I stare at her lounge pants. They are smeared with the chip crumbs she’s just eaten (but at least she ate!). She hasn’t changed in a few days and I’m afraid that if another day goes by a funky smell will follow her whenever she leaves a room.
But right now I’m down to the wire. I have five minutes to get out of the house.
“I’m not going with you, Selah,” she replies, not bothering to look away from the TV.
“Yes you are,” I insist.
“I’ve gone with you to your little interview. We’ve gone grocery shopping together. Not to mention the four or five times that you’ve had to get gas.”
I rub my temples. “Four times.”
“Four it is,” she continues. “Either way. I would’ve been perfectly fine at home. But did you listen to me? No. Well, I’m putting my foot down, Selah Kerrington. I’m your Mother, and I’m staying home.”
Did you see it? You have to look really closely, but the roles finally, and ever so slowly, were put back in their correct place.
I sigh, like a person who’s been wearing shoes that are one size too small and finally steps out of them.
“Are you going to be okay?”
“I. Am. Fine,” Mom says slowly. Her eyes never stray from mine and for a second I really believe that she’s going to be fine. I see pieces of the old Susie bubbling to the surface.
I push back slowly, feeling myself relent. I sigh loudly. “Thirty minutes. Tops. And then I’ll be right back home.”
Mom quirks a brow. A gesture that says, Well? What are you waiting for?
“I’ll be right back. Okay?”
“Okay, honey.” Her attention is already back on the screen.
“Do you want anything to eat?”
“No. I had a big lunch.”
Since when did a big lunch translate into a handful of Cheetos? I walk toward the front door and snag my coat. I grab the doorknob but at the last second remember that I don’t have my purse. I quickly backtrack.
“What are you going to do anyway?” she calls out.
“I’m going to have a quick bite to eat with Sam,” I reply as I grab my purse lying on the couch.
“Oh, Sammy,” Mom’s eyes well up with tears. “I miss her.”
Sammy.
Who doesn’t miss Sammy?
Samantha Gulick.
Sammy.
Or Sam.
She’ll answer to each variation of her name, but I always called her Sam. It’s an intimacy reserved for only close friends and family. And me.
Judging from Mom’s teary reaction when I announced where I was going I’m genuinely surprised that she didn’t change her mind and jump at the chance to go with me. Nonetheless, she stayed home and I left for the lunch date that I’ve had planned with Sam for the past week.
We decided to me at La Gondola on Water Street. At one o’clock sharp. Not a minute late. God forbid Sam would have to wait. I can see her now, impatiently tapping one heel-clad foot against the floor while she glances at her watch for the umpteenth time.
She’s the only person I know who has a watch and actively uses it. Better yet, she’s the only person I know who sets her watch ten minutes ahead and the clock in her car five minutes ahead. The reason? She always wants to be prepared. Prepared to be the first at work. Prepared for when traffic hits. Prepared for anything that comes her way.
I always try, or like to be prepared, yet I always end up being the last person out the door. The last person to arrive at a party or lunch.
Today, I’m bound and determined to be on time. More to prove Sam wrong than anything else. Surprisingly, traffic was on my side so I made it across town within ten minutes. My personal best.
Even though lunch breaks are coming to an end, the parking lot is still fairly busy. It’s hard to say if Sam is already here because she’s probably driving a rental. Still, I hurry out of my car and toward the restaurant, taking the chance of slipping on a patch of black ice and busting my ass.
It’d be so nice to be the one sitting down at the table first and looking impatient. I can imagine myself, drumming my fingernails against the table, irritably glancing at my phone every so often. And then Sam would walk in and I’d give her a look of pure disappointment before I say, “Well, well, well. Look who’s late.”
It’s a pretty image but complete bullshit because the minute I walk through the door I see Sam sitting in a booth in the corner to my right, doing all the things I dreamed of doing. “Holy shit. You’re actually on time,” she says.
As I make my way toward her, she slides out of the booth seat, leaving behind her grey, lambskin Chloé bag so she can hug me tightly.
She’s been my best friend for, well… forever. Mom used to joke that I didn’t have one childhood memory that didn’t involve Sam. ‘You two are attached at the hip!’ she’d shout to my retreating back as I ran out the front door, trying to catch up to Sam.
“I can’t believe you’re actually on time,” she repeats, as she pulls away.
“I can go outside and stand there for five minutes if you’d like,” I tease.
She just rolls her eyes and sits back down. “Let’s not ruin this perfect time, shall we?”
Before I take off my jacket, I give Sam a speculative glance, trying to figure out what brought on this impromptu visit of hers. For most, a scheduled trip isn’t considered impromptu. But this is Sam. She has a quota for the amount of times she will visit Decatur and that’s twice a year: Christmas and sometime in May. But that was only because we both shared the same birthday month. Hers is the twenty-fifth. Mine is the twenty-first.
A visit so early on in the year? That’s virtually unheard of.
She’s dressed sharp. A black tweed blazer paired with skinny jeans. A tan Burberry trench is dropped over the back of the seat. Right now, she sticks out like a sore thumb. She belongs in some upscale restaurant, but everyone in Decatur and within a fifty-mile radius knows that La Gondola has the best sub sandwiches. Their bread is to die for. In fact, it was Sam who chose this place to meet up.
