Archive of Our Own

[ YOU’RE ALWAYS ONE DECISION AWAY

FROM A TOTALLY DIFFERENT LIFE. ]

-

The first thought Frank has—after Meg cutting her hand, after the worst vice is advice—has got little to do with Gussie implying she’s leaving him. Little to do with the fight that breaks out between her and Meg, or the whispered gossip of those crowding around him (the blob, as Gussie had called them all those years ago, and, well, Frank’s not very good at thinking of the blob as his friends, not very good at think of the blob as people in general. He thinks he should be feeling guilty about that. He thinks he should be feeling guilty about a lot of things.)

Instead, it’s almost like a pitcher of cold water’s been poured on him; he's numb post-impact. And it should be jarring, having the pieces to his day-to-day life strewn haphazardly across the floor—third time’s the charm, they say, everything always seems to come in threes—but it’s like his brain’s forgotten all that and has instead latched onto the image of Mary’s car parked outside earlier in the evening, a picture which would naturally mean that she’s planning on driving home drunk out of her mind instead of taking a taxi. Frank balls his hand into a fist; she’s always impulsive when she’s drunk, she’s always impulsive. And before he knows it he’s standing out in the driveway, looking at Mary fucking Flynn, who he should be furious at. His oldest friend, embarrassing him like that in front of—

He closes his eyes. He’s been here before.

“Shouldn’t you be inside, celebrating?” Her dry tone shakes him out of his trance. He looks at Mary, really looks at her in a way he hasn’t for a while. She’s in a state of disarray, her hair tangled, her eyebrows set in an angry line, the corners of her lips turned downwards. She looks sad. He vaguely registers the sharp, incessant feeling of unhappiness drumming underneath his own skin but he files it away as the night’s events talking. Fuck what he said to Gussie earlier. He has everything he could ever dream of. He’s happy. Hell, he’s deliriously happy.

“Earth to Franklin.”

“Why would I be celebrating?”

Mary raises her eyebrow.

“You’re slower than I am, tonight. And I’ve been drinking since noon.” She smiles sardonically. “And, I don’t know, Frank. Last time you got divorced, you went on a cruise.”

“You all told me to.”

“Your attention is exclusively selective.”

“Fuck off.” He spits out. “I cared so much about everything you and—” Frank hesitates. Mary raises her eyebrow. “I cared so much about everything.”

“Cared.” Mary echoes. Frank closes his eyes.

“Care, I care—”

“Don’t do that.” Mary warns, tightly. “Don’t lie to me.”

“Mary, listen—”

“Don’t say you care. I don’t even care.”

Frank looks at the mascara smudged under her eyes, at her clenched knuckles; everything about Mary screams that she cares, too loudly and too much. He decides to drop it.

“Who said I was getting divorced?”

“It felt implied.”

“You think you’re so much better than me.”

“Yeah.” Mary answers, defiant, uncrumpling for just a second, and the light sifting through the door makes her look like she’s on fire. “And I fucking hate myself, so that’s saying something.”

“Did you come tonight just to humiliate me, because I have to say that that’s a new level of pathetic.” He doesn’t say even for you. He knows she hears it, anyway.

Mary laughs. It’s mean, hollow. Unfamiliar. Frank shifts uncomfortably.

“Because everything I do is just some big joke. You know, you’ve never taken me seriously, so I’m not sure how I deluded myself into thinking that one of these days you might. So, alright. Let’s say that I came here with every intention of ruining what little reputation I had left. And to walk out of your life forever, of course.” She says, and he can hear the hurt in her voice even as she tries her hardest to hide it. Maybe even more so because she does. “Because I am doing that. I’m done. With you, with torturing myself, with, with writing, with everything, I’m done with everything, Frank, do you understand? You know, I used to think you needed to be saved, but you… you’re happy with the skeletons in your closet. I’m through with caring. And I’m through with making a fool of myself. And I guess that means I’m through with you, so,” she folds her arms. “So, I’m through with you.”

He doesn’t know what to say to that. He settles on not saying anything at all. Instead, he grabs the car handle, taking advantage of how Mary practically flinches away from him as he approaches. He opens the door and sits down in front of the wheel.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“You’re not driving home like this.”

“God,” she starts, hysteria coloring her tone, “You are something else. What? Did you think I was showing off the opening monologue to my new play?”

“It’s like you said. You’ve been drinking since noon. Get in the car, Mary.”

“Well,” she throws her hands up in the air. “Did you enjoy it at least? Any critiques? How do you think Meg Kincade would sound on it?”

“Mary.” He says, warningly.

“Or, better yet, Gussie—”

“Get in the car, Mary.”

She glares at him for a full minute, before begrudgingly sitting down in the passenger’s side, slamming the door angrily enough to chip the paint. Frank doesn’t wince, doesn’t let himself sweat it. It’s her fucking car, in the first place.

“I need the keys.”

She reaches into her bag and throws them at his lap, then she leans her forehead against the window and closes her eyes.

“Do you want Advil?”

“I want another drink.” She mutters, before cracking an eye open. “Yes. There’s some in my purse, I think.”

He digs around and pulls out a small bottle, and he’s ready to hand two pills to Mary, when he realizes it’s not Advil at all. For a terrible moment, he wonders whether Mary’s moved on from alcoholism to drug addiction, but, no; it’s a prescription bottle. Well. Not like she stole this. He squints at the label in the dark—Trazodone. He vaguely remembers reading something about it in the paper. Trazodone. Prescribed to people with depression, he’s pretty sure. Frank frowns.

“Oh, that,” Mary snorts, grabs the bottle, and tosses it into the back seat. “Yeah, I don’t take that. The psychiatrist told me it doesn’t go well with vodka.”

“Mary—”

“Here it is,” she says, grabbing the Advil and dry swallowing two. “Do you know my address?”

“Uh—”

“9263 Lilac Street. Manhattan.”

“Right.”

“Don’t expect me to thank you for this.”

They fall into silence after that, Frank finally starting the car and pulling out of the driveway and into the streets of New York. He hasn’t driven in a while. He usually takes a taxi, especially if he’s going somewhere with Gussie, because taking taxis seems like such an inherently New York thing to do, something he’d dreamed about constantly growing with his chin tilted to the skyline, and there’s something in what Gussie’s done for him and his career that slots in pretty perfectly with all of that. He breathes out through his nose. Thinking of Gussie should hurt, now, but it really doesn’t. It doesn’t feel like anything. He doesn’t feel like anything.

“Y’know,” Mary says, suddenly, and her voice is still snide and her words are still slurred, but she’s gone quiet now, introspective. “What you said in there, about how, twenty years ago, we’d all be impressed with what we’d see? I disagree. I’d hate all of it. I know I would. Charley would, too, he’d have a conniption. But you knew that already.”

Frank grits his teeth. He hates her for bringing up Charley, and for a quick, awful moment, he’s so lost in his rage he considers swerving into the nearest building. He breathes in and out, slowly. He keeps his eyes on the road.

“Twenty years ago, this was all I ever wanted.” He says, struggling to keep his voice steady.

Mary turns away from him to face the window again.

“‘If I didn’t have music, I’d die.’” She says, firmly. Frank swallows hard. He says nothing. He lets her win. The conversations falls into a lull.

He wants that to be the end of it, wants his mind to stray far, far away from this and onto safer topics, because he doesn’t need Mary— he doesn’t need Charley— he doesn’t need anyone who’s gonna sit around and judge the choices that made him who he is, and he’s proud of himself, goddamnit. He’s proud of his life.

And yet, he can’t quite stop himself from thinking about his apartment; how empty it feels on the nights that sleep is too far away from him. How lonely he is even at those big blowouts, the ones they can’t admit they’re all much too old for. And he doesn’t have anybody on speed dial or as his emergency contact, does he? Not anybody he really trusts, anyway, because, well, he doesn’t really trust anyone. He thinks about Gussie and Joe Josephson and Beth and Meg and the iodine, the three marriages he’s managed to destroy in the crossfire, the three-picture deal for Musical Husbands—and the three of them, Mary, Frank, Charley, because maybe the best things don’t come in threes, maybe three really is a crowd after all, and that’s why they all ended up where they ended up and that’s what was bound to happen from the moment they all collided together on that rooftop. There’s Gussie asking him to write the music for her show. There’s Beth telling him she was pregnant. There’s Joe rejecting them, that first time, years and years ago. There’s turning points, everything’s a turning point, especially Charley calling him out on national television, especially friendship is like a garden, you have to water it and tend it and care for it and I miss it and I want it back, and, God, what was so terrible about that? What made him so angry? He thinks about congratulations, that was a real slaughter and you’re out of my goddamn life, Charley, about how he can’t quite put his finger on how it all feels whenever he looks back on it, and how he can’t ever really bring himself to actually look back on it. How it destroyed his oldest, his deepest friendship. How it changed his whole life.

He stops at the red light, and closes his eyes, taking a moment to himself. Is he happy? Hell, he’s about to get divorced for the second time in the past twenty years. What better time than now to start over?

“Mary, what you said about being saved,” he says, gently, when the light turns green and he’s on the move again. “Theoretically. How would one go about doing that?”

Mary doesn’t answer him. He thinks she fell asleep some time during the ride home, and it almost makes him smile. As he pulls up into the parking lot for her apartment, he uses his elbow to gently nudge her awake. She yawns, stretching out on the seat like a cat, then she puts a hand to her temple and groans.

“You’re not getting another Advil. We don’t want you high on painkillers on top of everything else.”

He feels her eyes on him. From the corner of his eye, he reckons she might be holding back a smirk.

“So, now what? You’re gonna taxi back to hell so Gussie can scratch out your eyes and castrate you?”

“I’m not sure. Would all that be before or after she subpoenas me, do you think? Being blinded might affect my chances in court. On the flip side, it’ll definitely affect Meg Kincade’s.”

“What, no comment on the castration?”

“It strays from the ocular theme of the night.”

Mary barks out a surprised laugh.

“I forgot you had a sense of humor.” She opens the door, but stays seated, decidedly not looking at him. “I’m not going to offer, but I’m also not going to say no.”

Frank sighs. It carries very little weight.

“See, the thing is, I’m just not sure I can cover a visit to the eye doctor.”

Mary hums, and she’s definitely holding back a smile, now. He thinks he might be, too. He promptly blames it on the alcohol.

“So I mean, might as well stay here, then, right?” He asks, shrugging.

“Might as well.”

-

When he wakes up in Mary’s guest room the next morning, it takes him a second to remember where he is and why he’s there. She’s in a larger apartment than the last time he visited (although, he can’t quite place when that was); not as big as his, it’s just two rooms, he thinks, but Frank’s pretty sure that’s a personal choice. Mary doesn’t need all that space, and she knows it, knows it like she knows she doesn’t handle things well when they’re in excess, so this is good.

He yawns, rubbing his eyes tiredly. He’s got a pounding headache, though he wasn’t drinking as heavily last night so he figures it’s not as bad as whatever Mary’s going through right about now. He winces, sympathetically, and sits up, running a hand through his hair. What time was it when he got here? What time is it now? God, Gussie must be livid.

But, then again, she already was, so who fucking cares, right?

He throws off the covers, and forces himself into the kitchen, fumbling around for a glass of water. The bottle of Advil is there, on the counter, and he grabs at it, gratefully. He uses the sink to wash his face, because he’s not really sure where the bathroom is, and vaguely wonders whether or not he brought his wallet and if he’s carrying enough cash for a cab ride back to his house. The thought makes dread pool in the pit his stomach, but he’s not just gonna stay here. He can’t. Can he? He can’t.

He pushes those thoughts out of his mind. He focuses on waiting, and sits down on the couch, tapping his toes anxiously. Jesus. He shouldn't be this nervous. It’s Mary. Her bark and bite pale in comparison to some of the characters he works with every day.

(Even so, he closes his eyes and thinks about her words last night, about how ready she’d been to give up on him forever and how certain she had sounded.

Then, he thinks about how she let him stay here, anyway, and allows himself to feel the tiniest bit better.)

He looks around the room, catching sight of the typewriter in the corner, collecting dust. There’s no paper on or near it, and the corners of his mouth fall in disappointment. One bestseller and she’s done with novels. And, sure, she’s writing reviews for the Times, but at what cost? It’s not as though she’d grown up dreaming of being a critic.

Then, he thinks about how he hasn’t composed in years and realizes that maybe he’s not the best person to be chiding Mary for giving up on her dream.

Not that he—gave up, of course. Other opportunities just presented themselves to him and he took them. Whatever. It’s too fucking early.

When Mary opens the door to her room, abruptly interrupting his cognitive dissonance, she’s squinting at him and pinching the bridge of her nose.

“Oh, you’re still here? Scandalous. I thought you’d leave before morning.”

“And risk my chances with the paparazzi?”

“They must be, like, Rottweilers or something. If the fear of them is enough to keep you here with me.” Mary smiles, wryly. “You do have a terrible track record with the press, to be fair. You’re lucky it hasn’t hurt your, ah, your reputation.”

“My reputation.” Frank echoes.

“Y’know. Prodigious. Calm, cool, collected. Loving? Eh, two documented instances of cheating can at least wear that one away. Also, it’s not like you’re a teddy bear or anything. Your photo-op smile screams casual detachment.”

“You’re a delight in the mornings, Mary, has no one ever told you that?”

“That’s all I get? No righteous screaming? These are all notoriously low blows, Frank, I was expecting more panache from your response.”

She’s trying to pick a fight, had been from the minute she walked in and saw him sitting there, a challenge etched onto the curve of her raised brow. He thinks he should be offended, knows he would usually take the bait with open arms, but nothing about today is usual. He chuckles, instead.

“Get me some coffee and try again later.”

Mary looks at him like he’s crazy, and like she can’t quite believe he’s sitting there on her couch, just a few feet away. Her eyes are narrowed, a deep distrust protrudes from her features, but she nods her head thoughtfully, and turns to make coffee for them both. Frank keeps a close eye on her, remembering her sarcastic words from the party—I never drink coffee, caffeine isn’t good for you—because he doesn’t trust her not to spike her cup with vodka, or wine, or something like that. He’s really starting to wonder about the level of functioning her liver must be working at.

She’s halfway through making it and hasn’t, to the best of his knowledge, added in anything extra, when the coffeemaker groans and the pop socket it’s connected to starts giving off sparks. Frank jumps, smelling something burning, and he has half a mind to throw a glass of water on the coffeemaker—even though it is decidedly not on fire—when Mary swears under her breath and pulls the cord. She leans against her refrigerator and shrugs, unceremoniously.

“Would you believe me if I told you that was all a part of the process?”

“You never told me you’d become a coffee connoisseur.”

She swats his shoulder, grinning, despite herself.

“Grab our coats,” she orders. “We’re going out for breakfast.”

-

The diner across the street is small, but cozy, and not like anything else in New York, lately. They get placed in a corner booth by a young waiter who looks at Frank reverently and at Mary like a neighbor he sees rather often. She smiles at him, tipping her head forwards in recognition. Frank cocks his eyebrow.

“You come here often?”

“I don’t love cooking for one.”

“Right.”

He cracks his knuckles, sifting through the menu. Everything on it is caked with grease, and a voice in his head that sounds an awful lot like Gussie’s is telling him to order egg whites and a tomato. He eyes the pancakes hungrily.

The waiter returns—Tommy, his name tag reads. He stammers a little while talking to Frank, hiding his face behind the notepad and scurrying away as soon as he possibly can. Frank looks at Mary, curious.

