Breakfast was sumptuous and Rollie and Angie both ate as if they had been starved for a week. The Mansfields clucked around their guests at the 1770 House that morning. Rollie pushed back his chair, patting his lean abdomen and told Mrs. Mansfield that if he lived year round with her, he was sure he’d weigh three hundred pounds. The elderly woman had smiled and pinched his cheek, calling him dearie every chance she got. Angie was quiet but smiled frequently. The sudden burden of what she wore on her finger was a little disconcerting. No way, she thought, could she wear this around the sets, working with goop and charges, and then, there was the other thing- the actual marriage thing.

Angie looked over as Rollie got pinched again, still stuffing another one of Mrs. Mansfield’s buckwheat cakes down, rolling it over and folding it with his fork and taking the whole cake in one bite. The man could eat! she thought and then, she nearly choked as she thought in panic- my God, he’ll starve on what I can cook!

Rollie called Ben Poe, the director that Angie had ingratiated herself with the day before, after breakfast. Between his tactful pleading and what must have been said on the other end of the line, Rollie persuaded Ben that Tyler FX would have no problem with Ectoplasmic Ranger going to 3D status. Angie rolled her eyes as she sat on the bed, watching Rollie negotiate. His patience was the salvation of the company and that was why he was the boss. She could always be the brains behind the man, she thought, with a sly smile, but there was no way she could do the amount of crawling and keeping of temper like Rollie.

"Great, that’s settled then," Rollie said as he hung up the phone, "I guess we best be on our way- the shoot today has moved to the studios and they are waiting on us." He grabbed his keys and she pulled herself off the bed, but as he walked toward the door, she walked out to the balcony.

Angie took a deep breath and made a silent prayer that she could really be what Rollie wanted her to be. She realized a whole new chapter of their lives was about to begin and she felt anxious and a little scared.

"What? Want to go for a swim now?" he asked her from behind, and pulled her back into his arms as his chin rested on top of her head.

"No, sorry- just thinking and taking it in, once last time," she replied, not looking up at him.

With her back to him still, he kissed the nape of her neck, "You’re scared, aren’t you?"

"No! What would give you that idea?" she said, turning around, putting her hands on her hips.

He looked at her then, challenging her, "I don’t know- maybe because I am a little."

She smiled, touched his cheek with her hand and kissed him, "Thank you, Rollie. You know me better than anyone, you’re my best friend."

"And hope to stay that way, Ange. We can take this as slow as you want, you know. The ring is my pledge and my faith in us. Anything else, is you know…"

"Yeah, I know…" she replied, her hands around his neck, and on tiptoe, she kissed him again.

"My, you are the best kisser in the world!" Rollie remarked to her, grinning.

"I was taught by the best!" Angie replied, a look in her eye as she tried to get him to remember back.

"Oh God, do you know, I forgot about that?" He said, giving himself a smack on the forehead.

"Well, I certainly didn’t. It was my first kiss," she told him, softly, "do you remember how old I was?"

"Umm, what? Twenty?" he asked, goading her.

"Yeah, right! I was fifteen, and you were, what? Twenty-five?"

"Oh my, an older man!"

"Do you remember what happened?"

"You were crying, I think?" he asked, his memory not as keen about this because to him it had been such an innocent little thing to help out his little adopted kid sister.

"No, I was angry. I told you that someone had said I would end up an old maid because I had never been kissed. Don’t you remember?" Angie was guiding him back and he suddenly had a flash of a beautiful young girl, pacing back and forth on the set of some movie that Manny and he had been doing.

"Yeah, okay- it’s coming back. You were absolutely pissed! Manny had laughed at you and was waving you off, going out the door for home. I saw you with that lower lip all out of wack, mad as a wet hen because he had told you that as far as he was concerned, an old maid was a good thing!" Rollie sat down on the couch, his memory replaying the scene. Angie stood at the balcony and smiled.

"And, do you remember what you did?" she asked him then, looking back at him as he ran his hand through his long, wavy hair.

