Dreams by Starlight

By Staci Stallings

Chapter 11

For two weeks Camille had watched him, and although Jaylon was still as gorgeous as ever, he looked incredibly lonely, sad and out-of-place. She wished Saturday had worked out better, but when her mother had announced an all-of-us shopping day, Daria simply could not be persuaded otherwise. As it turned out, it was an all-of-them shopping day-as it usually was.

Daria had come home with several new outfits, but Camille knew too much about the thin strand the family was holding on by, so she insisted that she had plenty of clothes and needed nothing else. Besides, she knew the whole trip was just about assuaging her mother's guilt over not taking more interest in their lives. It never failed. Once or twice a year for a day or two they were suddenly the most important things in their mother's world. For the rest of the year, they were simply obstacles in her path.

With a shove Camille pushed those thoughts out of her mind as her attention caught on the black leather that had just brushed passed her auditorium chair. She couldn't see his face or his eyes, but that wasn't necessary anymore. The sadness in the bend of his shoulders screeched across her heart, and she wished again that they could just talk. What she would say was a mystery, but anything was better than seeing him beaten to the ground.

"I even talked to her about it," Ariana's strained voice bounded through the crowd noise. "She is dead-set on choosing one of these stupid plays. They're all just so yesterday."

Wishing she wouldn't even as she did, Camille looked up and caught the arrow straight shoulders and razor thin waist as it moved passed her. If she was just Ariana, she could walk up to Jaylon and... and what? The fact that she wasn't even in Ariana's hemisphere slammed that thought right out of Camille's mind.

"So, what's it going to be?" Nick asked as he took his seat next to Camille.

Off-handedly she pushed her glasses up and forced her attention back to the space surrounding her. "What's what going to be?"

"Your choice for the play?" he asked as though that question should be obvious.

"I kind of liked 'Don't Listen to the Fates.' I think it would be fun to do."

Nick nodded. "Well, that's two votes." He expended a small amount of movement to get his books in order. "By the way, I've been meaning to ask you. Lexie's birthday is next week, have you gotten a date yet?"

By the way, Boris, Camille's mind screamed, have you set off the nuclear bomb yet? "Uh, no. I hadn't really thought about it." Unconsciously she pushed the edge of her glasses up. "Why?"

"Well, I could set you up if you'd like."

"A blind date?" Camille asked in horror. "No, I don't think so."

Mrs. Allen picked that moment to stride on to the stage.

"Okay, but you've got until Tuesday, and then I'll be forced to take matters into my own hands," Nick said far too seriously for Camille.

"I think we'll go ahead and get the vote out of the way," Mrs. Allen said from the stage. "We'll do this by secret ballot, and over the weekend I'll take the ballots and make my decision. Please take out a piece of paper, and write your choice on it."

It took only seconds for Camille to make her choice.

"Okay, now if everyone will please pass them to the center of the aisle," Mrs. Allen said when the noise level indicated that most choices had been made.

Instantly Camille took Nick's as she looked down to the other end of the row for the rest of the ballots.

"Jaylon, if you'll pick them up, please," Mrs. Allen said, and the ballots in Camille's hand threatened to scatter into the darkness at her feet.

Keeping her gaze glued to the far end of the auditorium on the ballots coming her way, she fought not to notice the black jacket approaching her row. However, the second he stepped next to her seat, she could feel the heat pouring off him. It seemed to rain down on her and flood through her neck and face until she was sure when the last ballot reached her that her whole body must be glowing bright red.

Quickly she stacked the votes together and fought to act natural as she turned to transfer them to him. But the second she looked up, all the battles ceased. He stood there, three feet above her, smiling softly, with not even a trace of sadness in his eyes.

With her heart in her throat, she laid the ballots into his out-stretched hand. Then in the last second before he turned back for the stage, one lid fell closed, and his smile brightened. And then he was gone. Camille closed her eyes as she slid down into her seat, letting the feelings inside her wash over her.

It was silly, stupid even. He probably winked at a lot of girls-all of them far more beautiful and sophisticated than she was. But for all the rationalizations of her brain, her heart simply wanted to live that one moment over and over again forever.

"I also want to remind you about the performance of 'True North' tonight and tomorrow night at the Ashcroft," Mrs. Allen was saying from the stage, and although Camille knew she should be paying attention, that was the last thing any part of her wanted to do.

For the rest of the afternoon, she sailed on a cloud of Jaylon's smile and his eyes, looking through the dimness of the theatre right into her own. It crowded out everything else-even the fact that Nick and Lexie had made other plans for the evening. Ever-so-slowly she was losing her best friend. Ever-so-slowly their last year together was slipping away, and the only thing that could take her mind off of that sad fact was the few moments when she could look into Jaylon's eyes.

It wasn't a terrible thing that they had other plans anyway she thought as she pulled on the best dress she owned-the one with only two small darn marks at the hem. Nick would probably laugh at her if he knew she hadn't finished the "My Fair Lady" assignment. Carefully, she braided the two sides of her hair and then pulled them together at the nape of her neck.

Although it made no sense, she kind of liked the idea of going out to a play. It was better than sitting at home in front of the television all night feeling sorry for herself. One more check in the mirror, and she decided that was as good as she was going to get. She grabbed her notebook from the desk, gave a few final instructions to the babysitter and then said a quick good-bye to Daria before stepping out into the cold November air.

The Ashcroft Theatre was much smaller than the Mance Theatre, and Camille quietly chose a seat about seven rows back. She laid her coat on the back of her chair and settled in. With her notebook on her lap, she pulled her pen from her ear and then opened the playbill. "True North, a quasi-comedy about life. Huh. Sounds familiar."

Her attention slipped to the stage as the lights went down, and the curtain slowly slid to the sides to reveal a wispy blue smoke pouring in from the edges of the stage. Through the blue smoke lit only with black light a lady in pink satin emerged from the back of the stage in all her glory.

In the darkness Camille squinted at the playbill, trying to figure out which character she was, but it was too dark to read, and Camille quickly gave up. The lady on stage looked every bit of ninety; however, she walked in a fluid, dance like fashion to the center of the stage, bringing her feather boa with her majestically.

"Life," the lady intoned. "It makes perfect nonsense while your living it. Perfect nonsense. Take the first time Bobby Porter asked me for a date." She lounged down onto a long couch dead center stage. "I was eight, and there was only one thing I was certain of, and that was that all boys were frog-holding, fist-fighting, dirty wastes of precious air."

The lights came up on the right side of the stage, revealing two small children. The girl was dressed in a white and pink, lace and crinoline number-the boy in dirty jeans and a slightly ripped yellow and brown plaid shirt.

"I picked these for you special," the little boy said as he held out a small handful of wilted wildflowers.

"Now what'd you go and do that for?" the little girl asked, crossing her arms in front of her and turning her back to him. "Where'd you get 'em-the meadow?"

Slowly the little boy's face fell as he shrank back. "I thought of you when I saw 'em."

The little girl turned to the flowers disgustedly. "I hope I don't look like that." Then with a smirk, she cocked her head. "Why don't you just take your little flowers and go find some other girl to annoy?"

'Bratty,' Camille wrote in her notebook just as the bright light winked off, once again revealing the lady in the cream lounge chair.

"Just like that," she said, arching her shoulders up. "That's what I said. And it worked, too. Bobby went, and he gave those flowers to Betsy Thompkins. 'Course she moved away when we were about 12, and I guess that was the end of that."