“Tom’s a self proclaimed ‘starving artiste,’” she says, amusedly. “He’s a composer and a lyricist. Two-in-one, baby. You’re kind of his hero. You and…” Mary trails off, gesturing to the air vaguely, taking a sip of her coffee. Frank nods, and he knows that she knows exactly what she’s doing so he ignores the twinge he feels at the implication, and looks at the kid as he comes back with their food. He’s really rather young, must still be in college, if he goes to college, and he’s skinny, gangly, freckled, hasn’t grown into his features just yet. He’s got a gleam in his eye that Frank finds all too familiar. He hopes he doesn’t lose it.

“And, for you, Mister Shepard,” Tommy says, not meeting his eyes.

“Thank you,” Frank tells him, sincerely. “Say, Mary here tells me you’re a composer.”

Tommy flushes a deep red, nodding fervently.

“Yes, sir, I am. Or I’m trying to be. Composer’s really formal. I—I write music. My friends performs it.”

“You guys have a show?”

“Oh, it’s nothing that official, really,” Tommy scratches the back of his neck, and Frank notices the way he refuses to take up space, choosing instead to shrink into himself. He can’t help but consider it starkly different than how he was at that age. “Not yet, anyway. Just a couple of songs. We don’t exactly have a book, but we’re getting there. I should be working on it more,” he divulges, “But I’ve been focusing mainly on the songs. I love writing music.”

“The gift of gifts,” Mary says, loftily.

“That’s really interesting,” Frank nods, and he grabs a napkin, passing it to Tommy. “Do you think you could write down the name of where you perform? And what days?”

“Tonight,” Tommy answers, immediately, scribbling down an address. “We, uh, we have a booking tonight.”

Frank takes the napkin and places it in his coat pocket.

“Mary, you don’t have anything important to do tonight, do you?” He asks, and she smirks.

“I haven’t had anything important to do since the 60s.” She pats the kid’s hand. “We’ll be there.”

“Oh God, uh, thank you so much,” Tommy breathes, his jaw hanging open. “You won’t be disappointed!” He smiles, widely, and hurries off to the front desk, grabbing the phone and dialing madly. Frank watches him gesticulate and nod into the receiver, and he smiles, turning back to Mary, who’s looking at him like she’s trying to figure him out. He kind of hopes she does; he’s not quite sure where to go from here.

“So, I take it you’re not heading back to Chez Carnegie, tonight?”

“Plenty of time tomorrow to deal with the forest fire that’s waiting for me when I get back.”

Mary, despite herself, smiles into her cup.

-

They walk around Manhattan, afterwards. Frank breathes in, and there’s something imperceptibly sweet in the crisp air. Autumn feels so familiar, he almost can’t bear it. Him and Mary walk past boutiques and food stands and theaters alike, talking and catching up, and it's not just the city he's meeting again: he’s reacquainting himself with her, too. She’s different, much more reserved, a painful edge to all her words, and he knows that, deep down, she hasn’t quite forgiven him, in the same way that he hasn’t quite forgiven her, but they’re both laughing together, and strolling along the streets together—they’re both trying. Together. She’s his oldest friend. There’s a chemistry in that that can never really be washed away completely. Before he can stop himself, he wonders whether it would be the same if Charley were here, but Frank refuses to entertain that for too long, shoving it deep down inside instead, to that place where he puts things he doesn’t want to think about right now. Or ever. He shakes his head once, to himself, before looking up.

“Oh.” He says, lamely, stopping in his tracks. He gestures over to the theatre before them. Next to him, Mary frowns. “ Would you look at that.”

“The Alvin.” She says, with a curt nod. “Musical Husbands—it ran here, right?”

“Yeah,” Frank says, absentmindedly, as he sits down on the steps. Mary does the same. They stay like that for a little while, reminiscing.

“The first big hit,” Frank says, to nobody in particular. “The hit that started it all.”

“It also ended a few things.” Mary chimes in, swiftly.

“I needed the money. Beth and I needed the money.” He argues, but there’s no heat behind it. There’s a bittersweet taste to these memories; Musical Husbands was the catalyst to his success. His and Charley’s success. From a purely objective perspective, he can appreciate the irony behind that.

“And then you needed more money, for your divorce with Beth,” Mary continues, sighing. “And now?”

“Now, I have a lot of money.”

“Good. Those upcoming court dates are gonna be expensive.”

Her words are more mocking now, openly snide, which means she’s mad again, and Frank closes his eyes, resting his face on his hands. He thinks that maybe some topics never quite stop being sensitive.

“God, this was so stupid,” Mary says, quietly, and he turns to look at her. She’s shaking her head and gritting her teeth, and he’s not sure if he’s imagining things but he thinks she might be trying not to cry. “You’re never going to change. I hope you and money have a very happy life together, Frank. I’m going back home.”

She goes to stand up, but he grabs her wrist, looking at her tiredly.

“Please don’t.”

“What. Did you leave something in my apartment?”

“No, I just,” he pauses. He’s not sure what to say. He thinks back to Gussie’s motto, all those years ago, about wanting the things he wanted, and wonders, vaguely, just how blindsided he’d really been, if all this nothing he’s left with is the end result. The resounding conclusion that it wasn’t worth it screams at him, too blatant for him to choose to ignore it. He resolves to think more deeply about it some other time; right now, Mary is priority.

“You just?” She echoes, as if on cue.

Frank swallows. Compartmentalizes, maybe.

“Let’s go to the kid’s show. Please.”

“Frank, I—”

“I can’t go back to that house, Mary.”

“Look, I’m sorry about Gussie, but you brought that upon yourself.”

“No, I know that,” Frank says, frustrated. “That’s not what I mean. That, that life. I thought it was what I wanted. And I… I don’t know. If it is, or or if it isn’t. But I— I want to fix this. All of it. And I don’t think I can do it alone. I need—” He pauses. “I want your help.”

Mary looks down at him for a long time. Her eyes are narrowed and her arms are folded. She sighs, still frowning.

“I feel like I’ve been waiting forever just to hear you say that.” She says. He’s not sure whether she means for it to come out as reverently as it does.

“Mary,” Frank starts, before shaking his head and pulling her into a hug.

-

They get back to the apartment at half past four, which is around the time that Frank realizes he doesn’t have a change of clothes for tonight. Then, he remembers he’s going to go see a college kid play piano for a bunch of other college kids, and decides it doesn’t really matter. This is one of his nicer suits, anyway.

His legs hurt from walking, so he sits down at the couch. Mary perches herself on the arm, hovering above him. She regards him for a couple of moments, wary.

“So, do you have a plan, or?”

“Not really,” he claps his hands together. “Sorta just making things up as I go.”

“Who are you, right now?” Mary laughs, and the tension in her shoulder relaxes somewhat. “You can stay here as long as you need. But you’re on thin ice, Franklin Shepard.”

“Duly noted. And thank you.” He says. “I think I’ll head over tomorrow and pack a bag, or something, because I don't think I can wear polyester for two days straight.”

“You’re so demanding,” Mary says, good-naturedly. “Relax, princess. You can go get your clothes tomorrow. And maybe steal something of Gussie’s, so I can burn it.”

“You’re insane.”

“You’re inane.”

“What a sorry pair we make.”

Mary hums agreeably, standing up and heading over to the kitchen.

“Ugh, I have to buy a new coffee maker, now,” she says, thinking out loud. She murmurs a couple of other things under her breath as she’s organizing her stuff that Frank doesn’t quite catch, and memories of a younger Mary tottering about his old apartment talking to herself flash through his mind—he makes the conscious choice not to paint the picture for too long. His eyes once again fall on her typewriter, and he contemplates it, tries to merge Mary as she is now with the Mary he knew then, who hated every word she wrote but had the resolve to fumble through it, anyway. He guesses she must be doing the same thing, trying to reconcile the Frank of 1976 with the skinny kid who swore he’d die without music.

God, he’s just gonna keep coming back to those words, isn’t he?

“Oh, that old thing,” Mary chimes in, having caught him staring. “It’s not old, actually. Pretty new. Barely used. I bought it a year or two ago. Thought it would inspire me, or something.” She snorts. “It didn’t.”

“When’s the last time you wrote?”

“I write all the time,” she reminds him. “I’m a critic.”

“You know what I mean.”

Mary sighs, and she turns to the cabinets, rummaging through them. For a second, he worries he’s overstepped, worries she’s gonna get defensive.

“I’m not sure.” She says, finally. “I really don’t know, Frank. Probably around the time I first started drinking competitively.”

He notices how all her words are infused with something short and righteous, and he wonders whether she always carried the anger lining her shoulders. Had he just never noticed? He’s finding it harder and harder to remember how things used to be. How they all used to be.

He wonders how much Charley’s changed. He’s not sure he wants to find out.

“Speaking of,” Mary continues, closing the drawers. “I am out of champagne. That should be criminalized.”

“Like Prohibition?”

“Specifically not like Prohibition, actually.” She snorts. “Do you think there’ll be drinks at Tommy’s thing?”

“I don’t think Tommy knows whether there’ll be drinks at Tommy’s thing,” Frank answers. “That’s like asking us if we even knew what the venue for our revue was going to look like, back before our first night on.”

“That nightclub was sleazy.” Mary says, as she’s on her knees looking through the remaining drawers. “There’s literally nothing left here. Where’s Jesus when you need him?”

“Jesus?”

“Water into wine, Frank.”

“Oh.” He frowns. “That wasn’t funny.”

“Yeah, that would be the sobriety.”

“Can you really call it sobriety if it’s been three hours?”

“Now, that was funny.” She pops her head back up onto the counter, sighing heavily. “Do you mind going out again?”

“You know,” Frank says, slowly. “You could just.. not drink?”

“There’s an idea.” Mary replies, but something different slips into her tone, something even sharper than before that Frank’s not entirely sure what to do with.

“Take this as a sign, maybe?” He offers, and she lifts her eyebrow. “You’re out of booze. So.. don’t buy more. I don’t know. I’m worried about you, Mary.”

“I’m fine, Frank.” She answers, tightly.

“I don’t like it when you drink.”

“You don’t even know me when I don’t drink. When’s the last time we spent time together with me sober?”

“Right now.” He reminds her. “And it was nice.”

“That doesn’t count. I’m hungover.”

“Mary—”

“Frank, all I do is drink, I can’t just,” she swallows. “Stop.”

“You weren’t like that when we were younger.”

Mary looks at him coolly.

“Things didn’t hurt so much when we were younger. I didn’t know how the world worked.”

“How does the world work, Mary?” He asks, quietly.

“It doesn’t.”

Frank turns to her, pressing the side of his face against the couch cushions.

“Look, I know I’m in no position to ask you anything, but,” he starts, and Mary inhales sharply. “Can you try? If not for me, then for yourself.”

“I have.”

Frank blinks.

“What?”

“I have.” Mary repeats, looking away from him. “I didn’t have a drop to drink for almost four days. My head hurt like hell, my body was trembling, I…” she trails off, shaking her head. “I don’t think I could do it, Frank. And what for? Nothing’s worth anything anymore.”

He grabs her hand, carefully, and she turns to him again. Her eyes are bloodshot. She looks so tired.

“It’ll be different this time.” He promises. “I’m here now.”

“Real humble.” She mutters, and he shoves her gently.

“You know what I mean,” he presses. “You won’t be alone.”

Mary closes her eyes, breathing in and out.

“Fine,” she agrees, finally. “But you have to do something, too. Something crazy difficult. Something that’ll make you a better person.” She pauses. “If it doesn’t kill you. Just so we’re on the same page, here.”

“Oh?” He says, nervously. Mary nods.

“You’re gonna write a new show. A whole show. And give up that mindless producing you do.”

“You mean my job?”

“Frank.” She says, warning, and he groans.

“Fine. Fine. But, how am I supposed to write a whole show by myself? What about the book?”

Mary shrugs.

“Adapt something.”

“I don’t think that process is as literal as you’re making it out to be. And lyrics? I’m a composer, I don’t do lyrics.”

“I never said it had to be good.”

“I’m not going to waste hours of my time making something that’s going to turn out to be trash.”

She grins, eyes shining in a way he hasn’t seen since they were kids.

“Better find yourself a lyricist, then.”

“Mary—”

“I’m gonna go freshen up, get ready for tonight.” She says, interrupting him. “The other bathroom’s to your left, if you care to do the same. Nice chat.”

Then, she’s gone, leaving Frank alone. And mildly annoyed.

“‘Write a show,’ she says,” he mutters. “It’s that easy.”

-

Frank takes a shower, shaves, combs his hair, and puts on the dress shirt and pants he was wearing, choosing to forego the suit jacket and the tie. He wishes he had cologne, or something of the sort to make him feel more comfortable with the outfit, but he shakes himself out of it, and goes to find Mary.

“How am I? It’s not too shabby?” He asks, rubbing a hand over his jaw. She looks him over and rolls her eyes.

“You’re so ridiculous. It’s fine. It doesn’t even look like the same thing you were wearing before.” She assures him. “And me?”

She’s wearing a dark blue dress and her hair’s down. Casual, but formal. He smiles, nodding appreciatively.

“You look lovely, Mary.” He says, and she rolls her eyes again, but this time it’s a lot more fond.

“I’m so relieved you’ve deemed it appropriate. I would hate to break the dress code of some dingy bar.”

Frank pauses.

“It’s a bar?”

“I hope so,” Mary jokes, and Frank gives her a pointed look. She raises her hands in surrender, passing him the napkin with the address on it. “Relax. I’m kidding. I think it’s just a restaurant with a stage.”

“Good,” he says, relieved, and offers her his arm. “Shall we?”

She takes it, grinning.

“We shall.”

The building isn’t far from Mary’s apartment, so they decide to walk instead of taking a cab. It feels nice, being like this with Mary again, but Frank can’t quite shake the feeling that something isn’t right, that something’s missing. But he’s grown very committed to not thinking about things like that, so he forces a smile onto his face and walks with zest. Either way, it’s much better than being with his soon-to-be-ex-wife, so he’ll take it.

“I think we have to turn a corner here,” Mary says, although she’s frowning, and Frank can see why.

“That’s an alley.” He states, and stops walking.

“Your deductive reasoning is unparalleled.” She counters, pulling him along.

“I feel like I’m in the beginning of a horror movie.”

“Were you always this dramatic?” Mary narrows her eyes, as they come to a door almost at the end of the alleyway. “What does that say? It’s dark and I didn’t bring my reading glasses.”

“What was that, grandmother?”

“Just read the fucking number, Franklin.”

“3-6-9-2.”

“That’s the one,” she says, opening the door. Frank pulls out the napkin, but he doesn’t have anything to shine a light on it so he follows Mary inside, crossing his fingers— he’s really not in the mood to get murdered tonight.

“Mister Shepard!”

It’s definitely the right place, Frank thinks, as he catches sight of Tommy approaching him. It is a restaurant, technically, but in name only; Frank would bet they don’t even serve water here, at least not anymore, and there are only a few tables off to the sides, and a lot of foldable chairs clustered in the middle. A platform that spreads from one wall to the next serves as the stage, and he catches a glimpse of a Baby Grand peeking out from the corner.

Frank smiles, charming as always, and extends his hand. Tommy takes it eagerly, palms a little sweaty. He assumes it’s the nerves.