"Yeah…"

"Well, there you go, my first kiss! With my future husband, of all things!" Angie remarked, her arms going out to each side, enveloping the breeze.

"You tricked me!" Rollie said, standing up and coming over to her and she turned around and repeated the same thing she had said to him then;

"Rollie, can you kiss me on the cheek, please! I want to be able to tell people that I’ve been kissed, come on, do me a favor, huh?"

Rollie laughed, realizing she was trying to mimic her own voice at the age of fifteen and he complied with her request as he had done then, feeling it was his obligation to a damsel in distress. As his lips began to brush her check, she quickly turned her head, her lips brushing his, and noses bumping at an awkward position. Rollie was taken back to that kiss so long ago that he had forgotten somehow.

"You were a little vixen back then…" he told her, tweaking her nose.

"And you were one surprised Rollie Tyler!" she replied as she walked past him back into the room.

"What? I barely remember it… and I am sure I was not surprised!" he told her, as he tried to recall his own reaction to her fifteen-year-old stunt with him.

"You blushed, a man of twenty-five!"

"I did not!"

"You did and I felt great!" Angie said, opening the door to the room and stepping out into the hallway.

"I was probably worried about Manny coming back in and catching me in that compromising situation with his little girl," Rollie continued, following her down the hall and keeping up the front of not remembering. They were in the van and driving back to the city when he looked over to her and conceded.

"Okay, I was startled. I remember that suddenly, I looked at you and you were all changed- not a little girl anymore but you had these," and he pulled his shirt out with both his hands over his chest with his knee on the steering wheel as she gasped and grabbed the wheel for a second, "and you had hips and lips like…"

"Aha! You did have some hormonal rush!" Angie said, sitting back in her seat, folding her arms across her chest and smiling.

"Oh no…" he said, shaking his head, "you just don’t know how I placed that whole thing back as far as I could in my brain at that time."

"Obviously, because it worked pretty well for a very long time!" Angie remarked and started reeling off former girlfriends.

"Hey, we’ll be at the studios before you finish that list," he told her, interrupting her mental and verbal count.

"Humph!" she remarked, then changed the subject, "you going to make that paste for Dingo of this ring?"

"Yeah," he said, almost dejectedly, "and he can do that business with whoever and get his tail right back to Australia and take his Dorinda, the Swallower with him."

"Oh Rollie," Angie replied, suppressing a giggle, "that sounds sorta, you know, pornographic."

"Yeah, well," he said, thinking about it and turned and smiled at her, "she is kinda strange, eh?"

"Strange yes, cooing all around you two Tylers, yes. I think she has the hots for both of you," Angie replied, rolling her eyes.

Rollie didn’t answer because Angie was too close to the truth.

They touched base with the studios and met with Ben Poe. Angie remained quiet but did apologize for the goop incident. She offered to pay for his shoes but he said that it did come off with water and that he would use the shoes to cut his grass or something. Somehow, both Angie and Rollie doubted that he cut his own grass. By the afternoon, they had remapped the sequences and Rollie was playfully jabbing the ectoplastic creature at the camera for the 3D shots that would come out as if the creature was jumping out at the audience. The goop scenes would be great as well, projectile gooping in 3D was going to be a hit, they all decided. After all, it had worked on Ben Poe already.

With the shots all planned and lined up for shooting schedules, they were ready to go home. They were making their way to the van when Lucinda popped her head out of the van door.

"Hey Luce!" Angie called out, "how’s that play coming? Are you going to do it?"

"You bet!" She said, jumping down and hugging Angie. Rollie smiled and hugged her as well and she took both their hands, Rollie’s right and Angie’s left in her hands and put them together, shaking her head, "Gosh, I just can’t get over it! OH MY GOD!" she screamed then, making both Rollie and Angie jumped.

"What?" Rollie asked, turning around, on guard.

"What a gorgeous ring!!!!"

Lucinda held up Angie’s hand and just gasped as she studied it. Angie blushed because one could have heard Lucinda in downtown Manhattan the way she had screamed.