Slowly she shook her head. "I always kind of wondered what would've happened if I'd have taken his flowers. But like I said, life don't make no sense-not a lick of it. And it don't get no better the older you get neither. Just one long string of random moments going nowhere."

Her voice faded out, and she seemed to be lost in her own thoughts. Then suddenly it was as though she had remembered that she hadn't been speaking. "Bobby? Oh, yes. He asked me out again. I was 16 at the time, and nothing was making any more sense.

"I told him that a hundred times, it don't make no sense, Bobby, but Bobby never saw it that way."

Instantly bright lights illuminated the left side of the stage.

"I'm not joking, Ellie," a young boy said to a girl seated primly on an ornately carved chair. "It's just ice cream. You don't even have to sit with me if you don't want to."

Camille laughed with the rest of the audience and made a note on her paper.

"Bobby Porter, you don't have no business asking me out. Why your daddy works down at the factory. What would that look like to everybody else? It'd be a big step down for me. Although from your perspective I can see how it couldn't do nothing but help."

"Yep," the lady on the couch said as the bright lights snapped off, "that's what I said all right, Bobby Porter, it don't make no sense for me to go out with you. I wanted to go out with... now, what was that guy's name again? ... Hmm, completely slipped my mind now.

She thought for a moment more and continued. "I guess it don't make no difference now. But I'll tell you what that Bobby Porter, well, he was a persistent one if nothing else. He didn't take no for an answer unless the question was, aren't you ever going to give up?"

The lights snapped on to the right of the stage, and it was the same couple in slightly different clothes. Immediately the bridge of Camille's nose wrinkled in confusion, and she looked back over to the other side of the stage. How did they do that so fast? She shook her head to clear it of the confusion and refocused her mind on the on-going conversation to the right of the stage.

The boy stood in slightly ragged clothing, clutching his hat. "You don't want to go out with me? What are you too tired?"

"No," the girl said adamantly. Her arms were crossed firmly in front of her as though they were made of stone.

"No?" he asked, turning the hat in his hands. "Does that mean no you won't go out with me, or no, you're not tired?"

The girl unfurled her hands into the air as the audience laughed. Then she slammed her hands on her hips and stared at the boy. "You, Bobby Porter, are the most exasperating, irritating, and frustrating person in the whole world."

"And you, Ellie Jane are the most beautiful girl I've ever laid eyes on," he said without missing a beat.

"ARGH!" she screamed, throwing her hands in the air and stomping off the stage.

"Yep," the lady down front said as the backlights snapped off. "He was always like that."

Camille made a few notes in her book was suddenly glad she had come. A three-hour diversion from her life was exactly what she needed.

The lady was still sitting center stage on her lounge chair, but she wasn't sitting up straight anymore. Now she was lying back motionless. The only addition to the original set was a man sitting in a chair next to her, holding her hand.

"It's okay, Ellie," he said in a voice that yanked the tears to Camille's lashes, her notes long-since forgotten. "I'll be here as long as you need me to be. I always have been, and I always will be because you Ellie Jane are my true north."

The lady seemed to hear that phrase, and she lifted her head. "Bobby? Is that you?"

"Yeah, Sweetness, it's me." He stroked her hand. "It's always been me, and it will always be me."

And with those words the curtains slid closed with four jerks. Along with the other theatre goers Camille's hands came together, first softly but gaining volume with each hit. The curtain came open again to reveal the actors taking their bows. It was too bad more people couldn't see that performance, Camille thought. The actors on stage continued to bow until finally the curtains swung closed, and the audience began their journey out.

Camille pushed the pen behind her ear and gathered her coat. It wasn't until she had stepped into the center aisle and glanced down the other side of seats that she stumbled into Jaylon's gaze looking right back at her. Immediately her face flushed as he smiled and offered a small wave.

"Hi," she said, trying to sound bright, but the syllable was drowned out by the noise of the departing theatre goers. Jaylon in a white T-shirt with an unbuttoned blue plaid shirt layered between it and his leather jacket pushed his way to her side.

"Well, fancy meeting you here," he said with a tinge of happiness lacing the statement. He ran a casual hand through his feathered locks to push them out of his eyes.

Camille was busy searching for something to look at other than the high cheekbones and the perfect smile. "Yeah, I didn't want to wait 'til the last minute to get in my last play."

Right next to her and with his elbow only a breath away, he walked with her up the aisle. "I hear you there. Knowing my luck I'd get sick for the last performance of 'Man of La Mancha' or something."

She laughed as she felt his gaze slide over her face.

"So, you've got your two done then?" he asked.

Camille shrugged. "I will by Monday."

"Oh, yeah, right," he said, smiling sheepishly. He held the door to the lobby open on the push of the person ahead of them, and they stepped through it. "I'm surprised more people weren't here tonight."

"But the theatre was almost full," Camille said in confusion.

"No," he said, correcting himself with a small cough. "I meant people from drama class."

"Oh."

"I saw Mark earlier, but I think he cut out sometime in the middle of the second act."

Immediately her eyebrows knitted together. "But then he missed Bobby at the end. Wasn't that kind of the point of the whole thing?"

Jaylon laughed carelessly. "Yeah, but let's not tell him that. Okay?"

Camille smiled at the teasing grin on his face. "That's cruel."

"It's not my fault. He should've stayed."

She shook her head and laughed.

"So, what are you up to now?" he asked, nonchalantly although the question threw her totally off-guard.

Quickly she looked at her watch. "I don't know. Going home to write my paper I guess."

"You've got all weekend to do that," he said, and she heard the edge of uncertainty slide into his voice. "How about we go over to Sal's, see what's going on over there?"

"Sal's?" she asked, choking on the word.

He smiled at her disarmingly, and there was a soft glint in his eyes. "Come on. I'll split some cheese fries with you."

For a moment her brain said she really should get home to take over for the babysitter, but with a quick glance at the wall clock, she knew she had some extra time. "Well, okay, but only for a little bit."

Jaylon couldn't believe his luck. Somehow he'd never even considered the possibility that she would be at this play. He opened his car door for her and watched her slip into the car seat as his heart did a small dance. Right or wrong, he was not going to let this golden opportunity get away from him. Quickly he slammed her door, ran around, crawled into his side, and slipped a CD into the player.

He glanced over at her but decided that was a recipe for having a wreck. "I missed you last weekend." From the side of his eye, he caught the questioning look she shot him. "At the center."

"Oh, yeah." She nodded slightly. "Mom decided we needed to do some bonding over a credit card and some clothes. Believe me, I would've preferred playing Dr. Mix-up."

Carefully he guided the car into traffic. "You and your mom don't get along?"

"It'd probably help if she knew I was around." The edge in her voice peeled in his ears as she looked down at her hands. "Or maybe if I just wasn't."

"Sounds serious."

Camille shrugged. "Once I got old enough to take care of myself, I kind of got replaced on her important things to care about list."

"What about your dad?" he asked softly, hoping that option evoked a more positive reaction.

However, Camille's face went hard as soon as the question was out of his mouth. "Which one do you mean?"

"I...I don't know." He glanced over at her. "How many are there?"

"Well, let's see," she said as the sarcasm dripped from the statement. "There's my dad, my original dad, but I haven't seen him in years. And there's Daria's dad, but he was only around long enough to get Mom pregnant, and then he skipped town. Then there was Leon Somebody. I don't remember him much, but he's in some pictures of when I was younger. Then there was some guy named Pete, but Mom found out he was married to someone else so she threw him out. And then there was Mr. Cordell, but he only lasted like six months or something."

