at his hands. “I don’t like ends either.”

  Maggie put in a movie and moved to sit beside him. “It doesn’t matter if you like it or not, that’s just the way it is.” She grabbed his arm and plopped it over her shoulders, smiling at him when he looked down at her.

  “Not always,” was his cryptic response.

  They watched two movies, Lance with his arm around her and Maggie resting her head on his chest. Then they went to the kitchen and made flourless peanut butter cookies, standing beside each other at the counter as they ate them. It was bittersweet, and ridiculous, and Maggie mourned the upcoming hours. She laughed, and smiled, and teased, and she pretended she was happy when she was really sad.

  In the basement workroom a few hours later, Maggie stared at the dozens of essential oils with Lance next to her. Maggie had changed into a stained blue shirt and purple leggings, and Lance hadn’t changed out of his grubby clothes from earlier. The cool temperature faded away as she focused on his nearness to her.

  “This is my favorite part,” she said, glancing at him.

  “What, staring at the bottles?”

  “Deciding what scents to use.”

  He studied her face, the ghost of a smile on his face. “Why is that?”

  “It’s fun to try out new scents, combine different oils and see what happens.”

  “As long as they don’t smell horrid.”

  “True.”

  Her fingers itched to touch him and Maggie spontaneously reached up and brushed hair from his forehead. Lance clapped his fingers around her wrist and slowly lowered her hand, gazing into her eyes. She opened her mouth, but words failed her. Lance looked at her in a way that made her pulse react maddeningly. Unspoken truths passed from his eyes to hers, and back again to his.

  “What do you recommend?” he murmured, releasing her hand.

  “Uh . . . um . . .” Maggie inhaled deeply, trying to think of a response to a question she didn’t remember. Shaking her head, she grabbed two random bottles and slapped them into Lance’s hand.

  He read the labels, looking up with a frown on his face. “Peppermint and lemon?”

  Maggie snorted. “No. That won’t work. Pick one of those and I’ll put the other back.”

  “Lemon.”

  “Okay. Good choice.” She nodded and leaned forward, tapping her fingers along the bottle caps as she thought. “Let’s be daring, shall we?” Maggie chose a bottle.

  “Vanilla.” He sounded skeptical.

  “What’s wrong with vanilla?”

  “Nothing. It just . . . doesn’t sound all that daring. How about . . . orange?”

  “You want lemon and orange scented soap?”

  Lance tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “I do.”

  She shrugged and moved away to catch her breath. “All right.”

  Maggie grabbed equipment from a shelf and slapped it into Lance’s hands. “First step—gloves, goggles, and masks.”

  “What the hell? I thought we were making soap, not performing some science experiment.”

  “Soap making is a science experiment. We’re going to be working with lye. It can burn you, or worse, cause an explosion.”

  “Explosion?”

  “It would be unlikely that that would happen.” Maggie gathered necessary tools and set them up on the table in the middle of the room.

  “Explosion?”

  “It would be a minor one.”

  Lance grabbed her arm and firmly turned her around. “Explosion?”

  Maggie looked at his troubled expression and grinned. “You wanted to be daring, right?”

  “Yeah,” he said faintly.

  “Who knew soap making could be dangerous?”

  She went to the freezer and removed a container of goat milk. Maggie then flipped a switch on the wall and a vent turned on, working to keep fresh air circulating through the area. “Over there, near the shelf, are a bunch of tubs of labeled oils. Get out the palm, coconut, olive, and palm kernel.”

  “You’re sexy when you’re bossy,” Lance said from across the room, eyes trained on her.

  Maggie laughed and struck a pose.

  Proper gear on, all the needed ingredients and utensils in place, they went to work.

  “What happens if we get burned?”

  “We put vinegar on the burns.”

  “And what is the purpose of the lye?” he asked, stirring the pot on the stove as she measured, weighed, and added.

  “It acts as a cleaning agent, attracts dirt and oil from the skin.”

  When the base of goat milk and lye and the combined oils were each between eighty and ninety degrees, they were mixed together. Lance stirred the components until the blend became somewhat thick, and then Maggie added crushed almonds and oatmeal to it once it was removed from heat.

