It was a short night for both of them.  JC rolled out of bed and dressed slowly, it was early yet.  He passed by Lisa’s closed bedroom door touching it lightly with his fingers on his way to the kitchen.  As he made his way to start a pot of coffee, a note caught his eye.  Spinning it around to face him, he read it with hope growing. 

JC,

We need to talk. 
Come find me. 
You know where I’ll be.
It’s time. 

Lisa

He took a moment to brew a quick cup of coffee for himself and make a cappuccino for Lisa.  Slipping his shoes on, he tugged on a jacket before grabbing the coffee cups and heading outside. 

There was a small pond behind Lisa’s house where several ducks spent their days swimming.  He knew Lisa would be curled up in a chair tossing breadcrumbs to them.  He crested the hill and saw her just as he had pictured.  She was curled up in one of the two Adirondack chairs on the bank of the pond.  There was a blanket tucked tightly around her body to ward off the morning chill.  Her head was tipped back to soak up the early morning rays, an empty bread bag was on the ground beside her, giving testament to the feeding of the ducks. 

She must have sensed his presence since he didn’t scare her when he settled into the chair next to hers.  He handed her the cappuccino and she smiled her thanks, warming her hands as she inhaled the fragrance. 

“Morning,” he said as he took a sip of the dark brew. 

“Morning,” she replied blowing on hers to cool it down. 

JC watched her out of the corner of his eye as she observed the ducks wash themselves, hoping for another crumb of food. 

“What game are you playing, JC?”  She finally took the first sip of her drink. 

“I’m not playing any game.” 

“Then what’s happening between us?”  He turned to look at her, but she never took her gaze from the view in front of them. 

He let out a shaky breath before responding.  “I have two conditions as we get into this.”

Her head rolled on the back of the chair to look at him.  “What are they?”

“Complete honesty from this moment forward.  There can be no doubt in either of our minds that the other is not telling the truth.”

“And the other?”  She prompted when he paused to take a sip.

“No more running.  For either of us.”

She bit her lip as she considered his words and the truth in his eyes.  Nodding once, “Okay – complete honesty and no running.”

“From this moment forward.”

“From this moment forward.”  She agreed. 

They both waited for the other to speak.  “Why did you change JC?”  She looked off in the distance not seeing anything in front of her as she waited for JC to speak.

He knew she wasn’t talking about lately.  Her question went back months before she quit.  He took a long drink of his coffee, welcoming the chance to gather his thoughts before he began the most honest conversation of his life. 

“I think I’d better start with the breakup, you remember?”  He saw her nodding her head out of the corner of his eye.  “Well, when we broke up, it hit me pretty hard.  Oh, not the way you’re thinking.  I didn’t love her, I didn’t even know what love was until I lost you.”  He noticed her look at him in shock but he continued.  “Most days I didn’t even like her.  She was just available and something in me said I should try to make the relationship work.  But when we broke up, I saw that as yet another failure in my life.”

“What do you mean another failure?  Jace, you’ve never failed at anything in your life.”

Scoffing, he dismissed her words.  “Oh really, then why isn’t the group still together?  Not to mention my solo album, all my relationships, my unreleased second album…”

Lisa reached out and grasped his hand.  His tightened almost painfully on hers as he looked over the water.  “First of all, the group is not together because you all wanted to try something new and expand your wings.  If you ever decided to get back together, I know, and I mean I am 100% positive that if the five of you made another album it would go to number 1.  Secondly, your album was amazing, just a little mature for the fans that you had at the time.  Your second album would blow them away.  Do you realize how many people out there follow your every move?  I was online the other day and just typed in something for fun and thousands of sites came up dedicated to you – pictures, blogs, fan fiction, and so many of them are pleading with you to release your solo album or get the group back together.  And as for your relationships – you just keep choosing women that are with you for all the wrong reasons.  I don’t know why you couldn’t see it.”

He squeezed her hand, thanking her for her words and when it appeared he had finished, she asked another question.  “So how does that fit in?”

Sighing, he leaned his head back and sipped his coffee.  “This is where it gets hard.”  He took a deep breath of the fresh morning air.  “At that point, after we broke up, I started looking around and everyone had it together but me.  Justin’s career…Joey’s family…you.  I looked at you and you were always on top of things.  You knew where I was supposed to be every minute of the day, you were so confident, and your life was going so well.”

“Jace, I was your assistant, you paid me to know where you were supposed to be every minute of the day.”

“I know – I know.  I just – complete honesty.”  She nodded for him to continue.  “It made me mad, I guess, that nothing ever fazed you.  I could demand the most outrageous things and you would find a way to get them.  So, I lost sight of our friendship and tried to find a way for you to come off that pedestal you were on.”

“I knew I was being unreasonable, but I couldn’t stop myself.  It became a habit.  Then you quit and I was furious…You had found a way to live your life and you didn’t need me in it like I needed you in mine.”

“Jace – that’s – ”   

He silenced her with a shake on his head, “Let me finish.  I wanted you back.  You were the one that kept me on track and I resented that you were going to be successful at leaving me behind.  So I called and called and the more that you ignored me, the madder I got.  Then the accident happened.  I don’t really remember what happened that day, a lot of pain, but other than that…then I woke up.”  He finally looked at her, holding her eyes with his.  “I couldn’t believe it – that you were sitting there next to my bed.  You were the first thing I saw when I woke up and I thought it was all a dream.  But then reality set in, I could barely care for myself and there you were, every minute, stepping in and seeing to all my needs.  But that wasn’t what I wanted from you.  I didn’t want you to see me as an invalid, I wanted things back to the way they were when we were friends.”