"Jeez."

Camille snorted softly. "Yeah, you can say that again." She looked out the window, seeming to escape there. "It's okay. I guess I'm better off by myself anyway-well, me and Dar."

"You take good care of her. Don't you?" Jaylon asked, wishing he could reach across the seat to her.

For a long moment she didn't say anything. Then she shook her head. "I try."

The car swung into Sal's parking lot, and Jaylon quickly parked and then killed the engine. However, before he had a chance to make it to her door, she met him at the front of the car, and he purposely took up position behind her and followed her to the restaurant.

At the door he managed to reach around her and open it, and together they stepped into the warmth of Sal's Place. All the gazes turned to them as they made their way across the restaurant, and he felt each of them hit him like a punch. "How about over here?"

She didn't protest so he led her to one of the back booths. Not wanting to push his luck, he slid into the booth's opposite side and folded his hands on the table.

"You want anything other than cheese fries?"

Her gaze stayed firmly on the table. "I'm not really all that hungry."

"I'll tell you what. I'll get some, and you can eat whatever you want." He was only vaguely sure that she nodded, but he stood anyway. "I'll just go put in the order."

Wishing he couldn't feel all the gazes in the place following him, he sauntered to the counter and put in his order. As casually as he could remember how to be, he leaned on the counter and waited-not daring even a glance back into the restaurant.

"I'm telling you, Mrs. Allen is going to pull something else out at the last minute." Jaylon heard the voice behind him, and the feeling of wanting to be anywhere else dropped over him. "She cannot be seriously considering doing one of these plays. She just can't."

The clerk returned and pushed Jaylon's order across the counter before collecting his money. Taking in a long breath, Jaylon turned, and his gaze instantly caught on Ariana's. Her eyes went hard and then softened condescendingly.

"Jaylon," she said, glancing across at her table companion. "I didn't expect to see you here."

"Yeah," he said as he stepped over to the side of her table and found Keane looking up at him. In self-defense Jaylon turned a happy but mildly surprised look on his fellow thespian. "Don't have too much fun, you two. I've got to go, my order's getting cold."

"Oh, don't mind us. We wouldn't want to keep you," Ariana said, and the edge of her voice cut through his carefully constructed act.

Without bothering to reply, Jaylon stepped away from their table. He tried to get himself to feel even vaguely jealous as that's what a true ex would be feeling, but the only thing he could really feel was relief that he was walking away from Ari's table to Camille's.

"Sorry," he said as he slid the order onto the table between them. Smoothly he set her drink in front of her and unloaded the remainder of the tray. "Typical Friday night around here. It's nuts." He stacked his tray on another table and then slid back into the booth where he draped one arm over the empty seat next to him and reached for a fry with the other. "So, how'd you like the play?"

"Tonight's?" she asked, looking up like a frightened animal caught in a trap, and the smoothness seeped away from him.

Slowly he leaned forward, pulling his arm off the back of the booth and leaning it on the table. "Yeah. Have you decided what you're going to use to critique it?"

She sat without so much as reaching for a fry for a small eternity. "I thought it was pretty cool the way they kept switching sides of the stage so fast, and they looked so different every time. I can't figure out how they did that."

Jaylon smiled as he reached for another fry-the act of cool dropping away from him like a coat on a sweltering day. "It was the costumes. They were all made interchangeable. Add a vest, change a shirt, pin in some ribbons, take some out. The costume design people really did a good job."

He noticed Camille's shoulders relax slightly as she tentatively reached to the center of the table and took a fry.

"It was also kind of funny how she kept telling him to go away, and every time, there he was again," Camille said although she sounded anything but comfortable.

Finger-to-finger Jaylon spun a fry. "Yeah, but she was too full of herself for me."

Camille reached for another fry. "Yeah, but that was kind of the point. Wasn't it?"

Jaylon's eyebrows arched as he shook his head. "That he could love someone so selfish?"

"No, that he loved her for who she was, and he didn't try to change her."

A peel of laughter jumped above the crowd noise, and Jaylon's gaze slid across the restaurant to the fall of long black hair that was tossing side-to-side across the slender shoulders. Keane's slightly tanned face smiled as he watched his date. With a shake of his head, Jaylon looked back across the table at Camille in annoyance. "So that's what you think love is? Putting up with somebody even though they're self-centered and obnoxious?"

Slowly Camille's dark eyes melted into liquid just before her gaze fell so far down he could no longer see it. "No, but I think it does mean you don't hold every little fault against them, and you don't try to change them into what you want them to be."

"Huh," he snorted shortly and bent his own lips to the straw in his drink. However, for the brief second she glanced up at him, he caught the sadness behind her eyes, and his anger at Ariana disappeared in the concern for Camille. Immediately his thoughts went to Nick, and Jaylon wondered if he was the cause of her sadness. "So, which play did you choose for the Spring Production anyway?"

In the span of a blink the sadness in her eyes vanished. "Don't Listen to the Fates."

"Really? I liked that one too."

"Yeah, it's kind of funny how they're all trying to improve their lives by trying to be somebody their not."

"You mean how they're trying to improve themselves by dating the right person."

She smiled as her head bobbed up and down. "I think too many people think that these days. If I could just go out with him, then I'd be someone."

"If I could just go out with her, my life would be perfect," he said, laying his hand on his heart dramatically.

Camille's face scrunched forward. "Good luck. Life isn't perfect no matter who you're with."

"Huh. That's the difference," Jaylon said, sitting up straight as the realization came over him.

"What difference?" Camille asked as she reached for one of the few remaining fries.

"Between 'True North' and 'Don't Listen.'"

She took a small bite as seriousness washed over her features. "How do you mean?"

"I mean, Bobby loved her, and he wanted her to love him, but he didn't go all bending and contorting himself into something he wasn't to get her to love him."

"Huh," Camille said obviously impressed with his insight. "I never thought of it like that."

Jaylon gazed at her over the now empty basket. "Neither did I."

In the ensuing pause he watched her take a long drink, and his heart spun on the next question. He wanted to ask with every piece of his soul, but if her answer was no, he was afraid his whole world might crash down right at his feet.

Without warning she glanced up, and their gazes met. Hoping the smile that was in his heart was making it all the way to his face, he let his feelings have full rein. "So, are you coming to help out tomorrow?"

The question threw her gaze across the restaurant. "I don't know. I guess. I'll probably bring Dar anyway-as long as Mom doesn't rope us into something else."

His heart flipped over. "Oh, well, I thought we might try that mirror game from the first of drama with them."

Seriousness mixed with a large dose of horror descended onto her face. "In that case I'm definitely not coming."

He laughed at the scrunch on her face. "Oh, come on. You weren't that bad."

"Yeah, uh-huh, and the sky's not blue."

Of its own accord Jaylon's head shook. "Everybody has embarrassing moments."

"Not center stage they don't."

The smile softened right off of his face. "Well, most people don't have the guts to get up on center stage to begin with, so I think making a mistake up there is the supreme act of courage and grace."

"Grace?" Camille asked incredulously. "You haven't been watching me very closely. Have you?"

The last thing he wanted to do was to tell her just how closely he had been watching her. Unbidden his gaze fell to his watch. "Jeez, it's almost midnight. Where'd two hours go?"

"Midnight?" Camille asked, instantly scrambling for her belongings. "Oh, my gosh, I've got to get home."

