"Tell you what, fellas," Bert said, looking directly at Lee and smiling. "If you guys sign today, I'll give you the first two months free."

Lee's brain did something very odd at that moment: It actually considered signing the lease. Two months free was a good deal, after all. He tried to tell it to mind its own business, that he was there specifically to make sure Peter didn't do anything stupid like sign a lease, but it wouldn't keep quiet. He tried to focus on something to get his bearings but the only things available were Bert, Peter and a poached egg form thing, none of which helped. Bert reached into his jacket (which we didn't mention in I-28, but he was wearing one. It's February. It's cold), pulled out a tri-folded packet of paper, unfolded it and handed it to Lee. It was a lease.

"Um... " Lee said, trying to sound on top of things and in charge of his faculties. "Peter and I need to talk."

Peter looked shocked at that and gave him an "I thought you were here to make sure I was just looking" look. Lee was surprised that he understood the look perfectly. He tried to give Peter a "shut up and let's go find someplace to talk" look, but was afraid it just made him look constipated.

"Okay," Mr. Cage said, smiled a disarming smile and patted Peter familiarly on the back. "I have someone else who wants to take a look, anyway. Busy day. Don't take too long talking, that offer is only for today. If this other party doesn't take it, of course. Meet you back here in an hour or so. If it's still available."

Lee and Peter stepped out onto the cold sidewalk. Lee noticed Peter's breath, bursting from his nostrils like a cartoon dragon, and realized his own had been visible inside.

"My head is spinning," Lee said, and watched the words mist into the air.

"Mine, too," Peter said. "And only partly because Bertram Cage is so... "

"Slimy?" Lee said reflexively and noticed that he was squinting. It was one of the things he hated about winter; everything was dead and sheathed in snow and ice, but it blinded you. It was like a being in a well lighted hell.

"No," Peter said and turned pink again. "Um... Fetching."

"Fetching?" Lee said and stopped looking at breath made visible and thinking of bright cold.

"Um... I mean... Attractive... ," Peter said.

"Him?" Lee said incredulously, looking back toward the building. "That guy?"

Lee would never be able to figure out what Peter liked. Besides cheese. Or what any gay man liked. Besides shoes. (You've seen my wardrobe, Steve, you know gay men aren't all obsessed with fashion. Name three that aren't. You know I hate this game. Okay, me. Besides you. Bruce Vilanch. That's one. Rip Taylor. Okay. And Michael Moore. He's not gay. But he looks like Bruce Vilanch. That's two. Okay, Christopher Isherwood. Who's he? Go rent Cabaret. Own it.)

"Yeah," Peter said, breathing heavily, trying to gain some control over it all. "And I don't like it."

"Why?"

"Because," Peter said, then reached down and polished his shoe. "He's dressed like a cowboy. It's cold out here. Where should we go to talk?"

Lee looked up and down the street, then nodded toward The Petting Zoo. Peter looked surprised.

"It's that or the gas station," Lee said and started toward the door.

Peter followed. His pants tented. Backwards. The room inside was dark and it took several moments for their eyes to adjust, but their noses worked instantly. The air was thick with layers of heavy, medium priced perfume, flat beer, old cigarette smoke and cheap cologne. Mixing around that was the odor of stale popcorn, assorted salty bar snacks and the subtle but unmistakable undercurrent of last night's testosterone. Rhythmic music with a heavy bass line was thrumming through the air, interrupted by the syncopation of cracking pool balls; music that even Nixon could dance to. Fortunately, he was off that afternoon. But Agnew was there wearing a fetching teddy.

There were small spots of green light in an arc around the room. As Lee and Peter began to distinguish shapes, they realized the green lights were small hooded lamps, one on each of the tables which were set against a railing that formed a semi-circle around a small round stage with a pole stuck in the center of it. They found an empty table. It wasn't hard, there weren't many people there. Three guys playing pool, two women dancing and a partridge in a pear tree.

