The Open Road

by Quinn Loftis

  As she and Jason had walked to her hotel room, Samantha had guessed at what Jason might say when he dropped her off. She’d anticipated he might again reiterate that they were simply two friends having a good time and they should keep it that way. And he’d said exactly what she thought he would. But she hadn’t expected him to be so matter-of-fact about it. The logical part of her knew he was right. So, why did she feel so sad?

  Had she been secretly hoping for something else? Anything else would have been ridiculous. She knew it was foolish to imagine more with Jason than just friendship, long-distance friendship at that. But now, after spending a few days with Jason, it was impossible for Sam to ignore the fact she liked him, really liked him. Samantha hated the idea of falling for anyone at this time in her life, much less someone she knew she couldn’t have. But, all of a sudden, Sam knew she had indeed fallen, as surely as if she’d been pitched over the guardrail back at the Hoover Dam. She was plummeting headlong to certain heartache, and there was nothing she could do to break her fall.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Well, I’m not waiting any longer,” Charity said, waving the waitress over. It was 10:30 a.m. and they had only a few hours left until their flight home. Jason was supposed to meet them at 10:00 for breakfast but was nowhere to be found. Charity had texted him twice, but he hadn’t responded.

  “He doesn’t seem the type to be late,” said Jessica.

  “What did you do to him last night, Sam?” Charity asked coyly. “You must have worn him out.”

  “Nothing. I already told you everything we did. It was completely, one hundred percent innocent. We went to the Hoover Dam, we came back, we ate dinner, we saw the circus acrobat, flippy-floppy show, and he walked me back to our hotel room. You two girls were both snoring like lumberjacks when I came in.”

  “Uh-huh,” said the blonde. “Are you sure there wasn’t any smoochie, smoochie when he dropped you off?”

  “I didn’t say that,” said Sam, feigning nonchalance.

  “What?” Charity and Jessica said at the same time, their eyes wide.

  “He kissed me on the cheek, just here,” Sam said, pointing to her left cheek.

  “Psh, the cheek? You had me excited there for a second,” said Charity.

  “Ha, the look on your faces,” said Samantha. “You two are pathetic.”

  “Maybe he went out after he left you,” said Jessica. “Perhaps he overdid it again.”

  “No, he wouldn’t do that,” said Sam.

  “That son of a bitch,” said Charity. “He’s not coming.”

  “What?” asked Samantha quickly. “What are you talking about?”

  “He just texted me,” replied Charity. “He says to check my email.” She tapped her phone a couple of times until she saw an email from Jason and opened it. “I see why he didn’t just text,” she said, turning the phone to show Sam and Jessica a wall of words. Samantha and Jessica scooted their chairs closer so they could read Jason’s email.

  * * *

  Dear Samantha, Jessica, and Charity,

  Thank you so much for an amazing weekend. I had so much fun with you ladies, and I’m glad to have met you. Over the past few days, I’ve been able to forget about Bethany and the girls, if only for a brief period of time. For that reason, however, I think it’s best I leave you early. This trip, for me, was about honoring Bethany, not forgetting her. And I have to be really honest now. The thought of forgetting her terrifies me. The way I felt when I was with you all—the happiness, the freedom—especially with you, Samantha … frankly scares the hell out of me. I haven’t felt like this in a very long time. I’m so used to being sad I don’t know how to feel happy again. For that reason, I think I need to continue on my trip and let you ladies go on back to your own lives.

  Unfortunately, there’s another uglier reason as well. I don’t know if you’ve paid attention to the comments on the last couple of videos, but they’re not pretty. I started this trip as a way to bring hope and healing to others. It seems our weekend may have done just the opposite. I never meant for that to happen. The things people have said about you are disgusting and it makes me so angry. I hate that I had to be the cause of that. You are three of the nicest women I’ve ever met, and I won’t be the cause of anyone disparaging you. For that reason, as much as any other, I think it’s time I moved along. I’m sorry. I hope to see you all again sometime, but I couldn’t guess as to when.

  * * *

  See you on the open road,

  Jason O’Neal

  * * *

  “What comments is he talking about? I didn’t know there were comments,” said Charity.