"Oh." Jaylon stumbled up next to her. "I'm sorry. I didn't know you have a curfew."

"It's not curfew," Camille said, yanking her coat on. "The babysitter was supposed to be home an hour ago."

"Babysitter?" Jaylon asked in confusion as he followed her out of the restaurant, the gazes of curious on-lookers no longer even on his radar screen. "What babysitter?"

Quickly Camille pushed through the door and turned down the sidewalk in the opposite direction of his car.

"Hey." His hand reached out and arrested her flight. "The car's this way."

"But..." She looked over her shoulder at the bus stop bench.

"Come on," he said gently. "I can get you there in half the time."

For the longest moment of his life, he thought she might tell him she wanted nothing more than to get as far away from him as possible, but then fate smiled on him, and she turned her steps back up the sidewalk.

"Fine, but can we hurry?"

"You're wish is my command," he said, sweeping one hand in front of him.

"Forget the gallantry," she said as she grabbed his hand and pulled him down the sidewalk. "Just drive!"

He laughed as he stumbled after her ever-quickening steps to his car. With only one small stop on her side of the car, he ran around to his own side and fired up the engine. Smoothly he pulled out of the parking lot, and in seconds they were tracing their way through the city streets to her place.

"So, what's up with the babysitter anyway?" he asked.

"I just told her I would definitely be home before eleven."

Even as his hands guided the car through the streets, he looked over at her. "But why is that your job? Where's your mom?"

"Out."

"Out? Out where?"

"Who knows where," she said, and although it was clear that she wasn't happy about that fact, he barely heard the annoyance.

"You don't?"

"It's Friday night-I don't know. Bar? Date? Movies? Some guy's place?"

What was once mild worry suddenly felt like overwhelming concern. "She didn't tell you where she was going?"

"She never even came home," Camille said, and the hard edge of her voice cut his heart in two. "Believe me, it's pretty hard to keep up with someone who doesn't want you to."

"So you had to get a babysitter for Daria?"

Camille's laugh barely sounded on the air. "Pretty normal around my house."

Jaylon wanted to say that she shouldn't have to be a mother-she should just have to be a kid, but he knew that comment wouldn't help anything, so he kept it to himself. "Well, I'm sorry I kept you so long. If I would've known..."

She smiled across the seat at him. "Don't worry about it, okay? I really had fun." Then her smile melted into somberness. "The most fun I've had in a long time."

With every part of him he wanted to reach over the console to touch her and tell her that everything would be all right. But both hands stayed right where they were, clutching the steering wheel until they guided the car up to the curb in front of her apartment.

"Good luck with your paper," he said, fighting not to let his heart beat right out of his chest.

"You, too," she said with the faintest of smiles, and then before he had the chance to say another word, she jumped out of the car. "I'll see you tomorrow."

And with that she slammed the door. He watched her run up the walk and stand for only a single moment at the door as she unlocked it. Then she disappeared inside, and he was left watching nothing but a motionless door. For several seconds even that was enough. Slowly he let his head fall back against the headrest as he thought about her.

Even without her in the car, he felt her presence next to him. She was something special. She wasn't bent only on putting everyone else down in her race to make herself look superior. No, Camille Wright, although not a supermodel on the outside, was a girl with substance. She did the work and sought no applause or recognition from the outside world, and somewhere deep down, he knew she was the kind of girl he could fall for-hard.

With that thought tracing through his brain, he put the car in drive and pulled away from the curb. Although she was no longer in the car, in every way that counted she was still very much with him.

Chapter 12

Every piece of her brain said to slow down. If she was just late enough for him to already be started, she could just drop Daria off and then disappear. However, the only message getting to her body was "Let's go already!"

Even the wind whipping down the city streets couldn't deter her. It was one of those dreadful days when the high temperature was reached at midnight, and the only direction the mercury was going after that was down.

Hand in Daria's they ran all the way from the bus stop to the center and then had to collect themselves before they walked into the auditorium. Still questioning why she had thought it was so important to come, Camille shook the cold off as they stepped into the auditorium darkness, but instantly her breath caught.

On stage right, looking more handsome than any guy had a right to, Jaylon stood-his light blue shirt with the white collar and dark blue tie were offset by the dark suspenders running down either shoulder. Somehow her feet continued to move although she wasn't sure how.

"Daria!" Katelyn yelled excitedly from the stage, and in a breath Camille was caught in the depths of Jaylon's eyes.

He smiled as though she was the sunshine after a long, dark night. "Well, great. We've almost got everyone then."

Ripping her soul from his eyes, Camille knelt down next to Daria to help the little girl out of her coat. "Now you be good. Okay?"

Instantly fear replaced the excitement in the little girl's face. "You're not leaving. Are you?"

"Well,... I..." Camille's gaze traveled to the door, but she'd heard that crack in her own voice before, and as much as her brain told her to leave, her heart simply couldn't say the words. Finally she smiled as she looked at her sister. "No, of course not."

The excitement returned as Daria skipped away from her sister and up the stairs to the waiting children. With a reluctant sigh, Camille shrugged out of her own coat and followed her sister onto the stage. However, this time she was careful not to take the risk of looking at him again.

Once on stage Jaylon took over like he'd been waiting only for them. "Today we're going to try mirroring. You are going to get a partner and follow what they do." He looked around at the group of serious but slightly confused faces staring back at him. Then without warning he looked right at her. "Camille, why don't you help me show them?"

She wanted to tell him no, but with 18 pairs of expectant eyes looking up at her, that option evaporated. "Oh, okay." Carefully she stepped forward, and the moment her body came within sonar range of his, the memory that this was anything other than vitally important escaped from her mind.

"I'll go first," he said, looking right through her eyes into her heart, and she nodded unable to say anything.

Slowly he put both hands above his head, and almost without watching anything other than his eyes, she followed his movement. One arm came down and then out to the side, then the other arm came down in an all-out stretch. To one side and then the other his neck arched and then came back to the center. Without moving his feet, he twisted first one way and then the other, and her body followed his as though they were tied by some piece of magical rope.

Finally he came back to the center and smiled at her, and instantly her smile mirrored his. A brief second passed, and then he looked away from her back to the children. Her breath escaped in a whoosh as her eyes fell closed.

There was something about him that made everything else in the world cease to exist.

"Now, I want you all to get partners," he was saying, and Camille watched him. Even his back was good-looking. Strong and in control.

She forced her gaze passed him to the children as they paired off. Each child had a mirror in a few seconds flat, and Jaylon turned back around to her.

"Camille and I will walk around and watch you. If you have trouble, just ask us. You may begin."

Although there were 18 children in the room, as they began, the only sound was the hum of the heaters.

"Very good, Daria," Jaylon said, walking slowly around the stage with his hands planted firmly behind his back. "Perfect, Jomei."

At first Camille felt totally ridiculous, but then it occurred to her that there was no one in the audience to watch her anyway, and besides she wasn't here for them anyway, she was here for the kids. "Good job, Cory. Way to watch." She took several steps around the stage, liking the anonymity she finally felt up there. Yes, she was on the stage, but nobody was watching her. "Watch him carefully, Katelyn. There you go. That's better."

"Okay," Jaylon called after several minutes. "Let's switch leaders."

For a second the children broke concentration, and the hum was drowned out.

"Okay. Everybody ready?" he asked, and all 18 heads nodded. "Go."

The hum was back.