Shortly after they sat, a woman with very pale skin and too much makeup, wearing Daisy Dukes, a tight bikini top and a see-through blouse tied at the midriff approached with a serving tray. She smelled like violets and baby powder.

"What'll you have, guys?" she said as she placed an ashtray in front of the little lamp and cocktail napkins in front of each of them.

"Um... ," Peter said, staring at her hairline. "Beer?"

"Me, too," Lee said, not even trying to not look at her steamer trunk.

"You have a show tonight," Peter said.

"Oh," Lee said. "Yeah. Tab®."

She went to get their drinks and Lee spread the lease out on the small table, smoothing it with his hands.

"Have you ever been to a place like this?" Peter asked. He looked around the room. There was a little light behind the bar where their waitress was pouring their drinks. The stage had one light shining toward it, picking up stray glitter on the floor. Besides the light and the glitter, the stage was empty. The pool table was on the other side of the room and had a lamp over it that looked like a larger version of the rectangular green shade on the lamp on their table. "Ever?"

"Tons of times," Lee said offhandedly. "Before I was married. Well, a few times. Twice. Once with my mom."

"I've actually been curious," Peter said, looking at the shabby curtain at the back of the stage. "I'd point more lights at the stage and put colored gels in them if it were my place."

"We are not opening up a strip joint," Lee said emphatically. "So, what do we have?"

"I have a headache," Peter said and Lee gave him a look. He missed it because the room was so dark, but he understood anyway. "I have just over five thousand dollars."

"And I have thirty-nine thousand, two hundred and twenty dollars," Lee said as he took a pen from his pocket and wrote the numbers on one of the napkins. "Let's just see if it's possible."

Peter glowed. They talked about how much they'd need to open a dinner theater. As they talked, Lee added numbers in neat columns on the napkins.

"We should call it 'The New Renaissance'," Peter said when the numbers started to swim in his head.

"Renaissance already means 'new'," Lee said. "Sort of. That would be like calling it the 'New New'. Literally it means rebirth, of course, but new is close enough."

"The Old Renaissance?" Peter said and sipped his beer.

"That's just stupid." Lee watched the line of beer foam on the edge of Peter's moustache, fascinated, as the tiny bubbles popped and the foam disappeared. He reminded himself never to get the impulse to grow a moustache.

"We could call it the Phoenix because it rises out of its own ashes." Peter was proud of the mythological reference.

Lee looked down at his napkin.

"We can't afford a new sign," he said. "We'll call it the Renaissance. Plain, old Renaissance. Standard, boring Renaissance. Unchanged, unenlightened, rigid Renaissance."

They discussed equipment and food. Advertising and staff. Licensing and royalties. The conversation made Peter nervous and excited and several times he got up to pace, but always noticed one of the women, which always brought him back to the reality that they were in The Petting Zoo, which always embarrassed him and made him sit back down.

"Okay," Lee said. "We could probably do it. Just. We could do it and probably stay in business for a year without any income."

Peter looked at him hard for a very long time, then got up to pace again. He sat back down and looked at Lee again, then got up to pace.

"Sit down, Peter," Lee said. "You're making me nervous."

"Are you sure?" Peter asked when he sat down.

"That you're making me nervous? Yes."

"No, that we could do it. For a year."

Lee studied his notes. There were several napkins, now, all filled with neat columns of numbers and little sketches of tanks shooting airplanes and a monster and a pretty flower. Shooting an airplane. Suddenly, Peter looked up at Lee and laughed. Lee cocked his head. So to speak.

"You need a visor and a cigar and a old adding machine with the tape getting longer and longer and we need coffee cups and cigarette butts and a bottle of hootch," he said.

"I don't understand."

"This feels like a film noir," Peter said, trying to sound film noirish.

"If this were a film noir, my girlfriend would walk through the front door right now," Lee said.

The front door opened with a stream of blinding sunlight. Silhouetted in the bright door frame was a slightly overweight figure with long, frizzy hair.

"Oh, my God," Lee said as the person felt their way into the room.