“Let me clean this table off for you,” a young girl says. She apologizes as she wipes down the table. But she only speaks to Sam. I want to wave my hands in front of her face and say, Yoo-hoo! You can see me, right?
Instead, I stay quiet and let Sam work her magic. “It’s completely all right,” she tells the young girl.
I’ve always said that Sam has this eerily good ability to portray one thing to the world while being someone completely different. She’s small and compact, which instinctively makes people think she needs their help. She has inviting eyes, but that’s only so she can draw you in and figure you out.
Essentially she’s the exact opposite of me.
Case in point: all throughout our school years, she could look a person up and down, only say a few words to them and have them completely pegged. Most people would call that judgmental. I thought it astute because she wasn’t trying to be critical. She just wanted to protect herself and the people she loved most from ever getting hurt.
She uses that same approach in her job.
I wouldn’t survive a day doing her job. We both knew that. “You’re too sweet, Selah,” she once said. “If you had to fire someone, you’d probably have a nervous breakdown and offer them your job.”
Kidding or not she was spot on.
“I see nothing in this town has changed,” she murmurs as she glances out the window with a critical eye.
She’s not the type of person to leave home and think back on her past with nostalgia. The minute she could leave Decatur, she did. The irony is that she didn’t stray too far, opting to go to U of I in Urbana- Champaign while I went to K-State in Manhattan, Kansas. But she had tentatively dipped her toes in the waters outside of her hometown, and each year away she became bolder and bolder until, when her college graduation rolled around, she took a few steps back and cannonballed into the water.
She moved to Chicago. (Which, in my opinion, still wasn’t terri
bly far.) Got a job at Bank of America. Married a man named Jason. Climbed the ranks until she had a comfortable job as Vice President of lending. She’s living a pretty comfortable life.
When her ten-year high school reunion rolled around and she was sent her invite she told me she’d rather have a lobotomy than go. But what she doesn’t realize is that this place will always be the key to her childhood memories. It holds all the laughter and tears. It holds all the conversations we could never have with our parents. It holds arguments with friends. Tailgaiting at football games. Summer nights with the top down, holding our palm out, letting the wind thread through our splayed fingers.
She might love to hate this place but she can’t escape it. We can’t escape it. There will always be an invisible thread connecting us to this mid-western city.
Sam insists on ordering for the both of us. That’s another hidden part of her personality, her willingness to give. She hides it so fucking well. You’d never know that she was always volunteering to pick up the tab. She never misses my birthday or Christmas gift while I’m the one always scrambling to pick out something for her at the last minute.
“So.” She gently yet firmly taps both hands on the table like she’s getting ready to start a meeting. “How are things?”
I mimic her actions. “Good. How are things with you?”
“I’m being serious, Selah.”
I lean back in the booth. “So am I.”
“I genuinely want to know how you are.”
“And you came all the way from Chicago to ask me that? You could’ve done that on the phone.”
“I could’ve,” she admits. “But you’ve been acting weird so I thought it was time I came for a visit.”
“To the one place you hate,” I say deadpan.
Everything she’s saying just isn’t adding up for me. There has to be a bigger reason as to why she’s here.
“Some welcoming this is,” she murmurs.
“I don’t mean to be a bitch,” I speak up quickly. “I’m just familiar with your visiting schedule and now is not that time.”
Sam shrugs. She opens her mouth, but our order is called. Sam jumps out of her seat and hurries to the front of the restaurant. Seconds later she’s back and hands me my plate. She leans over her plate and dramatically sniffs her food before she groans loudly.
For a few minutes we are silent, the two of us scarfing down our lunch. After half her sub is gone, she takes a long drink and rubs her hands on her napkin.
“I just started the Paleo diet but that little cheat was so worth it,” she confesses. “All right. Back to what I was saying—you’re concerning me and that’s why I came for a visit.”
“How am I worrying you?” I ask through a mouthful of food.
“You just sound stressed and distracted on the phone.”
“Well, I am distracted,” I admit. “From my job search to dealing with my mom… it’s all been hard to juggle.”
Sam’s brows pucker as she stares at the table, deep in thought. “And you never heard from the Credit Union?”
“Nope. I’m assuming they either found someone else for the job or they’re really playing hard to get,” I tease, but my joke goes right over her head.
“That’s just strange. They should’ve loved you!” she says.
It was Sam who got me the interview at the Credit Union. She knew a friend who knew a friend who worked there. That person said there was a job opening. That information all trickled down to me and I quickly put in an application.
I shrug helplessly. “Everything went good. At least I thought so.”
“Hmm.”
“Hmm, what?”
“Nothing. Just strange is all. So have there been any job offers?”
“No. Not even substitute teaching jobs.”
Sam takes another bite out of her sandwich. “Give it time. The flu season is upon us. I’m sure you’ll get some substitute jobs soon.”
“Substituting is not bad, but I need something more steady. The bills keep piling up.”
Instantly, Sam pounces on my words. “Do you need me to help you with anything?”