With supreme effort, Jaylon finished up with the parents picking up their children, and then bid them farewell as he strode to the corner of the theatre where Camille was helping Daria into her coat.

"Just let me get my coat," he said, sounding as though they had pre-arranged plans to leave together, although he of all people knew they didn't. A stolen moment here, a lucky break on stage to steal another there. That was all he could really hope for, and it would have to be enough although he wanted so, so much more. "Ready?"

Her answer came as more of an indifferent shrug, but he took what he could get and guided her out. "You hungry?"

"Hamburgers?" she asked.

"If you want," he said as though his life didn't hang on the balance of that offer.

"Sure why not?"

God Himself was smiling down on him. The bitter cold wind whipped around them as Jaylon shepherded them to his car. Quickly they piled in and headed for the restaurant.

"So, did you get your paper written?" she asked before he had a chance to find a similarly suitable topic.

"No, I figure I'd work on it this evening," he said, glancing at her as he pulled into traffic.

"Not going out tonight?" she asked as she cocked a teasing eyebrow at him.

He shrugged the question away. "My calendar kind of got freed up a couple weeks ago."

"Yeah," she said, and he heard the compassion in her voice. "I heard about that. You okay?"

It was strange. It had been almost two weeks, and she was the first person to ask if he was all right with the whole break-up thing. "Yeah. It's different though."

"I'll bet." She nodded sympathetically. "I can't imagine breaking up after going together as long as you two did."

"Since freshman year," he said, his voice near a whisper, and then a sigh escaped his throat. "But I think it was time."

"Oh, really? Why?"

The shrug of his shoulders crinkled his jacket. "I'm not the same person I was back then."

With a raise of her eyebrows, she nodded. "It's tough when somebody changes."

"Yeah, but it's even worse when somebody doesn't," he said before he could stop the words. He felt her next question forming between them, but thankfully they had arrived at the restaurant, and quickly he swung into a parking space. "This is it. You ready?"

"I guess," Camille said, thrown off-track by the sudden shift in conversation.

"I'll get Dar. You just get in." He looked at her and then back at Daria. "On three. Ready? One, two, three." One part of him followed Camille up and out of the car and then across the parking lot even as the majority of his brainpower was taken up by getting Daria out of the backseat and across the parking lot to the front door. "Man, it is freezing out there!"

He shook off the cold as Daria's hand left his to wrap itself around Camille's.

"Come on, let's find a table," Camille said, gently pulling Daria away from the door. The three of them tumbled into a booth and spent several minutes simply rubbing their hands together and soaking in the warmth surrounding them. "Man! Who forgot to shut off the air conditioners?"

"I don't know," he said with a laugh, "but I think they should be fired."

A shiver traveled right over Camille. "I'm just glad I don't live in Alaska."

"Here, here," Jaylon said, thawing out enough to remember how thankful he was to be here with her. "So, what do you want?"

"Hot chocolate," Camille said, blowing into her rolled up hands as she studied the menu.

Jaylon laughed as the waitress appeared. They placed their order, and then the three of them were left alone. He knew it was silly, but as hard as he fought to keep his cool around her, it was always just a half-inch beyond his grasp. "You did good with the mirroring thing today. Thanks for helping me out."

"Yeah, right. Admit it. You're just happy I didn't fall on my face," Camille said teasingly.

Without thinking, Jaylon laughed at her forthrightness. "No, I was just happy you came." When she looked at him with confusion, he quickly added, "That way I didn't have to answer five million questions about where you where and why you weren't there."

The puzzled expression on her face only deepened. "Huh?"

He laughed again as he shifted in the booth. "Oh, the kids all wanted to know where Camille and Daria were last week. I thought I was going to have to post it on the ten o'clock news or something to get anything done."

"Oh," she said with a still-confused nod. "Well, we were glad we could help. Isn't that right, Dar?"

"Yeah," the little girl said, bouncing in her seat. "I liked playing mirroring."

"Here," Jaylon said as he lifted a hand to Daria. "Here's another one we do." He nodded at his hand, and carefully she put her hand next to his. "Now, watch my hand and go exactly where it goes."

As Camille watched, their hands began to move, but he never looked away from Daria's gaze.

"Good girl." Clockwise, counter-clockwise, up, down. They moved in perfect sync. Finally Jaylon smiled and pulled his hand back. "Your as good at that as your big sister is."

The waitress appeared at their table, three hot chocolates and hamburgers balanced carefully on her tray. She deposited the food and then left.

"So, you got big plans for Thanksgiving?" Jaylon asked before nonchalantly biting into his hamburger.

However, Camille had already taken a bite and was struggling to chew the bite before she answered. "Hmm." She held up a hand to him to indicate she had heard and would answer as soon as she could.

After a few more seconds of chewing, he took a small sip of cocoa. It didn't matter that there was no conversation, he just enjoying the simple gift of watching her without cause to look away.

Finally, she swallowed and straightened. "I'm just going to make a little chicken or something. No big deal really."

"No family?" he asked as his eyebrows knit in the center of his forehead with concern.

"The less the better," Camille said with a touch of annoyance, and he remembered the litany of fathers. "How about you? Big family get-together?"

Unbidden his gaze fell to the table as his hand dropped the hamburger to his plate. "I'm sure Dad's folks will come, and Marianne will put on the house beautiful show for them, but it'll be just the five of us."

Camille's chewing on the other side of the table slowed. "Marianne?"

"Yeah." He batted the question away. "My stepmom."

"Oh."

He wanted to look at her, but his heart wouldn't let him. "My mom died when I was little, and Dad married Marianne a couple of years ago."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Camille said, and he could hear the sincerity.

"It's not a big deal." He shook his head to emphasize those words. "I barely even remember her."

"That must be hard-growing up without a mom."

"A lot like growing up without a dad," he said as his gaze snagged on hers, and a moment passed before either of them felt the need to look away. "How's that burger?"

She looked down at her almost gone burger and smiled. "Great."

When he left Camille and Daria off at their house, Jaylon's heart said it wouldn't be a crime to waggle an invitation in out of her; however, for once sanity won out. He bid them a hasty good-bye and watched long enough to make sure they got in all right, and then he spun the wheels and headed out to Hollybrook. There was guilt in his gut. It had been nearly three weeks since he'd made this trip, and that was far, far too long.

"Hey, Beautiful," he said as he folded himself down next to the lady sitting motionless and silent beside a menagerie of chirping birds. For a moment his thoughts slid to another lady sitting dead center stage on a chaise lounge chair, and he smiled. "How've you been?"

After a moment he pulled the little book out of his jacket pocket. "Look here what I brought you." He smiled for the old woman. It wasn't hard. He was just following the lead she had set down for him many years before.

"Okay, tell me you met Mr. Wonderful over the weekend," Nick said, sliding into the seat next to her on Monday afternoon, and immediately Camille reached up and pushed her glasses up.

"And tell me you've forgotten this stupid idea. I mean, listen. Wouldn't it be more romantic for you to just take Lex out yourself? You know-red roses, steak dinner, soft music, just the two of you."

Nick nodded. "Sounds great, except your friend doesn't want to celebrate without you."

Oh, now she wants to make a big deal out of being my friend.

"I'm really okay with it," Camille said, hoping he would decide she was serious. "Really I don't mind."

However, it was as though he was no longer listening to a word she said. "I was thinking I could always ask Mark. He seems like a nice enough guy."

"Now you're asking dates out for me?" she asked in panic. "How desperate does that make me look?"

