Standard disclaimer: The characters from FX The Series belong to Rysher and Hallmark and other people. This is done for fun, no profit intended or involved.

The Anniversary Party

by Kay White Simons

The moment Rollie Tyler walked into the florist shop, he knew what he was going to buy. His attention was immediately captured by an arrangement centered around one white rose, which just happened to be the featured bouquet of the month.

It looks like her, he thought, both surprised and pleased by the concept. He started to count and categorize the other items in the bouquet, then stopped. No, he thought, let’s not look for real life analogies here. It makes me think of her, that’s enough. There’s a time for logic and facts; this is not it.

He walked to the counter as the clerk asked, "May I help you?"

"I want to send that," and he pointed to the bouquet, "to a friend."

The clerk smiled a little at the word ‘friend", but only said, "Will there be anything else?"

They worked through the transaction quickly, with Rollie filling out the card to go with the bouquet, as well as the address card for where to send it.

"Can you send it this afternoon?" he asked, though the shop did advertise same day delivery.

The clerk checked her computer schedule, and stated, "If it’s in the City, we have a 2:00 P.M. delivery open."

"Great. That will work just fine." He pulled out his wallet and paid cash for the transaction. Once done he smiled at the clerk, said, "Thank you so much," and left, smiling and whistling as he got into his car.

Angie looked up from her computer as Rollie entered. Before she could say a word to him, he asked, "Aren’t you supposed to be on your way to the airport by now? You’re going to miss Lucinda’s plane."

"Just waiting for you, boss," she replied. "I’ve got some stuff together for the presentation I wanted you to see first."

Rollie walked to Angie’s side, peering at her screen. "Presentation is Friday; you’ve got three days to work on your part."

Angie just smiled as she got out of her chair. Sure enough, Rollie sat down the moment she was clear, grabbing the mouse almost without thought.

"I’m going, Rol. Any message for Luce I should give her?"

"Umm," Rollie said, obviously captured by Angie’s work. "Oh, tell her congratulations from me."

"Sure, Rollie, sure," Angie said, smiling. A bit part in a pilot for a TV show that might never be aired wasn’t exactly something to congratulate a struggling actress on ... but Angie didn’t argue - she was running late, after all.

Once Angie had left, Rollie made sure everything on screen was saved to hard drive and backup before closing off. He then logged onto his email service and pulled a letter from his personal, password protected, folder.

He read aloud: "Actress you recommended even better than you said. Series a go; part to be expanded to her ability. She sold it; I owe you one, RT."

Rollie smiled again. Sometimes things just work out even better than you hope, he thought. And if she doesn’t know this yet, it will work out even better!

Angie walked in just as Rollie was about to leave. "Where are you going?" she asked.

"Errands to run," he said.

"What about the party tonight?" Angie asked.

"That’s what the errands are for. Oh, good work on the presentation thing. There’s a couple of points, but we can talk about them tomorrow. I gotta run. See you later."

"Rollie, this place isn’t ready for a party!" Angie called after him, but he was already in his car. She sighed and closed the door. "Well, I guess I’d better start getting the place set up. Damn," and she pounded her fist against a work table. "I didn’t ask him who he got to bring Luce here. Some surprise party if the guest never shows up."

Rollie stared at the doorbell as if it were something he had boobytrapped. Not good, he thought; she’s a friend, I’m just taking her out for a late lunch to ask her about the shoot, it’s not like I haven’t taken her to lunch before .... except, of course, they’d been working together on a film every other time he’d taken her out for a meal. This was close to a date, and he knew she could easily see it that way.

He jabbed at the doorbell before he lost all nerve and bolted back to his car. There, now, that wasn’t so hard. Hey, maybe she’s asleep. Maybe she knows the news and is out celebrating - oh boy, I’m in trouble, how do we get her to the party if ...

The buzzer hummed in the middle of that thought, and Rollie quickly grabbed the doorknob of the inner door before missing his access. Okay, she’s home, let’s just do it, he thought, and put on his professional face, the one he used for presentations and client meetings.