It was a guy wearing a sweatshirt that said "I'm with stupid" and had an arrow pointing down toward his trousers. Lee shook his head to make sure the image didn't stick. The thrumming bass beat was making that hard.

"I need to talk to someone objective," he said. "Let me call Abby."

There was a payphone in the alcove leading to the rest rooms. He knew that because he'd watched Peter pace by it several times. Lee picked up the receiver and wiped it against his jacket several times, then looked at it, then wiped it again and held it close to his face, making sure no part of the hard plastic touched any part of his soft, creamy, smooth, satiny (are you done, Steve?) skin. Just as he deposited his coins, the music swelled (so to speak) and he fought the urge to press the phone into his ear in order to hear. His soft, creamy, smooth (Steve) rugged ear. He turned around to see why the music was suddenly so loud and jumped, almost dropping the phone, because he hadn't realized Peter was standing right behind him.

"Go back to the table," Lee said.

"I can't," Peter said sadly.

"Why?" Peter could be an exasperating man.

"Because they're dancing," Peter said, his voice strained and slightly high-pitched, making him sound like a scared little boy. A big, bearded, scruffy looking little boy.

Lee shook his head and dialed. The first thing Abby asked him was where he was.

"I'm at the... Um... Renaissance."

"No you're not, you're at The Petting Zoo."

He put the phone to his chest and told Peter that his girlfriend was scary, then asked Abby how she knew that.

"I can hear the music," Abby said, then explained that she knew the place because they were a client.

"The Petting Zoo is your client?"

"Sure. They advertise on the radio. How do you think they get customers? I go there at least once a week to get orders or approve copy or demo tapes and stuff. Hey, is Amber there?"

"Which one is Amber?" Lee asked and looked around the room to see if anyone there looked like she might be an Amber. Almost all of them did. Even the guy with the frizzy hair.

"She has a tattoo of a stoat just under her left clavicle."

"Yeah," Lee said. "She's... um... dancing right now."

"She's good, huh?"

"Um... Ask Peter," Lee said.

Peter mouthed "Ask me what?" but Lee waved him off.

"That was the right answer, Buster," Abby said and laughed. "She's who got me my first introduction to the boss to get the account. Took me a week to schmooze her. Had to buy six lap dances."

"Really?" Lee's pants tented.

"No, idiot. I just talked to her. I know all about her life. She's in school at River Bend Community and has a baby and wants to be an accountant."

"Really?"

"No, you idiot. Have you ever seen any accountants that look like her?"

Lee looked at Amber, who was at that moment undulating around the pole. He looked at her abdomen in a completely renaissance way and was about to mention that Amber did not look like she could ever have had a baby but chose to speak nothing, not a word, to keep mum, to hold the thought close to his breast. He had been called idiot twice already.

"Lee?" Abby said.

Lee looked at Peter, trying to figure out what to say. Peter cocked his head. He didn't understand the look at all.

"Lee?" Abby said again. "You still there?"

"Oh," he said. "Yeah."

He told her that they were figuring out what it would take to open a dinner theater at the Renaissance and that they had to make a decision right away and that he still didn't know if he could really do it.

"Do you want to?"

"I don't know that, either," Lee said. "I mean yes. I think. And I think I'm really going crazy if I want to."

"If you want to do it, do it, Lee, " Abby said. "I've said it before. I want you to do what makes you happy."

"I'm not sure this will make me happy," Lee said. "Yes, it probably will. I hope it will."

"Good. Okay. Just talk to Andrew first. Let him look at the lease."

"Abby, it's a standard lease," Lee said with a small sigh. "It's a form. They print them on pads and sell them in office supply stores. I know how to read a form. I used to make my living reading forms. I don't have to bother Andrew with it."

"Okay," Abby said, "If you're sure."

They said goodbye and Lee hung up. He looked at the wall by the phone for a while, then turned to Peter and looked at him for a while longer. Peter held his breath. Which wasn't hard given all the odd smells in the room.

"Okay," Lee said.

"Okay?" This time, Peter sounded like a Chihuahua. A big, bearded, scruffy looking Chihuahua.