  “We have to work fast now. Do you have the molds picked out that you want to use?”

  Lance motioned to the table. Not surprisingly, he’d chosen the alien heads.

  Smile stretching her face, Maggie began to fill them. “These have to set up in the molds for one to two days, and then it takes four to six weeks for them to cure. I’ll bring them to the fundraiser, if that’s all right? They should be ready in time.”

  Lance nodded, watching her as though spellbound.

  “It’s just soap,” she told him.

  He raised his head, his eyebrows lowered. “It’s not just soap. It’s you, being confident, creating things. It’s . . . hell . . . it’s the most fun I’ve had in a long time. Almost as good as sex.”

  She laughed. “I think that nine or ten months of abstinence is messing with your head.”

  “I think it’s the three months with you, actually. The first six months didn’t seem all that bad.”

  Maggie went still, then hurriedly finished with the cleanup. “What time is it?”

  Lance checked the watch on his wide wrist. “It’s after three. I have time to shower and pack and go.”

  She started up the stairs, pausing as Lance’s words hit her. Her pace was slower the rest of the way, sorrow adding weight to her legs. You’re fine. You’ve been fine all these years. You’ll be fine again. Except Maggie could no longer be satisfied with half a life, not since Lance showed her all she was excluding herself from. She couldn’t not do wonderful things for fear of the not so wonderful things.

  Once in the kitchen, Maggie turned to face him. “I want to co-host. Your show,” she stated when a frown claimed his mouth. “I want to co-host your show.”

  Maggie didn’t know when the thought transpired, and she didn’t really remember at any point thinking that, yes, she would do the show, or even that she wanted to co-host it. But she realized she did. It was an opportunity to do something great, and she had to take it.

  Pulse uneven and fast in anticipation of his reaction, she stared at Lance. They could do something wonderful together. It didn’t have to be goodbye. Their end could be postponed.

  Lance shook his head. “No. I’m sorry, Maggie, but no.”

  A frown took over her face as her hopes fell. “But . . . you wanted me on your show. Why don’t you anymore?”

  “Because I don’t even know if there’s going to be a show. And . . .” Lance rubbed his face. “I don’t want you to have a relapse because you can’t deal with the media. I don’t want you on my show anymore.” He dropped his hands. “And I sure as hell don’t want you as a co-host. That would be asking for problems.” His tone was hard, flints of ice in his eyes.

  “I’m stronger now than I was then,” she insisted. “Not just my body, but my mind. You know I am.”

  Lance averted his face, remaining silent.

  With a lump in her throat and a sick sensation swirling in her stomach, Maggie slowly nodded. “Okay. Fine. That’s your decision. But tell me why, and tell me the tr
uth.”

  His jaw turned to stone and Lance moved for the exit. “I have to get ready to go.”

  She let him go, confused and sad.

  Maggie took a shower and dressed in a loose shirt and shorts, studying her image in the mirror above her dresser. She felt along her sides and midsection, turning to examine her leg muscles, flexing her arms. She liked her body. It wasn’t perfect, but it was hers, and she was taking care of it. Laughing softly to herself, she turned and blanched. Lance stood inside the doorway, hair wet and black, dressed in a green shirt and dark jeans.

  He watched her with throbbing intensity in his eyes. “Do you trust me?”

  She tilted her head. Did she trust him? Maggie thought of where they’d started, where they’d gone, and where they presently were—all they’d been through to get them to that exact moment. She swallowed, nodding jerkily. Yes. She trusted him.

  Relief lightened his eyes, took shadows from his face. He stood taller. “I have my reasons for telling you no. Can you trust me?”

  “I do,” she said firmly.

  “Great. Now that that’s taken care of . . .” He grinned like a fiend with a new plaything. “I have forty minutes. We can either have phenomenal sex or we can have . . . meaningful conversation.” Lance’s mouth twisted around the last words. He set the bobby pin he’d used to unlock the door yet again on a stand that housed a framed picture of Maggie with her mom and dad.