Lucinda was standing in her doorway when he rounded the staircase to her floor. "Hello, Rollie, right on time I see," she said, smiling.

"I guess you got my flowers," he said lamely, feeling ashamed of himself for not thinking of anything better to say than the obvious.

"Of course, and they’re beautiful, Rollie," she replied as she backed away from the open door to let him enter. He walked in slowly, and Lucinda watched with obvious amusement on her face.

"Okay, spill it Mister Tyler," she said as soon as he was in.

"Spill it?" he asked, now in a panic.

"Yeh, spill it. Either this is a date, or you’ve got bad news and you’re trying to break it to me gently. I’ve known you too long for it to be a date, so ..."

Rollie was relieved - she didn’t know his connection to her recently completed role. His face showed his change in mental state, and Lucinda noticed it.

"It’s not a date, right? Is it? I mean ...’

"No, Lucinda, not that kind of date, anyway. It’s a friendship lunch offer, nothing more."

"You know, that’s almost an insult," Lucinda retorted, though by her expression and tone Rollie could tell she was relieved and now just teasing him. She put her hands on her hips as she announced, "I am a very hot looking woman, and there are a lot of men interested in me, I’ll have you know."

Rollie smiled; Lucinda had a way of stating any truth without it sounding anything less than fact. Useful when the truth was something that would be an insult coming from almost any other mouth; and how she could say something like this and not have it sound like conceit, despite the truth in the statement, still amazed him.

"I know, Lucinda. Come on; I’ll tell you why over the meal."

Together they left her apartment and drove to the restaurant.

"Oh my," Lucinda gasped, as Rollie handed over the keys to his car to the valet attendant in front of the Italian restaurant that was their destination. "I’ve wanted to try this place but I can’t afford it ..." She looked to Rollie as if to ask, are you sure you can afford it?

Rollie offered Lucinda his arm; she placed hers in his, and he brought her through the door to the woman standing at the dining room entrance.

"Tyler reservation for two," he told the woman. She checked her book, nodded, then said, "This way, please," as she walked towards the middle of the room.

Once they were seated she handed them two menus, then returned to her post. Lucinda immediately opened hers, and gasped at the prices.

"Don’t worry about it, Luce, just order what you want," Rollie told her, but she couldn’t help staring at him in response.

"Did you just inherit an opal mine or something?" she asked.

"Not an opal mine, but a something, I guess you could say." Then he smiled his "it’s a secret" type of smile, and Lucinda returned her attention to the menu.

Once they had ordered their meals, Lucinda again asked Rollie, "Spill it. You’re driving me crazy with the suspense."

Rollie nodded. "It’s our anniversary," he said, and to the puzzled look on her face, added, "Our friendship anniversary. We first met on this day, you know."

"Uh, maybe it’s jetlag, but ... so?" Lucinda was totally confused now. So they met on this date three years ago, so what? She’d never known anyone to spend this kind of money on that kind of anniversary before.

Rollie shook his head in wonderment. "Friendship is important, Luce. And I’ve lost a few friends over the last couple of years. Ang and I were talking about it, and we decided to celebrate the friendships we have. If I can go put flowers on the graves of those I’ve lost on the anniversary of their deaths, I can certainly put flowers in the hands of the friends I’ve still got on the date I first met them." He said the last with such emphasis that Lucinda wasn’t about to argue. Seeing as how her hands had gotten some beautiful flowers out of the deal, she decided agreement was the better part of flower keeping.

"Okay, that explains the flowers, but what about this?" She waved her arm to include the total restaurant, just as the server showed up with the meals. He dodged her arm expertly, walking over to the other side of the table to put down his load.

"Oh, well, this is an excuse to talk to you privately," he explained as the meal was placed in front of them.

"You see, I want to do the same kind of thing to celebrate me and Angie, but, well, I’m not sure how to go about it. With what happened with Loubar and all. She’s just, well, trying so hard to keep it business as usual. Too hard, I think, but if I send her flowers, would she take it the wrong way?"