Nick shrugged. "You tell me."

At that moment the black jacket caught her attention as it floated by her seat. Defiantly she turned her full attention on Nick if only not to have to look at it. "I'll get my own date, or I won't go."

"You will go because Lexie wants you to go, and the clock is ticking. If you don't get a date, I'll get one for you."

Mrs. Allen walked up onto the stage just as the bell rang. "First off, I need the critiques from anyone who attended a play over the weekend."

Camille was grateful when two other papers were passed down from the end so she added hers to the bottom of the stack stealthily and handed the stack to Tessa who was collecting them.

"That it?" Mrs. Allen asked, holding the papers in the air.

Unconsciously Camille nodded even as she relaxed, knowing that part of the class assignment was now finished.

"Okay," Mrs. Allen said obviously not happy with the number of papers turned in. "Some of you better get busy." With that she rolled the papers up in her hand and began class in earnest. "Now, I know you all are dying to know my decision about the play selection, so I won't put it off. We will be having auditions the Monday after Thanksgiving for the casting of 'Don't Listen to the Fates.'"

Moderate cheers crossed the audience as Camille smiled to herself. Well, the others would have a good play to produce anyway.

"This year we will be doing things a little differently," Mrs. Allen said, walking to the side of the stage to retrieve a handful of scripts and deposit the papers. "Instead of letting you sign up for the parts you want to audition for like last year, this year everyone will try out for all the parts-for a grade."

Soft groans echoed throughout the auditorium, accompanied by Camille's.

"You will audition one of four scenes," Mrs. Allen continued, "my choice."

She retraced her steps to the center of the stage. "Each of you will need to have a script anyway, so consider the script you receive today yours. You may mark it as you like-within reason of course." Bending down off the stage she handed the scripts to Keane and Jaylon to pass out to the others.

Thankfully, Camille noted that Jaylon would be staying on his side of the auditorium this time.

"Now as you all know the four main characters are not the only parts, but the other parts will be assigned based on your performance of the main parts."

Camille accepted the stack Keane handed her, took one, and passed them on to Nick.

"I will not forbid you to use your scripts in the auditions, but obviously it would be better for your audition and for your grade if you didn't. Yes, Mark, that means memorizing the part."

Another chorus of groans wafted across the auditorium.

"Try-outs will begin the Monday after Thanksgiving."

Barely listening to Mrs. Allen, Camille leafed through the script, wishing they could postpone the auditions until after Christmas break. Of course she wouldn't get a part, but even the thought of going through tryouts was enough to make her skin crawl.

"I thought today we could break up into partners and practice the passages we will use for auditions." Mrs. Allen quickly gave the instructions on how to locate the proper passages, and then allowed the class to break up and work.

"What do you say?" Nick asked as Camille stayed firmly planted in her seat. "Partner?"

"Sure," she said with a small smile. She stood and followed him to the back as the remainder of the group scattered as well. Good. A nice, dark corner where nobody could hear her butcher the script. Perfect. "Which one do you want to start with?"

"Let's try page 20 first," he said as he sat down cross-legged on the carpet. Camille followed him, truly liking his choice of locations. "We can run through Dominique and Hawk's first fight."

"Okay," Camille said, knowing there was no way she would ever be able to pull off Dominique's haughty superiority even in practice.

"You first."

Camille swung her braid over her shoulder, pushed up her glasses, and settled in. "Oh, don't be so dramatic, Hawk. It's not like we were married or anything."

Remarkably Camille managed to avoid discussion of her non-existent date and most of the thoughts of the black jacket for the remainder of Monday. When she met Lexie at the cafeteria table Tuesday afternoon, she breathed a sigh of relief that for the moment anyway as Nick was nowhere to be seen.

She waited a full three minutes before her curiosity got the best of her. "Where's Nick?"

"Sick," Lexie said over her cheese sandwich forlornly.

"Oh, really?" Camille asked, sorry for him but feeling her day brightening with the news. "What's wrong with him?"

"Stomach something. No big deal, but his mom thought he should stay home rather than making all the rest of us sick."

Camille considered this. It could be better, but it could be so, so much worse. He could be here hounding her about her non-date. "So I guess Friday's out then."

"Oh, no," Lexie said immediately shaking her head. "He promised me he'd be well for Friday."

"Great." No part of Camille liked that news. "You know I was thinking, I bet the two of you would really rather be alone than to have me tagging along."

Lexie's face scrunched. "Don't you dare chicken out on me, Camille Wright. We've spent every one of my birthdays together since I was eight. You can't bail on me now."

"I'm not bailing. I'll be here with you that whole day at school."

"That's not the same."

"Yeah, well, the last ten years you didn't have a boyfriend either, so it seems to me that a lot's not the same anymore." She had meant for the statement to be a joke, but once it was out, it sounded nothing like one.

Lexie's gaze never left the table as she continued to chew. "Does it really bother you how much time I spend with Nick?"

"No," Camille said defensively and then she deflated. "Sometimes. I don't know. Nick's a great guy and everything. And we both knew things were going to change sooner or later. Hey, let's face it, next year we might not even live in the same state anymore."

The scowl on Lexie's face deepened. "Don't even say that!"

Camille shrugged. "We have to be realistic. It's a possibility."

After a long moment Lexie squared her shoulders. "Well, then that makes this year that much more important."

"Yeah," Camille said as her own shoulders fell. "I guess it does."

There was a long pause as the clinking of the cafeteria silverware filled the air between them.

"So, you'll find somebody then?" Lexie finally asked.

Camille exhaled, wishing her answer could be anything else. "Yeah, I'll find somebody."

If someone else commits you to something, you have the right to not follow through, but if you commit yourself to something, you are then obligated to make it happen. To Camille promises were something never to be taken lightly, and this one was no different. She had given her word, and like it or not, she now had to follow through on that word.

However, the second she had agreed, her body and spirit began conspiring to make every other part of her life fall apart. In the next three hours she managed to leave her Physics book in her locker, completely blank out on an English test, and fall down six stairs, twisting her ankle when she missed the first one, which reduced her to hobbling, pitiful wreck for the rest of the afternoon.

So much so that when Jaylon's voice broke through the crowd of students as she limped to the auditorium door, she couldn't even bring herself to care anymore.

"What did you do?" he asked as he surveyed her all the way down to her shoes.

"Oh, you know me. It's always something," she said as her annoyance with the whole situation bubbled to the top.

He pulled the door opened and waited as she hobbled through. "No, seriously. What'd you do?"

"Grace here. I fell down some steps. Got my ankle good too."

"Are you okay?" he asked with growing concern as they made their way down the center aisle.

"Well, I might be if I could perform some kind of miracle and find some desperate soul who wouldn't freak out at the mere mention of going out with me on Friday." In the pain and frustration, the words were out of her mouth before they could be stopped.

At her row, she turned in, thankful only for the empty seat next to hers.

"Where's Nick?" Jaylon asked, looking back up the aisle.

"Sick," Camille said angrily as she threw her backpack to the floor and sat down in a heap.

"Oh," Jaylon said, and then he shifted his books to the other hip. "Then would you mind having some company?"

For the first time since she'd agreed to the Friday night double date nightmare, his question jolted her back to reality. With two blinks she took her first real look at him, and her brainwaves scrambled. "Oh, yeah. Sure. Of course."

The smile that always sent her heart pounding spread across his face as he slipped into the seat between her and the aisle. "Cool."