"Let's do it."

"Really?" Peter said, his eyes getting painfully wide. "Oh. Oh, my God. Ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod."

Peter floated around the room a few times, giggling, repeating "ohmygod" over and over. Everyone stopped what they were doing to watch him, including Amber who was standing at a very odd angle, expertly accepting a tip from the guy with the frizzy hair. None of them had any idea what it was all about, but he just looked so happy it made them all smile. When he settled down a bit and got back to Lee, he had a few dollar bills stuck in his belt.

"Are you sure?" he asked, suddenly very much afraid. "I mean, what if we fail?"

"Don't wienie out on me, now," Lee said, "or I'll change my mind."

Peter grabbed him by the arm and dragged him out the door.

When they got back to the Renaissance, Bert was at the front door with the key out. Lee had the distinct impression that Bert had been waiting there for them so he could lock it the moment he saw them to make it look like they had just caught him. Peter had the distinct impression that he was going to own his own theater. Visions of sugar plums danced in his head that shook when he laughed with his eyes all aglow. He'd find it hard to sleep that night and Steve and Geoff won an award for their creative use of Kid on Christmas Morning imagery.

"Well, there," Bert said. "I was beginning to give up on you."

"No, we were just talking," Lee said.

"Talking? At The Petting Zoo?" Bert said with a wink. "Never heard of that. Was Amber there?"

"Who?" Lee said.

"We're going to do it," Peter blurted, unable to contain his enthusiasm or appear anything like a shrewd buyer. "We're going to start a theater."

Lee stared at him for a while, then realized it was still really cold out and he could see Peter's breath again, so he turned to Bert to remind him about the two months free.

"Of course. I'm a man of my word. Come on in and let's take care of the paperwork."

They went inside and Lee handed the lease back to Bert so he could add the part about two months free. Once that was done, they all signed two copies, then Lee wrote out a big check that made his colon clench while Peter stood there grinning dumbly. When Lee handed the check to Bert, Peter got scared again and almost grabbed the check out of Bert's hand, but stopped himself and froze in a sort of vibrating tableau. Bert firmly shook Lee's hand, then grasped Peter's and leaned in slightly, enough to bring the smell of Mennen to Peter's nose, as he shook it. His hand was calloused but manicured and his grip was powerful and Peter pulled his hand from Bert's grasp, shaken, and reflexively put his hand in his pocket.

Bert wished them luck, told them he hoped they'd make a go of it, asked them to make sure he got a schedule of their shows, handed them a set of keys, patted them both on the shoulder, then turned and left them to their fate.

Lee saw Peter standing in the middle of the room vibrating fear and realized he was vibrating a little fear himself. He turned Peter in the direction of the front door and got him moving with a small push. On the way there, he noticed something on the floor and bent down to pick it up, but stopped before he got it. It looked like a little charred rat's foot.

"What's that?" Peter said.

"I hope it's a crouton," Lee said.

Peter bent to look at it.

"It looks like a callback," Peter said, and they both spontaneously combusted. (Steve, can we try to behave? Me? You're the one that said "tits". That was many months and many installments ago. And I can get away with it because I'm the good one. Well, smell you.)

In the car on the way back to Twain's, Lee was able to repress the buzzing in his jaw enough to suggest that they pool their money into a joint business account first thing Monday morning. Peter vaguely nodded, vaguely smiled, then looked like he might vaguely throw up. When Lee dropped him off at his car, he asked Peter if he was going to be all right.

"We have a theater," Peter said.

"Yes," Lee agreed. "We do."

"I hope I didn't do it just because Bertram Cage is so... "

"Fetching?" Lee asked.

"Yes," Peter said. "No. Slimy."

Lee shook his head, assured Peter that had nothing, or at least very little, to do with it, and patted him on shoulder. Once.

After the show that night, Lee lay in bed with his arms under his head, staring at the ceiling, which was odd because it was dark in the room and he couldn't see the ceiling. Abby, who was lying on her side with her elbow on her pillow and her head propped up on her hand staring at him, asked how he was doing.

