****116:

Tracy sat at the piano at Rocks where she had moved her local studio just the week before in an effort not to be so dependent on the easy walk across the street, and not to have her back up band have to wait on her. When she sat down tonight, she felt music all around her, and it was a unique feeling. The current had been strong all day, even when she had surfed, it wasn't enough, and she wished that Austin was around, or better yet.... Richard. One touch and this headache would be dissipating right now.

But she could feel music. She began to play what she felt, it wasn't a heard kind of sensation, but something in the vibrations all around her. She was the first one there tonight. She was alone. And she felt energized, ready to work.

Michel came into the sound room and put the studio on speaker so he could hear her. Rocker piano music was coming from her. A real beat, with real pattern and melody. But....he hesitated, the rest of the magic... what made Tracy so key and integral, seemed to him to be missing., Others, Greg and Jimmy had told him that she was back.... One hundred percent, but he felt it was because she was working. When Tracy worked she was all business. There was no dreamy quality to her. She simply cranked out hit after hit, she could write lyrics, easily, based on a few simple suggestions from anyone in the room. In fact, he'd seen her ask a grocery store clerk how her day had been and then base her lyrics on that.

"You want to lay that down?" He asked over the microphone.

"That would be great if I had some back up." she said.

"You're early."

"I am not, they're late."

"Trace, you see this invite to play at the Hoerner State Fund benefit for AIDS? I think you should do it."

"Are you kidding? I can't perform."

Michael came into the studio. He put his meat hook hands on his ample hips and commanded her attention. "It's time to perform. You turned down another role, I heard."

She ignored him, still playing, but the music had changed. "I don't perform." She repeated. "There's no time, Michael, this is all I've got. And you can't say it's not lucrative. I'm certainly paying the bills."

"It's not about paying the bills. Stop playing and look at me."

She stopped and turned to him, a faintly exasperated look on her face, but not enough to be disrespectful. Michael had been her manager for far too long for her to alienate him.

"I have a stack of invitations on my desk a mile high, not to mention the contract performances and promotions you are supposed to be doing."

"A slight exaggeration." She commented and started to turn back to the piano, but one look at Michael's face stopped her. "Listen to me. I don't want to perform. I don't want to be on stage. I don't want to face a crowd."

"Why?" It was one simple question, and Tracy's eyes darted around the room uncomfortably.

"Michael...."

"Tracy....."

"I don't want to go solo."

"You already went solo. What do you call your three discs?"

She shrugged. "Download material that I couldn't perform live."

"What would it take for you to perform at the AIDS benefit?"

"An act of God."

"That can be arranged."

She stared up at him. "You're serious about this?"

"I'm giving them an answer today. In the affirmative. I'll ask Greg to be with you on stage, just Greg, and just the piano. You'll do simple stuff and have recorded background."

Tracy shuddered. "It's too soon. Don't you see? I've pushed myself and pushed myself to hide how I really feel, but Michael, I'll be honest with you, I'm not out of the woods. There's darkness Michael, deep darkness in me. You've got to believe me. It's all a cover up. You know it, I can see it in your eyes."

Michael ran a hand through his huge curly mop of brown hair and closed his eyes, pinching his nose shut and blowing a disgusting noise out of his squeezed shut fingers. "Honey, I think you would feel more like your old self if you went back to doing the things you do best."

"Michael, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but I am not my old self. I haven't been my old self since January... when my whole world went up in pitch black never ending agonizing smoke and flame. You rescued me from absolute despair and pulled me up to at least where I can function with the life God gave me, but I don't feel like giving any more... you know what it takes out of me to be on stage, or to act a part in a movie, are you kidding?" She shuddered. "To have a thousand cameras in my face again? No way!"

"I've asked Marc Creel to come and do a photo shoot with you tomorrow." He said quietly, still staring her down. "Then Friday night you and Greg will go to the AIDS Fund Raiser."

Tracy's mouth dropped open in shock, as she envisioned the things he had told her. "I will not...."

"Yes, you will. And I've asked Yvonne and Stuart to come to Rocks once a week for the next month. You're to work with them. Consider it part of your internship."