"Umm," Lucinda answered around a mouthful of lasagna. "This is sooo good, Rollie," she swallowed the food then finished her statement, "and I’m going to be on a diet for months getting rid of these calories." Rollie took the opportunity to get some of the spaghetti into his mouth as Lucinda spoke.

"How soon do you need an answer?" she asked him, after a minute or so had passed as she considered the question.

"Doesn’t have to be tonight," he said, as soon as he had swallowed more of his meal. "But soon, it’s coming up."

"Okay, later in the week all right?"

"Sure, that’s fine."

They then turned their full attention to the meal, chatting only slightly, and that about the restaurant and the excellent food. Rollie did ask casually how the shoot went, though he was still worried about the subject.

"Six scenes," she replied. "Small ones, no big effort, done in one take. Could have done them in one day if the shooting schedule had been set up that way. It’s a small part, but they’ll let me know if the series gets picked up and my role stays."

"So what else did you do in L.A.?"

"Went shopping once with my friend, but then she had a flight to attend, so I mostly stayed in her apartment watching TV and catching up on my email." She paused for a moment, then added, with a wistful smile on her face, "Oh, and I met this grip named Marty; he took me out to dinner last night of the shoot. Says he’ll look me up if he’s ever in New York, and I should let him know if I ever come back to L.A." She then shrugged. "Can’t see anything happening with this one, but he’s nice."

Rollie smiled; this was going to be perfect, he thought. Lucinda noticed his smile, but thought nothing much of it, just figuring he was smiling at her attempt to downplay her interest in the man.

Once they were done with their meals they were asked if they wanted dessert, which both declined.

"Ready to leave?" Rollie asked. Lucinda nodded, adding, "But they haven’t brought the check yet."

"They won’t," Rollie said, rising to his feet. "Someone else is paying for all this."

Lucinda’s eyes opened wide. "Who do we know with this kind of money, Rollie Tyler?"

"Let’s just say a friend who doesn’t want to be named at this time, okay?" he replied.

She was shaking her head back and forth as she rose. Later, waiting outside for the car, she started shaking it the same way again.

"I feel like there’s something going on that I don’t know about," she told him as the car arrived. "There’s something you’re not telling me, and it’s not just who paid for the meal."

Rollie got behind the wheel, thus avoiding the question for the moment, and was about to say something noncommittal in reply when his cell phone rang. Grabbing it from his jacket pocket, he answered, "Tyler here."

"Yeh, Rol, it’s me," Angie told him. "You need to be here right now."

"On my way," Rollie said, and he ended the call.

"That was Angie," he told Lucinda, "I gotta get back there right away; hope you don’t mind if I don’t drop you off at home first, do you?"

"Well, I really need to get some sleep soon, it’s been a tiring week and then some," Lucinda said, "but I can always take a taxi home from your place."

"It shouldn’t take long, and then I’ll drive you home. Deal?"

She smiled; Rollie had put all of his charm into that statement, so how could she say no? Besides, maybe it was a date ... and he was just too shy to admit it.

"Deal."

Rollie pulled into the large building where he both worked and lived, parking his car next to his workvan. He hurried to the connecting door from the garage area to the work area, opening it and peaking his head through before Lucinda had reached it herself.

"Rollie Tyler, now I know there’s something going on here," she stated, though she couldn’t quite make her tone angry enough to be sincere.

"Just walk through that door, m’dear, and all will be explained," Rollie said with a smile as he opened it wide.

"Surprise!" called a crowd of voices as Lucinda made her entrance. Glancing around, she saw Angie first, standing almost in front of her. The rest of the crowd she recognized as people they had worked with on some of the movies they had filmed together, grips and gaffes and extras that were stock to New York City’s film industry.

"Mira called," Angie told Rollie as he entered. "They’re on a case, so they’ll be here later."

Lucinda was still standing where she had stopped, still looking at all the people and decorations.

"A party? For me?" she asked in a small, almost little girl lost, voice.

"All of these friendships started the day you met Rollie," Angie told her.

"But ..." she started.

