he house sat all alone at the end of one of the murderously twisting narrow roads that wound through Topanga Canyon. The road had no guardrail, and the darkness, combined with a late November drizzle, made even as fearless a driver as Honey jumpy. She tried to work up some enthusiasm for her new house as it came into view around the final hairpin turn, but she hated its sweeping roof and stark contemporary lines as much as she hated its location.

Topanga Canyon was a far cry from Beverly Hills and the pretty little house she had loved so much. Every leftover hippie in Southern California lived here, along with packs of wild dogs that bred with the coyotes. But after seven months in Beverly Hills, Gordon still hadn't been able to paint, and so they had moved.

Honey was drooping with fatigue as she pulled into the drive. When they had lived in Beverly Hills, it had only taken her half an hour to get back and forth from the studio. Now she had to get up at five to be at work in time for a seven a.m. call, and at night, she rarely got home before eight.

Her stomach rumbled as she walked into the house. She wished that Chantal and Gordon would have dinner ready, but neither of them was good in the kitchen, and they usually waited till she came home to cook. She had hired four different housekeepers to take care of the cooking and cleaning, but they kept quitting.

She dragged herself into the great room that stretched across the back of the house, and as her eyes fell on Sophie and her new husband, the old adage about being careful what you wish for because you just might get it sprang into her mind.

"Mama's not feeling well," Chantal said, looking up from the issue of Cosmo she was thumbing through.

"Another one of my headaches." Sophie sighed from the couch. "And my throat is real scratchy. Buck, honey, could you turn down that TV?"

Buck Ochs, the amusement park's former handyman and Sophie's new spouse, was sprawled in the big recliner Honey had bought them for a wedding present, where he was eating Cheez Doodles and watching a swimsuit show on ESPN. He obediently reached for the remote control and pointed it toward the big-screen TV Honey had bought for them.

"Look at the busts on that one, Gordon. Man-oh-man."

Unlike Sophie, Buck had been more than willing to leave the decaying amusement park for the riches of LaLa Land, and the two of them had shown up on Honey's doorstep early in the fall, right after their marriage.

"Honey, would you mind going out and buying me some lozenges?" Sophie's voice rose weakly from the couch. "My throat's so dry I can barely swallow."

Buck zapped the volume back up. "Aw, Sophie, Honey can get those lozenges later. Right now what I'd like is a good steak dinner. How 'bout it, Honey?"

The expensive white furniture was grimy with stains. An overturned beer can lay on the rug. Honey was exhausted and heartsick, and she exploded.

"You're all pigs! Look at you, lolling around like white trash, not contributing one single thing to society. I'm sick of this. I'm sick of all of you!"

Buck tore his attention away from the television and 'looked around at the others, his expression befuddled. "Now what's wrong with her?"

Chantal slapped down her Cosmo and got up in a huff. "I don't appreciate being talked to like that, Honey. Thanks to you, I've lost my appetite for dinner."

Gordon unwound from the floor where he had been sitting with his eyes shut doing what he called his "mind painting." "I haven't lost my appetite. What's to eat, Honey?"

She opened her mouth to deliver a stinging retort, but then she checked it. No matter what, they were the only family she had. With a weary sigh, she went into the kitchen and began dinner.

In the three months since she had gotten Melanie fired, Honey's relationship with the crew and her coworkers had steadily deteriorated. One part of her couldn't blame them for hating her. How could anybody like somebody who was so horrible? But the other part of her—the scared part— couldn't back down.

The Monday after her unpleasant weekend with her family, they began filming an episode in which Janie, jealous of Dusty's relationship with Blake, tries to get her fired. At the climax Dash was to rescue Janie from the roof of the barn while Dusty and Blake watched.

Dash ignored her as usual all week. Honey bided her time until the afternoon they were to shoot the final scene. She watched from her perch on top of the roof as Dash worked out the movements of the rigorous climb from the ground to the hayloft and then over two levels of roof. After almost an hour, they were finally ready to do the scene for real.