"Oh Rollie! Wherever did you find this?" she asked, still amazed and giddy, "Oh Angie, can I? Can I try it on?"

Angie looked at Rollie and then they both silently agreed, knowing full well that Lucinda might go into a soliloquy from a play while placing the ring on her finger.

Angie removed the ring and Lucinda gently took it from her and put it on her own finger, grunting slightly, "Oh my, must have been all that pizza for lunch- my fingers are a little swollen."

"Well maybe you should wait…" Angie started to say but Lucinda managed as usual and raised her hand high in the air; "Bring me the head of John, the Baptist…"

"Oh God," Rollie said, rolling his eyes as Angie laughed, "come on then, Luce? Want some dinner with the gang? Dingo is in town as well. We can have a big dinner with the old gang."

"Really! That would be great!" she replied, her attention drawn from being Salame, the daughter of King Herrod.

"Come on then, you two. You can fawn more in the van!" Rollie told them and they all got in, Rollie pulling out the van into the street.

Angie was just about to ask for the ring back when she heard Lucinda squeal in pain.

"What?"

"Oh no!" Lucinda cried, her fingers trying to pull off the ring with considerable effort.

"Oh no, it’s not stuck?" Angie said, but knowing already the answer as Lucinda’s knuckle was raised and swollen and very red.

"I’m sorry, Angie! We’ll soap it up at the loft. Don’t worry! Or, Rollie can just take me down the aisle." She shrugged her shoulders and Rollie turned around and gave her a dirty look. "Okay, okay- just kidding…jeez!"

Angie was beginning to believe that the ring inspired bad luck. It was meant to be only held by the Tyler men, apparently. Being held by women, it seemed to get them in trouble.

"Rollie, how much longer?" Angie asked, noting the traffic jam ahead of them and sighing.

The loft door opened with a bang as Rollie, Lucinda and Angie walked in without fanfare. Rollie expected to see Dingo and Dorinda, but what he did see made him groan.

The loft was trashed. Debris was everywhere. Things had been thrown into the floor and broken. The couch had been slashed with a knife. Obviously, Dingo’s friends had gotten a little impatient.

"Dingo?" Rollie called out, as Bluey barked back, a muffled bark at that.

"Bluey? Where are you?" Angie called out, hearing the bark and worried that he too, was broken and couldn’t move.

The barking continued and finally, they found him, placed in a metal box, one that had the lid tightly in place.

Rollie pulled him out, "What’s up, boy?"

Bluey continued to bark but was moving and he led them to the closet in the kitchen, a pantry really and the door had been locked from the outside. Rollie fumbled for his keys and finally, found the key that would unlock the door. Folded up inside was Dorinda, bound and gagged. They quickly removed her gag and she was crying and hugging Rollie for dear life.

"Oh my heavens!" she remarked, tightly hold him and panting, "they were looking for Dingo and the ring! Dingo wasn’t here and I just couldn’t help myself- I told them that you had it now and that they could come back when you got in!"

"Okay, where is Dingo?" Rollie said, pulling her back from him as Angie appeared at his side, looking at the distressed redhead and frowning.

"He just stepped out for a smoke and to get a paper," Dorinda replied, straightening her dress.

"Okay, we’ll wait. Angie? Call Mira! Lucinda- get that ring off your finger!" Rollie barked out as they all went to attempt their assigned tasks.

Only Dorinda wasn’t given one. She sat on the slashed couch and pouted. Angie looked over at her once or twice while waiting for Mira. She still had that feeling about Dorinda. Lucinda soaped her hand over and over and still no luck with the ring. Angie, after calling Mira, tried to help and it only made the finger get more swollen.

"Okay, let’s just stop and put ice on it and try to get the swelling down, okay?" Angie told her and Lucinda nodded, embarrassed as Rollie gave her an exasperated look. They all looked up from their respective locations when the door opened suddenly. In stepped Dingo, with Mira right behind him. The comedy of errors was just about to start a new scene.