"We all felt it was time to celebrate the good in our lives, after all the bad things that have been happening to us," Angie continued, ending with, "Don’t worry; you may be the first to get a party, but you won’t be the last."

Lucinda’s attention was grabbed by a man who had worked his way to the front of the crowd. "Marty?" she gasped, totally surprised. He smiled, and walked to her.

Rollie took Angie’s arm and moved her to an empty section of the loft.

"Okay, start explaining, Rollie. Who is this Marty guy? He showed up right after you left and insisted on helping me decorate the loft, I had to get Mira to run a check on him he was so insistent on being let in here, and ..."

"Ang, I’m sorry, he was supposed to have arrived early this morning so I could have introduced him to you and saved you all the worries. Even then, I figured you would call me when he arrived and I’d clear him then."

Angie was only slightly appeased by that explanation. "He says he was a grip on that pilot Lucinda shot - so what is he doing here? How did he know about this party?"

Rollie noticed a couple of people headed his way, and said, rather loudly, "Ang, help me get some stuff out of the van, would you?"

Taken aback by the sudden change in topic, Angie hesitated for a moment, then saw the people coming their way. "Oh, sure, Rollie. No problem." As they walked off, she smiled at the two who were now nearly next to them.

"Hi, guys, great party, isn’t it?" she said to them as she and Rollie entered the privacy of their garage.

"Okay, here’s the deal. Marty’s not a grip." Seeing that Angie was about to retort to that, he added, "Or rather, he’s not just a grip. He’s also the executive producer of the TV series Lucinda auditioned for." Then, for good measure, he finished with, "And he’s a friend of mine from a long time ago."

"That’s not all of it, Rollie. What are you holding back from me?" Angie asked.

"What is it with you women? You and Lucinda both, ‘you’re holding out on me, Rollie’ and ‘spill it, Mister Tyler". How do you know there’s more?"

"We know you, Rollie, we can see it on your face, hear it in your voice. So spill it, Mister Tyler. Did she really say that?"

"Yeh, she did, when I took her out for lunch."

"You did what?"

"It was Marty’s idea, he made reservations at that swanky Italian place, what’s it name again ..."

"The one with the prices that could buy airline tickets to Milan?"

"Yeh, that one. Marty likes the food there and has a standing account. Owner was a friend of his father’s or something. Anyway, Marty figured it would be a good way to get Lucinda to this party, and it would give him time to get here if something delayed his trip in. Which it did since he was supposed to have been here before you even picked up Luce from the airport. And we should be getting back to the party since I really don’t have anything in the van that takes this long to bring in."

"Not until you tell me how you know him and why he’s at this party."

"Well, his father was a director, used to do National Geographic specials, and sometimes he brought Marty with him on a shoot. There was a filming on the tribes of Australia, Marty was there, he was about ten at the time, we met. We sent each other letters off and on for a few years, then we kinda lost touch with each other until I moved to New York. We ran into each other on a movie set and stayed in touch. He even offered me a job with him when he went into producing, but by that time I was working with your father and I wanted to stay in New York, so I said no. But he’d send work my way every so often, and I’d send him names of people and companies for whatever he was working on."

"And you sent him Lucinda’s name for this TV Show." Angie made it a statement of fact rather than a question, though her face didn’t show the same certainty.

"Yeh, Lucinda’d been out of work for awhile, and I thought she’d be good for the show. And I was right, wasn’t I?" Rollie looked at her hopefully.

Angie smiled, "Yeh, you were right. So why does he work as a grip?"

"Well, he started out as one and really enjoys it. This way he gets to keep an eye on the show without making the director and stars nervous; you know how people get when the executive producer is touring the set," and he used a deep, ominous tone for those last six words. "He just enjoys watching a show being filmed, but try telling them that."

Angie’s expression showed that she accepted what he said, so Rollie added, "Can we please go back to the party now?"

"In a moment," Angie said, and ducked into the van. She came back out with one of their carrying cases. "Here you go, boss, I found where you hid it last." She smirked while she said it.