The cameras rolled. She waited until Dash had completed the climb. As he pulled himself up onto the top level of the barn roof, she stood and looked at the camera.

"I forgot my line."

"Cut! Give Janie her line." Jack Swackhammer was in charge of this episode. As the director who had been with them the longest, he had also had more than his share of run-ins with her. Honey hated him.

"Honey, this is a tough scene on Dash," he said. "Try to get it right the next time."

"Sure, Jack," she replied sweetly.

Dash gave her a warning glare.

During the next take, she managed to slip as she stood. On the following take, she flubbed her line. Then she didn't hit her mark. Dash had sweated through his shirt from the exertion and they had to stop while he changed. They began again, but once more she failed to hit her mark.

One hour later, after she had slipped again and ruined the shot for the fifth time, Dash exploded and walked off the set.

Jack immediately went to Ross to complain about Honey's increasingly disruptive behavior, but The Dash Coogan Show was a ratings giant, and Ross wouldn't risk antagonizing the actress that the newspapers were calling the most popular "child" star on television. Before the episode was over, Honey had gotten Jack Swackhammer fired.

When she heard the news, she felt sick. Why couldn't somebody care enough about her to make her stop?

The writers sat around the conference table and stared at the door Honey had just stamped out of and slammed shut. For several moments everything was silent, and then one of the women put down her yellow pad. "We can't let this go on any longer."

The man sitting to her left cleared his throat. "We said we wouldn't interfere."

"That's right," another agreed. "We promised to function as impartial observers."

"As writers we report reality; we don't alter it."

The woman shook her head. "I don't care what we promised. She's self-destructing, and we have to do something."

EXTERIOR. FRONT PORCH OF RANCH HOUSE—DAY.

Eleanor, dressed in a mud-spattered white designer suit, is filthy and furious. Dash is grim. Janie stands by the porch rocker looking guilty.

DASH

Is this true, Janie? Did you deliberately set that booby trap?

JANIE

(desperately)

It was a mistake. Pop. Miz Chadwick wasn't supposed to fall into the trap. Oid Man Winters was. I had to do something! She was getting ready to seil him the ranch.

ELEANOR

(wipes a clump of something organic from her cheek)

That does it! I finally get o buyer for this miserable place, and what does your little hellion of a daughter do? She tries to kill him!

JANIE

I wasn't actually trying to kill him, Miz Chadwick.

Just slow him up until Pop got back from town. I'm really sorry you fell into the trap instead.

ELEANOR

I'm afraid sorry isn't good enough this time. I've overlooked a lot from your daughter, Mr. Jones, but I'm not going to overlook this. I know you think I'm spoiled and frivolous and possessed of half a dozen other qualities of which you rugged cowboy types disapprove. But I will tell you this. Never once have I not been a parent to my

JANIE

(jumping forward)

Your son is a low-life, stinkin' womanizer who should be struck right off the face of this earth!

DASH

That's enough Janie. If you're finished, Miz Chadwick.

ELEANOR

I'm not finished. Not by a long shot. Never once have I let my son harm other people, Mr. Jones. Never once have I failed to point out to him the difference between right and wrong. Perhaps basic qualities of decency oren'f fashionable here in Texas, but I can assure you, they are respected in the rest of this country.

DASH (coldly)

When I need advice on how to raise my daughter, I'll ask for it.

ELEANOR

By that time, it may very well be too late.

Eleanor snatches up her purse and exits into the ranch house.

JANIE

(smugly)

You sure told her, Pop.

DASH

Yeah, I told her, all right. And now I'm gonna tell you. Miss Jane Marie Jones, your days as a carefree child untouched by human hand are about to come to an abrupt end.

He snatches up Janie by the waist and carries her purposefully across the porch and down the steps toward the barn.

