have you heard, it's in the stars, next july we collide with mars

"Mike?"

"Yeah?"

"What do you think I would have done if you'd married that Tracy Lord" - with all of her wealth and beauty, Mike could hear somewhere between unsaid and muttered - "after all?"

Mike fidgeted. This was the million-dollar question, so to speak. Yes, Liz was "only a simple photographer" and all that, but that didn't mean she was stupid, just because she hadn't had to specifically practice up at being a newspaper-style snoop like he had. Come to think of it, she was really better with the zingers than he was. So he was, was, was in trouble.

"Oh, I don't know," he started out casual, "I mean, I guess you'd have a heck of a story to turn in to Sidney Kid, and that'd get you better set up for a while. And then maybe you'd find another nice guy at Spy who didn't really care for the racket, and who was a heck of a lot smarter 'n me about it, you know, and--"

He hadn't been interrupted, per se, but it was Liz's superarched eyebrow and laser glare that had gotten him stopped. Here lay the penitence of one Macaulay Connor, and there lay the judgement of one Elizabeth Imbrie.

"I didn't say what you think I should have done. I want to know what you think I would have done."

"Oh, well, uh..." Was this a trick question? Obviously, it was, which made even asking about it a trick in its own right, but really, what was he not getting? He knew he'd have screwed up their friendship something awful if he'd done it, but Liz was a sensible girl, and she knew how to stand up for herself - which including dumping guys who weren't worth her time.

Oh.

"You'd have slapped me, I think. Somewhere in between the objections and kissing the bride."

"That's right," said Liz triumphantly, somehow ignoring the fact that it was very wrong, and that her nerves combined with her good grooming would have kept her palm tidily stuffed back in her pocket, or under her hat, or somewhere. "But right now, I'm not thinking about that. I think I'd like to kiss you instead."

"You sure about that?"

"Well, don't quote me on it." Oh, Liz. "But yes, I think I am."