Lisa chewed on her bottom lip as she considered all that JC said, she had no idea that he had resented her.  “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

“You have nothing to be sorry about, you did nothing wrong while I constantly screwed up.  The grape juice incident – that woke me up a little bit.  Not when I dumped it on you, but when you came back into the room that night and said that behavior was what you expected from me.”

Her cheeks reddened uncomfortably, “You heard that?”

“Yeah, and can I just say that I am so sorry for how I’ve treated you in the past.”

She waved it off with the hand holding her cup and cappuccino sloshed on the blanket.  “I’m such a mess.”  She pulled her hand out of his and rolled the blanket up to toss it on the ground next to her, placing the cup next to it. 

“Did you burn yourself?”  JC asked leaning forward to get up and check. 

“No, it just got on the blanket, it’s fine, at least it’s washable.”  He relaxed back in the chair once more and Lisa shifted a little to face him more directly.  

“So let’s talk about New York.”  She watched as a slight blush tinged his face.

“What about New York?”

“Well, let me tell you what I think happened then you can fill in the blanks.”  She watched as he nodded.  “Okay, somehow you convinced Kelly to help you, how I’m not sure yet, however she and I will have a loooong conversation about that.  Anyway, you get her on your side, she convinces me to come to New York where you just happen to have a show the same time Joey is on Broadway. She checks me in to the hotel so she can get an extra key for you and I suspect I ruined some plans when I went straight to the theater that night instead of their house.  Where were you that night?”  She asked thinking she already knew the answer.

He mumbled behind his cup, “Behind the couch.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you.  Could you repeat that, please?”  A large grin threatened to break through. 

“I was behind the couch, are you happy?  You showed up and there was no where to go except behind the couch.  If you had seen me that night, it would have ruined all my plans.”

“And did you panic when your phone started ringing?”  She couldn’t contain her laughter at his surprised look. 

“How did you know –”

“I didn’t, at least not then.  I thought about it all later and wondered if it was you, after I thought about how weird everyone was acting and wanting to get me out of there.  But you stayed hidden and Kelly and I went to the show.  Were you also the one in the balcony who fell?”  She asked following her hunch.

“Jeez – how –”  He stumbled over his words. 

“I didn’t know until just now.”  Clapping her hands, she celebrated her discovery.  She had never seen him look so embarrassed.

Pushing on, she continued, “But then, there was the show where you came on stage.  You pegged me perfectly.  I was trying anything to get out of the theater, but Joey wouldn’t let me pass and I knew that if I climbed over the seats in front of me those people wouldn’t be very happy and I would draw attention to myself.  You picked the seat very well to keep me there.  I was absolutely floored – I had no idea you were going to be singing.  And then that song…I love that song.”

“I know.”  Confident now, he flashed his classic smile and lifted his ankle to place on his opposite knee.  “I knew I would get to you with that song, but I pictured it a little differently.  At that point I thought you would jump into my arms, but you didn’t even want to be there and see me, did you?”

All laughter aside, Lisa stretched both arms over her head, before bringing them back down to cover her eyes.  “No, I didn’t.”

“Why?”

Placing her feet on the ground, she put her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands, scrubbing her face as if she could scrub away this conversation.  “I don’t want to be hurt again, I’m not sure I can pick up the pieces if they crack one more time.”

JC cleared his throat.  “Lisa, I can’t promise that I won’t hurt you again, I’m only human, but I’m going to do my best to be the man that you deserve because I can’t imagine my life without you.  Will you give me one more shot and trust me?  Please?”

She stood and walked to the edge of the bank, crossing her arms against the chill.  JC moved behind her, standing just inches away.  She could feel his body warmth.  He lifted the hair off her neck, moving it to one side as he leaned down and inhaled her scent. 

“Please – just one more chance?”  His breath stirred the tendrils of the hair floating around her ear.  She shivered in response.  His hands found her shoulders and rubbed them as he followed them down to her hands.  He tucked them in his large warm ones and stepped forward so he was pressed against her back. 

“Jace – ”

“I’m not perfect Lisa, but I’ve never pretended to be.”

“I don’t want perfect, Jace.  I just want you.”  She turned in his arms to look into his eyes. 

“And I just want you.”  Their lips met and Lisa was sure she would never get used to this feeling.  She rested her weight on him as she lost herself in the feelings he evoked.  He was smiling as he broke the kiss.  He began to step backward drawing her with him to the chairs behind them when his foot tangled in the blanket she had discarded earlier.  He lost his balance and tumbled backward.  Unable to break his fall as his hands were linked with Lisa’s, he pulled her down with him. 

When she landed on his chest, it knocked the wind out of him for a moment as Lisa buried her laughter in his chest.  “You seem to have trouble staying on your feet lately.”

“Only around you, I’m afraid.”  Groaning, he released her hands and wrapped his arms tightly around her back, holding her to him.  “I used to be so graceful.”

“Yeah, well, you used to be smooth too, and let me tell you that wasn’t smooth at all.”

“I’ve missed you, Lisa.”  He said softly after his laughter died away.  “Forgive me?”

“I’ll consider it,” she said as she pressed a quick kiss on his cheek.  “But first I need you to tell me all about Kelly’s part in this whole elaborate plan.”

“You’re just trying to get Joey and Kelly to beat me up, aren’t you?”

She stuck her tongue out at him, “Payback, baby, payback.”

He looked up at her smiling down at him and felt his heart jump, “Well, you see…”