"You can't tell anyone," Lee said. "Not yet."

"Okay," Abby said. "Not even Kim?"

"Especially not Kim," Lee said emphatically, recalling the game of telephone that ended in Peter quitting his job. Damn him.

"So," Abby said with a gleam in her eye that Lee would have seen if it hadn't been so dark. "Wanna buy some radio advertising?"

Lee smiled and leaned over to kiss her, then rolled back down. Suddenly, he tried to remember if they had included advertising in their projected expenses that afternoon. He was sure they had. Pretty sure. Did they include utilities? Pretty sure. Insurance? Powdered paint pigment? Abby knew she wasn't going to get any sleep with Lee vibrating all over the bed like that, so she kissed him again and got up. On the way out, she said goodbye to Charlie, who didn't respond. Charlie was the only bird she had ever known who didn't need a cover at night. She was pretty sure he was a bird. She also said bye to Gable, who did respond. Abby felt a chill creep up her spine. She was sure it was because of Gable. Pretty sure.

After the lunch rush on Saturday, Twain stood on the little platform with his head bent at a contemplative angle. Either that or he had a sore neck. He lifted his face toward the heavens. Either that or toward the cobweb in the far corner. He cleared his throat and leaned in toward the microphone.

"Winter," he said,"Shortest of days, longest of seasons. We abide your cold shoulder and you pass us by, by and by, day by day by day, for weeks and months and years. It's still February, the shortest month, but it goes on forever. A snake lies frozen in a pond and the color has left the building. Your order's up. Why don't you pay your bill and go home?"

He looked down again, then put the microphone stand back and stepped off the platform. When he got back to the kitchen, Lee reminded him it was March first.

"I wrote that yesterday," Twain said. Outside, a bird sang a single note.

Agnes sat primly in her booth across from Ron, who played with his napkin while he waited for Matt to bring their food. First, he folded it into an airplane and moved it around in the air while making small airplane engine noises in his throat. Agnes gave him an anti-aircraft warning look that he didn't notice. He dove the plane and smashed it into the tabletop, with the appropriate but quiet sounds of a plane falling, crashing, bursting into a ball of flame and the passengers screaming for their lives. He glanced up at Agnes with a smile which quickly disappeared when he saw her look. He smoothed the napkin out carefully, folded it back into a napkin and put his hands into his lap.

"So," he said. "March first."

Agnes nodded.

"Closing night."

She nodded again just as Matt brought their order; a cheeseburger and fries for Ron and Baked Alaska for Agnes.

Matt turned to Ron and made a small and slightly too high pitched sound like a very tiny baby succumbing to smoke inhalation. Ron laughed, then looked quickly at Agnes. Thankfully, she was smiling. She must have remembered how charming I am in bed, Ron thought.

"How's school?" he asked Matt, who shrugged. "Yeah. Me, too."

The little bell rang its high, dissonant tone announcing another order ready for him, and Matt raised his hand in a small salute and turned to attend to it. It was a late afternoon, but the diner was starting to get busy. The front door bells slapped against the door announcing the entrance of a cold burst of air and Abby. She sat at the counter.

"Hi, Matt," she said. "Is minute man here?"

"Um... " Matt said. He wasn't quite sure what that meant, but was embarrassed, anyway. "You mean Mr. Harris? Yeah."

He called back for Lee, then delivered the next delectable plate of steaming Twain food. Lee looked out the serving window.

"Hey," he said when he saw Abby.

When he came out front, he noticed Agnes and Ron. Well, he noticed Agnes, who, at that very moment, was looking right at him. He nodded to her. She nodded back.

"Closing night," he said.

"Yeah," she said. "March first."

They both nodded again, and Lee happily turned his attention to Abby. She had taken off her coat, and on her sweatshirt was a picture of a sheep wearing a tee shirt that said "Born to Dye". Under the picture it said "Cotton, the other white fabric".

"So, Mr. Harris," Abby said. "Closing night."

"Come on," Lee said. "Not you, too."