  “Me neither,” said Jessica.

  “What are people saying about us?” asked Sam. She and Jessica grabbed their own phones, and they all checked the latest video.

  “Oh my gosh,” said Charity, “listen to this. Here’s a comment from Fairylover94. She says, ‘Can you believe that tramp, Samantha? That whore is trying to steal Bethany’s man. She should be ashamed.’” Charity lowered the phone and gawked at Sam and Jess. “I can’t believe that bitch. I’m going to message her right now and give her a piece of my mind. Sam’s not trying to steal anything. This woman doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”

  “Stop,” commanded Jessica. “Don’t respond to the troll. You don’t want to get sucked down that rabbit hole. You’ll never win that battle.”

  Samantha spoke up. “Here’s another. Bokbok_85 says, ‘Three Virginia sluts taking advantage of a man while he grieves. SHAMEFUL!!!!!!!’”

  “Think she used enough exclamation marks? I don’t think we got the message,” said Charity.

  “Here’s another one,” said Jessica. “Yikes, it’s about Jason. It says, ‘This guy’s a phony. He’s using his dead wife to get into that Samantha girl’s pants. He probably wasn’t even married.”

  “Unbelievable,” said Sam. “He wasn’t trying to get into my pants!”

  “Calm down. We know,” replied Jessica.

  “Here’s one about you, Jess,” said Charity. “It says, ‘That black girl is as fine as wine. I’d like to—’ Ooh, I can’t read the rest of that.” She turned her head sideways, one eyebrow cocked to her hairline.

  “Let me see that,” said Jessica. “Ooh,” she said gasping and putting her hand over her mouth. “Hold on, I better get this dude’s username so I can message him later.”

  Charity laughed. “Here’s another one about you, Sam,” said Charity. “‘That Samantha skank can’t hold Bethany’s water. She should crawl back under the rock she came out of. If Jason hooks up with her, it’s a disgrace to Bethany’s memory.’ Ouch, that stings,” said Charity. “Most of them are from the Hoover Dam video. You guys did look very lovey, dovey when you let that flower go.”

  “It wasn’t like that.” Samantha moaned.

  “I know,” said Charity.

  “Here’s another one,” said Jessica. “‘I bet that Samantha slut isn’t even afraid of heights. She was just doing that to get close to Jason.’” Jessica looked up. “Ugh, people are brutal. I’m sorry, Sammy.”

  Samantha huffed. “No, it’s my own fault. I should have expected something like this.”

  “You couldn’t have expected this. How could you have guessed that people would be such asshats?” Charity spat.

  “No, they’re right. Jason is vulnerable. And, I’ll admit it”—she cast a glance at Charity— “there is something between us that is more than just friendship. I shouldn’t be messing around with him while he’s trying to get over his dead wife.”

  “I thought you said there wasn’t any messing around,” Charity asked.

  “Okay, maybe messing isn’t the right word. There wasn’t any messing,” said Sam, “but there was something. And it’s too soon for both of us.”

  “You didn’t do anything wrong,” said Charity crossing her arms. “Oh, this makes me so freaking mad.”

  Just then the waitress brought their food. She also produced a large gl
ass snow globe and sat it in front of Samantha. “A man brought that in earlier. He said you three would be in here and I should give it to the dark haired one.”

  “Thanks,” said Sam, picking up the snow globe. It contained a miniature relief of the Hoover Dam inside. The words ‘Hoover Dam 2018’ were etched along the bottom of the wooden base.

  Something inside of Samantha snapped. All of the feelings she’d felt last night about Jason came crashing down upon her. She knew she’d probably never see him again, at least not in person. She knew that shouldn’t bother her. But it did. She never wanted to like the guy in the first place. Now, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to get over him.

  “There might be another reason Jason didn’t show,” she said. The sadness was evident in her voice. “What day did you say Jason and his wife got married?”

  “June twentieth, 2012.” Charity gasped. “I can’t believe I forgot that. Today is his anniversary.”

  Samantha nodded solemnly. She didn’t understand why, but the knowledge that Jason was gone, somewhere out there on the open road, all alone on such a sad day, simply broke her heart.