Fighting to keep herself from fidgeting, Camille pulled the pen from behind her ear and nailed her gaze to the stage where Mrs. Allen was already laying out the plan for the day.

"I had some questions yesterday after class about how I'm going to grade your auditions, so I thought we'd talk a little bit about that before we get started today. First of all, just getting or not getting a part will not necessarily earn you a good grade.

"The things I will be looking for as far as the grading is concerned are whether you understand the character's motivation and can convey that motivation in a meaningful way. Also, I will be looking for how you interact with another actor in a scene. And finally how well you can carry a performance off overall."

The black sleeve of Jaylon's jacket kept yanking Camille's gaze and thought pattern to it even as she tried to listen.

"Also, I'll be looking at whether or not you have the passages memorized. There are only four try-out parts for the girls and three for the boys, so memorizing them shouldn't tax your brains too much."

Maybe not, Camille thought, but sitting right next to Jaylon Quinn was completely overloading hers at the moment.

"Also for the next couple of days, I will let you use some class time to practice and memorize. You may work with a partner or on your own today, and I'll give you the whole period again. But don't squander this time because Thursday and Friday you'll only have half the class to practice, and next week I'm not promising anything."

Mrs. Allen stopped and thought for a moment, and then she dropped her hands. "Questions?"

No one raised a hand. In fact, no one even moved.

"Okay, then. Good luck," she said and then backed up before turning suddenly back. "Oh, wait. I have your papers from Monday for those of you who wrote them. They'll be up on stage. Okay, now you can get to work."

Camille watched Mrs. Allen lay the papers on the stage, wondering the whole time how many eons it would take her to make it all the way up there and back.

"You want me to get yours?" Jaylon asked, standing from his seat.

"Would you mind?" she asked, never quite looking all the way up.

"No problem."

When his presence moved away from her, Camille was convinced she must have fallen down Alice's rabbit hole. He wasn't really here. He hadn't really been sitting right next to her. No, if she just concentrated really, really hard she could make herself wake up from this dream, and she would no longer be in a parallel universe with a twisted ankle and Jaylon Quinn sitting with her. In fact, if she worked really hard, maybe she could make the whole, entire drama thing disappear for good. That would be a blessing.

"Good job," Jaylon said, reappearing next to her seat. "93." He flipped the paper onto her lap. "What'd you use to critique it anyway?"

"Oh, umm. How they used the lighting to emphasize the dimming of her mind," Camille said, looking over her paper. "What about you?"

Jaylon scrutinized his own paper like he was in a trance. "The costume design-like we talked about."

Her heart thudded forward as Camille nodded slightly. "Good choice."

"Yeah," he said, moving very slowly to put the paper into his book. Then he looked around the auditorium at the others who were already immersed in play practice. "So, umm. You want to run lines together?"

She looked at him in wide-eyed fear. "Run lines?"

"You know. Practice, rehearse?"

"Oh, sure," she said, stumbling over the words. She was acting like an idiot, and she knew it. Forcing every scattering thought to stop and stand at attention, she pulled her script out of her backpack and stood. "Where to?"

Jaylon shrugged and pointed to the space at the back of the theatre where she and Nick had escaped the day before. "Back there?"

Gamely Camille followed him out of the row and into the aisle. At each row she reached for the seat back to ease the strain on her ankle.

Three rows from the back, Jaylon looked at her and laughed softly. "Maybe we should've stayed where we were."

Despite all the pain shooting up her leg, Camille laughed as she turned and headed for the back corner. "Or maybe you should've chosen a non-wounded partner."

He laughed outright at that as she eased herself down the seatbacks of the back row. "Too late now."

At her destination she carefully lowered herself to the floor and wrapped her legs together, wincing only once as she settled herself against one of the seatbacks, glad to no longer be moving.

"Better?" he asked with concern as he sat down facing her.

"I'll live."

He studied her for one more moment and then flipped open his script. "You got a preference about where we start?"

"Wherever you want," she said, knowing she was here to practice for him, not the other way around.

"Okay, how about Act Three Scene One. The park thing."

With a shove she pushed the meaning of that scene away from her and thumbed through the script to the page. "You're first."

As she watched him, Jaylon took a single deep breath closed his eyes and became Hawk Fletcher. In fact, when his eyes opened again, they seemed to no longer even be Jaylon's eyes. The transformation was so complete that Camille knew that simply reading the words on the page would not be enough effort on her part. Leaving out closing her eyes, which felt too weird, she followed his lead, relaxed her shoulders and imagined herself in a beautiful park on a spring day with the guy she had idolized for years sitting on a blanket right next to her-it wasn't too hard.

"So you've never wondered what you want to do with your life then?" Jaylon as Hawk asked.

"No." Camille shook her head to emphasize the point. "Mom used to take me to the office with her sometimes, and I'd watch her sitting there, taking orders from all these other people about when something was supposed to be done or how it was supposed to be done. I'd sit in that corner, and I'd be reading. But I wasn't really reading, I was watching. I was watching her-I was watching her lose who she was a little bit at a time.

"And then when I was older, I asked her once about why she didn't stand up to those people, and she said, 'Lauren, the only way to stand up to them is if you have more education than they do, and I just don't.'"

"But education's only a part of it," Hawk protested.

"Not according to my mom. To her, an education's everything. So I decided that I wasn't going to be the person on the outside, I was going to be on the inside of that office, and I'd never treat my workers the way they treated my mom."

"So, what then? You're going to be a banker? A lawyer? A doctor? What?"

"It doesn't matter. I'm going to be something. Something big. Something powerful. Something so important that people can't make me feel...like I'm not enough."

"Enough? How can you not be enough?"

Camille wasn't sure if it was her or Lauren talking at that moment. "You've seen me. The only time people even notice me is when I make a fool out of myself. All the other times it's like I'm just invisible."

"But you've always got your head in those books of yours. You don't even give people a chance to get to know you."

"Why should I? They're all a bunch of losers anyway."

"Whoa. That's pretty strong coming from somebody who's going to become some benevolent boss some day."

"Oh, I won't be like that then."

"Well, you're sure practicing pretty hard for the part right now."

In character Camille defiantly pulled her shoulders up a full foot. "Well, what about you, Mr. I've got it all figured out? I don't see you exactly banishing inferiority complexes in your fellow students."

He deflated only a touch. "That's not me though. That's just who I am at school."

"Well, you're practicing pretty hard for that part right now. Aren't you?"

Jaylon's break stretched on a little too long, and Camille looked up at him. The color of his face had drained out until it looked a sick ash color.

"Yeah," he finally said so softly she barely heard the word. "I guess I am."

She wanted to ask if he was all right. She wanted to, but she was afraid of the answer, and even more afraid that he might throw up all over her if he even tried to say something else.

"Pretty good," Jaylon said, breaking out of character with a snap.

Stunned, Camille couldn't decide what had just happened. Every part of him now sounded perfectly Jaylon, but only a few seconds ago, she could've sworn she'd heard his heart break.

"How about we try the one with Dominique and Ethan?" Jaylon asked, paging backward through the script.

"Oh, okay," Camille said, still stumbling to understand the last several moments.

"Well, well," Jaylon said, sliding into the part of slippery, slimy Ethan, "what have we here?"

"Hi, Ethan," Camille said, stretching for the sappy sweet voice of a girl trying too hard to impress; however, the right tone eluded her.

"Now here's a question," Jaylon said with no trouble getting into his part at all. "How is it that you know my name, but I don't know yours?"