"Cut it. Print it." The director looked down at his clip board. "Janie and Dash, I need you back in fifteen minutes. Liz, you're off till after lunch."

Before Dash could set her down, Honey began to struggle. "You don't have to suffocate me, you clumsy sonovabitch!"

Dash dropped her like a rabid dog.

Liz came through the doorway back onto the porch, wiping her face with a tissue. "Honey, you stepped on my lines again. Give me a little space to work, all right?"

Liz's request had been mildly uttered, but Honey blew up. "Why don't you both go straight to hell!" She stomped away from them. As she passed one of the cameras, she slapped it with all her force and launched her final verbal rocket.

"Fuckers!"

"Charming," Liz drawled.

The crew members looked away. Dash slowly shook his head and mounted the porch steps toward Liz. "My biggest regret is the fact that those fool writers chickened out and I don't get to whale her butt this afternoon."

"Do it anyway."

"Yeah, right."

Liz spoke quietly. "I'm serious, Dash."

He scowled and pulled a pack of LifeSavers from his shirt pocket. She scrupulously avoided personal entanglements on the set, but the situation with Honey had grown so impossible that Liz felt she could no longer ignore it.

She walked over to the far side of the porch out of earshot of the crew, hesitating for a moment before she spoke. "Honey's completely out of control."

"You're not telling me anything. She kept us waiting almost an hour this morning."

"Ross is useless, and the network's even worse. They're all so afraid she'll walk out on the show that they let her get away with murder. I'm really worried about her. For some perverse reason, I happen to be fond of the little monster."

"Well, believe me when I tell you the feeling isn't mutual. She doesn't make much secret of the fact that she hates your guts." Dash sank down into the rocker near where she was standing. "Every time I do a scene with that kid, I feel like she's going to stick a knife right through my back the minute it's turned. You'd think she'd show a little gratitude. If it weren't for me, she wouldn't even have a career."

"From the tone of this new script, the writers seem to be sending you a message to do something about her." Liz stopped trying to clean herself up and held the towel loosely in her hand. "You know what Honey wants from you. Everybody on the set knows it. Would it kill you to give it to her?"

His voice was flat. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"From the beginning, she's looked at you like you were God Almighty. She wants some attention, Dash. She wants you to care about her."

"I'm an actor, not a baby-sitter."

"But she's hurting. God knows how long she's been on her own. You've met that parasitic family of hers. It's obvious that she's raised herself."

"I was on my own when I was a kid, and I did all right."

"Sure you did," she said sarcastically. Anyone with three ex-wives, two children he hardly ever saw, and a long history of fighting the bottle could hardly brag about how well adjusted he was.

He got up from the chair. "If you're so worried about her, why don't you play mother hen?"

"Because she'd spit in my face. I'm more the wicked stepmother type than a fairy godmother. This is a dangerous business for a young girl who doesn't have anyone watching out for her. She's looking for a father, Dash. She needs someone to put the reins on her." She tried to lighten the tension between them with a small smile. "Who better to do that than an old cowboy?"

"You're crazy," he said, turning away from her. "I don't know a damned thing about kids."

"You've got two of them. You must know something."

"Their mother has raised them. All I do is write the checks."

"And that's the way you like to keep it, isn't it? Just writing the checks." The words had slipped out of their own volition, and she wanted to bite off her tongue.

Dash turned back to her, his eyes narrowed. "Why don't you just come out and say whatever it is you've got on your mind."

She took a deep breath. "All right. I think Honey's identity has gotten all tangled up with Janie's. Maybe the writers are to blame, I don't know, but for whatever reason, the more you distance yourself from her, the more she resents it and the worse she behaves. I think you're the only person who can help her."

"I don't have the slightest intention of helping her. It's not my problem."

His coldness unearthed a fragment of old pain that Liz hadn't even known still existed. She was suddenly twenty-two again and in love with a stunt rider from Oklahoma who she had just learned was a married man.