"While you're running my life, you want to add a little more? How can I do all this?"

Michael breathed a sigh of relief that his normal bully tactics seemed to be working. "While we're discussing your life then, I have one more thing. You need to date."

Her eyes turned on him in full blown despair. "Go to hell." She flared brightly running out of the room and he heard the bathroom door slam shut across the hall. Well, that had been pushing it, he thought ruefully, and ran another hand through his hair as Greg and Jimmy stomped up the stairs for work.

"Hey, Mike." Greg acknowledged clapping Michael's large shoulder in greeting as he doffed his leather biker's jacket and stretched his shoulders. "Was that Trace I saw running hysterically into the bathroom? Is she sick?"

Michael didn't answer right away, except to shake his head.

"What'd you say to her?" Greg persisted, sitting at the drum set and flipping the sticks expertly. Jimmy had picked up his guitar and started tuning it.

But Tracy came back into the room, her eyes red rimmed and puffy, but her face pale and her hair tied back in a long braid and out of her face. She didn't look at any of them, and simply sat at the piano and started playing the last thing they had worked on the night before. Michael went back out of sight into the control room.

"What's up pretty lady?" Greg asked carefully.

Tracy looked up, her eyes full of unshed tears. "Do you find me attractive, Greg?" she asked unexpectedly, and Michael, hearing this query, bit the inside of his lip painfully.

Greg looked back at her frankly, trying very hard to keep a sincere smile on his face.

"Are you fishing for compliments, or really concerned about your looks?" He tried hesitantly, giving Jimmy a lop-sided, but purely masculine smirk.

"I want to know if you find me attractive." She persisted and shot a venomous glare at the control room window, where Michael was shaking his head in exasperation, knowing where this was going, and not at all happy about it.

"Sure, Trace, you're a very attractive woman." Greg laughed, feeling uncomfortable as he waggled his brows in Jimmy's direction.

"I think you're really attractive too, Trace." Jimmy added for good measure so his brother wasn't the only one on the spot.

"Thanks, Jim, but you're already attached and I'm asking Greg out on a date."

Greg choked back another laugh, and stared at Tracy in rising alarm. "Are you serious? You're asking me out?"

She turned to look at him and then her eyes drifted carefully toward Michael's chagrined ones. She nodded triumphantly, "Yeah, so will you go out with me?"

"Where are we going? I mean, sure, Trace, but...."

"Well, is it too weird? If it's too weird, I understand..." She said, but her voice wasn't a bit understanding. It was almost as if she wanted him to tell her it was too weird.

"No, it's not weird. I've always thought it would be good for us to hang out.... Are you really asking me out right now, here, in front of everybody? Are you serious? Or is this some kind of get back at Michael game?" He nailed it, she thought and looked at him in real interest for the first time.

"No, I'm really asking you out, right here, in front of.... Well, only a couple of people, not everybody!"

He stared at her hard and then got up and came over to sit on the piano bench with her in a comfortable position they had adopted early on in her grieving process. "Trace, we're friends, we work together, and I really like you, but... you don't have to ask me out."

"I think it's great that she wants to ask you out. Why don't you just say yes?" Jimmy strummed loudly without looking up.

"Tracy..." Came Michael's voice warningly.

"I'm not messing with you, Greg. I want to hang out."

"With me, like a date..." He went on, staring into her eyes for confirmation.

She nodded and then glanced back at Michael. "It would be fun."

"Tracy, step into the control room, now!" Michael snorted in aggravation.

"Michael, I already told you what to do with yourself tonight, and I meant it! Leave me alone." She turned to the keyboard. "Are we working or what?" She quipped to the room at large and started playing again.

Later, a normal rapport established once again, laughing and goofing around, Michael closed up shop shaking his head in consternation. Agitation simply made her more productive, he thought and shut down the lights as he watched the three of them poking each other and goofing around all the way down the stairs. But at the bottom, Tracy turned to Greg. "You want to come up to my office? I want to show you the plans for my AlternateBirthing Center."

