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written by Margaret Royal

Love, Lies and Voldemort

The Lianca Recaps

Monday, October 6, 2003

Episode summary: Bianca runs into Lena at PVU, and they have a conversation in private with Maggie's help.

A bulletin board with a shitload of handwritten signs on pastel paper sets the scene as PVU. Ah, "college." Where everyone writes in fat, colored, felt-tip pens on pastel paper and is never square enough to use a computer and plain old printer paper. Maggie seems to be assuaging some Bianca fears by pointing out to her BFF that there are a lot of rooms for rent posted. Binks stalls that they're all probably for a year, but she only needs a place for, what, three months? Maggie's found something and pulls a tag off one of the postings: "Here, look. This one might be . . ." he tone changes as she sees something, and she directs the next remark out towards what she saw . . . "just what you want." Sensing the change of tone, Binks raises her eyes from the tag to spy Lena entering, purse over shoulder, in the same dress she was in the last time she visited PVU—the day Bianca tried to pretend to Lena that she had gotten involved with Maggie. Lena stops when she sees Binks and looks happy but a little dumbfounded. And for once, Binks smiles back. Commercials.

Lena smiles nervously as she approaches, and looks in Maggie's direction for a fraction of a second before focusing all her attention on Bianca. "You're looking for an apartment?" she offers geekily. "Oh, yes," Binks replies, a little too casually—hee, Maggie makes herself scarce and appears to mouth "Ooo-kay" as she slides from the frame—"I can't live with my mother forever." Lena laughs a nervous laugh in recognition, and Binks gestures to the board and wonders about Lena. Turns out Lena's there to post jobs in hopes of recruiting business school grad students to work for Kendall. Smart. "Oh," Binks breathes, with a smile. Eeeeee, Lianca is back! Eeeeeee!!! EEEEEEEE!!!!!! Hoo. Sorry. They're just ...so good to have around again. *sniffle* "In fact," says Lena, "I'm supposed to be meeting with Professor Farris; he's the department chair." She points quickly off-screen. "There he is." "Oh," Binks says. "I guess that you should go, then." "Yes," Lena laughs. Binks dorkily wishes her luck "with everything," and Lena gives her a happy, goofy smile in return. OMG eeeeee!!!!! They're so cute! Lena turns and walks over to a white-haired, bespectacled man in a sweater vest (you can hear her say, "it's so nice to meet you"), who leads out of the bustling student rec area they were in.

But—just as a side note—"department chair" of what? The business school? Wouldn't that be a Dean? The Corporate Espionage Department of the School of Management at Pine Valley University? I want some answers, AMC, to this totally irrelevant question.

Bianca, a little affected, walks to the middle of the room and past Maggie. "Um," begins Maggie, which is already annoying, "excuse me. Are you going to ignore what just happened?" "You know what, Maggie, too much time has passed, it's far too complicated, and Lena and I are both better off the way things are," Binks denials. "Oh, really?" says Mags. "Because I thought I just saw fireworks and . . . and the New York Symphony in the background, unless I was mistaken." I can't tell if Maggie is trying to be a good friend and is just doing it with a pissy tone or if she's actually, well, kind of jealous and pissed. No Bagena triangle! Boooooo! Binks sits and tells Maggie that she wasn't mistaken. "It was real." Okay, so that was big, and warms my shipper heart.

In the rec area, student union, common room, whatever the hell it is, Bianca ambles toward a foosball table. "Yes, Lena and I could be happy together," she tells Maggie. "In my dreams. And then I wake up, Maggie. You know, too much has happened, and now I'm pregnant with this baby; how can I possibly expect Lena to understand that and accept that? It's Michael Cambias's child." Ooohh, "this baby" is getting more annoying every time she has to say it. Maggie is staring at Binks with raised eyebrows. "Besides," Binks continues, "Lena once told me that she doesn't want kids, so how can I hit her with all of this? Especially since she seems so together now. . . . What?" Disapproval!Mags points out to her that she's "freaking out" the same way she did "the other day" (except, on show time, that's "yesterday," and I don't know why they can't call it "yesterday" if they're also calling it "last night") about coming back to school—she's assuming what Lena will think without giving her a chance. Lena appears with Professor Farris in the background behind Bianca, and Maggie sends a chin nod in her direction, pointing her out to Binks, who turns around and smiles again, not noticing it. Mags suggests that she just go tell Lena.