  Charity wrapped her arm around Samantha as tears began to fall from the brunette’s eyes. “Damn you, Jason O’Neal, you loveable bastard.” She growled. “C’mon, Sam. Let’s scarf these pancakes and head to the airport. I’m ready to put Vegas in my rearview mirror.”

  * * *

  Jason gripped the wheel tightly as he drove north on Interstate 95 out of Las Vegas. He hated to leave the girls like that, especially after they’d had such a good time together, but he just couldn’t face anyone today.

  Six years. Today would have been he and Bethany’s six-year anniversary. He was extremely grateful for the distraction the three women from Virginia had provided leading up to today. He honestly didn’t know if he’d have made it through the time without them. But it had taken everything he had to put on a happy face over the past three days. He didn’t have the strength to do it anymore … not today.

  Even if he could have been around people today, some of the comments on his video blog had really gotten to him. It tore him up to think people thought of Samantha in that way. He knew they were way off base. And he knew he should just ignore the comments, and he might have been able to, if another force hadn’t also driven him away.

  Jason was scared, no terrified, of the way he felt for Samantha. He knew it was beyond foolish, but he felt he was betraying Bethany’s memory. It was silly. He and Bethany had even talked about this very thing when she’d been alive. They’d both agreed the other would move on should something happen to one of the them. They both felt they would want the other to be happy again someday. But talking about moving on and actually doing it were two entirely different things. Plus, in those hypothetical scenarios, there was one assumption, one constant, that didn’t hold true to reality—the presence of the girls. Bethany had always said she would want Jason to remarry so the girls would have a mother figure. Jason had said the same to Bethany, so the girls would have a father. Neither contemplated the nightmare scenario of the girls dying as well. That was a game changer. If Jason were to move on with his life, he wouldn’t be just betraying Bethany’s memory, he’d also be betraying his daughters. He couldn’t do that.

  Chapter Eighteen

  As the wheels of the plane touched down in Roanoke, Samantha said to Charity for the tenth time, “Don’t be mad at Jason. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “I will be mad and you should be mad too. He left you.”

  “No, he left all of us. He was supposed to meet us all for breakfast. I thought we agreed to give the man some grace on his anniversary.”

  “You know good and well he really only wanted to see you. But he got scared, like a frightened rabbit, and he turned tail and ran. And just because it’s his anniversary doesn’t excuse him. I’m sorry for what happened to Jason, I really am,” said Charity. “But that doesn’t give him an excuse to hurt my girl. He never should have agreed to this weekend if he was going to do that.”

  “That’s not fair,” said Sam.

  “It is fair,” argued Charity. “You told him about Derek, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, then. He should know how it would make you feel if he left you. He has no excuse. He is a giant, stinky, female reproductive organ, and he is uninvited to my wedding.”

  “You haven’t sent out invitations,” offered Jessica.

  “That doesn’t matter. I was going to invite him. Now I’m not.”

  “Listen,” pleaded Samantha. “He didn’t make me feel anything. I was upset when he didn’t show for breakfast, sure, but only for a minute. I’m fine now. I knew before the weekend started Jason and I had no chance. Nothing has changed. I didn’t go to Las Vegas to find a man, and I’m perfectly happy I didn’t.”

  Jessica coughed from her seat behind Samantha, and the noise sounded an awful lot like the word “bullshit” muffled by her hand. Samantha turned and glared at her as the plane taxied slowly to the terminal.

  “Whatever. Defend him if you want,” said Charity. “But if he was any sort of man, he wouldn’t have run off just because of a few lousy internet comments.”

  “This is too rich,” said Sam. “When we left I was the one calling him a phony, and you guys were defending him. Now it’s the other way around.”

  “I just call ’em like I see ’em,” said Charity. “Internet Jason is a lot better than the real thing.”

  “I thought real-life Jason was pretty great,” said Samantha.

  Charity made a gagging sound. “You’re just lucky it didn’t get any further than it did. If he runs off at the first little internet comment, he probably has no balls whatsoever to speak of. They’re probably the size of raisins. I would hate for you to have been disappointed if things got hot and heavy.”