"I was thinking of coming tonight."

"To my place? After the show?"

She gave him a "no, you idiot" look and told him she was talking about closing night. He looked perplexed and slowly shook his head.

"I thought closing nights were a big deal," Abby said. "That's what Kim always says. I met you on a closing night, if I recall," she added with a little wiggle of her left eyebrow.

"Oh. Um... I would really rather you didn't come," Lee said. "To this one. For me, tonight, it's a bad thing."

Abby thought about that for a moment, then nodded and picked up a menu.

"You don't mind?" Lee asked and Abby shook her head.

"This show hasn't been a lot of fun for you, has it?" she said over the menu.

"I did get a good review," Lee said. "Now I'm... op... um... nothing."

Peter chose that exact moment to make a very excited and slightly fluttery entrance and Lee's back stiffened. He got Peter's attention by sheer force of will and shook his head with a small, definite motion and Peter stopped fluttering. At least on the outside. At least for the moment. He sat next to Abby and they said hello to each other, then Abby leaned over to whisper to him.

"We're not supposed to talk about it, yet," she said, and twisted her fingers against her lips.

Peter rolled his eyes but behaved. Then his back stiffened and he slowly turned around. Agnes's eyes had made their focus known to him, and she wasn't smiling. Ron was, but that had nothing to do with Peter's discomfort. Peter nodded a small nod. So did Agnes, but a much smaller nod than Peter's. Matt came up to Agnes and Ron to see if they needed anything and Agnes reluctantly pulled her eyes out of Peter's forehead and turned to Matt and smiled. Matt raised and dropped an airplane he had folded from an order slip. It glided down in a tight, neat spiral and landed in Ron's drinking glass. Ron laughed, partly because it was a great gag but mostly because it hadn't landed in Agnes's glass.

"No, dear, we're fine," Agnes answered Matt, then turned back to Peter to continue staring at him just in time to see him leave.

"Did I scare him away?" Abby asked Lee, concerned, as she watched Peter go.

"I think Agnes did," Lee replied.

"Or you did," Abby said, and smiled innocently.

That night after the show, Lee sat alone in the dressing room playing with a pot of foundation. Ben Nye #L-0. Creamy Beige. Almost everyone had left for the closing night party. It sounded like there was someone out in the house closing things down. Lee hadn't much moved since the curtain call. His last curtain call at the Willow Lane Theater. Somehow, he was sad about that. And was sad that he was sad. The play had gone as well as it could have, given that no one would look at him backstage. It actually worked on stage because Roy was the snotty one and he could be snotty to everyone and pretend it was Roy and not Lee, who wanted to be snotty to everyone, but they wouldn't talk to him long enough so he could. Acting was easy. Backstage was hard. He looked around the darkened room, trying to avoid the sensation that he was saying goodbye to it. That would be entirely too sentimental, not manly at all. A small creaking sound escaped Roger's Room. He wasn't going to miss that. Of course, now he'd never be able to work up the courage to investigate that maw, which would eat away at his manhood in a way sentimentality never could. Maybe Roger was saying goodbye to him. He'd stick with that. At least Roger liked him. Damn Beverly™.

"Hey," someone said.

Lee jumped and the pot of foundation went flying over his head and landed on a Boeing 707. Next to a brick. (That's just way too obscure, Steve. You knew what I was talking about. Yeah, I sure did.) I mean on his costume. They'd probably blame me for that, too, he thought. (The brick? No, the stain on his costume. What stain? Are you paying attention at all? Yeah. Petting Zoo. Amber. Stoat tattoo. That was... Never mind. Stop being a pill. How old are you?) Lee whipped his head around, and there, standing in the doorway, silhouetted by the ghost light glowing all the way from the front edge of the stage, was Bear. As soon as he got his heart to stop threatening to leave him, he said "hey" to Bear.

"Going to the party?" Bear asked as he sat in the chair next to Lee.

Lee shook his head. "No," he said, "everyone hates me."

"No, they don't," Bear said, puzzled. "I don't hate you."