Bianca stares longingly at Lena, who chats with Professor Farris. Maggie comes up behind her and tells her she's right: "things are really complicated between you and Lena, but I hate to see you act out of fear." "Fear?" Bianca repeats, surprised. Mags suggests she give Lena a chance: "Maybe she'll say 'yuck' and freak out because it's Michael Cambias's baby, but, you know, maybe she'll surprise you. And it wouldn't be so bad having her around the next couple of months, now would it?" Binks agrees, and Maggie urges she go tell Lena. "You're not gonna see her every day, you know." Like, why couldn't she? Is there any doubt that if Bianca called Lena up and said, "hey, let's talk," Lena would be in the next room before they even hung up? But whatever. Lena concludes her conversation with Professor Farris and turns back to Bianca and Maggie with a big smile. She tells Binks it was good to run into her, and maybe they can have coffee sometime. "How bout right now?" Binks proposes. Lena thinks that's great; Binks thinks they can catch up, so the HPF suggests they find a place to sit down. "Hey, um, I'm late for class, and, well, I forgot to feed my fish," Maggie lies obviously. She actually seems kind of bitter about it. She gives Binks her keys, says there's coffee in her room, and speedwalks outta there. Binks and Lena skedaddle, and Maggie emerges from behind a brick pillar with an unreadably unhappy look on her face. Is she worried Bianca's about to get her heart stomped on, or . . . uh-oh . . . jealous? Please no Bagena triangle, please no Bagena triangle . . .

In Maggie's room, Lena and Bianca stand very close together and regard the fish in the tank. It's totally cute! Squeeeee!!!! The shot is framed with the fishtank in the foreground and Lianca's faces on the other side. Lena avers that people would be better off if they were more like fish. "Why do you say that?" Bianca wonders. Lena points to a couple: "See, these two, just a moment ago, they were locking lips, but the rest of them, they don't seem to care what sexy they are." "Well," says Binks, "I guess the scales fell from their eyes." Shout-out to Acts 9:18! Luke in the house! Binks turns and looks at Lena, they grin at each other, and then they straighten up, suddenly a little nervous. Lena moves away, leaning on Maggie's desk, and says she thought Mags was just pretending to have fish so they'd have somewhere to talk. Binks says that Maggie did want them to talk. "Really?" says Lena. Binks allows how Maggie just wants her to be happy. "And are you? Beginning to be, maybe?" Lena wonders. Bianca hesitates. "Beginning to be," she smiles. The Fox is glad to hear it. Binks says that she feels "so much less alone now," and she has "so many people in [her] life who love [her]." "Of course you do," Lena replies earnestly, rising and stepping closer. "And you know, that includes me, because I still love you just as much as ever . . ." She stops, seeing something we can't in Bianca's expression, and as Binks turns away from her and toward us, we can see that she's a little shaken up. Lena apologizes: "I shouldn't have said that; that was a mistake, wasn't it?" She exhales a little as Binks stands wordlessly. Oh, Lianca. You're killing me!

With fishtank noises in the background, Bianca tells the HPF that she knows Lena loves her, "but it still sounds strange when you say it." The hell? "Yes, of course," Lena says, trying to downplay it, "you don't have to respond, and we'll just let it go." Bianca's face is pretty unreadable; it's hard to tell if she's relieved that Lena backed off so quickly, or if she's disappointed that Lena didn't protest as she has done in the past. She's something, that's for sure. Looking for anything to talk about, Lena remarks that the fish still look hungry and fiddles with the fish food canister. (Is it poison?!?!) Binks smiles. "I like . . . just being here with you," she says, and looks at Lena, who gazes back at her and replies, "That means everything to me." There's a beat in which they continue to stare at each other, and Lena continues: "Bianca, you know I told you once, you can tell me anything, anything in the world, no matter what. You know that's still true." "No, I don't think I do know that," Binks replies reluctantly. "Why not?" says the Fox. Binks tries to respond, but all she gets out is "because..." before stopping. "What is it, Bianca, what do you have to tell me?" Lena wonders. Nice touch by Olga, acting concerned but not desperate or insistent. We get a big, moony close-up on Bianca's face, searching Lena's.

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Screen grabs courtesy of Olga Online. © 2000-2003 (texts) are with the author. If not otherwise stated, the author is Ivanova. All rights reserved.