  “Or green ball peas,” said Jessica, sticking her hand between Charity’s and Samantha’s seats and holding her thumb and forefinger about a centimeter apart.

  “Or marbles,” said Charity. “And not the big shooter ones either. The little tiny ones like in the hippo game.”

  “First of all,” said Samantha loudly, “Jason probably has a perfectly normal set of testicles, and second, you know good and well the internet comments aren’t the real reason he left.” Several surrounding passengers giggled.

  “So, why did he leave then, Sam? Tell me, why did the regular-sized-testicle-having Jason tuck his tail between his legs? Huh? Huh? Go ahead, tell me.”

  Sam knew she was trapped. “Because he was…”

  “He was what, Sam? Go on, say it. Say it.”

  “He was scared because he thought we might be getting too close, and he was probably scared he was betraying Bethany.”

  “That’s right,” gloated Charity, knowing she’d won. “And the key word in that sentence is scared. So, I don’t want to hear any more about the scared, little pussy Jason O’Neal, with his cute little RV and his sad purple flowers and his tiny marble-sized testicles. I’m done with him. If you want to watch his videos, fine. Knock yourself out. I don’t give a crap. Just don’t mention them to me.”

  “What about me?” asked Jessica poking her head up between the seats. “Can I watch the videos?”

  “I don’t know why you would,” said Charity.

  “I’ll watch them with you, Sam,” said Jessica, nodding to Samantha.

  “Well, then same goes for you, princess,” said Charity to Jessica. “I don’t want to hear about them.”

  * * *

  As they drove home from the airport, nothing was said about Jason O’Neal. When they reached Charity’s apartment, it was almost 10:00 p.m. Samantha pulled her suitcase out of Charity’s trunk, and the blonde came around the car beside her friend.

  “Look,” Charity said, “I’m sorry I was so ugly about Jason earlier. I know it must be hard for him. But I just don’t want to see you hurt again.”

  “I get it,” said Sam. “And I appreciate you looking
out for me. You’ve always looked out for me, even in high school. But I’m a big girl now. I can take care of myself.”

  “I know,” said Charity. “I’m just afraid this might be the kind of thing that will send you running back to Derek.”

  “That’s the thing,” said Samantha. “Spending this weekend with Jason has made me realize what a loser Derek actually was. Regardless of what happens in the future, there is no way on God’s green earth that I would ever get back with Derek. He could buy me flowers every day. He could beg me on his hands and knees. He could give me the Taj Mahal. I wouldn’t even listen to him. I’m done. We are through. I know that with complete certainty now.”

  “Well, then I guess Jason did his job after all.”

  “He did,” said Sam.

  “But I still think he has marble testicles.”

  Samantha just shook her head and tossed her suitcase into the back of her own dilapidated hatchback, which had spent the weekend parked at Charity’s place. “But how was the weekend otherwise?” she asked Charity. “After all, this was supposed to be your bachelorette party weekend.”

  “I have to admit,” said the blonde as Jessica retrieved her own suitcase from the car, “it was pretty damn fun.”

  “And?” asked Samantha slowly.

  “And it wouldn’t have been as fun without Jason,” she admitted.

  “Exactly,” replied Sam, beaming.

  The girls shared hugs and Samantha thanked Jessica profusely for organizing the trip, even if it was under false pretenses. Sam and Jessica got into their own vehicles and headed for home. Soon, Samantha brought her puttering hatchback into her apartment complex parking lot and parked in her empty spot. The spot next to her was reserved for the tenants directly beneath her, and she saw a new blue truck parked there. Samantha remembered the moving truck she’d seen just before she left for her trip. Apparently, the noisy couple below her had finally been kicked out, and there was already a new tenant. Samantha dragged her suitcase to the top of the stairs. When she reached the landing, Skip was in his usual spot smoking. Knowing Skips’ routine like she did, Sam knew it was probably his final cigarette of the evening before he turned in. He wore flip flops, cut-off denim shorts, a tie-dye tank top, and wire-frame reading glasses. Soaking wet, the man couldn’t weigh more than a hundred pounds.