  “Bobby pins and lipstick . . . I’m beginning to wonder at your extracurricular activities,” she said, looking at the place he’d put the hair accessory.

  He sighed. “The jig is up—I’m a robber slash drag queen. Now you know.” Lance opened his arms. “Judge away.”

  Maggie crossed the room to him, her hand outstretched. “No judging. How about you just hold me?” she said softly.

  Lance’s face contorted with hurt, and then he nodded abruptly.

  Situated on the bed with their arms and legs touching, and Maggie’s head on Lance’s shoulder, they looked at a ceiling and committed the feel of one another to memory.

  “About seven years ago, one day my sister showed up here with a cat,” Maggie said, Lance’s shirt fisted in her hand.

  “I thought she was allergic?”

  “Apparently only when it comes to having them live with her.” Maggie’s mouth tipped down, but it quickly melted into a smile. “She thought I needed a pet to cheer me up. I was angry at first, but I took him anyway, mainly because she said if I didn’t, the shelter she’d gotten him from was going to put him to sleep.”

  “No pressure.”

  “He was the ugliest, meanest cat. He was black and white and his face looked flattened, and he had half of an ear gone from previous street fighting. Anytime I went to pet him, he’d try to bite me. I named him Lance.”

  A low rumble of mirth traveled up his chest. “I’m flattered.”

  Maggie’s smile faded and her eyes burned. “During the day he hid, but he used to come in my bedroom at night and sleep near my feet. Broke my heart. Lance was scared, but he still wanted love, so he’d slink into my bedroom when he thought I was asleep and wrap himself around me.”

  “That sounds disturbingly like me.”

  She laughed. “He started coming out during the day, then he’d follow me around. I’d show him pictures of you and tell him how he was such a better boy than his namesake. He’d sit on my lap and purr and bite me when I got too close.” Maggie inhaled deeply. “He healed me, and I healed him. I loved that cat.”

  Lance’s arms tightened around her. “What happened to him?”

  Maggie picked at his shirt, closing her eyes. “He got outside one day when I didn’t properly close the door. A car hit him. You wouldn’t believe how much I cried, all for a hateful cat named Lance.”

  “I’m sorry, Maggie.”

  She moved to her elbows and looked down at a face shaded in the darkness sorrow brought. “I cried because I loved Lance and that was a good thing. Even though I ended up heartbroken, and I lost him, I was glad that I’d had him to love. That cat was more cathartic than years of counseling.”

  Lance flipped them so that Maggie’s back was to the bed with him above her. His strong body was aligned with hers, making her yearn for him. He locked his fingers around hers and slid their arms above her head, dipping down to place a kiss upon her forehead. Lance’s eyelashes teased her cheek when he pressed the side of his face to hers.

  “I bought you a ring—when you went back to Iowa before we broke up,” he said against her mouth.

  “What?” she choked out, body taut with disbelief.

  He moved his face so that their eyes were even and she could see the truth in them. “If I had been crazy enough to propose, would you have said yes? I mean—before I cheated on you with Tabitha.”

  “Yes,” Maggie answered after a pause. “But it would have been wrong.”

  Lance nodded. “That’s what I realized too.”

  “What did it look like?”

  A sad smile claimed his mouth. “It had a silver band with a heart-shaped diamond. Tacky, right?”

  Maggie’s throat tightened. “No.”

  “I kept it, used to stare at it for hours. It was a symbol of us to me, and I couldn’t get rid of it. I eventually lost it, and yeah, I cried over that.” Lance’s smile faltered and the blueness of his eyes darkened. “You had a cat and I had a ring.”

  He kissed her, his mouth tasting like the sweet tartness of apples. Maggie let his lips tell her all she wanted to know without uttering a word. His mouth was warm and hard, soft and coaxing. They kissed like they were lovers, like a goodbye could never really keep them apart. Words blocked her throat and Maggie kept them unsaid. She knew how she felt about Lance—he knew how he felt about her.

