The Open Road

by Quinn Loftis

  “Tran not yelling,” countered the coffee shop owner. “Tran no like repeating himself. Tran speak so people hear. You white girls all mumble. No one understand you. Speak up, speak up!”

  “Once again, racist.”

  “Tran not racist,” said the shop owner. “You white, you mumble. I just put two and two together.”

  “Whatever,” Sam replied.

  “Now, what so important you on the phone during working hours?”

  “Uh, how about you mind your own business?”

  “It happen in my shop, it my business. Now, you tell Tran what so important.”

  Samantha saw the couple in the dining room openly watching her and Tran now. They were clearly quite entertained. Samantha ignored them. “Fine, what do I care?” she said. “It’s a video my friend sent me. Some guy is taking a trip around the country to honor his dead wife and children, or so he claims. I think it’s bogus, personally.”

  “Bogus? What you mean, bogus?”

  “Well, this guy is probably just selling something or trying to get internet famous. You know how people are nowadays, trying to get their fifteen minutes of fame.”

  “You let Tran see. Tran is good judge of character.”

  Samantha punched the play button on her screen and handed the phone to Tran. She walked away and returned to cleaning the tabletops, having no desire to watch the video a second time. After a few minutes, she heard the video stop. Despite herself, she couldn’t help but look up to Tran to see his reaction. Tears filled the man’s eyes.

  “Are you kidding me?” she asked. “You too? You’ve got to be joking right now.”

  “Tran never joke,” he said harshly.

  “I don’t doubt that,” Samantha said. “But you really think this guy is for real?” Samantha saw the man and woman sitting at the table pull out their phones and start punching the screens.

  “Of course he real. You see how much he love dog. He good person, beautiful spirit.”

  “How much he loves the dog? What are you talking about? I thought you hated dogs.”

  “Tran love dog. Tran hate dog in store. People eat here. No dog allowed. Dog hair in Caesar wrap no good. Tran have three dog at home. Dog stay there. No come to store.”

  Samantha raised her eyebrows. Sound logic.

  “Well, I think the guy is full of it,” she said.

  “He no full of it. You full of it. He has good heart. You have heart like marble statute.” Tran turned to the couple sitting close by. “She have heart like statute,” he said to them as an aside. With that, Tran handed Sam back her phone and returned to the kitchen.

  Samantha mumbled to herself as she wiped down the tables. “I don’t have a heart of stone. You have a heart of stone, you crazy old bastard.” The young couple couldn’t contain their laughter.

  “Tran hear that,” he yelled from the kitchen. “Tran have excellent hearing. Tran no crazy bastard. You crazy bastard.”

  Samantha just shook her head and wiped her tables. The shop got busy around lunchtime but tapered off again mid-afternoon. Casey, the other weekend employee, came in for her shift at 2:00 p.m. She and Sam exchanged a few pleasantries, but nothing beyond small talk.

  Shortly before Sam’s shift ended, Jessica and Charity walked in. The two women looked like they should be sauntering down a runway instead of casually walking into a small-town coffee shop. Jessica’s ebony skin and almond eyes put Sam in the mind of a Nubian princess. Charity, with her bleach blonde hair and blue eyes, looked every bit the bubbleheaded Valley girl, but nothing could be further from the truth. She was shrewd as a serpent and didn’t mind mixing it up with anyone. They were both dressed for a night on the town.

  “Wow,” said Samantha, her face brightening at seeing her two friends. “Is there a magazine doing a photoshoot close by? Two of their models have apparently escaped.”

  “Well, we do try,” said Charity as she mimed brushing invisible lint from her shoulder.

  “And here I am covered in coffee stains and ranch dressing,” said Samantha, feeling terribly inadequate next to the two taller, thinner women.

  Charity put her arm around Samantha’s shoulder. “You make coffee stains look like a million bucks.”

  “Whatever,” said Sam.

  “No, she’s serious,” offered Jessica. “You’re gorgeous. I mean it. I wouldn’t say it if it wasn’t true.”

  “How’s your day been?” Charity asked.