“Hi, Tommy, it’s great to see you, too,” Mary cuts in sarcastically, tapping her foot. Tommy apologizes profusely, and Frank finds it hilarious, the sight of this kid just absolutely towering over Mary— five feet even as always, that he remembers— and wringing his hands, chastising himself. Mary seems to find it hilarious, too, seeing as how she smacks him over the head and leans in to give him a proper hug. Frank grins. They kind of look like mother and son, and it tugs at his heartstrings—how long’s it been since he’s talked to Frankie?

“So, uh, we’re gonna start soon,” Tommy says, chewing on his bottom lip like his life depends on it. “You can sit anywhere you like, even if it’s taken, I’ll, uh, I’ll make them stand up. Anywhere you like! Thank you for coming, thank you so, so much.” He swallows. “Enjoy the show!”

“Jesus Christ does that kid need some Valium,” Mary whispers to Frank, before dragging him to one of the tables.

“So,” she says, drumming her fingers on the table. “Exciting, isn’t it?”

“I’m practically quivering with anticipation.” Frank deadpans.

“And so you should be. It was your idea to come.”

“I’m glad we did.” He says, and he means it. “I’ve been surrounded by so much bullshit pretending to be art—”

“And producing most of it.”

“—it’s places like these where you find something real.” Frank finishes, glaring at her.

“That’s very nice and also terribly hypocritical of you, Socrates.” Mary folds her arms. “But I’m glad you’re learning the lesson from someone. Don’t let Charley find out, though. He’ll bitch that it wasn’t him.”

“He’s just mad that our dreams weren’t carbon copies, he couldn’t deal with us wanting different things.” Frank says, impulsively, then he clenches his jaw, hands tensing up and eyes falling down to focus on a suddenly very interesting ring of water on the table, probably from patrons prior to them. Huh. Maybe they did serve water here. In front of him, he hears Mary huff.

“Oh God, please calm down,” she begs, rolling her eyes. “You can say whatever you want, Frank, I’m not going to crucify you for being pissed at Charley.” He looks up to meet her eyes, and she leans back, shrugging lazily. “Your point stands. So does mine. Maybe there’s a lyricist in us both.”

“Hopefully, that doesn’t mean we inherit his little habit of, uh, writing all over his hands.” He says, and even though his voice shakes, it feels good, it feels right to be able to joke around about this. A memory—generalized from the many times he’d seen it happen—of Charley and him and oftentimes Mary, too, taking advantage of their downtime, where Charley had suddenly stiffened, grabbed the nearest pen, and scribbled something essentially illegible into the crook of his elbow, a gummy smile worming its way unto his face. “I’ve got it,” he’d say, pride coloring his tone.

And he would bet money that Charley was still out there, writing words on his knuckles, rhymes on his wrists. If any one of them did what they set out to do and was still doing it, it was Charles Kringas, Pulitzer Prize Winner.

(A memory—specific, achingly specific—right after they’d made their way back home from the rooftop, right after they’d first met Mary, when impossible was a concept still undefined by them: Charley and him, alone, stumbling into their practically barren apartment. They weren’t drunk, but the giddiness of the evening had had a similar effect on them, and they had toppled over onto the couch, giggling with the kind of ease that time erased. Charley was half on top of him, cheek rested against Frank’s chest. Frank’s hand, almost unconsciously, was stroking Charley’s hair. They stayed like that for a while, it seemed like the right thing to do, the only thing they could do, and Frank was halfway to dozing off, when Charley had suddenly sat up, eyes wide. Frank’s hand fell from his hair and the warmth and pressure was gone from his body. He let out a whine, reaching up to pull Charley back down.

“Shh,” Charley had said, grabbing a pen off the ground. He turned back to Frank, dark eyes shimmering with something he couldn’t quite place. Then, he had taken Frank’s palm, pulling it close—his glasses had fallen and currently resided on the floor, which meant Frank’s hand was situated so near to Charley’s face, he could feel Charley’s warm breath on his wrist. He remembers shivering and blaming it on the feel of the pen’s tip gliding across his palm.

Then, Charley had smiled, satisfied, and lobbed the pen off to the other side of the room. He’d laced Frank’s fingers in his, and leaned back down to rest his head against Frank’s chest, once more. Within minutes, his breathing had evened out and he was quietly snoring.

Frank had laid there, awake, for the rest of the night.)

“Go ahead,” Mary challenges breezily. “Ask me. You know you want to.”

Frank opens his mouth, and closes it again, eyes shifting around the room.

“I thought you two weren’t talking.”

“He wrote to me, a while back. He saw my review of his play. We got dinner.”

“And?”

“And what?” Mary asks, feigning ignorance.

Frank grits his teeth, and swallows his pride. Again. For something he’s not very good at, he sure is managing it remarkably often.

“How is he?”

“Well,” Mary folds her hands on the table, tilting her head to the side. “He’s good in some aspects.”

“Pulitzer Prize,” Frank says, and Mary touches her nose.

“Bingo. Honestly, what’s there left to do after you win the goddamn Pulitzer?” She pauses. “But, that’s not everything. He’s not so good in other aspects.”

“Oh?”

“Him and Evelyn are separated. Soon to be divorced.” Mary tells him, her eyes turning calculating, analytical, almost like she’s trying to read his mind. “They’re on good terms, though.”

“Good terms?”

“Relatively. I mean, they both were aware of what they were getting themselves into. Ev always knew, I think, but she’s finally had enough. The split was her idea.”

He frowns.

“You lost me,” he admits, and Mary pauses.

“Do you.. not know?”

“How the hell would I know Evelyn and Charley are getting a divorce?”

She narrows her eyes.

“No, not that—”

“Then what?”

“That they’re getting a divorce, because,” she furrows her eyebrows, looking at him intently. “Frank, do you really not know?”

“Know what?”

“That Charley’s—”

“Cheating on her?” Frank interrupts, shocked. “That’s not like him at all.”

“You’re right, it’s not.” She sounds kind of amused, but her expression still screams incredulous, and Frank hates this, hates being so out of the loop that apparently something so obvious is lost to him.

“Well, if he’s not cheating on her, then why—”

“Frank, he’s, he’s gay.”

He freezes.

“What?”

“Charley’s gay.” Mary repeats, as though he should have already known this, as if it makes all the sense in the world and isn’t a total fucking curveball.

“I— what? I— I think I’d know if my former best friend was gay, Mary.” He says, his tone varying in pitch.

“I thought you did know.”

“D-Did you know? Back then?”

Mary looks at him, curiously.

“Of course I knew, Frank.” She says, shaking her head. “I can’t believe you didn’t. You, of all people.”

“What the hell’s that supposed to mean?” Frank jumps in, and he’s not sure why, but his heart’s beating really fast all of a sudden, his breath following in tandem. Mary just stares at him, like he’s the crazy one, when he isn’t, he’s just—he’s actually not entirely sure what the fuck’s going on with him right now. Jesus, it’s hot in here.

“I mean, like you said,” she answers, slowly. “You were his best friend. What did you think I—”

“Nothing.” Frank says. “Nothing, I just—I don’t know.” He pauses. He wishes someone would turn on the goddamn air. Maybe he’s getting heat stroke. “I don’t—I don’t have a problem with him being.. queer, obviously. I just. I didn’t know.”

Mary’s looking at him like he’s a bomb ready to explode. It’s maybe the most lucid he’s seen her.

“I mean, he never really said anything,” she says, slowly. “It’s okay.”

“Okay,” he echoes, swallowing, and he thinks that maybe he should probably drop the topic as a whole, but. But.

“Is he.. seeing anyone?” He asks, and Mary pauses, taking in his words before bursting into a fit of shocked laughter. He glares at her. “What?”

“I just—I’m sorry,” she says, sobering up slightly. “You just did a complete 180 before my eyes. I think I might’ve gotten whiplash from that.”

“I did not—”

“I don’t know if he’s got a partner, actually,” she admits, and something about Charley having a partner makes Frank very, very upset, because he hasn’t had a partner since—and obviously it’s not that kind of partner that Mary’s talking about, no, she means a—a partner in life, not in music or business or—but, then again, him and Charley, they lived together for years, spent every waking moment at each other’s side, so wouldn’t that make them—

Partner’s a stupid fucking word, Frank decides.

“I could ask him?” Mary proposes.

“I don’t really care,” Frank tells her tightly. Mary chuckles. It makes him feel cornered, somehow. Heat stroke can do that to you.

“Yeah, I’ll definitely ask him.”

She’s smiling now, looking at him curiously, like a question’s forming on the tip of her tongue. Thankfully, that’s when the lights start to dim.

“Show’s starting,” Frank murmurs, hoping she gets the hint, and he closes his eyes, emptying his mind of everything—he wants to experience this with fresh eyes, the same way he did the first time he saw a show and realized that that’s what he wanted to do. He wants that inspiration to take over his whole body again, wants that urge to create carved back into his bone. He misses it, needs it; it’s necessary for his part of the deal to be completed, after all. It’s necessary for Frank Shepard to be Frank Shepard again, not—

Not Franklin Shepard, Inc., a voice that sounds an awful lot like Charley whispers in his ears, and it stings, to remember that phrase, but it only makes him want that fire back even more, makes him want to prove that voice—prove Charley wrong.

He’s more than what he’s become. And he can be more than what he was before, too.

-

(The show was good, Frank has to admit, later that night, as he stares at the ceiling of the guest room and turns it all over in his head. Messy, but not unintelligible. And the music…. Frank has to hand it to those kids, he’d say they had passion to spare, but he knows too well that passion is all consuming; there’s never anything spare.

He wonders what Charley would have thought about it, about the lyrics. Frank bets he would have loved anything that was played with that amount of raw emotion, even if it ended up being garbage.

The thought makes him smile, and he falls asleep like that, dreaming in quarter notes and octets.)

-

It’s after Mary makes a crack about him borrowing her clothes to sleep in that night, that Frank decides he’s had enough of the same suit, and that’s why, on the third day of his new life, he finds himself standing outside the door to—well, to his old life. With the jacket tossed over his shoulder, he unlocks the door and steps inside. Everything is as it was when he left, save for the disarray from the party, but, still. It’s all as he remembers it.

Well, of course it is. It’s been three days.

Mary’s right, Frank thinks. He’s too fucking dramatic.

He walks into the living room, and inhales sharply because, of course, there’s Gussie. And their lawyer.

“Darling,” she greets him, coolly—but he can tell he’s caught her by surprise. “Lovely of you to show. If you’re looking for your last shred of dignity, I think Meg might have left it somewhere by the second floor. Try the bedroom, maybe?”

“Lucky for me, I bet there’s a suitcase there, too,” he snaps, gritting his teeth. “Hi, Jerome.”

“Frank,” his lawyer says, not looking up from the pile of papers he’s underlining.

“I assume those are the divorce papers.”

Gussie purses her lips, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She thrives on all this discomfort, he knows. She’s somehow still this portrait of elegance amidst all the chaos. Some opponent he is; wearing the same thing he left in three days ago is decidedly not a power move, not in her game.

“They’re actually from your little girlfriend’s lawyers.” She replies, sneering. “She’s rather mad at us.”

“Us?” Frank echoes.

“Us,” she confirms. “Seems to think we’ve both…. disgraced her.” She wrinkles her nose. “Whatever that means. Honestly? I can’t bring myself to care about a brainless twenty-something who only got the job by whoring herself out to my husband. I’ve got bigger issues on my hands.” He’d forgotten how systematically gaudy Gussie was when mad, how she spoke like one would throw knives—calculated and aiming for the kill and a little like a soap opera villain. He has to fight not to roll his eyes. “Jerome’s taking care of it, baby. A little hush money will cure her bruised ego.”

“As long as that’s all you bruised,” Frank mutters. Gussie laughs, and it teeters on the edge of mania. She presses a perfect, manicured hand to her upper chest. Then, she stands, gesturing to their bedroom.

“Let’s talk, shall we?”

Frank follows her, but he tells himself it’s only because it’s where he knows he’ll find the stuff he needs. If Gussie wants to talk, she can go ahead and talk; he’s packing his damn bags and getting out of this place for good. There’s something about being in this apartment again that makes him feel like he’s trapped, like the walls are closing in on him, and he’s one dollar bill away from going back to the way he’s been for the past years. She shuts the door behind him, spinning him around to face her, and placing her hands on his hips.

“Where’ve you been, angel?” She asks, holding him in place.

“Away.” He answers, curtly. She leans in to kiss his neck. “And I’m staying away.”

“That,” she whispers into his skin, her breath sending shivers down his spine, “is a very bad idea, Frank.”

“Gussie,” he says, swallowing. “I’m leaving.”

“I think we both said some stuff we didn’t mean at that party. I’m not divorcing you, Frank,” she tells him, lifting her lips to his ear as she does. “Why would I do that? We’re a perfect couple.”

“I cheated on you,” he says, remembering himself, and pushing her off.

“Baby, our relationship started with you cheating with me. I never fooled myself into thinking you were a saint, or, much less, loyal.” She steps forward, her hand reaching up to caress his cheek. “It’s not like we got married because we loved each other, Frank. We look good together. And we work well enough together, business wise. You produce the movies and I star in them. That’s how it’s always been. I don’t care that you fucked Meg Kincade—she’s half your age, half as pretty as me, and not even slightly close to being as talented—I care that you gave her my role. A role she’s renounced, now, because she’s an idiot with illusions that you’re worth it. You’re not, Frank. You’re a sell-out. That’s all you’re ever gonna be.” She presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “But, if we stay together, we keep this house, we make more money, we become even more successful than we already are. You know what the key word in all of that was? We. Frank, don’t be stupid. I’m all you have left.”

Frank sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose as he turns away from his wife. He hates how tempting it all is, how a small part of himself that he can’t manage to kill is telling him that she’s right, but she’s not. Somewhere inside of him, he knows she’s not. What kind of person would he be if he chose to stay? He can’t. He owes it to himself—he owes it to Mary. He owes it to Mary.

“I’m leaving, Gussie. You, the house. I'm leaving all of it.” he says, grabbing a suitcase from under the bed and shoving whatever he can fit into it.

“You have nowhere to go, baby.” She tells him.

“That’s where you’re wrong, baby,” he mocks, and she narrows her eyes. “I’ll have Jerome fax you the divorce papers. I’m done. For good.”

He fills the suitcase up with clothes, tucking in his wallet, toothbrush, and other toiletries into a small pocket on the wall of the bag, then he carries it all the way to his car, grabbing the keys from the ring in the garage.

“Frank, you’re making a terrible mistake,” Gussie calls out, hands situated on her hips, forehead wrinkled in frustration, and he thinks this might be her, begging. Like everything Gussie does, it’s perfect. "And when you come to your senses, don’t you dare show your face anywhere near here, ever again.”

“Gladly,” he tells her, as he slides in behind the wheel. It’s the image of Gussie, red hair mussed by the wind, eyes spelling out war, heels digging into the ground that gives him the most satisfaction; there’s a certain air of victory to the afternoon that he refuses to shake. He pats the suitcase, grinning.

Mary’s gonna lose her fucking mind over this.

-

As soon as he gets to the apartment, he changes into a fresh set of clothes, and lies down on his bed, leaning his head against the suitcase. He still has to pen a letter to Paramount, still has to file for divorce. They’re weights on his chest, these reminders of what he’s left behind, but he closes his eyes, and chooses not to let it bother him for the time being. He had his reasons. Everything that happened, he had his reasons. Musical Husbands, it helped him and Beth back during their first years of marriage—he didn’t want to admit it, but having Beth be the sole breadwinner had felt emasculating, almost—but when they’d gotten divorced it had caused a dent in his bank account, and even as that dent steadily increased, Charley had remained impatient, eager to produce the show they had always dreamed of and so did Frank, God, so did Frank, but he’d sworn, he’d sworn to himself he wouldn’t be poor ever again. He hadn’t been able to see a way out and, hell, maybe there wasn’t one then, but he thinks that maybe he might’ve found one now.