Camille thought for a second that the stomach bug must've jumped the gap to her own throat as suddenly all she wanted to do was throw up. "You're reputation precedes you."

Jaylon's laugh sent shivers down her spine. "That's my kind of answer."

They had practiced all three boy-girl parts, and Camille was busy flipping through the script to the Dominique-Lauren discussion, which Jaylon had graciously agreed to read with her, when he suddenly threw a grenade right at her.

"So what was that you were saying about Friday night?" he asked as he searched for the audition section.

In mid-page-turn her hands stopped. "Huh?"

"Earlier. You said something about needing a date for Friday night. What's the problem? Nick going to be too sick to take you?"

"Huh?" she asked, getting even more confused.

Jaylon shrugged even as he continued his search. "I just figured you two must have some big shindig going on, and you're mad cause he's too sick to go."

In utter confusion, Camille struggled to figure out where this line of conversation had come from and where it was going. "Me and Nick?"

"Yeah. I mean you're going out and everything."

"Me and Nick?" she asked again, knowing she sounded utterly ridiculous. "We're not...umm, just a second, let me get this straight...you think that Nick and I are...dating?"

The last word sounded totally incredulous.

Jaylon's eyes narrowed as he looked at her, his script totally forgotten. "Yeah. I mean you're always together. You sit together and stuff."

"I sit by Elrad Hollister in Physics, but that doesn't mean I'm going out with the guy!"

Now it was Jaylon who was struggling. "But you always sit together, and you're partners for all the exercises, and you always leave together."

"That's cause he's the only one brave enough to practice with me!"

Silence fell over them as Jaylon began a frantic search through her eyes for how truthful she was actually being. "Are you telling me you never were going out with him?"

"No," she said emphatically. "In fact, he's going out with my best friend. In fact, he's the one making me so miserable right now-trying to find a date for this weekend."

"What's up with this weekend anyway?"

"Oh, it's my best friend Lexie's birthday," Camille said, giving up all hopes of sounding anything even close to thrilled. "They want to double, and if I don't find someone, Nick's going to fix me up with his first choice."

"Who's that?" Jaylon asked as though he didn't want any part of hearing the answer.

"Mark," Camille said dramatically. "Or Oren somebody that Lexie made this face about." She squished her face together causing him to laugh out loud-a move that immediately made a pained look jump to her face. "Don't laugh. This is my life we're talking about."

Obviously fighting to squelch his laughter, Jaylon finally managed to level a serious face at her. "Well, if you're really that desperate, I could always go with you."

"You?" Camille asked, crashing back into whom she was talking to and what she was telling him. "Oh, no. I couldn't ask you to do that."

"Why not?"

"Be...because. I'm sure you've got a thousand things to do, and...and you don't want to waste your time..."

"First of all," he said as the laughter fell completely away from him, "I'm not doing anything else, and second of all, I'd love to go. That is, if you don't mind having me around."

Having him around? Having Jaylon Quinn around? No, she didn't mind at all although she had the distinct feeling that Alice's hole couldn't be too far behind her.

"Okay, then," she finally said as though they were signing a multi-million dollar deal. "That sounds great."

The bell picked that moment to ring, and he pushed up to his feet and then extended his hand to her. With a pull she righted herself and quickly let go of his hand. Feeling like every gaze in the place was locked on her, she made her way back to the center aisle as he followed her so closely that she could actually feel him.

"I guess we can get together tomorrow or something so I can fill you in on where we're going, and times and all of that," she said, wishing she'd had more practice at this. More practice? Any practice at this.

"Okay. That sounds great," he said as they reached their seats and retrieved their belongings. "Oh, and what does your best friend like?"

"Like?"

"You know. Candy? Flowers?"

Camille laughed. "You better leave those for Nick, or you might be on more than a date."

He laughed. "Good point."

She limped with him to the back and out the door.

"So, I'll see you tomorrow then?" he asked at the intersection of hallways where their paths parted company.

"Yeah," she said, knowing full well in the bright light of the hallway that this must be a dream.

"I'll see you then," he said as that unnerving smile spread onto his face.

Unable to move she watched him turn and walk down the hallway, and then she shook her head in disbelief. It seemed that somebody had asked somebody out for Friday night, and although her sanity couldn't quite be sure, she had the vague suspicion that she had just gotten a date with Jaylon Quinn.

However, with no way of verifying that news flash, she forced her body to move in the other direction. Somehow she answered all of Lexie's questions about her ankle while simultaneously keeping mum about the drama class happenings. One part of her wanted to say something, to tell someone, to scream it to the world, but another part said that telling anyone might be just the thing to break the spell she had somehow fallen under.

And the last thing she wanted to do was to find out how this magic trick was done.

Wrapped tightly in his jacket, Jaylon sat on the South side of the tree letting it block as much of the chilled November wind as it could. Four feet from him the swing twisted in the breeze. In his hands the script lay rolled. Sitting here gave a whole new meaning to the term cold reading, but not even the bone-chilling air whipping around this spot could compete with the cold that had invaded his body when he'd read those words.

Unbidden his gaze fell on them again. "Well, you're practicing pretty hard for that part right now. Aren't you?" As memories of the countless people he had stepped on to become the Jaylon Quinn he was today tromped through his mind, he looked out across the gash in the earth to the sunset beyond. "Yeah, I guess I am."

Slowly his head shook back and forth just before it fell back onto the hard bark. As the tearing of his heart sounded in his ears, he glanced back at the house-now broken and abandoned. How many days had he spent here, and how many had he spent forgetting the lessons Grandma Lani had taught him?

In the confusion of his mind, he knew only one thing-that she wouldn't be proud of the man he was turning out to be. Camille's fragile features, tucked neatly behind a pair of neat wire-rimmed glasses floated into his mind, and he could see her even now reading the words that could just as well have been spoken about him-except he was the one on the inside of that office, watching his father as he ordered, commanded, and demanded his way over people.

"You have to be tough. Tough. You hear me?" his father had said on more than one occasion. "You have to put on your thick skin if you want to make it in this world." Jaylon could see his father sitting there on the edge of the bed, the darkness forming a background for his silhouette. "Crying won't make her come back, J. Look, I miss her too, but you don't see me blubbering like a little baby. Do you?"

A single tear slid down Jaylon's cheek as he watched the sky light up in a flare of color. If she just hadn't gotten sick. If his father had just found a way to make her better. If. If. If. A thousand ifs and still his father was right-none of them would ever bring her back.

The pain in his heart seized the breath from his lungs. In defiance he stood and swiped at the tears. Stupid. It was stupid to keep thinking about it. Stupid to cry now. No, now he needed to grow up already-like his father had said a thousand times.

It was just a script. Someone else's fantasy in someone else's head. It had nothing to do with him or his life. Nothing. If all he had to do was to remember that and the world could continue spinning just as it always had, then why was simply remembering that so unbelievably hard?

Camille stood in front of her mirror, script in hand. The drama book had suggested this practice routine, but it didn't seem to be helping much. "Hi, Ethan." She mumbled the next line to herself. "Oh, your reputation precedes you." Her gaze looked up into the mirror, but when she looked back down, she lost her place. "Of course, it's your kind of answer."

As her mind flew away from script, she wondered what idiot had come up with this idea. It wasn't working for her at all. "Ring? Oh, this ring? It's nothing... Really."

Giving up the mirror idea, she flopped backward on her bed. "Hi, Ethan."