"Honey's too needy for you, isn't she? That first month we filmed, she ran after you like a little puppy dog practically begging for some attention, and the more she begged, the colder you got. She was too needy, and you don't like needy women, do you, Dash?"

He gave her a dead, hard stare. "You don't know anything about me, so why don't you just mind your own goddamn business?"

Liz was silently berating herself for ever having begun this conversation. This show had enough problems without adding a conflict between Dash and herself. She shrugged and smiled brittlely. "But of course, darling. Why don't I do just that."

Without another word, she walked off the porch and headed for her motor home.

Dash stormed over to the catering wagon and got himself a cup of coffee. It burned his tongue as he swallowed, but he kept drinking it anyway. He was furiously angry with Liz. Where did she get the gall to act as if that little monster from hell was his responsibility? He had only one responsibility, and that was to keep himself sober, something that hadn't been requiring much effort on his part until Honey had stomped into his life.

He swallowed the last of his coffee and tossed away the cup. Ross was the person who should be keeping Honey in line, not himself. And from now on Miss Liz Castleberry could just mind her own goddamn business.

They called him for the next scene, a simple one in which he had to carry Honey across the yard and into the barn. The scene that followed in the barn would be trickier— what television people called the MOS, when the moral lesson for the episode was delivered. MOS stood for "Moral of Show," but all of them referred to it as the "Moment of Shit."

"Where's Honey?" the assistant director asked. "We're ready to shoot."

"I heard Jack Swackhammer took out a contract on her," one of the camera men said. "Maybe the hit man finally delivered."

"We should be so lucky," the AD murmured.

For ten more minutes, Dash cooled his heels while his temper burned. Someone located Honey with the horses, and one of the camera operators suggested that she spent so much time with the animals because they were the only ones who could stand being with her since they didn't have to worry about getting fired.

Bruce Rand was directing that week's episode. He had been responsible for some of the best episodes of M.A.S.H., and Ross had brought him in because he had a reputation for tact. But after working with Honey all week, even he was starting to show wear around the edges.

When she finally ambled onto the set, Bruce looked relieved and began blocking out the scene. "Dash, carry Janie from the bottom of the porch steps across the yard toward the barn. Janie, give the line about being opposed to violence when you reach the corner of the porch, then start to struggle when he ignores you."

He finished the blocking and called for a rehearsal. Dash and Honey climbed the porch steps to the open front door. The assistant director, whose job it was to maintain continuity from one shot to the next, looked down at her notes.

"You had her under your left arm, Dash. And Honey, you need your hat."

Several more minutes passed while one of the wardrobe people ran back over to the corral to retrieve the navy blue cap she had been wearing. When it was on her head with the bill turned up, Dash tucked her under his left arm and they walked through it.

They returned to the porch, but as Dash turned to pick her up, he saw something he didn't like in those light blue eyes of hers, a subtle air of calculation. He remembered the episode in November when she'd been stuck on the roof of the barn and had deliberately blown her lines so he had to keep climbing up after her. His back had bothered him for a week afterward-

"No tricks, Honey," he warned. "This is an easy scene. Let's get it over with."

"You just worry about yourself, old man," she sneered. "I'll take care of me."

He didn't like it when she called him that, and his anger settled in deeper. No matter what the mirror said, he was only forty-one. Not that damned old.

"Quiet, please," Bruce called.

Dash walked to the bottom of the porch steps and picked Honey up under his left arm.

"Stand by now. We're rolling. Marker. Action."

"No, Pop," Janie screamed, as he began to walk. "What are you doing? I said I was sorry."

He reached the corner of the porch.

"Don't forget you're opposed to unnecessary violence," she shrieked. "You can't turn your back on your principles."

She was giving it one hundred percent, just like always, and he had to clutch her more tightly as she struggled.

"No, Pop! Don't do this! I'm too old for this..."