"Thank you so very much," he replied, sarcastically.

Lucinda was waiting for them when they walked through the door. "It’s about time you showed up, I was just coming to get you. I have an announcement to make." Then she turned to the crowd and yelled, "Listen up, people, I have an announcement to make."

Silence moved its way through the crowd. When it was so complete that you could hear Blue’s motor humming, she said, "You all know I was in Los Angeles to film a pilot for a proposed new TV series, right?" A chorus of "right" and "yeh" came back at her from the crowd.

"Well, I have just learned that the pilot sold ..." and cheers from the group interrupted her. She raised one hand, and the crowd quieted. " My part’s been expanded, I’m a supporting actress in the series," and she almost squealed those last few words. More cheers rang out, so that Lucinda had to yell, "There’s more" a couple of times before her friends stopped celebrating.

"It’s going to be filmed here in New York, and I bet you all are going to get jobs on the show!"

Well, after that there was no silencing the friendly mob. Toasts rang out, champagne was poured, and friend after friend came to shake Lucinda’s hand. Angie and Rollie saw Francis and Mira work their way to the front of the crowd.

"We got here just in time for the good news," Mira said to Lucinda, just as Angie said to Rollie, "You knew this already, didn’t you," in an accusing tone of voice. "Some of it," he admitted, "but not the New York part."

"Had to keep something as a surprise for you, Rollie," Marty returned, having followed Mira and Francis to the front of the crowd.

"So, have you told her yet, Marty?" Rollie asked.

"Told me what?" Lucinda asked.

"That I’m the producer of the show? Yeh, I told her," Marty said.

"Can you imagine that, Angie? He’s a producer and he likes me. Not just as an actress, but as me!" Lucinda looked from Angie back to Marty and then smiled wide.

"Life is good," Angie commented as Lucinda and Marty were again mobbed by well wishers.

"So, Mira, how’s it going at the precinct house?" Rollie asked.

Mira’s cell phone rang before she could answer him. Smiling apologetically to Rollie, Mira pulled out her phone and answered it. After a "yeh," an "uh huh", and another "yeh" she said, "On our way," and ended the call.

"They caught the guy, Frank," she said to her partner, "and the Captain wants us back at the station pronto. Sorry, Rollie, gotta run. Great party, though."

"Yeh, shame we couldn’t be here to enjoy it," her partner added.

"Well, I’m glad you got to be here for the announcement," Rollie told them both.

"So, what’s the name of this new TV Series," Francis asked as Rollie walked with his police friends to the door.

"Masters of Illusion," Rollie told them. "Its about a production company that makes SciFi films and the problems they have during shoots."

"I’ll take a pass on that one," Mira said as she was about to leave. "Lived it, don’t have to watch it." With that, the two left.

"What do you mean, you’ll pass," Rollie yelled after them as they got into their cars.

"Gee, Rol," Angie said in a slow, exaggerated drawl, "what ever could she have meant by it, huh?"

"It’s gonna be a good show, you’ll see," Rollie told her as he closed the door.

"Hit series," he continued. "Run for years. You’ll see."

"Uh huh," Angie replied, walking towards the refreshment table.

"And we’re doing the special effects for it," he told her, walking with her.

She stopped in her tracks; Rollie didn’t. "Are you nuts?" she yelled to his back. "A TV series?" He started walking faster. "Do you know how much work that’s going to be?"

Lucinda and Marty watched the exchange from their vantage point and smiled.

"And you’re saying you met Rollie on this day?" Lucinda said to Marty.

"Yep. I was ten years old, was scared to death, jetlagged before we ever invented the term, in a strange country surrounded by strange people, and Rollie was just there somehow making it all seem alright. I would do anything for that man for what he did for me that day."

Lucinda nodded thoughtfully at that, then looked around at the crowd and the party going so strong. "I think we all would do anything for what he’s done for us," she said quietly. "He may have thrown this party for me, but he’s the real guest of honor."

"Amen to that," Marty said, then raised his glass. "A toast to eternal friendship."

One by one every member of the party joined the toast.