  Samantha’s face scrunched up in disgust. “My stalker showed up and informed me we have a long, happy future in store for us, after I told him in no uncertain terms that we would never be together.”

  “You need to report his ass to the cops,” Charity said. “The creepiness is escalating. That’s what happens right before he kidnaps you and makes a necklace out of your toes.”

  “Okay, thanks for that. You aren’t creeping me out at all,” Samantha said. “I don’t know if he’s dangerous. But he’s persistent, I’ll give him that. If he shows up at my apartment, I’ll call the police, I promise.”

  “Said every abducted female ever,” Charity added.

  “Anyway,” said Samantha, ignoring the sarcastic remark, “where are you two off to?”

  “No, it’s where are we three off to, and the answer is Club Sprocket, as soon as you go home and get cleaned up. Not saying the coffee stains don’t look great on you, but they may not be the best thing for attracting a member of the opposite sex.”

  “I’m not trying to attract a member of the opposite sex,” said Samantha. “Weren’t we just talking about a member of the opposite sex wearing my toes as a necklace? Why would I want another one of those?”

  “First, the ones we are going to attract aren’t the kind that chop off your toes,” Charity said.

  “Guys, could we lay off the toe chopping talk?” Jessica asked, cringing.

  “And second,” Charity continued, ignoring Jessica’s question, “that is exactly your problem. You need to be on the lookout for a non-toe chopping man and realize there are good men out there. It’s past time.”

  “Not interested,” Sam said. “I’m fine on my own. Other than my stalker, I’m in a good place right now.” The words fell as flat as a corn tortilla as soon as they left her mouth.

  “She no fine,” Tran yelled from the kitchen. “She terrible. She need man. She pathetic, like old washer woman.”

  “He’s not wrong,” said Charity smiling.

  “He is wrong,” argued Samantha. “Everything is going my way right now.”

  “Uh-huh, so when you get off work you’re not going to go straight home to your tiny apartment, order a pizza, binge watch some reality TV shows, drink a bottle of wine alone, and hope your toe chopping stalker doesn’t show up?”

  Dammit. Charity knew her entirely too well. “No,” Samantha replied. “I will not be alone. I’ve recently purchased a new pet, a beta fish, and his name is Fred, and he can’t be left alone for very long or he gets moody. So there.”

  “Fish suck!” came Tran’s booming voice again. “His name suck, too. Fred. Who name a fish Fred?”

  “Shut up, Tran!” Samantha yelled. The truth was, she didn’t have a fish. It was the only thing she could think of on short notice. She was barely keeping herself alive, so she certainly couldn’t be in charge of another living creature, even a fish.

  Jessica leaned against the counter. “Girl, you’ve been busting your ass working two jobs for far too long. It’s time you had a break. Come out with us tonight. Nothing crazy. Drinks, dancing, and unlimited appetizers. It’s exactly what you need. No men allowed, if that will make you feel better. We’ll shoot them all down. Girls only.”

  “Not that I’ll be attracting much attention from the opposite sex anyway,” said Sam.

  “You would with a couple of excellent wing women like us,” said Charity, motioning back and forth between she and Jessica.

  “Yeah, right,” said Sam. “I’d be like a caterpillar in the middle of a couple of butterflie
s.”

  “Uh, hello…” said Charity, “Who snagged Jeremy Johnson right out from under my nose in our junior year? I caught you two snogging under the bleachers. You knew I liked him.”

  “Only because I happened to catch him in a vulnerable spot after Whitney Peeler dumped him. If he knew you liked him, he would have run right past me to get to you.”

  “No, not true. I knew when I’d been bested. Sometimes, you just have to tip your cap to the better woman.”

  “Yeah, yeah, you all beautiful.” Tran came bustling out of the kitchen. “You all bunch of flowers. Now you get out. Tran can take no more. Samantha, you leave early today. You go have fun. You like a sad donkey, scare away all Tran’s customers with your mopey-ness. This coffee shop, not suicide counseling center.”

  “Can’t argue with that,” said Jessica.

  Samantha shrugged, resigned to her fate.

  “Thanks, Tran,” said Charity, planting a sloppy wet kiss on the shorter man’s cheek.