She started to kick, and her knee caught him in the small of his back. He grunted and his arm tightened around her waist as he continued to move purposefully toward the barn. Without warning, she jabbed the sharp point of her elbow in his ribs. He gripped her even tighter, warning her without words that she was going too far.

Her teeth sank into the flesh of his arm.

"God damn it!" With a sharp exclamation of pain, he dropped her to the ground.

"Ow..." Her hat flew off, and she looked up at him, outrage stamped all over her small, furious face. "You dropped me, you fucker!"

Fireworks went off inside his brain. She was ruining his life, and he'd had enough. Reaching down, he snatched her up by the seat of her jeans and the collar of her shirt.

"Hey!" She cried out in a combination of surprise and indignation as she left the ground.

"You messed with me one too many times, little girl," he said, hauling her off to the bam, this time in earnest.

Her struggles before were merely a rehearsal for what she did now. He pinned her against his side, not giving a damn whether he hurt her or not.

Honey felt the painful pressure of hard muscles clamping her ribs and cutting off her breath. Apprehension ate away at her anger as she grew conscious of the fact that he was in deadly earnest. She'd been looking for her limits, and she'd finally found them.

The faces of the crew members flew by. She called out to them. "Help! Bruce, help! Ross! Somebody call Ross!"

No one moved.

And then she saw Eric standing on the side smoking a cigarette. "Eric, stop him!"

He took a drag and looked away.

"No! Put me down!"

He was carrying her into the barn. To her relief she spotted half a dozen crew members working there, adjusting the lights for the next scene. He couldn't do anything horrible to her with so many people standing around.

"Get out of here!" Dash barked. "Now!"

"No!" she screamed. "No, don't leave."

They scampered away like rats from a burning building. The last one out closed the barn door.

With a rough curse Dash sprawled down on a stack of hay bales that had been arranged for the next scene and threw her over his knees.

She'd read the script and she knew what happened next. He lifted his hand to spank her only to find out that he didn't have the heart. Then he told her a story about her mother, she started to cry, and everything was all right again.

The flat of his hand slammed down hard on her bottom.

She screamed in surprise.

He hit her again, and her scream changed into a yelp of pain.

The next one hurt even worse.

And then he stopped. The flat of his hand cupped her bottom. "Here's the way it's going to be. From now on you've got one person to answer to, and that's me. If I'm happy, you don't have anything to worry about. But if I'm not happy, then you'd better start saying your prayers." He lifted his hand and slapped it down smartly on her rear. "And believe me. Right now, I'm not happy."

"You can't do this," she gasped.

He smacked her again. "Who says?"

Tears stung her eyes. "I'm a star! I'll quit the show!"

Smack. "Good."

"I'll sue you!" Smack. "Ouch!"

"You'll have to stand in line." Smack.

Her face was hot with pain and mortification, and her nose had started to run. A tear plopped down onto the floor of the barn and made a small dark stain on the wood. Her muscles screamed with tension as she waited for the next blow, but his hand had fallen still—as still as his voice.

"Now what I'm going to do is this. I'm going to start calling people in here that you've insulted. One by one, I'm going to call them in and hold you down and let each one of them take a whack at you."

A sob erupted from her throat. "This isn't the way it's supposed to be! This isn't the way it is in the script."

"Life isn't a script, little girl. You have to take responsibility for yourself."

"Please." The word slipped from her lips, small and lonely. "Please don't do this."

"Why shouldn't I?"

She tried to take a breath, but it hurt. "Because."

"I'm afraid you're going to have to do better than that."

Her bottom was burning and his big hand cupping over it seemed to hold in the heat and make it worse. But worse than the pain in her body was the pain in her heart. "Because..." she gasped. "Because I don't want to be like this."

He was quiet for a moment. "Are you crying?"

"Me? Hell, no. I—I never cry." Her voice broke.