He rubs his eyes, and desperately hopes the divorce with Gussie won’t change this new line of thinking too much. He’s got much more money than he did back then, but this kind of stuff’s always instilled a strange and frantic sort of nervousness in him, and he can’t afford to be nervous right now, not if he wants to do what he came here to do. It’ll be different, now. This is his choice. He’s going to see it through.

Frank sits up, raking his hands through his hair, then he stands and settles down at the typewriter, writing his letter of department from Paramount—thank God he hadn’t signed that contract yet—and that’s how Mary finds him, an hour later, as she tumbles in with shopping bags.

“Glad that thing’s helping one of us,” she quips, but he can hear how tired she is, and as he catches sight of her, he immediately stands to help her with the haul.

“It’s not fair you keep paying for this stuff all on your own.” He states, and he wants to trust her, but keeps his eyes peeled for any stray bottles she may have tried to sneak in, regardless. Mary scoffs

“Frank, I’m a critic for the New York Times. And do you know how much money I still get from my book? They go nuts over it in, like, Norway, or something. You’re gonna have to use a lot of money for the divorce and the mortgage for the house before the separation is finalized. And to officially settle in, you’re gonna have to buy a couple more stuff.” She reminds him, and the thought of it makes him nauseous, almost. “And I know, I know, you have dollar bills to spare, but keep in mind that you don’t really have a job, right now, and we don’t know what tricks Gussie has up her sleeves, so if ever there was a time to be business savvy, here we are.” She places her hands on his shoulders. “I can take care of things like this for a little while, okay?”

“Okay,” he answers, weakly.

“Excellent. I’m going to go lie down because my head is killing me.” She kisses his cheek, and adds, as she pulls away; “withdrawal symptoms are starting. How exciting.”

Frank shoots her a sympathetic smile, but she waves him off, and heads back into her room. He shuffles around the empty quarters aimlessly, and vaguely registers the fact that he should probably get a new lawyer. And that he should probably get started on that stuff, like, now, but he can’t quite bring himself to do all that, and he decides he’s dealt with enough for tonight. Gussie and him will still be broken up, tomorrow, and New York will still be full of lawyers, too.

So, instead, he scribbles a note to Mary, leaves it on the table, and heads over to the restaurant, remembering something Tommy had mentioned as they left about putting on another performance the following night.

“Mister Shepard!” Tommy waves, practically vibrating with excitement, and Frank grins. “I didn’t—I didn’t think you’d take time to come back here again.”

“It really is a wonderful show, Tommy.”

“Despite all the kinks,” Tommy adds, sighing, and rubbing the nape of his neck.

“Hey,” Frank admonishes, “of course there’s flaws, kid. Every damn show has flaws. What you do, is you put your heart and soul into it, no matter what. If you do what you love with all the passion you have, then all that’s left to do is fix what isn’t working. It’s a process, Tommy. Honestly? You’re running much smoother than my pals and I were when we were around your age.”

“I find that hard to believe, Mister Shepard,” Tommy says, but he’s beaming with pride.

“Behind every success story, there’s a million things that went wrong behind the scenes.” Frank tells him, and the words ring truer for him than he means them to, even if it’s not exactly in the way he’s trying to get at. “For example,” he adds quickly, “When me and—my lyricist, when we performed for Joe Josephson, he told us our music wasn’t catchy enough. We were penniless, not a single cent to our name. But we loved what we were doing, so we.. kept doing it. Even when all we seemed to do was fail. In fact, we put together a revue of our own, showcasing literally anything we had ever written. And we got a booking! For approximately four days after we had even thought of the idea. Somehow, we made it through.”

“And Joe Josephson came to that revue,” Tommy continued for him, and Frank nodded.

“And he was impressed with what he’d seen.”

“And the rest is history!”

“Something like that.”

Tommy smiles as he sits down in one of the chairs, and it’s a little less nervous than before, so Frank considers this one a victory and sits down next to him. Before them, three performers read through their sheet music, singing to themselves and to each other, and the air is filled with this sense of possibility that gives Frank chills. There’s something about seeing things come to life that he can’t seem to get enough of— maybe that’s why he chose to become a producer, after everything. But it backfired; he only feels this way when it’s something he loves, and those cheesy b-movies Hollywood keeps making, God, he really just does not care about them, not like he cares about this. Besides, it’s nothing compared to the feeling of seeing his own, actual work being done. If he thinks about it hard enough, he can almost remember what it’s like

“So, you really think we’ve got something here?” Tommy asks, quiet, embarrassed.

“I do,” Frank nods. “You want my advice? Play your heart out, tonight. Then, tomorrow sit down and flesh out the plot. Worry about all that stuff when you’re not on stage. And advertise. Put up signs and tell your friends to tell their friends, and just do whatever you can to get your art out there. It deserves to be seen. And,” he adds, looking down at his knees, “never, ever give up.”

“I won’t, Mister Shepard,” Tommy promises, bouncing his leg up and down, gleefully.

“Call me Frank, kid.”

Tommy laughs.

“Maybe someday, Mister Shepard.” Then, he stands, motioning to the stage. “I’ve gotta go get this started, if you need anything—”

“I’m okay, Tommy,” he answers, warmly. “You go up there and love what you’re doing as much as you can.”

“Yes, sir!” He salutes, smiling widely, then he heads up onto the platform, introducing the show, and the lights dim, once again, with Frank sitting there, in the middle of it all.

It’s even better the second time, lodging itself under Frank’s skin permanently, and as he walks back to the apartment, he starts humming something new, something of his own, keeping time by tapping his finger against his belt, and he’s trying to visualize it on paper, on a piano, in any way he can so that he doesn’t forget it. He’s still humming along to that same made up melody when he walks into the apartment, and it’s juxtaposed by the sound of Mary Flynn vomiting in the bathroom. He freezes for a millisecond, before bursting in, the worry sinking deep into the pit of his stomach, and he looks at her, kneeling in front of the toilet, looking pale and weary, and Frank is suddenly struck with the fact that he hates himself more than anything for leaving her all alone.

“Must be a bug going around,” she says, hoarsely, as she wipes at her mouth, but Frank has a terrible feeling that that’s not what this is at all. He can’t blame her for giving up, last time. This looks like a nightmare.

“Must be,” he says, sitting down on the floor behind her and pulling her hair away from her face as she leans in to throw up again, her whole body shaking as she does. He rubs her shoulders, humming the tune gently. Mary closes her eyes, leaning into him more.

“That’s nice,” she croaks. “Is it yours?”

“Yeah. It’s all I have right now, though.” He admits.

“More than you had yesterday.” She points out, then she lifts her hand to her temple, groaning. “Frank, I don’t think I like sobriety.”

“I know,” he says, pressing a kiss to the back of her head. “I’m gonna get you some water, okay?”

“Can I order vodka on the rocks, instead?” She means for it to come out joking. He knows that, just like he knows that she isn’t really joking at all.

“Do you want ice with the water?”

“No ice, please,” she says, and he comes back with it as quick as he can, pressing it into her hand. She drinks it, shakily, as he grabs her toothbrush and puts some toothpaste on it, taking the glass of water and placing it on the counter.

“Do you wanna stand?” He asks, and she nods, so he takes her from under her shoulders and lifts her up as gently as he can, watching as she brushes her teeth and washes her face, and finishes the rest of the water.

“I think that, if I get through this, I’ll start taking the medication,” she tells him, quietly, and he brightens. “But, not right now. Even if I’m not drinking.. not right now. I don’t trust myself. I’m worried my body’s just going to look for something else to get addicted to. I don’t want to take shit to fill a void anymore, I want to feel good about things again, about life. About myself.”

“I’m really proud of you.” He says, sincerely. She rolls her eyes.

“I haven’t done anything yet.”

“But you will.”

“I might.”

“You will,” he repeats, and they look in the mirror, twin smiles spread across their faces.

The next two weeks are long ones, so it turns out. Frank finds a new lawyer and spends night after night looking over the legal separation draft. Paramount almost tries to sue him, but it’s a scare tactic that doesn’t go anywhere—he hadn’t signed anything, yet, so they don’t really have any basis for coming after him. His new lawyer’s good. He trusts her. Together, they go through all the papers he has to sign, and, finally, one day, he’s done with all of them, has looked through all the terms of agreements, and listed his conditions. His lawyer takes the papers, with promises to hand them over to Gussie first thing that morning. Neither of them mention how none of it means anything unless she signs it.

That same night, him and Mary sit on the balcony of the apartment, looking up at the stars.

“We should get a drink to celebrate,” she says, and he looks at her pointedly. “What? I’m kidding.”

Frank doesn’t laugh, because he knows she’s not. He’s worried about Mary, maybe even more so than he was before. Because, now, she’s thinner than she should be, and the color seems to be permanently gone from her cheeks, and her features are gaunt, and she either doesn’t sleep at all or sleeps too much, and throws up even more, and wakes up in the middle of the night with hundred degree fevers, shaking and screaming for him to get her a drink, swearing he’s an awful person for making her do this, and he doesn’t take it personally, knows it’s not really her talking, but fuck is it gnawing away at him, and he wonders whether he should have looked more into this, beforehand, if she’s doing it in the healthiest way possible.

“Do you wanna go to the diner, get something to eat?” He says, suddenly. Mary shakes her head.

“I’m not really hungry.”

“When’s the last time you ate?”

She doesn’t answer, and he sighs.

“Mary.”

“It makes me nauseous, Frank.”

“When, Mary.”

“Yesterday morning.”

“Jesus Christ,” he breathes, “that’s not good, Mary.”

“No shit,” she snaps, then pauses. “Sorry.”

“No, I’m sorry. I’ve been so preoccupied with all of my affairs I’ve completely forgotten to keep track of how you’re doing.”

She snorts.

“Frank, all you do is keep track of how I’m doing. Trust me, you’re doing a great job at that. In fact, could I ask you to do a worse job?”

“Mary, I’m being serious.”

“Yeah, so am I. I’m not your responsibility, Frank, it’s okay if some things get past you.”

“I just want you to be okay. I love you, and you’re in pain, and I hate it. You’re like my sister, Mary.”

In the darkness, he sees her smile.

“You wanna know the only good thing about all of this? The clarity. There are moments that are foggy, but, lately, I’ve had this overwhelming clarity. I know how I’m feeling about things. If you had told me I was like your sister, all those years ago, it would have killed me, Frank. And, now? It just feels right.” She sighs, contentedly. “How about that?”

Frank isn’t sure what to say to that, doesn’t know how to contextualize it from his perspective, so he stays quiet and fiddles with a loose strand on his suit jacket. Mary grabs his other hand, lacing their fingers together.

“That was my long-winded way of telling you that you’re like my brother now, too.” She tells him, with a gentle laugh. He leans her head against her shoulder, and thinks to himself, I would do anything for you.

-

It’s his twelfth day there—he keeps track with the calendar he hangs up on the wall, because he’s systematic by nature and it’s a way of feeling more in control—when Mary makes a comment about him possibly buying a piano so he can actually start composing something. He laughs, but the words stay knocking around in his head for the rest of the day, because it wouldn’t be a terrible idea, would it?

Mary’s wrong in assuming that he hasn’t composed, though. It’s not much, what he has, but it’s definitely the beginning of something— a piano would help things along, he’s sure, because up until now he’s been using sheets of paper with the keys drawn on it, using only muscle memory and trusting his pitch, and it’s working, but it’s also tedious and frustrating, and he’s never considered himself an impatient man, but it was so much easier to spend hours figuring out a song when he could actually hear it. He’s got two pages of notes written. He wants to know what they sound like.

On the other hand, a piano would not only be hard to move in, it would also take up a lot of space, and he has to remember that this isn’t his house. And, sure, Mary said it was fine, but of course she did. It’s Mary. And he can’t quite get the image of her, crying, sweating, looking like she’s on the brink of death out of his mind, and he’s not going to invite more chaos and disruption into her routine. She falls asleep at the oddest times, anyway, so it’s not like he could just play whenever he wanted to, might not be able to play at all, some days. Which is fine, of course, he isn’t complaining, but then why waste the money in the first place?

It’s when him and Mary are back at the diner again, that it hits him. Tommy’s taking their orders, and making small talk, and Frank lets his mind wander off to the not-restaurant and its empty tables and foldable chairs and—

And Baby Grand piano.

Slowly, a smile spreads onto his face.

“Hey, Tommy?”

“Yeah, Mister Shepard?”

“How exactly did you get a booking for your venue?”

Tommy bites his lip, signature nervous tic on display as always. Frank’s learned by now that it’s just his natural setting. He worries about Tommy sometimes, in an absent minded sort of way. Frank’s thought about it before, about whether or not Tommy can handle the adverse effects of making it—he’s thought about it a lot actually. He doesn’t know. He has hope.

“Well, it used to be my cousin’s, actually!” Tommy says, and he’s smiling a little now. “I say used to be because, well, it’s mine now. He’s basically giving it to me, I just have to pay a small fee for a little while and sign some papers. So, yeah. Once I get the plot all figured out, uh, we’ll be performing every night.”

“Tommy, that’s incredible,” Mary says, clapping her hands together. “I’ll get down there as often as I can. We will.”

“About that,” Frank begins, folding his hands on the table, “I was wondering if I could maybe drop by there a little more than usual? I’ve been working on composing something new, but, you see, we don’t have a piano back at the apartment which means I don’t have anywhere to play it, and—”

“Say no more,” Tommy interrupts, nodding profusely, “come by anytime you want, as long as it’s before seven! The piano’s yours whenever you want it, it would be an honor to even let you near it, Mister Shepard, let alone compose something, I—”

“That’s enough, Tommy,” Mary chimes in, playfully. “All the hero worship gets to his head.”

“Just because she’s right doesn’t mean you should listen to her,” Frank adds, winking.

Tommy laughs, flushing.

“I’ll be back with the food,” he says, hurrying away.

“I should hope so,” Mary calls after him, before turning back to Frank, expression twisting into something akin to pride. “So, you have been working on something?”

“It’s my end of the deal, after all,” Frank says, trying to appear as casual about it as possible, but he can tell by the smirk tugging on her lips that Mary sees right through him. And, well, it isn’t casual, it’s huge, and they both know it. He vividly remembers one of the guests at his party asking him if he’d ever write music again, with Frank loftily saying he’d get back to it, and he had. He thought about the melody constantly, working it out in his mind, and maybe he was a little bit rusty but with the aid of Tommy’s piano, Frank had no doubt he’d get it, and God. He loved it. He loved writing music.

The gift of gifts, Mary had called it, all those years ago.

“Where are you, right now?” She asks, and he looks up to see her examining him, her head tilted to the right. The food’s on the table now, so he grabs his plate and digs in, shrugging nonchalantly.

“Thinking.”

“Thinking,” Mary repeats. “Oh, dear. About?”

“Things. How they are now.”

“Do you like how they are now?”

Frank pretends to consider it for a second.

“I rather do.”

“Good,” Mary says, and he swears there’s a hint of relief in her voice. “Me too. Sometimes,” she adds, scrunching her nose at the food.

“Finish it.” Frank warns, and she huffs.