  “Yuck, white girl germs.” He moaned.

  “Try these then,” said Jessica, kissing his other cheek equally as sloppily.

  “Yuck, black girl germs.” He moaned again.

  Charity and Jessica giggled as they ushered Samantha out of the shop before she could think of any more objections.

  Chapter Three

  An hour and a half later, Samantha looked and felt like an entirely different person. She was freshly showered, shaved, tweezed, and make-upped. The mane of curly brunette hair that framed her heart-shaped face was washed, blow-dried, scrunched with gel to tame her natural curls, and teased back into a stylish mess. She lifted it up on top of her head and stared into the mirror. She turned to her left and then her right, scrutinizing it. Then she dropped it back down and repeated her survey once again. “Down, I guess. Who cares?” she muttered.

  Charity was in Samantha’s closet, removing articles of clothing one by one loudly saying “Nope, nope, nope,” as she examined each garment before promptly dropping them into a pile on the floor. “You have absolutely nothing decent to wear,” she yelled to Sam.

  “Tell me about it,” her friend shouted back.

  Charity poked her head out of the closet and addressed Jessica. “This closet is where fashion goes to die, Jess,” she said.

  “Tragic,” replied Jessica, who sat on the side of Sam’s bed, checking her phone for movie times.

  “I mean, seriously, it’s like a frumpy, saggy wasteland in here. How the hell did you get a stalker with a wardrobe like this?” continued Charity. “I think I finally found where my grandmother gets rid of all her clothes.” She went back to work. More and more garments could be heard being flung onto the ground. “Ah ha,” she said finally, pulling out a low-cut red blouse and marching out of the closet. She held it up for Sam’s approval.

  “No way,” said Samantha. “That’s way too low cut. I can’t wear that.”

  “Hey girl, if you got the goods, you might as well flaunt them,” said Jessica, not bothering to look up from her phone.

  “If you weren’t going to wear it, then why did you buy it in the first place?” asked Charity.

  “Derek made me buy it. He always hated my clothes. He said I dressed like an old lady.”

  “The guy is a prick … but I think I might have to agree with him on that subject,” said Charity, wrinkling up her nose.

  “By the way, couldn’t you have hung those back up?” asked Sam, indicating the pile of discarded garments now resting on the floor of her closet.

  “Oh, no, dear. I cannot allow those to be hung back up. I am making a donation pile. You should never wear any of those clothes ever again.”

  “You can’t give those to charity,” said Jessica, stowing her phone and turning to face the other two girls.

  “Exactly,” said Sam. “I can’t throw out all my clothes. There’s some perfectly good stuff in there.”

  “Oh, no,” said Jessica, “Not that. I just meant it would be cruel to donate those clothes to anyone. They aren’t fit for human consumption. Haven’t those poor people suffered enough? Even the homeless have some dignity. This would just be insulting them.”

  “Ha-ha,” mocked Sam. “Anyway, besides being ridiculously slutty, I don’t want to wear anything that reminds me of Derek.”

  “No, no, no,” said Charity grabbing Samantha’s arm. “This is perfect. Poetic justice. Imagine dancing with a hot guy in the shirt Derek made you buy.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “Hey,” her blonde friend continued, “that guy deserves to have his balls cut off and fed to piranhas. We can’t do that, unfortunately. But this”— she held up the red shirt—“is a start.” A sly grin came over her face. “Stick it to his sorry ass.”

  “Fine,” said Sam, finally cracking a smile and snatching the blouse out of the girl’s hand.

  “Yes!” said Charity pumping her fist. Jessica squealed and clapped.

  Samantha replaced her T-shirt with the blouse and stood in front of the mirror. Whistles and catcalls came from the other two girls.

  “It’s too much, isn’t it?” asked Sam.

  “It is exactly enough,” said Jessica, joining her at the mirror. “You are smokin’.”

  “Yeah,” agreed Charity. “Covering a body like that is like putting a curtain over the Mona Lisa.”

  “Or filling the ocean with concrete,” offered Jessica.