He lifted his hand from her bottom. She scrambled up, pushing herself off his lap and trying to get to her feet. But the scattered hay on the barn floor was slippery and she lost her balance so that she sprawled awkwardly on the bale next to him. She immediately turned her back so he couldn't see her tear-smeared cheeks.

Everything was quiet for a moment. Her bottom burned, and she clenched her hands together to keep from rubbing it. "I—I didn't mean to hurt anybody," she said softly. "I just wanted people to like me."

"You sure have a strange way of going about it."

"Everybody hates me."

"You're a mean-tempered little bitch. Why shouldn't they?"

"I'm not a b-bitch! I'm a decent person. I'm a good Baptist with a-a strong moral code."

"Uh-huh," he replied skeptically.

She hunched her shoulder so she could use the sleeve of her T-shirt to catch her tears before he saw them drip off her jaw. "You're not—You're not really going to call all those people in here and—and let them take a whack at me, are you?"

"Since you're such a fine Baptist, you shouldn't mind a little public repentance."

She tried to stiffen her spine, but her misery was cramping her insides and keeping her bent forward. How had her life come to this? All she'd wanted was for them to like her, especially this man who held her in such contempt. There were too many tears to hold them back, and a few of them dripped onto her jeans. "I—I can't apologize. I can't embarrass myself like that."

"You've embarrassed yourself every other way. I don't see what difference it'd make."

She thought of Eric seeing her like this. "Please. Please, don't do it."

His boots shifted in the straw. There was a long silence. She hiccupped on a sob.

"I guess I could hold off for a while. Until I see if you've decided to mend your ways."

Her misery didn't ease. "You—you shouldn't have hit me. Do you know how old I am?"

"Well, Janie's thirteen, but I know you're older than that."

"She's sup—supposed to be fourteen this season, but the writers haven't changed her."

"Television time passes slow."

The tears kept leaking out like a faucet with an old washer, and her voice sounded all mushy. "Except on the s—soaps. My Aunt Sophie watched one show where a baby was born. Three—three years later, that baby was a pregnant teenager."

"The way I remember it, you're around sixteen."

Another sob squeezed through the narrow passageway in her throat. "I'm eighteen. Eighteen years, o—one month and two weeks."

"I guess I hadn't realized. In a way that kind of makes it worse, doesn't it? Somebody who's eighteen should act more like a woman and less like a kid who has to be turned over somebody's knee."

Her voice broke. "I don't th—think I'm ever going to be a woman. I'm—I'm going to be caught in this kid's body forever."

"There's nothing wrong with your body. It's your mind that needs to grow up."

She crumpled forward, her arms squeezed between her chest and her legs, her body shivering. Self-hatred consumed her. She couldn't stand being herself anymore.

The brush of his fingers against her spine was so light that at first she didn't realize he was touching her. And then his hand opened and settled over the center of her back. The storehouse of emotions that she had locked away for so many years broke free. The feelings of abandonment, the loneliness, the need for love that was like an unmelting cone of ice at the center of her heart.

She twisted around and threw herself against his chest. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and she buried her face in his shirt collar. She could feel him stiffen and knew he hadn't meant to let her into his arms—nobody ever wanted her in their arms—but she couldn't help herself. She just took possession.

"I'm everything you said," she whispered into his shirt collar. "I'm hateful and selfish and a mean-tempered bitch."

"People change their ways all the time."

"You—you really think I should apologize, don't you?"

He held her awkwardly, neither pushing her away nor embracing her. "Let's just say I think you've reached a crossroads. You might not realize it now, but later on you'll look back at this moment and you'll know that you were forced to make a decision that affected how you were going to live the rest of your life."

She was quiet, pressing her cheek against his shoulder and thinking about what he had said. She'd gotten two people fired and insulted nearly everyone on the show. It was a lot to make up for.

Her breath caught on a small hiccup. "This is the real MOS, isn't it, Dash?"

There was a moment of silence.

"I guess it is, at that," he replied.