Greg agreed and the rest said goodnight, with Michael shooting Tracy a warning glare and she giving him back a saucy smile that he couldn't quite peg.

The studio was far from empty, but the front hallway and stairs leading up to the private offices of the original owners, Tracy, Casey, Bridget and Julian were dark and closed. Tracy led the way and accessed the upper level doorways with a digital combination lock.

She used a voice command to turn on lights in her offices and hurried over to her private chamber and shut the door.

"What's in there, Trace? The mummy in the closet?" Greg laughed, looking around expectantly.

"I have stayed here every once in awhile and I have a lot of clothes and other junk, and it's a mess."

"A bedroom away from your own bedroom?" he mused and went to look out over the harbor and the night lights reflecting off downtown and the pier.

"I've had periods of my life when this was my only home." She said and shrugged. "There's a whole apartment on the other side of that door, but that one room is the only one I've really used. Not for awhile though." She said.

"So, that's okay. You have a home now." He said. He turned to the fireplace and looked at the pictures on the mantle.

"Yeah." She said and walked over to see what he saw, knowing she'd seen these pictures a million times, even recently. She pointed to one of her in studio about a year and a half ago, and he was with her, playing guitar, they were grinning at each other, a good picture, good light, Julian had taken it. Greg laughed and put an arm around her, hugging her easily.

"Good times." He laughed, and she nodded. "You okay? You seem a little on edge tonight."

They stood that way, actually facing the cold fireplace, staring at the pictures, with Greg's arm around her slender back and her fingers hooked in his belt loop.

"I'm okay." She said, "Why?" her voice had that wariness he had come to realize meant she thought that someone, in this case, him, suspected her of not being able to cope. For some reason, coping with her grief especially, but her crazy busy amazing life in general, was of paramount concern to her. He read the tabloids at the grocery store, and knew they portrayed her as unfit, grief stricken to the point of being hospitalized, clubbing with all kinds of actors and actresses, linked with many whose life styles were less than her standards, and having affairs with half of them, man and woman alike. She seemed to blow this off, and always had, since he'd known her, but maybe it was getting to her.

"I was thinking that maybe the almighty image was becoming too hard to live." He said gently.

"Michael wants me to start performing. He seems to think I don't have enough to do."

"Oh, I don't know if he thinks you don't have enough to do, or if you just seem to be missing it. You used to love to perform."

She shrugged. "I- I really don't feel like it right now, Greg. It's more than I want to get into. It takes too much out of me. I don't see how I can perform and spend the right amount of quality time with my kids...."

"You have your schedule," he said and squeezed her shoulder. "You just add it in and stick to it. You know the way. You're good at it, Trace."

"I don't know."

"Did Michael put you up to asking me out as well?"

Tracy had the grace to turn away and shuffle her feet a bit, but when she looked up at him, she smiled in real interest. "Not exactly. He said I should date, and I know he is thinking of those same idiots I am always linked with in the press, and I thought if I could go on a date, who would I go with?" tears clogged her throat briefly, but she swallowed them with a will that got stronger every time she had to answer. "And I looked up and you were there, and I thought I could go on a date with you. I like you, we could, you know, get to know each other on a different... different level. I mean, we've always hit it off as friends, and we could...."

Greg shushed her with a soft kiss on her upturned lips and Tracy stopped talking abruptly. At first surprise hit her with a force of shock that rivaled any other thoughts, but as the contact penetrated her numbed mind, she drew away. Eyes closed, no, squeezed as tightly shut as they could, and tears came anyway. As hard as she tried not to cry, not to think, not to remember, not to feel, the warmth of that simple sweet touch undid her. A hand came up to ward him off and instead fingered the union of the two. She shuddered again.

"I wouldn't mind getting to know you better." He whispered, and Tracy kept her eyes glued shut, and rested her forehead against his shoulder so he couldn't see how affected she was. He stroked her back and held her there. He rocked slightly, and would have tilted her back to see her reaction, when he felt the shuddering sob escape.

Greg swallowed. "Trace, you okay?"

