Page 59 of The Backtrack
“Sam!” Pearl’s accusatory voice hit her.
Sam looked up from the refrigerator. She was removing ingredients that would sour if the power went out in the storm—boneless chicken breast, yogurt, heavy whipping cream. She wasn’t a great cook, but she’d picked up a few tips from her Parisian neighbors. She might as welltryto make them dinner with what they had.
Not that Sam was even hungry. But she had to do something to stop her thoughts from spinning about Damon.
“Yes?” Sam asked back.
Pearl was on the couch, but she’d partially turned to glare at Sam. “I told you not to mess with my fridge. If you keep the door shut, the cold will stay in and keep everything safe.”
“Just let me help,” Sam said, but started putting the ingredients back into the fridge. She knew Pearl well enough to understand she wouldn’t win this fight.
Pearl winced as she shuffled over to the kitchen. Her grandma’s wrist was broken, but the injury seemed to have affected her whole body. She was slower. More pained. The full eighty years actually showing. Though maybe the injury wasn’t to blame. Maybe she’d been this way for some time, and Sam was now around to actually notice all the physical changes.
“So, how was it?” Pearl asked.
“The fridge?” Sam played as if she didn’t know Pearl’s implication.
“Like I said, you woke me from my nap.” Pearl yawned, as if to prove the point. “I think you can cut the horse shit.”
“Grandma...” Sam hid her eyes behind her hands.
“It isfinethat you have sex, Sam.Morethan fine. But next time, maybe turn on some music so you don’t wake your grandmother up?” Pearl cocked her head, waiting for acknowledgment.
Sam was about to try her best to evaporate into the tile floor when a loud knock sounded at the door.
“Oh, perfect timing.” Pearl patted Sam’s back. “Go on, get that for your poor grandma.”
The wind had kicked up significantly, and the storm pummeled the house with rain. “Who did you invite over?” Sam asked as she flung the door open.
It was Jessie, in a neon orange rain slicker, carrying a slow cooker and a plastic grocery bag. Of course she’d come—the Thelma to Pearl’s Louise. Jessie shook her shoulders out as the door closed behind her.
“Hurricane parties are the best!” Jessie exclaimed as she set the slow cooker down on the kitchen counter.
Sam forced herself to smile, some of the pilot customer service mentality kicking in. Hurricane partieswerethe best. A time when there was nothing to do while you waited out a storm, so you invited friends and family over. There was usually food, drinking and games. But Sam’s emotions were still tied up in the what-if of Damon, so getting excited for a party was proving hard.
Still, she was a little curious. “What’s in the slow cooker?” Sam asked.
Jessie brightened. “Hurricane punch.”
The punch, as it turned out, was mostly rum with a lot of fresh citrus juice from Jessie’s trees. “I make a big bowl every time there’s a hurricane, just in case the wind takes the damn orange trees.”
Jessie ladled a big cup of punch and handed it to Sam. When Sam took a sip, her mouth burned from the syrupy sweet taste of rum, oranges and...something sharp. She winced as she swallowed.
“That’s the hot sauce,” Jessie said knowingly. “I’m experimenting with a few dashes in the punch. What do you think?”
“She’s always doing this,” Pearl said, putting her own cup down. “Ruining a perfectly good drink with some absurd ingredient.”
Once the mixture made its way down, Sam discovered she was both instantly buzzed and suffering from heartburn. Still, she took another sip. “I don’t know why I like this,” Sam said. “But I really do.”
She liked it because it was taking her mind off Damon and how much they still had to talk about.
“Drink up,” Pearl instructed. “And then you’re going to tell us about what’s going on with you and Damon.”
“Sounds like draaa-MUH.” Jessie took a sip of punch, then stuck her tongue out dramatically. “Oh, Mylanta, that’s awful.” She reached into the grocery bag and pulled out a twelve-pack of mango White Claw. “Good thing I brought backup.”
Two White Claw drinks later, Sam found herself on the couch sandwiched between two overeager octogenarians.
“Your grandma has thrown some truly wild hurricane parties.” Jessie crossed one leg over the other, sitting primly and in stark contrast to the sentence she’d just uttered. “Remember the time that Wild Boar Willie brought a keg?”