Sam considers working on her checkbook, counting out money, doing taxes and spread sheets fun. Any time she can work on her (or someone else’s) finances she jumps at the chance. When tax season rolls around I never have to ask her twice if she’ll do mine. In fact, she treats the task like it’s a gift from me to her.
Yet this time I’m a little more reluctant to take her up on her offer. Things are exponentially worse than they’ve ever been. I’m afraid she’d go through everything and tell me I was royally fucked and I have enough stress to contend with. So I intend to pretend, just for a bit, that things aren’t that bad.
“No. I’m good,” I say.
Sam squints at me. “Are you sure?”
“Absolutely.” I give her a strained smile, which makes her squint even harder at me.
Finally, she gives up on trying to figure out what’s wrong and finishes off her sandwich at the same time I do. Before she can put our empty plates on the tray, the young girl comes back. “Ma’am, you want me to take this for you?”
Like before, she only looks directly at Sam.
“Yes, that’d be great,” Sam replies.
The girl takes her tray, leaving my empty plate behind.
I stare dumbfounded at it before looking at Sam. I wave my hands over my face. “You can see me right? I’m not a ghost, right?”
Sam laughs. It’s an odd sound, probably because she hardly ever laughs. “Yes, I can see you.”
“Well, tell it to that girl,” I say, who is now back behind the counter happily taking someone else’s order.
“Ah, don’t worry about it. So,” Sam prompts. “What’s new with you?”
I’ve told no one I’ve been talking to Jackson. At first, I wanted to keep it quiet, just in case things went awry. But now I feel ready to talk about him. Every time I’ve talked to Sam on the phone, I’ve had to force myself not to say anything about him. Plus, I needed time to build up immunity against what her or any other person might say about the fact that I’d met him online.
But right now, Sam’s here. What better time than the here and now?
Pushing aside my plate I lean in. Sam leans in, too.
“I’ve met someone,” I confess.
She leans back and crosses her arms over her chest. “Ah-ha.” Sam smiles with understanding. “So that’s why you’ve been so distracted.”
“That’s why,” I agree.
“Well. What are you waiting for? Tell me everything about him!”
My fingers curl around my drink, as if it’s a protective barrier. “He’s thirty-one. Loves to read and write like me.” A broad, yet dreamy smile sweeps over my face and I can’t do anything to stop it. “Sam, it’s so easy to talk to him. I spend hours on the phone, just talking about everything and nothing all at the same time,” I confess.
Sam whistles. “Wow. Sounds intense.”
I nod rapidly. “It is. And it should be scary how quickly everything is going, but it’s not. With all the bullshit I’m dealing with right now, I need this.”
“That’s great. Who is he? What’s his name? Where did you meet him?” She stops the game of twenty questions to lean in. Her eyes twinkle mischievously. “I need every single detail.”
I shift in my seat and take a deep breath. “His name is Jackson and I met him online.” And just like that the happy, interested Sam disappears. She looks at me with a mixture of sympathy and sadness, as though I’m a child.
“I know what you’re going to say,” I rush. “It’s dangerous. It’s impossible to fall for someone so quickly. Blah, blah, blah. But it’s happening.”
Sam doesn’t say anything and the silence is driving me crazy.
“What are you thinking?” I press.
“I’m thinking,” she starts out slowly. “That this isn’t a good idea.”
“But it is,” I say. “I enjoy talking to h
im.”
“Is that what this is about? Talking to someone?” she prods. “You can pick up this magical thing called a cell phone and talk to me until you’re blue in the face.”
“I’m being serious.”
“So am I.”
The napkin that was on my lap just a minute ago is now wadded up into a ball, resting in one clinched fist. “You’re being dramatic, Sam. I’m not eloping with the guy or anything crazy. We have a lot of things in common.”
Sam takes a long sip of her drink before she sits back in her seat. “Like?” her voice is terse.
“I already told you. He’s a writer and loves to read.”
Sam knows about my pipe dream of being a published author. In fact, she was the first person I expressed my interest in writing to. She was immediately supportive. Always listened to my ideas and never turned down a chance to read chapters of my manuscript. Didn’t matter if it was the first, third or fifth draft, she always offered her thoughts.
The problem was that she was biased. We were too close for her to blurt out her honest thoughts.
With Jackson there’s a different bond. One that we both understood hinged upon the worlds that we created and the words that described them. It didn’t matter how close I was to Sam; she would never comprehend this other, more secretive part of me.
We sit in silence. Alternative rock music plays lightly from the speakers above us. To our right two women bustle in, trying to figure out how many tables they need to move together for their co-worker’s baby shower. I’m shamelessly eavesdropping on their conversation, but I don’t care. Sam’s unnaturally quiet and I’m starting to feel really weird.
“Nothing good can come out of an Internet relationship,” she states.
“That’s not true. What about that girl from high school? What’s her name?”
“Stephanie?” Sam provides.
I snap my finger and point at her. “Yes, Stephanie! Remember how she started talking to a solider that was stationed overseas? Two weeks after we graduated she went off and married him.”
Sam frowns. “Where are you going with this?”
“Well, you were so convinced that the marriage would fail within a year and she’d be living with her parents. You even bet me fifty dollars.”