  Maggie cupped his jaw on either side, the rough edges of it causing tingles in her fingertips. If a day could come, that allowed Maggie and Lance to either toss aside or embrace their broken, flawed love, she would take it. Every day she would take it. He ended the kiss, studying her face with flared nostrils. Eyes sparked with lust and something more, his heart pounded against her chest. Shutters fell over his dark handsomeness, hiding all he felt.

  “I have to go.” Lance got to his feet and started for the door.

  Maggie jumped from the bed and ran, locking her arms around his waist and burying her face against his shirt. She trembled within arms that shook as they held her.

  “I don’t want to say goodbye. I’m not ready. I’ll see you at the fundraiser.” Lance swallowed and offered a half-smile when she looked at him. “It’s less than a month away and the thought of going that month without seeing you makes my head hurt.”

  “Are you trying to say you’ll miss me?” Maggie smiled, but it was laced with an ache.

  “I’m trying not to say it. I’ll miss you as soon as I walk out the door, Maggie,” he admitted.

  They hugged again, it lasting for minutes and yet over too soon. They could say words, make promises. She could say she loved him and Lance would probably say it back. Maggie could say she wanted to try again. Lance could say he’d never hurt her again. Maybe it was all true. But Maggie didn’t want to claim certainties in an existence without many, so she smiled and tried not to cry as Lance walked out the door.

  After he was gone, Maggie ambled around the house, unsuccessfully searching for pieces of him. She already missed him too, felt the ache where he should be. She ended up in the bedroom Lance used while there. Maggie looked at the bed, once again in its proper spot, and she smiled, though it wobbled and fell. He’d cleaned the lipstick message from the bathroom mirror, but Maggie had asked him to leave it on the basement one. Sometimes a short message was the difference between a positive and a negative outlook.

  Her eyes landed on the bed and she frowned, stepping closer. An unmarked envelope lay there, and with trembling fingers, she opened it, staring at the check she’d written Lance to cover the time he’d worked with her. Her hand dropped to her side, the
paper falling from it. Her heart grew, added more of Lance to it, until it was brimming with bits and piece of him, and their disjointed path that overlapped one another’s. What a stupid thing to do. He needed the money.

  Not that much, he seemed to whisper in her head.

  LANCE—1999

  THE FOLLOWING SEASON, Maggie got Tabitha fired. She told Herman either Tabitha left, or she did. Tabitha was an essential character, but Maggie was the show.

  Lance didn’t say anything as Tabitha walked off the set after doing her final scene as Zoe Clark on ‘Easier Said’. She glared at him, and he stared back. Ultimately, it was his fault she was canned. If he hadn’t gotten shit-faced drunk and slept with her, Maggie wouldn’t have come back early the day after his birthday party to surprise him and instead receive her own unforgettable, unforgivable surprise.

  Every day since the day he lost Maggie was like living in hell for Lance. Everyone on the show knew what had happened, but that wasn’t what was slaying him. It was Maggie, and how he’d hurt her. Maggie looked at him like he was a stranger. Like they’d never kissed, or touched, or been together. She looked at him like she’d never seen him before, and it broke his heart. He’d thought it was broken before. He’d been wrong.

  It was shattered, and it was his doing.

  Herman shouted behind him, startling Lance. “Get your ass to my office, Denton!”

  He turned around, but Herman was already across the room and in Maggie’s face. She was pale, nodding as he went on and on about something. Lance started for them, but a hand pressed to his chest and stopped him.

  “Don’t,” Steven Stephens urged. Steven played Maggie’s father and Judith’s husband on the show, and the kindness found in his character was genuine. He was the best out of all of them, Maggie excluded.

  “He’s yelling at her for something that isn’t even her fault. I messed things up, not her. It’s because of me that she’s blowing her lines and not acting as well as she can.”

  “It is her fault if she can’t be professional. What happens outside of the show, even if it involves the people on the show, stays there. She put Herman in a bad spot, giving him an ultimatum like that. If she wasn’t such an integral part of the show, I think he would have let her go instead of Tabitha. Viewers are not going to be happy with the loss of Tabitha’s character. Maggie will have to wow them to make up for that, and how she’s performing lately isn’t going to do it.”