  “Or plugging your ears when Adele starts singing,” said Charity.

  “Or turning your back on the Grand Canyon,” continued Steph.

  “Or covering your eyes when Chris Pratt takes his shirt off.”

  “Enough,” shouted Samantha. “Let’s just go.”

  “That’s what I’m talking about,” said Charity. “Now, the night goes like this: movie, drinks, dinner, then dancing until Samantha goes home with a stranger.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” said Sam. “Have you forgotten about Henry Hyena already?”

  Charity shrugged and held up her palms. “Maybe he’s a tiger in the sack.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” offered Jessica, but whatever happens, we won’t be doing it sober. It’s ride-share all night, and the car is waiting outside,” she said, holding up her phone in one hand and a small bottle of peach vodka in the other. “Now, Transformers, roll out!”

  Chapter Four

  Two hours later, the girls sat around the table at their favorite restaurant discussing nothing in particular while they waited on their margaritas and queso to arrive. The romantic comedy they’d just watched was mindless, but it seemed to be what Samantha had needed to lighten her mood.

  The waiter arrived and placed a drink in front of each of them and a basket of chips in the middle of the table. He looked to be about their age or maybe a bit younger. Sam knew he must be at least twenty-one, as he was allowed to bring their drinks to the table.

  “Here you are, ladies. Enjoy,” he said before pulling out a pad to take their orders.

  “Hey,” said Charity to the waiter abruptly. “Which one of us do you think is the hottest?”

  The guy chuckled. “Do I look like an idiot to you? I’m not answering that.”

  “Oh, c’mon,” said Jessica, who was sitting next to Samantha in the booth. “You’re not going to hurt our feelings.” She put her arm around Sam and pulled her in close, pressing their cheeks together. She motioned between the two of them and then pointed to Charity. “Who’s hottest?”

  “I am not answering that,” he said firmly.

  “You tell us right now or no tip,” demanded Charity.

  The waiter let out an exaggerated sigh. “Well … I like big hair, so” He shrugged and gestured in Sam’s direction before letting his words trail off.

  “Ha,” said Charity slapping the table. “I knew it! Double tip for you, my good man. That was exactly the correct answer. Now run along. We’re not ready to order yet.” She made a shooing motion with her hand, waving him away.

  The server just
shook his head and walked off.

  “What did we tell you?” said Jessica, releasing Sam from their face hug.

  “Okay, you’ve proved your point. I’m not hideous. But that doesn’t matter. I’m just not ready to get back out there yet.”

  “It’s been almost a year,” growled Charity.

  “No, it’s only been seven months,” countered Samantha.

  “Seven months since he ran off and left you high and dry, or seven months since you found out he was cheating on you? Because I seem to remember that happening a loooong time ago.”

  “Oh, she went there,” said Jessica.

  “Well, seven months since he left,” Sam replied weakly.

  “Good riddance,” said Charity. “I know it hurt, but that’s the best thing that ever happened to you. It’s a good thing, too, because if he’d have hung around any longer, you might have lost your best friend over it.”

  “You’d really stop being my friend?” asked Sam, the disbelief coming through in her voice.

  “No, but you’d have had to come visit me in prison because I would have killed his ass. Imagine how much of a pain that would have been for you once a month.”

  “When are you going to tell me about this Derek loser anyway?” asked Jessica. “I know we haven’t been friends long, but you can talk to me if you want. The way Charity makes it sound, this fool must have done you real dirty. You’ve gotta tell me about it. Maybe I’ll help Charity take him out for you.”

  Samantha picked up her margarita and turned the bottom toward the ceiling. She squinted as she forced down the last drop. “Well, I guess I’ve had enough of these to tell the story. But I’ve got to warn you, it’s not pretty. I may have done some seriously stupid stuff.”

  “Don’t worry, we’ve all been there,” encouraged Jessica.

  “Alright, Jess, here goes. Honestly, it’s embarrassing. Maybe that’s why I haven’t wanted to date, because I’m afraid of my own judgment.”

  Samantha paused for a moment. The statement came to her as sort of a revelation, something she’d known unconsciously, but never voiced.