“Yes, dad,” she mutters, stabbing a piece of asparagus with her fork. She glares at him as she chews it, nose turned upwards. “That’s fucking disgusting,” she remarks, and then they’re both laughing, and it’s not that quiet sort of laughter—it’s the kind that you feel in your ribs, that’s a little like a punch to the gut, and he has the feeling that neither of them have laughed like this in a very long time. And that it has nothing to do with the asparagus.

“Here,” he says, swapping their plates. “Have my salad, instead.”

“That’s not better, Frank,” she says, feigning exasperation, but she takes it anyway, and, despite her complaints, he makes sure she finishes it, just like she makes sure, later that night, that he gets to bed at a reasonable hour, instead of tapping out rhythms on the kitchen counter at four in the morning.

It’s nice, he thinks, how they take care of each other. Almost like having a family again.

-

Things are good, until they aren’t.

It’s about a week later, and he’s inside the venue, hands dancing over the piano keys, Frank himself humming along as he plays, and it’s just as exhilarating as it was when he sat down in front of a piano for the first time, the feeling of being absolutely in control of something so beautiful. It fills him up and rushes through him, and he knows, he knows that there is nothing like this, nothing even comes close.

He pauses to make note of a small change in the music, and then he’s off again, playing it once, twice, three times, and one of the kids in the show has been watching attentively since he got there, and it’s when he finishes that run of it that she approaches, looking somewhat shy but determined.

“That sounds really good,” she praises, and Frank smiles, bowing his head in thanks. “I’m Julie.”

“You’re the lead,” he states, and she nods, grinning, her short hair bobbing back and forth. “You have a beautiful voice, Julie.”

“Thank you so much,” she says, and she’s different than Tommy in the sense that she knows how to take a compliment she’s aware she deserves. “I was just wondering if it had any words yet? This might be.. presumptuous, but I’d love to sing through something like that.”

His smile thins, slightly.

“No, not yet,” he answers, and she nods, understandingly. “I have to admit, I’m not great with words.”

“Do you have a lyricist?”

He sighs, involuntarily, and she immediately backtracks.

“I don’t mean to pry, really,” Julie adds, quickly. “I’m so sorry if I—”

“No, no, don’t worry,” he waves her off, forcing a smile back onto his face. “I used to have a lyricist, a very long time ago. We.. went our separate ways. Before this week, I actually hadn’t written any music since.”

“Oh,” she says, slowly. “Then, I’m really glad you’re writing again.”

“Yeah, me too.”

His hands are ghosting over a chord, and he’s getting ready to play, when he hears someone that sounds an awful lot like Tommy screaming outside. He stiffens, alarm freezing both him and Julie in place. They stare at each other for a beat, before hurrying towards the door. He blocks her path, standing in front of her, and puts his palm out. He hears more noises coming from behind them, and swallows thickly.

“We don’t know what’s going on,” he says, quietly. “It could be dangerous. Stay here.”

She huffs, and he’s certain there are protests blooming on her lips, so he gives her a pointed look and turns to go out into the alley, eyes narrowed.

As his vision adjusts, the first thing he registers is Tommy, on the floor, slightly bloodied up, glaring viciously at three other boys around his age, all more bulked up than he is. Next to him is another boy, one of the performers, he’s pretty sure.

“What the hell’s going on here,” Frank barks, and the boys all turn, looking like deer caught in headlights for a moment, before they quickly recover.

“Teaching these flamers a lesson, sir.” The one in the middle says, sneering. Frank’s blood turns to ice.

“We didn’t fucking do anything.” Tommy snarls, and Frank’s proud of him for standing up for himself, but the nervous edge to his voice is obvious in a way that makes it all more harm than help.

“Oh, no?” The one to the right says, and he kicks Tommy in the ribs. Frank runs over and steps in between the two. The other two boys take a few steps back, looking around, warily.

“I’m sure this is all just a misunderstanding,” Frank cuts in, trying to keep his voice level

“We didn’t fucking do anything.” Tommy repeats, and the boy in front of Frank grits his teeth.

“Public indecency.”

“We were talking!” Tommy yells, and he’s standing up now, clutching at his ribs. Frank turns to look at the other boy, who’s crouched against the wall, hugging his knees to his chest, looking straight ahead like he wants to be absolutely anywhere but there, and something about that hits home so harshly that he almost can’t stand it.

“You were doing more than that—”

“We were talking—”

“No, you were too busy shoving your faces together,” the boy says, lips curling up in disdain. As if the idea alone is repulsive. Frank grits his teeth as he turns to him. “And I don’t wanna see that shit. You understand, right man?”

“No,” Frank says, trying to keep his cool, but finding it increasingly hard to. “No, I don’t, actually, and I think you should get going right now, or—”

“Are you a fucking queer, too?” He laughs, and Frank doesn’t remember swinging, but he must have, because suddenly the boy’s yelping and on the ground, his nose bleeding profusely, and the others look like they have half a mind to fuck Frank up, but then there’s police cars, and they’re all running away, and Julie’s finally out there, yelling herself hoarse, and she must have called the police—smart girl—and he’s leaning over to check if the other boy, the one who’d been quiet, if he was okay, but then he’s being handcuffed and pressed against the wall and pushed into a squad car, and so are Tommy and the other boy, and he thinks he can still hear Julie screaming, can still feel his knuckles aching from the hit, can still hear the disgust in the other kid’s mouth as he says that word, queer, and, God, Frank can’t even begin to deal with this right now.

“I’m sorry, Mister Shepard.” Tommy says meekly.

“Don’t be,” he says, firmly, even as he’s digging his fingernails into his arm. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Tommy nods, very clearly relieved. Next to him, the boy is still looking into the distance, non responsive. Outside the car there are camera flashes and the buzz of the press, and Frank thinks he should probably care about that, should probably care about a lot of things, but, no, he’s exhausted instead, and none of this matters. He doesn’t care about any of it.

At the station, it’s Tommy who gives his account first, and Frank listens carefully for the story he tells, wants to make sure he stays true to it when and if he’s asked for a statement.

“Joel and I, uh, we were heading over to that old restaurant on 53rd, it’s the venue for our musical,” he says, wringing his hands. “These creeps just attacked us, out of the blue. I think they were looking for trouble.”

“Could you identify them?”

“No,” Tommy answers, much too quickly for it to be the truth. “It was really dark. I don’t, I—I don’t know what they looked like.”

“And him?” The police officer asks, gesturing to the other boy, to Joel, apparently, who’s looking down at his knees.

“He’s in a state of shock,” Tommy explains, his eyes lingering on his black eye and split lip. “They got him pretty bad.”

“They seemed to have gotten you worse,” Frank chimes in, noticing the way he’s limping and holding his ribs. Tommy smiles thinly, but doesn’t say anything.

“And you, Mister Shepard?” The officer says, finally, turning to him with a raised eyebrow. “I’m a big fan, by the way. I have to know… You and Gussie Carnegie— Is it true you’re getting a divorce?”

“I heard screaming. I went out into the alley. I saw these kids ready to attack so I got in front of them. I wasn’t there when things were ugly, but I know these boys and I know they didn’t do anything that warranted blood.” Frank says, and then pauses. “And, yes, it’s true.”

“Well, then, you’re all free to go. We’re very sorry for the misunderstanding.” The officer dismisses them, signing a few papers as she does, and then she leans in towards Frank, conspiratorially, passing him a picture that suspiciously resembles his latest movie cover. “Do you think you could sign this?” She asks, sheepish. “It’s for my daughter. She loves Meg Kincade.”

Frank obliges, plastering his signature smile on his face as he does. Then, he turns over to the boys, and it drops instantaneously. Tommy’s kneeling in front of Joel, who’s sitting in a chair with his eyes closed, fingers ghosting over his injuries, a look of sadness on his face.

Frank clears his throat. Tommy turns to him, and he doesn’t look like himself at all, looks like he’s aged decades in the span of a couple of hours. Frank’s heart aches.

“Do you two need a ride home?”

Tommy smiles, which makes his lip bust open again.

“That’s okay, Mister Shepard. Julie and Tina, they brought the car. We’re good.” He says, with a simple shrug. “Thank you. For everything. Thank you so much.”

“Of course,” Frank says, swallowing thickly. “Of course.”

He finds Mary arguing with a lady at the station’s front desk, palms flat on the counter, eyebrows raised into her hairline. When she catches sight of him, she stops mid sentence, and launches herself into his arms, holding onto him as if he might disappear if she lets go. He closes his eyes and hugs her close, wants to lose himself in the familiarity of this, wants to forget everything about tonight, wants to never hear that word ever again.

“What happened?” She orders shakily, as she’s pulling back.

“Let’s go home.” He says, and she looks like she’s about to protest, about to demand an explanation here and now, but something stops her. Maybe she sees how tired he is. Maybe she sees something else entirely. Frank’s not sure. He tells himself he doesn’t care.

“Okay,” she agrees, nodding.

-

He thinks about that night for days after.

He thinks about it when he’s lying on his back in his room at night, when he’s taking a shower, when he reads, when he eats, anytime that there’s a quiet moment, the image of Tommy being kicked in the ribs, the image of Joel’s empty eyes, the image of those three idiots and are you a fucking queer, too?—Frank can’t get it out of his mind.

It’s Mary who suggests that maybe he should go back to the venue, some three days after it happens, saying something about how his only way of coping with things is composing, so maybe he should go do that, and he scoffs. How the hell does she think he’s been coping with shit for the past years? He doesn’t say that, though, because he knows Mary, knows she won’t back down from a challenge, especially if it comes from something like this, so he stays quiet, and chooses not to think about it, because, maybe, she’s right.

So, he goes back every single day after that, throwing himself into his music violently. A quick smile at the kids, an even quicker scan at Tommy and Joel’s bruises—they’re both healing well, although he notices how the former has more trouble breathing than usual now—and then he sits down at the piano and plays for hours and hours and hours, and it’s only then that he starts to feel like himself again.

He tries not to look at the headlines, knows that a lot of them are about him and that they aren’t pretty. Divorce, affair, attack, each displayed more cutthroat than the last, and Frank suddenly is extremely thankful Mary fell into reviewing, instead. He fucking hates reporters.

People start approaching him more, especially when they’re at the diner, recognizing him from the papers, and those who don’t approach him stare and point until Mary turns around and glares at them viciously, and that makes Frank smile, at least.

“How’s the work coming along?” She asks, trying to keep his attention away from the pairs of eyes trained on him. It’s not totally working, but he appreciates her efforts all the same.

“It’s good.” Frank answers. “I have a few songs sorta done. Still don’t have a plot, if that’s what you were asking. Don’t have any words at all, actually. You?”

“Me?” Mary asks, frowning, and he feels a sudden shot of embarrassment that they’ve never really talked about her job, at all. “Actually, I have to review the Fiddler on the Roof revival tonight. Limited run. Wanna come?”

“A whole show?” Frank asks, sarcastically. “Not just sneaking into act two?”

“We’ve climbed uphill, baby.”

He grins.

“I’d love to.”

He’s getting ready for the theatre, later that night, when he hears Mary talking in low tones to someone on the phone, sounding like she’s getting more and more aggravated with whoever’s on the other end, like she’s trying to convince them of something. He pops his head out, lifting an eyebrow.

“Everything okay?” He mouths, and she looks up at him in alarm, mouth hanging open for a second before she remembers herself and nods fervently.

“Okay, bye, mom.” she says, quickly, and hangs up. He frowns.

“Parents,” she shrugs, nervously, and Frank can tell she’s lying, but he decides to drop it for the time being, opting instead to just keep a closer eye on her and try not to worry about it.

“Ready to go?”

“Yes!”

-

The show’s nice, he thinks, as they walk home. Mary’s jabbering away at all her thoughts, and she’s definitely got a lot of them, on the plot and the music and the characters and the relationships and what worked and what didn’t and it makes Frank smile. She’s really damn good at what she does, and he thinks maybe he shouldn’t be so surprised, because Mary is one of the smartest people he knows, especially when it comes to words, but it’s like he’d forgotten, almost. He’s been so concentrated on himself, lately. Even before all of this, when he was still—well, Franklin Shepard Inc., he thinks, sardonically—all he’s ever really done is think about himself.

He hopes Mary knows he’s trying to change that.

“What did you think?”

“The music was gorgeous,” Frank says, because it was. He hadn’t gotten a chance to see Fiddler in its original incarnation, but the score felt timeless. It was like satin. He thinks that if any show could constitute as beautiful, it would be this one. “I want to write something like that.”

“You’d make a horrible critic,” she quips, fondly, and he chuckles. “And it’s not like your style in the slightest.”

“Both valid points.”

“It’s almost like it’s a pattern or something,” Mary says. “Me being right.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he rolls his eyes. “Maybe you’re onto something.”

They walk in a comfortable silence for a while.

“It’s easier, now,” Mary divulges, after some time passes. He steals a glance at her, notices how she’s looking more like herself again, even if she’s still a little too thin and can’t quite sleep right. “Writing. I still haven’t done anything that isn’t part of work, but,” she grins, biting her lip. “I think I’m falling in love with it again, Frank.”

“Good,” he says, smiling at her gently. “That’s really, really good.”

“Look at us.” She says, sounding positively giddy. “You, composing. Me, writing. Me, sober. You,” she pauses, looking at him carefully. “Happy?”

“Happy.” He agrees, and, if he doesn’t think about it too much, he thinks he’s kind of getting there. He should be, at least. “Or on the way.”

“Yeah,” Mary nods. “Yeah, me too. I saw a psychiatrist about the medication, yesterday. Told him about my history with alcohol, and stuff. He prescribed me a small starting dose. And I took it.”

“And?”

“And I don’t know yet,” she breathes out through her nose. “I guess we’ll have to wait and see. But just trusting myself enough to be able to wait and see, that’s… that’s everything to me, Frank. Thank you.”

“Hey, I didn’t do anything.”

“Hey, yes you did.”

“Maybe, but you were the one who pulled through.”

“And you kept up your part of the deal. I think congratulations are in order.”

“Not yet,” Frank shakes his head. “But, soon. Maybe. We’ll see.”

“It’s still our time.” She tells him, swinging their held hands back and forth.

“Maybe,” he repeats. “We’ll see.”

-

It’s a month into the routine that he’s settled into, when it all begins to change.

It starts, as erroneous things in his life have a tendency of doing, with Gussie. Frank knows that getting a divorce is a long, tedious process—even more so than most, having powered through a custody battle on top of that—and that him and Gussie don’t even qualify yet, he knows that, and it’s not what he’s aiming for right now. The real kick to the gut comes every time she returns the legal separation draft, sans her signature. The last time, she’d even kissed the top page, the red stain just sitting there, mocking him. He’d gritted his teeth, and tossed the papers back on the table.

But that was all fine. And expected. It was Gussie, after all.

What really started grinding his gears were the damn papers. Her and Jerome had recently come forward with an affair of their own, making the front page with a kiss that looks so goddamn staged, Frank can’t really stand it at all. And if he thought the press had fucked him over before, it was nothing compared to now—everyone’s looking to him for his opinion on all of this, and he can’t quite figure out the most tactful way to let the public know that he doesn’t give a shit. He’s not gonna sit here and play the scandalized and scorned husband; he’d cheated on her, in the first place. And, it’s like Gussie had told him, when he’d gone to pick up his stuff—they didn’t love each other, not really. He’s pissed at Jerome for the betrayal, but it’s not like they were friends, so, honestly, whatever.

Then, it’s the boxes that start showing up at Mary’s doorstep, labeled frank’s in curly, familiar handwriting. Boxes filled with the rest of his clothes, with his favorite books, with his camera, and his gramophone, and other random trinkets. Boxes that smell of Chanel No. 5 and revenge.