"Come on, I got the only good review from this play," Lee said, and even to himself it sounded a little whiny. "And no one has talked to me since. And I just signed the lease on the Renaissance."

"You what?" Bear said, very startled.

"Oops," Lee said.

That was the most emotional thing Lee had ever heard Bear say. Except that time he had bumped into that friend of Peter's in Lee's living room. Who was she? His ex-wife's sister or something. And even then, he'd been a real guy and not said much. Lee wondered if he had any more of those pain pills.

"When Peter quit," Bear said quietly, deliberately, trying not to judge, trying to understand, "he said you weren't opening a theater."

"When Peter quit," Lee assured him, "we weren't."

"That was only Monday."

"Things seem to happen fast in my life," Lee said defensively, trying to avoid the realization that he was the first one to blurt it out. "Of course, it's taken four years to get to March, but hey."

"Okay, I know," Bear said, and settled back into being a guy, which put Lee much more at ease. "I get it. I'll miss you around here. I'll miss Peter, too. A lot. Have you ever tried to get Stella to order supplies?"

"No," Lee said, trying to imagine trying to get Stella to do anything.

"But you know Stella."

"Yeah, I know Stella," Lee said and remembered his errant body's reaction to her when he'd first met her. "Hey, don't say anything, huh? About the Renaissance."

"Oh, I'm telling everybody," Bear said, and Lee turned a little pale. Like Ben Nye #PC-01. White. "I was kidding. I won't say anything. You're so easy."

Lee nodded, then thought about how much he'd miss working with Bear. He really liked Peter and all, but Bear had tools. Good ones. The thought left an odd, warm emptiness in his chest, which embarrassed him. He didn't want to start getting all emotional like Bear had been that day.

"Whatever happened to that Roz lady that you bumped into at my place that time?" he said to fill the emptiness.

"Good heavens, what made you think of her?"

Lee shrugged. He wasn't sure himself, but it had something to do with pain pills.

"Well," Bear said. "I haven't seen her. But I have... Um... seen her sister."

"Your ex?" Now, Lee was intrigued. Drama in someone else's life was interesting.

Bear nodded, and turned a little pink. Not nearly as pink as Peter had turned on Friday. More like a soft maroon. It made Lee smile a little. He wondered if Ben Nye made that color.

"We went out to dinner," Bear said, looking off in the distance, or as much in the distance as he could in the small, dark room. "Well, first she showed up at the opening night party and we ended up at my place and... Um... ended up at my place. It was a big... mistake. But then I took her to Chaussettes de Beurre."

"Buttery socks?"

"What?" Bear wondered why Lee was interrupting his sensitive moment with such a strange phrase. He'd never known Lee to be rude. Dark, maybe. Sarcastic, yes. But never rude. To him, at least.

"Chaussettes de Beurre is French for buttery socks," Lee explained, in a sort of rude, sarcastic tone.

"You're kidding," Bear said, wondering how Lee knew that, wondering if he were just getting him back for the whole "I'll tell everyone" thing.

"Non," Lee said.

"Sacré Bleu," Bear said. "I took her to Buttery Socks?"

"Yes, you did."

"You speak French?"

"Yes, I do," Lee said. "And a little English."

Bear laughed, and realized that Lee wasn't being rude, he really did speak French, and he wasn't interrupting the sensitive moment. Well, he was interrupting, but not rudely, and who could blame him with a name like that.

"Why would they name a restaurant Buttery Socks?" he asked.

"It's River Bend," Lee explained. "Why do they have an alley covered in bubble gum? That people think is cool?"

Lee shuddered and tried to remember if any of that horrid wall had touched any part of him that horrible, horrible afternoon. Bear saw the shudder and didn't bring up that he had contributed several sticks of Black Jack to the depiction of The Last Supper. Instead, he talked about how hard it had been the last few weeks, that sleeping and eating had somehow become superfluous, about how much he really still loved Dee Dee and how scared they both were about doing anything about it. It was nice being able to talk to someone about it.