She nodded against him. She was afraid that if she looked up at him again he would kiss her again and she didn't know if she could handle it.

He took her to the couch, a little sofa area set up for conversation and sat down next to her. She curled on her side and buried her face in the soft pillows.

"That bad, huh?" Greg laughed, keeping a hand on her leg as a connection.

Tracy shook her head. Get a grip... she told herself fiercely. You asked him out, you asked him up here... you lead him on.....

He sighed loudly. "Maybe we should talk about what you really want. I think I've been making it clear what I would really like already. But now it's up to you."

Tracy sat up, her feet tucked under her, her arms wrapped around her knees, her hair coming out of its braid and straying around her face. She had never looked so lovely to him.

"I thought I wanted to go on a date, but I've forgotten what all goes with dating."

Greg laughed, his new goatee accentuated as he pursed his lips thoughtfully. "I think I pushed that part of dating a little too soon. It seemed like what I wanted though and I was hoping it was what you wanted."

She rested her cheek against her knees and turned a side-long glance at him. "Om..." She closed her eyes and smiled, searching for the right words. "I'm... om.... Well, yeah, I wasn't ready."

"Is it Raine?" Greg asked companionably trying not to show his disappointment.

She nodded. "I have a lot of flash backs, and that definitely triggered one. I guess you're not ready when you're still thinking about the old boyfriend while you're coming on to the new one." She said it to be funny, but what it was to Greg was heart breaking. Her eyes looked so forlorn for once, not quite as withdrawn as they had been, so shut off, not at all the girl he'd always known. This girl for once, maybe the first time since the accident seemed real, a glow seemed to permeate her that was at once familiar and at the same time foreign, but extremely alluring. He'd seen it before, definitely, it was that glow that set her apart from other performers. She didn't just mouth the words, or walk the walk.... She felt it, lived it... became it....

He scooted closer to her. "He wasn't just a boyfriend, Tracy. It's totally different trying to get over Raine. You didn't break up with him,"

Tears came then, and she let them. He scooted even closer and put an arm around her, but Tracy was suddenly wishing it wasn't an arm. She had another flash back, forceful, as if her mind was making her relive it and she once again felt strong arms pulling her onto a warm lap, sharing the entire feeling, taking the load, so to speak, giving her sanctuary. It hadn't been an isolated instance either, but only with him....

And then a moment of panic assailed her, and she felt claustrophobic and pushed herself off the couch and away from these arms, strong in their own way and meaningful....her eyes met his as she raised a hand to her chest to still the suddenly shallower breathing, the sudden rush of current her flash back had caused.

Greg pinched his nose and pursed his lips. "This isn't going to make you awkward around me at work is it?"

She shook her head, but the current was racing around, looking for.... Him... and she felt light headed, and head achy at the same time.

Greg stared at her. "You're glowing blue now." He said somewhat in awe. "I mean, you were just kind of glowing a few minutes ago, but now you are definitely glowing blue, like you're sparking...blue." He reached out to her. "You're swaying as well."

Tracy backed up a step and leaned against the wall. "I'm okay." She said, but a hand was out to ward him off.

"I'm not going to hurt you, is that what you think?"

"No." she said, but her voice was trembling, it had hit so hard. Right now there was only one person she could focus on...

"We can take it as slow as you want." He said, but with little hope in his voice, she knew he was feeling rejected and she was sorry for that.

Hang on... she thought.... Hang on.....

"Do you want me to go?"

"Maybe it would be best. I'm a little out of sorts right now, I just need to be alone." She saw him nod through a cloud, and tried to wave as he left the room, nodding, smiling in acceptance, and a little dejected.

Tracy slumped to the floor. The dizziness wasn't passing, and she realized she was on a build, as she hadn't been in a long time. What to do? Ground out....

On what? On whom?

She couldn't think.... Another effect of the build then?

She reached for her phone in her pocket and opened it, as if it were the hardest thing in the world to do. She felt white lighted spots touch her outer vision and she closed her eyes, a myriad of colored lights washed over her. She hit speed dial and held the button down.

*******