“Oh, calm down,” Mary says, rolling her eyes as he tells her. “I mean, it’s good you’re getting all your stuff back.”

“She’s kicking me out, Mary!”

“She’s not kicking you out, Frank.”

“She sent me my pair of keys with a post-it note that said ‘changed the locks.’”

“You got me there,” she says, tittering.

“It’s not funny.”

“I don’t get what the big deal is. You left. She’s not really kicking you out.”

“Oh, but she is,” Frank swears, pacing in frustration. “That’s what all of this is. She took my lawyer, took my house, but she’s evidently too damn good for the rest of my things.”

“I’m lost,” Mary says, sitting with her legs crossed on the couch. “Do you want her to keep your clothes?”

“It’s not about the goddamn clothes, Mary!” He yells, stopping in his tracks and turning to her. She winces, and he sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’m sorry.”

“My head just hurts. I’m not three years old,” she snaps. “And I know it’s not about the clothes, Frank. It’s about your pride. Like usual.”

Ouch.

“I’m just stressed to the max,” he says, tightly, trying to remain unfazed. “So I’m sorry if I’m a little more sensitive to things that are purposely done to make me wanna set her house on fire.”

“Look, Gussie’s a bitch. Jerome’s a snake. Life sucks.” She shrugs. “You knew all of that already. Remember what I told you when you divorced Beth?”

“Vaguely.”

“Burn your bridges. Start again. And you have. This is just a side effect of that. Gussie’s bitter, and the only hobby she has that’s worth anything is making the front page. She’s trying to push your buttons, Frank. Don’t give her the satisfaction of letting it work.” She shifts in place, hugging her knees to her chest. “Unpack the boxes. Find a place for everything. Send her a thank you note, for fuck’s sake. But don’t let her do to you what she’s currently doing to you. Don’t give her what she wants. You’re home. She’s not allowed to invade that, in any way, shape, or form.”

He doesn’t say anything to that, which makes Mary huff and roll her eyes.

He listens, though. He listens and he tries to move past it, and it’s hard at first, because he sees red every time he catches a glimpse of the divorce papers, every time a newspaper headline screams at him from the rack, every time he opens the door and there’s a package waiting for him on the doormat, but Frank likes to think he doesn’t have a temper and most things that he likes to think he manages to convince himself about. And, eventually, it starts bothering him less. Cut, print, moving on.

And, in his mind, it’s over. The adjustment period. He is incredibly used to everything that’s a part of his life again. Other than Mary still kind of looking like a ghost, other than him still sometimes staying up late thinking about blood and bruises and words, other than all of that, he thinks maybe he could call things normal.

So, of course, it’s then that they drastically change, once again.

“Hey,” Mary says, one day, leaning her hip against the table and looking down at him. “Do you wanna go see Tommy’s show again tonight?”

“Sure,” Frank agrees, not looking up from the sheet music. “He’s talked to me a little about how to make the plot more coherent.”

“Were you any help?” Mary asks, snorting, and he looks up at her, glaring playfully.

“I have a basic grasp on the english language, Mary, yes, I was. My point is that it’s changed a little, it should be interesting to see it again.” He lifts his eyebrow. “Why tonight?”

Mary shrugs, but it’s stiff, unnatural.

“I thought it would be fun!”

“Oh?”

“Mhm.”

“Okay.” He says, after a moment, warily. “What’s up with you?”

Mary leans forward to kiss his forehead, and then she takes off into her room, shouting a quick “Nothing! We’re leaving at seven!” over her shoulder, and shutting the door.

“You’re a terrible liar,” he calls after her, but he’s laughing as he turns back to his music, drumming the pencil on the table, concentrating on it with ease. Composing’s like a form of meditation for him, except it doesn’t clear his mind so much as it can make him lose himself and his surroundings for hours at a time. It’s especially intoxicating now that he’s gotten back into the groove of things. He can’t believe he survived without it this long.

A small part of him knows he won’t be able to write a whole show by himself, something that’s become increasingly apparent any time he tries to add lyrics to his songs. It’s wrong, choppy, out of place, and it makes him feel strange. He’s not cut out to be a lyricist. It’s a completely different state of mind, a completely different way of being in tune to things than he’s used to. He sighs. He’s not sure what he’s gonna do in regards to that, yet. He hopes Mary doesn’t mind too much.

He has half a mind to voice his concerns to her, as they’re sitting at the same table they sat in the first time they went to see the show, but it feels a lot like accepting defeat, admitting he’s not good at something, and Frank can’t quite bring himself to go through with that. He’s changed, he has, but not that much. Yet. Besides, Mary has enough on her mind, it seems, what with her anxiously tapping her nails on the wood and looking around the room. He takes her hand in his, and she looks at him, blue eyes wide and apologetic.

“Is everything okay?” He asks, and she swallows.

“Yeah,” she says, and he looks on, disbelieving. “The medicine just, uh, makes my anxiety worse, I think.”

“Mary—” He says, pointedly, because he knows her, can tell she’s lying, but he doesn’t continue because right then and there Mary’s eyes lodge on something behind him, and she tenses, slightly. Frank frowns.

He turns around, worried for a moment that the thugs he’d seen that day in the alley were back, or maybe that Gussie and Jerome were there, or, worse, Beth and—and Frankie, but, no, it’s none of them at all. In fact, Frank’s unsure of what it is that grabbed Mary’s attention so violently, until he catches a familiar pair of glasses staring back at him, and, fuck, Frank whirls back around. Mary’s looking down now, biting her lip.

“Mary,” he says, slowly. “What the hell is he doing here.”

“I thought this should be the next step,” she says, thinly.

“So, you just, decided to invite the one person that—” Frank scoffs, incredulously. “Who gave you the right to interfere with my personal life?”

“Frank—”

“No, don’t Frank me,” he says, and he thinks he might be falling into hysterics, thinks about the last time he saw Charley Kringas, badmouthing him on national television, thinks about Franklin Shepard, Inc. and there’s this tribe in Africa where, when one of its members does something cruel or evil, or betrays them, they never see him again, they simply just never see him, they never talk to him, or look at him, or acknowledge him in any way, for them, he is dead, absolutely and irrevocably dead.

Charley looks awfully good, for a dead man.

“I’m leaving.” He says, suddenly.

“No,” Mary grabs his hand, regaining a bit of her backbone. “No. This is a good thing, Frank.”

“What the hell do you know about what’s good for me,” he says, and he’s absolutely delirious with fury, and this is part of it, he thinks, this is why he went the other way all those years ago, because everyone in his life thinks they know what he wants better than he does, and it’s moments like these where he has the least control, where he’s being confined to a corner and he can’t do anything about it, and Frank can’t do that, he needs the freedom to choose, and, fuck it, he’s fine with mistakes as long as they’re his own, but he thought he was done with people feeling like they needed to hold his hand and walk him to a conclusion. And all those thoughts from the night he drove Mary home flood back— he doesn’t need her, he doesn’t need Charley, he doesn’t need anyone in the world except for himself.

“You miss him, Frank.” Mary says, desperately, and he runs a hand through his face, because she’s right, of course she’s right, she’s Mary fucking Flynn, and she’s always right, apparently, but that doesn’t mean he can deal with any of this, yet. Because seeing Charley, talking to Charley, reconnecting with Charley; it leads to other things, things he’s not ready for yet, like admitting he was wrong to be so angry at him for what happened at that interview, that he was wrong for keeping the three picture deal a secret, that he was wrong for prolonging their work on the one thing they had always wanted to do together, that he was wrong, he was wrong, Frank was so wrong about absolutely everything, but he can’t say that, not to Charley, not to anyone, and he thinks maybe the walls are closing in around him again, and he wonders just how on the nose Mary was when she called him dramatic, because this is absolutely ridiculous, he should be able to be a grown adult about this, but, but—

There’s so much conflict inside of him, constantly, and Frank is just so damn tired of being scared of who he is. He doesn’t know, anymore, everything’s up in the air, like he’s twenty years old again, lying on his best friend’s lap and smiling up at the stars. But it’s not those days anymore, Frank is old, and he’s not friends with Charley, and he’s not sure he’s ready to admit to himself whether he wants to be or not.

“Please, just, stay here.” Mary begs. “Just one conversation. For closure. And then you never have to see each other again.”

“What’s the point.”

“Because,” she says, firmly. “If you don’t, you’re going to spend the rest of your life with him as your unfinished business.”

“Charley and I will always be unfinished business.” He says, severely, but Mary shakes her head.

“You don’t have to be.” She tells him, gently, and he looks up to meet her eyes. “I used to think the same thing about us. But, here we are.”

“That’s different.”

“It wasn’t,” Mary says, and her voice is quiet, now, faraway, and he thinks maybe she’s trying to tell him something. He’s not sure what. “Not for me.”

“I didn’t disgrace you during a televised interview, Mary.” He points out, and she frowns.

“That’s—that’s not what I—” She closes her eyes, and sighs deeply before she opens them again, shaking her head. “Jesus Christ, Frank, fine, you can miss the point altogether, if you’d like to, but please, just. Talk to him.”

Frank turns to look back at Charley, who Tommy’s now made his way over to, and is chatting with, quite animatedly, probably about his plays, he knows Tommy loves Charley’s work, and, to be fair, who doesn’t? They’re… they’re genius.

(He thinks back to a night, to that night, all the way back in 1959, with Frank rambling on and on about the future while Charley looked at him, just, just looked at him, his eyes glinting with this something that Frank wishes he could have photographed. The full force of Charley’s attention on him had always been enough to knock the air out of him.

“Charley,” he’d breathed reverently, the word sounding like a wish, or a promise, or a prayer, Frank’s not too sure. “I read your two plays last night. They were so wonderful, I-I couldn’t sleep.”

“I thought you were mad,” Charley had divulged, not skipping a beat, never skipping a beat, and he looked pleased at the praise, a soft smile playing at his lips as he settled down next to Frank, bumping their shoulders together. “I have to tell all the people who stay over to always wake me when they think I’m wonderful.”)

The memory makes him smile, involuntarily, and, of course, because that’s his luck, it’s then that Charley decides to chance a glance back towards him, and Frank flushes, embarrassed, but then Charley’s smiling, too, lifting his eyebrow with an unspoken question.

“Okay,” he says, turning back to Mary. “Okay. I’ll talk to him. For ten minutes. That’s—that’s it.”

“Excellent!” Mary exclaims, and then she’s standing up, winking at him, and moving to a table all the way across the room before he has time to stop her. Charley slides into the booth in front of him, cautiously, everything about him so much more reserved than the last time they saw each other. His hair’s shorter, a little more like it was back when they were first starting out, but other than that, and other than the couple of wrinkles he’s gained since they last talked, he’s still.. Charley.

“Did Mary always meddle in our lives this much back then?” is the first thing Frank thinks to say, and Charley chuckles, shooting a glance at the woman situated at the other side of the venue, looking like she’s trying very hard to make herself appear busy.

“Oh, absolutely.” He answers, turning back to him, smiling crookedly. Frank thinks this might be.. okay, other than the fact that he can’t really seem to remember how to breathe properly. “She knows everything she shouldn’t.”

“That’s terrifying.”

“Really? I find it kind of comforting.”

“I tend to not like it when people know things about me that they shouldn’t.”

“I know,” Charley says, through a thin-lipped smile.

“I’m sorry about you and Evelyn.” Frank says, before he can stop himself. “It’s a shame.”

“It was bound to happen,” Charley waves him off, but there’s some sadness to it, too. Frank thinks about that day with Mary, about do you really not know? and he swallows, thickly. “I’m sorry about you and Gussie.”

Frank barks out a laugh.

“No, you’re not.”

Charley can’t quite keep the grin from his face at that.

“I’m really not.”

“Honestly? Neither am I.” He admits. “I’m starting to think I’m not cut out for the whole marriage thing.”

“Is that what you think?” Charley looks at him, cocking his head to the side. “I’ve always just thought you needed to stop marrying people you were never actually in love with.”

There’s a beat of silence, and then Charley pales, slightly.

“Shit, that was probably out of line,” he says, suddenly. “I’m sorry, it’s just—I, I feel like no time’s passed at all, you know? We haven’t talked in so long, and, still, it’s kind of like we’ve never really not talked, I don’t know—”

“Charley,” Frank says, but he doesn’t go on. Smiles, instead, and hopes it gets the message across.

“I’ve really missed you.” He says, and Frank breathes in deep, because Charley’s still so Charley. Impulsive, and slightly reckless, and so much braver than Frank ever was, ever will be.

“I—yeah.” He stammers, then frowns. “Yeah.”

Charley snorts.

“I got it,” he says, and he sounds so fond that Frank feels his chest constrict. Yet, he can’t bring himself to agree about it being like no time’s passed at all, but maybe that’s because Frank can’t stop thinking about all the time that’s passed, all the years of Charley’s life that he’s missed, all the years of his own life that he’s wasted— can they really ever be completely free from that?

“Are you working on anything new?” Frank asks, because he needs to know as much as he can, needs to know all that he doesn’t so that he can even begin to close the chasm between them.

“I’ve been toying with some ideas,” Charley shrugs. “Nothing’s really holding my attention lately. I feel like I’ve already written my magnum opus. It’s kind of weird having to go from there. And you? Any new movies in the works?”

“No, actually, I’m composing again.” Frank says, proud, taking pleasure in the shock that passes over Charley’s face—he hadn’t missed the bitterness infused in that last sentence.

“Oh?”

“Yeah, working on a musical,” he says, nonchalant.

“Oh,” Charley repeats, and his eyebrows are furrowed. “Do you—I’m just curious, here, are you working with a lyricist on it, then?”

He’s trying to hide the jealousy in his voice, but Frank hears it loud and clear.

“No,” he says, and Charley relaxes. “I haven’t collaborated with anybody since you.”

“Me either.”

They don’t say much of anything for a few minutes, after that, and, it’s so fucking weird, just sitting here with Charley, just, just looking at him and thinking, and, God, Frank never thought they’d be here again.

Mary should start betting money on her hunches.

“So, uh,” Frank starts, and his mouth feels really dry. “Catch me up. How are things? Are you doing okay?”

Charley pauses, turns the questions over in his head.

“I’m okay.” He decides, finally. “I’m renting a studio here in Manhattan. It’s.. hard, not being with the kids, or with Evelyn, but,” he runs a hand through his face, and he suddenly looks so tired. “I don’t blame her. Besides, I’ve missed the city. It’s good being back. And you?”

“Me?” Frank laughs, shaking his head. “Well, I moved into Mary’s, started composing again. Things have changed. I’ve changed. I think.”

“Are you and Mary…” Charley trails off, something in his expression closing off.

“What?” Frank pauses. “Oh. No! No, not at all. Not even a little bit. She’s practically my little sister. And it’s been really crazy, lately, I only just left Gussie, so I haven’t even been thinking about things like…”

“Love.” Charley finishes.

“I was gonna say sex, actually,” Frank corrects him.

“How could anyone ever leave such a romantic?” Charley quips. Frank flicks his hand.

“I can be a romantic!”

“Oh, I know,” Charley says, lifting his index finger accusingly. “I’ve fallen victim to your charming wiles many a time.”

“Have you?” Frank says, but he’s smirking. “Funny, I don’t seem to remember that.”

“A truck could slam into you and you wouldn’t notice, Franklin.”

“Are you calling me dumb?”

“I’m calling you oblivious.”