"How are you and Abby getting along?" he said to take the focus off himself.

"We split up," Lee said.

"Really?"

"No. I was just kidding. You're so easy," Lee said, and the two men bonded. "I... gave her a key... to my place."

Bear nodded. He understood the ramifications of that.

"Did she think it was a ring?"

"Everybody asks that," Lee said. "God, I hope not. I mean... not because... "

"I know," Bear said, and Lee knew he did know.

A loud, low rumbling wave of sound crawled in from the direction of Roger's room and the tiny hairs at both the top and bottom of Lee's vertebrae stood at attention, ready to fight or fly. It looked like Bear was consciously trying to remain unaffected, which made him look very affected. Lee wanted to reach back to his neck to smooth the hairs there, but he knew if he were successful there, he'd have to do it to his coccyx, which started throbbing for the first time in weeks, so he let all the hairs stand.

"Okay," Lee said gruffly, then cleared his throat. "That wasn't a furnace."

Bear shrugged, noncommital. Lee thought of standing and trying to force the hairs to quiet down so he could go investigate, but the look on Bear's face stopped him.

"Okay," Lee said, and his voice sounded like it had been poured through steel wool. "A long time ago I asked if Roger's Room was haunted and you gave me some strange story, then told me I was gullible."

"I remember. You are."

"Yes, but is it haunted?"

"I don't know," Bear said. "Honestly. I never go in there. Unless it's bright daylight outside and the dressing room door and all the windows are open. And I really need to."

"But that's where the furnace is. And the paint pigment."

"I don't service the furnace. And I only need pigment in the daytime. And I send volunteers to get that, anyway. I'm not stupid."

The low rumbling got quieter, which was far worse, and the hairs on the rest of Lee's spine joined in. The ends of Bear's moustache twitched.

"Come to the party," Bear said to gain some masculine mastery of the moment.

Lee squared his shoulders, forced his spine hairs to behave and responded definitively to Bear.

"I don't know."

"Come on, it'll be fun," Bear insisted quickly. "And you're the only actor around here that isn't like an actor."

"Really?" Lee asked. Talking about himself got his mind further off the sound.

"That's probably why you're good," Bear said. "And why everybody hates you."

"See, I told you."

Neither of the men realized that the pace of their conversation had quickened a bit with each response.

"I'm kidding, stupid. You are gullible," Bear said with a forced smile.

"Well, you ate Buttery Socks," Lee responded, jumping in quickly so there would be no void between the words.

"No, I ate AT Buttery Socks," Bear corrected him.

"What did you eat?"

Maybe, if he kept Bear talking, he could stand, gather his things and they could both leave before whatever was making that sound decided it was hungry. He wondered vaguely if Bear had to lock up first. If so, he wondered if he were man enough to just leave Bear to his fate.

"It had sauce on it," Bear said. "It might have been socks for all I know, all I could think of were Dee Dee's tits." (Steve! You did it. Once, it's funny. And Bear would not say "tits". He'd think it, though. Well, yeah, of course. That's been his whole problem all month.) "I mean all I could think of was Dee Dee. Come to the party."

Lee looked like he might equivocate for some time, which neither of them wanted just then, so Bear took a coin out of his pocket. (Is it a three-legged buffalo nickel? No, it's a damp quarter. Pay attention.)

"Heads, you go," Bear said and put the quarter on his thumb.

"What if it's tails?" Lee asked.

"Then you take me to Buttery Socks," Bear said with sly smile, glad they had almost completely covered the sound.

"Okay, but I won't sleep with you afterwards, either. Unless you spring for dessert. Then we'll talk."

Bear's smile changed from sly to patronizing and he flipped his thumb, and, with a faint ringing sound, the quarter tumbled slowly up into the air, end over end, the light from the moon streaming through the dusty window glinting off it in a strobe-like pattern. It sounded like the muffled helicopters at the beginning of Apocalypse Now; whoop, whoop, whoop, whoop. When it reached the height of about three feet above his head, it paused for a moment at the apex, still turning over and over, then gently descended.