Page 112 of How To Plot a Payback

But then Kye went off kissing Maggie, and then Kye came back on set to take every single opportunity to touch Lavender, to invade her space, and to coo under his breath in between every page rehearsed.

I could no longer surgically remove any emotion from my expression as I followed the lines and diverted my attention elsewhere as needed.

I cracked.

“You know what?” My eyes widen as a new thought pops into my mind. “What if things get really interesting. What if he just dies?”

Cindy frowns, as she has done the entire past hour as I’ve been steering this ship through this storm. “We can’t kill off Lance Lewis.”

“Sure we can. It’ll be the spin nobody expects.”

“He has a contract.”

“The season’s nearly up and we’re set for contract renewal.” I throw my hands out with a grandiose shrug. “Nothing is set in stone. And I think we can all agree here that his biceps would be better suited to other channels.”

“Lance has been Lavender’s love interest for ten seasons.”

I snap my fingers. “Correct. All the more reason to introduce Joey, that new neighbor downstairs.”

“The forty-five-year-old telemarketer with the parking problem?” someone says.

“Oookay.” Paula jumps up, and before I know it her hands are on my shoulders, pushing me up and out of the writers room. “I think we’ve stretched our minds to their creative limits for one day. We’ve had some great brainstorming here”—she says this to the room as if to emphasize I am not crazy but just doing what is very, very standard for our jobs, so nobody needs to mention my momentary lapse in sanity—“and I think we ought to go home, have a nice night, and bang at it tomorrow.”

I don’t resist as she pushes me through the door, gives everyone a friendly see-you-all-tomorrow-because-this-is-absolutely-normal wave, and slams my office door.

She wheels around. “What is going on?”

“Nothing,” I reply. “I am just trying like everyone else here to get this season off to a spectacular end—”

“By turning a sitcom into Higher Stakes and killing off your main characters.”

“Is he, though?” I retort. “Can we really say with all honesty he’s a main character?”

“Yes,” she replies bluntly, crossing her arms over her chest. “On the page. And in his contract. And on-screen.”

“See”—I raise a finger—“that’s where I think we may differ in our viewpoints,” I reply. “Because the way I see it, it’s Lavender who’s actually carrying the show. Frankly, if she turned to a cash register as her next love interest, people would write songs about it.”

“Is that what this is?” she says, her voice hushed. “Are you honest-to-goodness trying to sabotage the show to get back at this poor woman?”

“No.” I rake my hand through my hair. The conversation is settling over me like a wet blanket over the fire that has been burning in my chest. A tiny bit of reason is starting to show its face. “No.” I turn to the desk. “I just really prefer he not shoot cupid’s arrow at every woman he meets.”

Her eyes widen. “Wait. Now you’re jealous for Lavender?”

Her words ring through the room far too loud for my liking, which makes me grit my teeth and growl, “I am not jealous. I just don’t like his overstepping professional boundaries to flirt with Lavender every second he can.”

“I knew it.” There’s a gasp and a sudden punch in my arm that, were I Kye, would probably bounce off like a ping-pong ball, but as I am not Kye, and I don’t spend five hours a day lifting weights to impress multiple ladies, it hurts. I reach up to protect my arm from another swing.

“You like her,” she accuses.

“I appreciate her,” I correct. “And I was wrong before, and—”

“Are you going to ask her out?” she says, apparently dropping the point of this conversation and going for the newer, shinier point of interest.

“—and no,” I continue. “I have no intention of asking her out.”

Her smile wilts into a suspicious frown. “Why?”

“Because I respect her too much. More specifically, because I don’t think I can forgive myself.”