Frank pauses, thinking about how Mary had looked at him like he was an idiot for not knowing Charley was gay, or how she tends to imply things that go over his head completely, and he wonders what else he’s been blind to. He thinks that maybe he’s been so busy trying to ignore things about himself, he must have started doing the same thing with other people. Then, he pushes that thought away, like clockwork.

Looking at Charley, now, however, it’s hard not to face the facts.

“Do you believe in second chances?” Charley asks, quietly.

Frank thinks about it for a moment.

“I don’t know yet.”

“I didn’t, for a while. I’ve always thought what’s done is done. I’m not good at the whole apologizing thing. Or the forgiveness, either. I’m good at regret, though. Much better at it than I wanted to be. And I’m sitting here, in this apartment in New York, just, feeling goddamn sorry for myself, when I get a call from Mary Flynn, of all people, and she’s… she’s talking about the one person I never thought we’d be able to talk about, ever again.” Charley leans back into his chair, his eyes faraway. “And she’s telling me to come here, and, well, naturally I hang up. And she calls again. And she keeps calling, and keeps asking, and all three of us are so stubborn, I swear it should be a crime. Mary, though. Mary’s stubborn about the right things. So, I thought about it. Thought about how things used to be, thought about the three of us and our dreams, and there are still so many stories we haven’t told yet, Frank. Do you ever think about that? About how much there is to say and how little time we have to say it? I think about it constantly. So, I came here. And I saw you, and,” he pauses, looking back up at Frank, and there it is again, that something. “I think I made the right choice.”

“I think so, too,” he says, softly, and he thinks maybe Charley’s going to say something else, but then the lights are dimming, and Tommy’s saying something into the mic, apologizing for the delay, and Mary’s sliding into the booth next to Charley, kissing his cheek hastily and muttering about how she couldn’t really see in her other spot, and Frank looks at them. They’re right there, right in front of him. Mary and Charley. He can’t quite believe his eyes, but there’s something so unbelievably right about all of it that it’s almost overwhelming. The three of them, sitting at the same table, breathing the same air, there’s a certain kind of balance in it that makes Frank’s heart race.

Charley’s eyes flick over to him, and he smiles.

Maybe they should believe in second chances, after all.

( “Those were some really long ten minutes,” Mary says to him, later when they get back home. Frank doesn’t dignify that with answer. And, if anyone asks, he was not smiling, thank you very much.)

-

Charley manages to integrate himself into their routine pretty well, after that. It starts with him just being there, with Mary, in the apartment, when Frank returns from the venue. The sight of his old friend still shocks him, every single time. It’s confusing, being so near to Charley after having been away for so long. Frank’s not sure what to feel. The anger he’d held onto all those years has since faded away, leaving something else entirely in its wake. Fear, maybe. Frank’s not sure of what.

Besides, even if he’s not actively upset anymore, that doesn’t mean he’s forgiven Charley and it doesn’t mean that Charley’s forgiven him. Just because they talk, sometimes, and crack jokes, and hug when they see each other—that, that doesn’t mean they’re friends again. Right?

Mary chuckles when he shares his concerns with her.

“You’re both so damn stupid.”

Frank huffs.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself.”

“Oh, I am. This is miles better than my soaps.”

He toys around with the idea that Charley and Mary are conspiring against him, for a while. He sits at the piano, playing the keys absentmindedly, and thinking about whether this was all just an elaborate plot the two pulled together to kill him, once and for all. He accidentally hits a discordant note, and hopes that at least seeing him gave Charley cold feet when it comes to the execution of his murder.

He’s not actually paranoid, of course, it’s just odd that they’ve taken to talking so much. And it’s even odder that Charley seems to leave almost directly after Frank gets home—when Mary doesn’t hold him back and demand they all go do something together, that is—and he’s not offended, of course, Lord knows he had his own sort of panic when he saw Charley for the first time, but he’s gotten used to it enough that, sure, it’s still very weird, but he could handle a damn afternoon with the guy, if Charley would just stop running away. And if he doesn’t want to interact with him then he should just come right out and say it, because Frank’s never been more unsure of something than he is with where he stands with Charley right now, and it’s killer when something that used to be inherently known to him is in limbo. Hell, it was easier when they were both pretending they hated each other.

He’s not entirely sure what they’re pretending at right now.

Ironically enough, it’s those thoughts that tumble through his head—of Charley and Mary gossiping—that he comes across, well, Charley and Mary gossiping. He hears them talking, and, against his better judgement, stays quiet in the doorway and listens.

“I don’t think he knows—”

“Oh, he knows,” and that’s Mary’s voice, sounding amused, sounding suggestive.

“Well, he hasn’t brought it up.”

“I can’t imagine how it would come up organically in a conversation. Especially between the two of you, right now. You’re both acting like robots.”

“I’m just not sure whether he actually wants to talk to me.”

“Yeah, and I’ve told you that he does.”

“You say a lot of things, Mary.”

“Charley, all he does when you leave is bitch about how you left. Talk to him. He wants you to.”

“Then, he should talk to me! He’s the one who said I was dead to him, in first place.”

Frank stiffens. Oh. Right.

“It’s hard, isn’t it?” Mary says, softly. “Letting go of everything?”

“I don’t know if I can let go, Mary. I, just—God, he doesn’t even know how much it hurt. He has no fucking clue. Day after day, trying to contact him, trying to take it all back. Trying to apologize for feeling the way I felt, and, Jesus, okay, so I was out of line with what I said and where I said it, but I meant every single word, Mary. After years of feeling like that, I just couldn’t handle it anymore, I was going insane. Not to even mention the whole—you know. Why does he get to just come back in our lives, and we have to forgive him?”

“We don’t have to.” Mary says, simply. “We do it because we love him. You think he doesn’t have his reasons for what he did? For how he acted?”

“They’re terrible reasons.”

“Maybe. But they make sense to him. And despite the years of holding onto those reasons, he let go. And he’s changed, Charley, I’m telling you. He’s—he’s Frank again. And, if not, he’s damn close.” She pauses. “And, to get back to our earlier topic, he does know about you. He just doesn’t know how I knew. How everyone else knew.”

“Which is the important part,” Charley mutters. “That’s crazy to me that he doesn’t know.”

“I mean, he didn’t know about me either. And I was so much more obvious about it than you were.”

“Yeah, you could afford to be, Mary.”

“Right.”

“You don’t still…”

“Not even a little bit. And like I get it, you know? I get why I… but all of that is just gone for me.”

“Must be nice.”

“Oh, so you still—”

“Never stopped. All those years, and I—I never stopped.” Charley says, and Frank is so absolutely out of sync with the rhythm of the conversation, and he kind of resents Mary and Charley for this in a way he didn’t before, because they’ve always been on a separate wavelength than him, always been able to say things without really saying them, but it was a lot easier to miss it when he felt like he was just as connected to them as they were to each other. He’s not sure if he has that anymore. He wants it back so damn badly. Still, something about the way Charley says those words makes Frank’s breath hitch in his throat. Maybe he doesn’t want to understand. “Talk about pathetic.”

“That’s not pathetic, Charley,” Mary tells him. “Frank’s going to come around, he’s just—”

“I think that’s why it’s so hard to talk to him, now.” Charley says, cutting Mary off completely. “It’s like: I look at him, and all of that just comes rushing back and it’s been so long but all those wounds are still so damn fresh.”

Frank closes his eyes. That he understands completely.

“That’s how it was for me, too, at first. Granted, it was easier. The rift between Frank and I was decidedly smaller. But it was still there. And he moved in while it was still there. It’s difficult, fixing things, letting go, forgiving. But it isn’t impossible. A lot of things aren’t impossible, I’m finding out.”

“You should be a motivational speaker.” Charley deadpans.

“My point is—”

“Talk to him.” Charley finishes. “I know.”

“Exactly.” There’s a pregnant silence, before Mary adds, “did I tell you that he asked me if you had a boyfriend?”

“He fucking what—” and that’s when Frank decides the conversation’s gone on long enough, so he slams the door, and steps in, announcing his presence, and acting like he hasn’t spent the past minutes being a fly on the wall to something that felt much more private than he thinks it should have been.

“Afternoon,” Frank says, trying to give off as much nonchalance as he can possibly muster.

“It sure is,” Mary quips, one eyebrow raised. Next to her, Charley’s slightly redder than usual.

“Hey, Frank.” He says, tightly, and then turns to Mary. “We can finish this conversation later, right?”

“Sure, but—”

“I really should be going!” Charley says, standing and Frank’s stomach drops.

“So soon? I just got here.” He says, and Mary looks at him, beaming and nodding and gesturing for Frank to go on. “Why don’t we get dinner? All of us?” He adds, quickly, noticing the even deeper look of panic that crosses Charley’s face at that.

“That’s a great idea, Frank,” Mary decides, and now she’s standing too, placing her hands on Charley’s shoulders. “Don’t you think so?”

“This is an ambush, you guys.” Charley complains, but he’s smiling. It’s infectious. Charley has a really nice smile, Frank registers.

At the diner, they tease and joke and laugh, relearning the ways they all fit together as a unit, and Frank feels like he’s been transported back up onto the rooftop, talking about changing the world and actually believing it. There’s something magical about the three of them together, a sort of joy he never thought he’d be able to feel again. It’s so right, and, for right now, it’s his, and Frank swears, right then and there, to never lose sight of what’s really important, ever again.

-

Things are a little easier, after that night, when it’s the three of them. There’s a sort of closeness that’s restored, a sort of anxiety that’s dissipated. Frank thinks that maybe he should loiter at his doorstep more often.

“Got any twos?”

“Go fish.”

That’s just when it’s the three of them, though.

“Got any fives?”

“Go fish.”

Frank knows the ball’s in his court now, even if Mary and Charley don’t, he’s just not even remotely sure how to go about doing what needs to be done. He doesn’t even know what needs to be done.

“This game is rigged,” Mary announces, tossing her cards on the floor.

“You always say that when you’re losing.” Charley says, and she sticks her tongue out at him.

“She got that from you,” Frank chimes in.

“Why is she always my daughter when she’s doing something wrong?”

“That was funny. Got any threes?”

“Fish for it, Shepard.”

Frank grins, grabbing a card from the stack before them.

“I’m getting a glass of water and then I’m going to bed.” Mary says, sighing, as she stands up to do just that. “I hate this game. I hate the both of you.”

“Frank, please tell our daughter to behave herself.”

“I’m starting to think she’s right, because I still don’t have any damn threes.”

“‘She got that from you,’” he repeats, mockingly, and Frank grabs a card from the deck and chucks it at him. Charley turns it around, and bursts into laughter.

“Got any threes?” Charley asks, waggling his eyebrows.

“I’m going to strangle you.”

“Finally, all this pent up animosity is going somewhere fun.”

“And that’s my cue to leave,” Mary says, kissing the top of both their heads. “Try not to stay up too late, I don’t need Frank passing out from exhaustion at Tommy’s piano tomorrow.”

“Goodnight, Mary.”

“Night!” Charley calls out to her retreating form, then he looks down at the cards scattered across the floor. “That looks like it should be fun for you to clean up. I should be going—”

“Not so fast, Kringas,” Frank says, shaking his head. “We made this mess together and we’re cleaning it up together.”

“Are we?” Charley says, and Frank looks up at him.

“They’re cards. Let’s not get metaphorical.”

“Ah.”

“Writers,” he laughs, as he’s sorting through the pile. “You guys are the worst.”

“Oh, and composers are so much better.”

“You said it, not me.”

“We use words to capture feelings. You guys... draw squiggly lines.”

“Yeah, and we use those squiggly lines to capture the exact same feelings you do.”

Charley scoffs. Frank raises his eyebrow.

“Don’t believe me anymore? Fine, come down to Tommy’s with me, tomorrow. I’ll play you what I’ve been working on.”

“Challenge accepted.” He says, immediately, and Frank thinks he sounds sort of pleased, but he doesn’t have enough time to really process that before Charley places the final card at the top of the stack, and stands up, grabbing his coat. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“See you,” Frank nods, and, as he hears Charley open the door, adds: “You know, a composer’s only as good as his lyricist. And a lyricist is only as good as his composer.”

“Is that a truce I hear?”

“Just something to chew on.”

He turns to look at Charley, who’s staring at him with an indecipherable look on his face. Then, he’s gone. Frank immediately misses him, in this strange, unsettling, and pervasive way.

He makes a resolution to not think about it too much.

-

The following day, Frank sits at the piano, and plays. No one other than him is there, the teenagers that are usually littered around the room absent, which is suspicious until he remembers it’s Monday, and they don’t have to be here until around 6pm. Charley hasn’t gotten there yet, Frank doesn’t know if he’s really coming at all, which is.. fine, of course. It was just a loose suggestion, not a set thing that they were doing, so if Charley decides to blow him off it’s not a problem. Charley can do whatever he wants to do. Frank doesn’t care.

He’s humming along tensely to one of his pieces, absentmindedly making adjustments here and there; composing is and always will be second nature to him, and there’s a comfort Frank feels in remember he has something he knows he can’t lose.

“It’s nice,” Charley says, and Frank jumps, twisting around in shock. “It kinda sounds like your old work.”

Our old work, is what he means, of course, but Frank smiles, regardless.

“I’ve been trying to channel that part of me.” He admits, as Charley sits down next to him. “How long were you there?”

“Not long at all. Play it from the beginning.” He demands, and his eyes are narrowed, and Frank can practically see the wheels turning in his head, so he obliges, and starts the song over, this time humming a harmony over it, instead.

When he finishes, Charley’s looking at the sheet music, intently.

“What’s it about?” He asks, quietly.

“Hm?”

“The musical.”

“..I don’t really know yet.” Frank confesses, and Charley chuckles.

“Right. How about the song?”

“These are all very good questions.”

“Frank?”

“Look, I know I’m in over my head here. I don’t know how to write lyrics, much less write a book, but it was part of the deal and I wasn’t going to say no to Mary when she practically still hated me..” Frank spouts, and he’s sighing, because he’s thought about this a lot. “I don’t know what the song’s about. I just know how it’s supposed to feel.”

“How is it supposed to feel?”

“Lonely,” Frank answers, immediately, and it feels different to talk about this, because even when he was doing it for a living, he never spoke about the things along these lines; with Charley’s lyrics it was always apparent, they both always separately conveyed the stories they wanted to tell and, somehow, it fit, when they put it together. They fit. And Frank used to think that was in spite of their differences and the lack of overlap in their mediums, but maybe it’s because of that.

“Is that how you feel?”

“No.” He considers it. “Maybe. How I used to feel.”

Charley looks over at him.

“Funny. I’ve thought so much about how all of this affected me, I never even stopped to think about how you might be feeling.” He admits, and it hurts Frank, but, then again, it doesn’t really have a right to. He did the exact same thing. “I’m really sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too.” Frank says, barely audible. “It’s just.. I felt like a damn supervillain, Charley. Every choice I made was wrong in both your eyes. I’d turn to you and see just this, this disappointment and I couldn’t bear it. I didn't want to. And I’m not going to say you didn’t act out of line at the interview, because you did, but so did I. I was angry and my pride was wounded and I took it too far. I never allowed myself to think about that day before I moved into Mary’s. Because it wasn’t worth it, and some part of me knew that. Nothing was worth losing you. And Mary.” He adds, quickly.

“You wouldn’t have lost Mary.” Charley points out, frowning.

“I almost did.”

“But then you stepped up to the plate.”

“We both did.” He pauses. “We all did.”

“I haven’t really done anything, Frank.”

“That’s not true. You’re here, aren’t you?”

“You asked me to.”

“You could have said no.”

“Turns out I still have trouble saying no to you.”

Frank quirks his eyebrow, and thinks about the dozens of times Charley refused to give in, to bend, even the slightest bit, about all the times he’s said no in the past, but then he looks at him, really looks at him, and comes to the conclusion that, maybe, that’s not what Charley means, at all.

“Oh?”

“Remember when I kept singing the song?” Charley says, wryly. “Good thing going, twice, at Gussie’s party?

“You were so mad at me after that.”

“I was hoping we’d use it in Take a Left, not as an eleven o’clock hit in a show that the producer himself said wasn’t ‘big on depth.’” Charley says, and there’s an edge to his voice now. “That song.. it wasn’t for Gussie to belt out, Frank.”

“Who was it for, then?”

“Me, Frank, it was mine.”

“I didn’t know you performed.”

“That’s not what I mean and you know it.”

“I’m sorry,” is all Frank can say and Charley lets out a tired sigh.

“I wrote a lot about being angry, back then. But that was the only song I wrote about what I was afraid would happen with us. There was so much truth to it and she just… took it and made it mean nothing and I don’t think I’ll ever forgive her or Joe Josephson for that.”

“Or me.” Frank says, simply.

“Or you.” Charley agrees. “Whatever. Getting angry is practically second nature to me by now.”

“I’m sorry.” Frank says, again.

“Do you even know what you’re sorry for?”

He thinks about the conversation he overheard between him and Mary. He does know about you, he just doesn’t know how I knew. How everyone else knew.

Frank swallows, thickly, and turns back to the piano.

“I think I write music because it’s a way to feel things without having to talk about it. Without having to acknowledge it. There aren’t any words. I’ll write something that makes me cry, and I’ll tell myself it’s for a completely different reason than it actually is, and I get to believe myself, it’s not like anyone can prove me wrong. I can ignore things that are right in front of me, for months, for years, for a whole lifetime, if I really want to.”

“Lyrics are different.” Charley says, and Frank can feel his eyes on him, cautious and tempting. He keeps his own gaze on the keys, and ignores the pounding in his chest. “You have to tap into that part of yourself, that part you want to keep hidden. It’s awful, sometimes. And it hurts like hell. But it’s cathartic. There’s this strange sort of acceptance that comes with it, when you’re done. I’m not sure what I’d do without it.”

“Acceptance,” Frank repeats. He thinks about Evelyn and Charley’s divorce, about Mary’s knowing eyes and Beth’s kind smile and Gussie’s charm. He thinks about are you a fucking queer, too? and Tommy’s broken ribs, his righteous anger. He thinks about and if I wanted too much was that such a mistake, at the time, you never wanted enough, alright tough, I don’t make that a crime, and how Charley made him cut those lyrics for Gussie’s number, and Frank was so spineless and selfish. He still is and he’s breathing in and out erratically again, and, Jesus, his lungs are utter crap, aren’t they?

“Frank, hey,” Charley says, sounding worried and placing a hand on the small of his back. Frank turns to him, hand rising before freezing midway. Charley’s eyebrows are furrowed, his mouth slightly ajar, and, fuck, Frank wants, he, he wants so damn bad, he—

“I have to go,” he says, tightly, pulling away harshly. He can’t handle this and he can’t bring himself to do what needs to be done, he thought he could, but he can’t, it’s too hard, he hasn’t grown enough, maybe he never will, and all he knows right now is that Charley’s eyes burn, and maybe all three of them should have just stayed where they were, depressed and complacent, because there’s so many bridges he has to cross before he can even begin to be happy, and he knows now that he can’t cross them. Let alone burn them. He can’t. He can’t.

“I have to go.” He repeats, standing up, and Charley’s looking at him like he’s a madman, and that’s perfectly fine because maybe, maybe that means he’ll stay the hell away from him. “I’m sorry, about everything, I just—I have to go.”

Good thing going, going, gone, indeed.

-

He heads back to the apartment, after that, because he doesn’t know where else to go. It’s not like he can rip up the separation papers and drive back over to Gussie’s, that part of his life is absolutely and irrevocably dead, and he intends on keeping it that way. So, instead, he goes to the only place he’s truly considered home in years, and he sits at the kitchen table and stares at the wall, trying to numb all his senses.

The problem with blocking everything out so violently, Frank thinks, is that nothing is permanent and, eventually, things slip through the cracks and he’s spent so long not dealing with it, he has no idea how to even start. He’s running on autopilot, now. He doesn’t know what comes after that.

That’s how Mary finds him, hours later.

“Hey,” she says, gently, and he closes his eyes because he can tell from her tone alone that she’s already talked to Charley. He’s struck with a desperate need to know what he said. “How’re you holding up?”

“I’m fine.”

“Frank,” she says, pulling up a chair and sitting next to him. “Please talk to me. What’s going on?”

“That day, with the both of us out on the balcony. I called you my sister. You said that if I had said that back before everything collapsed, it would have killed you.” Frank turns to look at Mary, who’s nodding.

“It would have.”

“You were in love with me.” He states, matter of factly, and it’s as if so many doors that had been sealed shut are suddenly pushed open. It makes sense. He can’t believe it took him this long.

“Were being the key word there,” Mary stresses. “Past tense. I’m not anymore.”

“All those years, Mary… You watched me get married to two other women.”

“And those were two of the hardest days of my life.” She admits, and then she shrugs. “I don’t know what happened to make me not be in love with you, anymore. When you moved in, I thought it was going to be worse than ever, and then… something changed. I changed. Maybe we both did. Maybe, just maybe, I never actually was in love with you. I just thought I was. Thought I had to be. I think I was addicted to the desire. It’s so intrinsically human, to want something you know you can never have.”

“You’re very human,” Frank tells her.

“You might think you aren’t,” Mary says. “But you are, too.”

“I don’t know what to do,” he says, and his voice is shaking. “I’ve spent so long trying to kill a part of myself that I barely even knew was there. I don’t even know who I really am.”

Mary scoffs.

“Yes, you do,” she says. “You’re Frank Shepard. My closest and oldest friend. You’re an artist. You’re slightly disillusioned and heavily distrustful of most things you can’t make sense of. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders, even if you need some sense knocked into you, every once in a while. You’re repressed. Probably depressed. Neurotic and commanding and charming, and altogether something uniquely wonderful. I’m not in love with you, but I know why I was. I wasn’t fooling myself, not at the beginning. And you may think you’re drastically different than you were at twenty years old, but we all do, and, secretly, I think we’re all kind of wrong. Everyone changes. But, at our core, we’re all the same. Inside, no matter how much we try to stifle it, there’s this fire burning, this insurmountable drive to do better and be better and that’s why you’re sitting here, with me, instead of at Paramount. You know what you want, Frank. But when you don’t let yourself want the things that you want, the actual things that you want. And you get mad at others for doing you wrong, but you've been doing yourself wrong the longest.”

Frank looks at her, taking the words and spinning them around in his head. He wants to believe her, wants to live a life that’s genuine, and she’s looking at him like she sincerely thinks that he can, and—

And, well, she hasn’t been wrong, yet, has she?

“Okay,” is what he says, and there’s a sort of quiet revolution against all he’s ever known in that one word. Mary smiles, bright and beautiful, and he’s so unbelievably proud of her and who she is. He has no idea what he would have done without her. That’s a kind of love, too. Deep and unbreakable. It’s not the kind that Mary had wanted, all those many, many years ago, but it’s perfectly molded for the both of them, now.

“Okay,” Mary repeats, and then she stands up, dragging him with her. She hands him a paper with an address scribbled on it. “You have a lyricist to find. Go! And don’t come back too soon,” she adds, eyeing the typewriter. “I need peace and quiet if I’m really gonna start brainstorming, here.”

“Mary,” he says, and then he hugs her tight, laughing. “I want a hundred pages by the time I get back.”

“Let’s not get too crazy,” she snorts, as she pulls back. “But I figure if you can compose again and Charley can win a Pulitzer, then what the hell’s stopping me? Now go. Leave. And tell me everything, later.”

Frank runs out of the apartment so quickly, he almost trips on the doormat in his haste. He takes his car and drives as fast as he can, running through red lights, because he doesn’t trust himself to keep going if he stops. He’s terrified, absolutely, utterly terrified, and he has no idea about how he’s going to do this, whatsoever, and he doesn’t have a single second to think, because, in no time at all he’s standing in front of what he assumes is the door to the studio Charley’s renting, and, against his better judgement, because fuck his better judgement right now, he’s knocking unrelentingly.

And then, the door opens, and there he is, there’s Charley, eyes widening slightly as he takes in the sight of Frank, disheveled and panting and looking ready to collapse.

“Frank,” he starts, but Frank cuts him off.

“Write the musical with me.”

“—what,” Charley says, faltering, and Frank pushes through him and steps into the studio. Behind him, Charley closes the door. “Have you been drinking?”

“Not a drop since Mary went clean,” Frank swears. “Write the musical with me.”

“Frank, I don’t know if that’s—”

“We’ll make it about us. The three of us. You and me and Mary. About our friendship. About what happened to it. About how we saved it.”

“Have we saved it?” Charley asks, tiredly.

“Yes.” Frank says, firmly. “We have. You’ll do the lyrics, I’ll do the music—”

“You don’t say?”

“And Mary can do the book. I haven’t asked her yet, but she’s a part of this. A part of us.”

“Frank—”

“And we’ll have Good Thing Going in it. Properly. How it’s supposed to be.”

Charley pauses, looking up at him through eyes that look so old and so sad, and Frank needs him to say yes, needs it like he needs the air he breathes.

“Why?” Charley asks, softly.

“Remember what I told you, on that night where we went up to the roof to see Sputnik? We’re what’s happening. That’s why. We’re not dead, yet.” Frank grins. “That’d be a stretch.”

“We’re what’s happening.” Charley echoes, wryly.

“Exactly,” Frank breathes, and the smell of Charley—coffee and terrible, biting cologne—gives him the courage to take a step towards him. “I’m tired of running away. Aren’t you?”

“Could be I am,” Charley murmurs, and he closes his eyes, a sad smile playing on his lips. Beautiful, Frank’s mind supplies. He’s inclined to agree. “So, how does this musical end?”

“I’m not sure yet,” he confesses, and that fear’s starting to creep back up again, but he takes a quick breath, leans in, and hooks his fingers around Charley’s belt-loops, tugging him closer. “I guess we’ll have to wait and see. What do you say?”

Charley opens his eyes—and Frank can’t begin to explain how thankful him and his paper confidence are for the lack of commentary on where his hand is situated—and he looks at Frank directly.

“I mean, how else am I gonna EGOT?”

Frank laughs—a real, genuine laugh— nd he thinks his chest might burst with how light and young and free he feels. Charley’s beaming at him, clearly proud at himself for the joke’s landing, but that’s not why Frank feels like he’s flying. He lifts his free hand up to cup Charley’s cheek, and Charley’s smile drops a little, turns into something smaller, more curious, more disbelieving. There’s a question there, now, a question that’s been there for years. Frank’s hand drops to Charley’s lapels.

“Frank,” he says, quietly.

Frank tugs him forward. Frank kisses him. And kisses him. And kisses him. Charley melts into him, gasps against his mouth, hands running up and down Frank’s neck and shoulders. And kisses him. And kisses him. And kisses him.

-

The next year goes by in the blink of an eye, though uneventful would be the last word Frank would use to describe it.

Of course, Mary’s on board with the whole musical idea from the start.

“If I’m being completely honest,” she tells them, one day, “I was planning on writing a book about it, anyway.”

Eventually, Charley’s lease is up and he moves out of the studio he’s been renting and into Mary’s apartment, and Frank has plans to stay on the couch that first night, because he doesn’t want to assume or push anything and also he’s a gentleman, goddamnit, but Charley merely rolls his eyes and drags him into the room by his shirt collar, and they fall asleep tangled up in each other. Frank’s pretty sure it’s the most well-rested either of them have been in years.

(“I wish we could have done this sooner.” Charley tells him that night, with such raw honesty it makes Frank ache. “All that time...”

“I’m so sorry,” he says, and it’s almost inaudible. Charley burrows his head in his shoulder, and Frank’s arms tighten around him protectively. “I was an idiot.”

“We were both idiots,” Charley says, muffled from the fabric of Frank’s shirt. It makes that area tickle. “You were a bigger idiot, though.”

“Yeah,” he says, even though he knows that—to a certain extent—Charley’s messing with him.

“On the bright side, it could be, like, the show’s thematic statement. Idiocy. And repression.”

“Sounds specific.”

“You’d be surprised.” Charley muses, pulling back just enough that he can look at Frank directly again, dark eyes open and trusting and loving. It’s a combination that makes him feel twenty years old again, it’s—oh. It’s that look. That something. Frank breathes out through his nose, stricken and afflicted by the notion that he really, truly could have been soaring for years. “I think the audience would appreciate it.”

“Anything you want.” Frank says, and his voice breaks a little. He means it beyond their work. He means it beyond this moment. Charley leans forward to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth.

“I’ve already got that.”)

Mary’s symptoms slowly start to manifest as only mild insomnia and slight nausea, and she powers through, because that’s who she is—sometimes, Frank catches her eyes drifting over to a glass of wine on a nearby table when they’re out to eat, and he holds her hand, tightly, a constant reminder that he’s there for her, from now until forever, and she smiles up at him, often watery and always grateful. Him and Charley make a vow to never keep alcohol at the apartment, and rarely let themselves get noticeably drunk, even when Mary’s off at her parents and can’t see them.

Frank starts seeing a therapist six months in, upon both Mary and Charley’s requests, and he begrudgingly admits that, yes, it helps. The pressure on his chest is still there, sometimes, but he knows what it is and how to deal with it. The weight of the world isn’t on his shoulders, anymore. He thinks he breathes a lot easier now.

Mary takes a while to find the right dose of her medication, but, once she does, she sticks to it, and although there are still side effects, as well as days where she doesn’t have it in her to get out of bed, she’s overall much more stable than she has been for a long time.

Frank can say the exact same thing.

Charley sees a shrink, too, and although the first couple of sessions he comes out with red-rimmed eyes and white knuckles, he tells Frank that, slowly, it’s getting easier to not be so consumed by his emotions when he talks about how he feels. Frank kisses his forehead, murmuring a “good” into his skin.

Frank buys a piano.

Mary dusts off her typewriter.

Charley fills notebook upon notebook.

They’ve found themselves again, and found each other again, and Frank thinks that now they’re working on redefining happiness, what it means for them in threes and individually, alike.

Gussie finally returns the separation papers signed, around the same time that Frank gains the backbone he needed to call his son. He talks to Beth, too, gives her a brief overview of how things have gone on for him, and she does the same. She’s married again, apparently. He’s genuinely happy for her, he registers later that night, as he remembers Charley’s words from their first re-encounter—I alway thought you should stop marrying people you were never actually in love with—and he thinks idly about how maybe marriage wasn’t ever really in the cards for him. That maybe it could have been, in another life, one where he had never known about Charley Kringas or his dimples or his talent, but what kind of life would that have been, anyway?

-

“Here’s to us,” Frank says, one night when they’re all sitting out on the balcony looking up at the stars. Mary swats his shoulder.

“That’s my line.” She clears her throat, and sticks out her hand. “Here’s to us!”

“Who’s like us?” Frank laughs. From the corner of his eye, he sees Charley grin. They all lace their pinkies together.

“Damn few.”