"Double chocolate fudge ripple frozen berry blast," Sam repeated. "You got it?"
The cashier, a lanky youth with long greasy hair and skin the texture of uncooked chicken, looked from her to the refrigerated cabinet that was humming softy in the corner of the store, then back to her, then back to the cabinet, then back to her. Sam resisted the urge to lean across the counter and punch him out.
"Errrm," the cashier drawled (his name tag said "Hi, my name is Stevie. How may I help you?"). He looked at the cabinet again, and then back to her. Sam clenched her fists and began counting to ten in her head. By the time she got to three she was picturing him picking up his own teeth.
The cashier would never know the pain he avoided by speaking up at that very moment. "We've, erm, only got what's in the thing," he stuttered, gesturing to the cabinet.
"Fine. Thanks for not wasting my time," Sam snapped, aware her sarcasm went unnoticed by the cashier. As she walked out of the store it took all her resolve not to pull down the shelves. The door slammed shut behind her before the cashier could remember his employee training and ask her to "come again."
The temperature had dropped while she had been dealing with the imbecile behind the counter and she zipped up her leather jacket before climbing back on her motorbike. It had also gotten darker, and she turned on her headlamp before kick-starting the bike and pulling out into traffic.
As she drove down the street she kept one eye on the stores whizzing past while the other made sure she didn't slam into the back of a truck. This late in the evening most of the storefronts were dark, and of the those still open not one looked like it would carry what she was searching for. While overtaking an overweight family crammed into a Vista Cruiser, she wondered, not for the first time, why she was doing this. She would have dwelled on this question further, but at that moment a jerk in a Mercedes cut her off and she had to suddenly slam on her brakes.
It was while she gave the Mercedes driver a hand gesture that showed exactly what she thought of his driving that she noticed the grocery store, it's sign boasting of 24-hour service, it's windows bright. Ignoring the no parking signs she pulled her bike up to the kerb in front of the store.
She found the frozen section at the far end of a harshly lit, deserted aisle. She quickly scanned the ice cream selection, then slowly went back over them in case she had missed it. Double fudge, raspberry ripple, Cherry Garcia (she moaned inwardly), mint madness. No double chocolate fudge ripple frozen berry blast!
The little old lady behind the counter was deep in the middle of a romance book with an embarrassingly graphic front cover. Judging from the layer of dust on her pink-tinted bouffant she hadn't moved from her seat in days. Sam impatiently drummed her fingers on the counter, but the old lady seemed in no hurry, reading to the end of the page, then slowly folding down the corner with a well licked finger before looking up.
"How can I help you, sweetheart?" she asked, dust falling in little clouds from her hair.
"Is that all the ice cream you got?" Sam asked, nodding towards the back of the store.
"I think so, sweetie. What is it you're looking for?"
Sam bristled at the woman's saccharine terms of affection but managed to keep her voice in check as she replied. "Double chocolate fudge ripple frozen berry blast."
"No, I'm afraid we don't stock that. We used to, but it didn't really sell. I'm sorry," the old lady replied, then fell silent, her milky eyes staring into the distance. Sam, unsure whether the conversation was over, hovered between the counter and the door. After five minutes she stopped wondering if the conversation was going to continue and starting worrying that the little old woman had died.
Sam was just looking around for something long she could poke her with, when the old lady finally spoke. "I believe they have some at Gerry's All-Night Groceries in Greenvale though," she said with a kindly smile that scrunched up her wrinkled face until it resembled a little brown over-ripe cooking apple.
"Where the hell is Greenvale?" Sam asked, leaning eagerly across the counter.
"About forty miles up the road. Here, I'll draw you a map." Producing a pen from her top pocket the old lady sketched a crude, spidery sketch on a notepad with a shaking hand, ripped it out and handed it to Sam.
"Yeah, thanks," Sam muttered absent-mindedly as she studied the map before shoving it in her inside pocket.
"You must really love that ice-cream if you're thinking of going all the way to Greenvale at this time of night," the old lady called after her as she headed for the door.
"Never even tried it," Sam called back.
Outside Sam straddled her bike but didn't start the engine. 40 miles! If there was minimal traffic and she really pushed the bike, it would take her about an hour to get there and then the same back. If she turned around right now she could be home in fifteen minutes. It was obvious what the smart decision was. She had already gone to more effort than anyone would expect of her, especially anyone that knew her. So why was she about to make the stupid choice? With a sigh she started the bike and headed down the long road to Greenville.
The rain started almost as soon as she began her journey, a fine mist that stung her face as she whipped along, but before she had even gone five miles it was coming down so heavily that even with her headlight on full she could make out no more than ten feet of the road ahead. Before long the black asphalt was slick with water, shining in the white light of the headlight, and the bike juddered under her as the tyres spun, seeking traction. At the road's lowest points the rain quickly formed large black pools, invisible against the asphalt. Despite the treacherous conditions Sam kept pressing onwards, the odometer slowly creeping upwards, giant rooster-tails of water flying from her back tyre as she splashed through the puddles.
Sam pushed her luck for the next ten miles, but on a deserted stretch of shimmering black asphalt it ran out. She was approaching 50mph when her front wheel hit a pothole hidden beneath a pool of water, wrenching the handlebars from her grasp. No longer under her control the bike slewed across the road into the thankfully empty opposite lane. Desperately she grabbed at the handlebars and tried to wrestle the bike back onto the right side. As she steered the heavy body of the bike back into the right-hand lane, the back wheel, unable to find traction, swung across the road behind her. Now the bike was out of control. She fought against the handlebars that were trying to jerk and shake out of her grip as the bike wobbled back and forth, but despite her best efforts the back tyre was beginning to swing more and more wildly. Her fingers gripped the brakes trying to gently slow the bike, but by the time she hit the road she was still travelling at just over 15mph.
Sam landed on her side with a force that knocked the breath from her and rolled over and over until she no longer knew which way was up, each impact rattling her teeth and jarring her bones. As she was spun down the road her bike slid past her, spraying sparks and missing her head by millimetres. Finally she lay still, the falling rain beating out a rhythm on the back of her leather jacket.
Sam had no idea how long she lay there. At one point the bright white light of a passing car swept over her, but the driver didn't even slow to investigate the tiny limp body lying seemingly dead in the middle of the road. Finally Sam decided that she wasn't dead after all, and with aching arms pushed herself onto legs that threatened to give way under her. Gingerly she limped her way over to the bike which lay in the dirt by the side of the road, it's engine clicking as it cooled in the falling rain.
Getting the motorcycle upright proved difficult. It seemed much heavier than usual and every time she bent over her side throbbed so badly she had to grit her teeth to avoid screaming out in pain. Finally the bike stood on two wheels and she could inspect the damage. It appeared to mostly be superficial; the chrome along the left hand-side was scratched and pitted but the front fork was unbent and wheels still pointed straight.
It took her three attempts to straddle the bike, as each time she raised one leg the other buckled under her weight. In the end she had to perch on the seat side-saddle and swivel her body into position. The keys were still in the ignition and the engine started without complaint. She checked her mirror, gripped the handlebars, then sagged forward until her head rested on the central steering column.
What was she doing? Driving around in the dark and the rain, and for what - a carton of ice-cream that, if she was honest, sounded really gross? A carton of ice-cream that had almost gotten her killed. Why was she doing this?
It seemed like recently she had been doing a lot of things that she didn't want to. She'd had a plan. The same night Carly had left for Italy, Sam had gone home, thrown her few meagre possessions into the saddlebags of her bike, left her mom a note saying that she didn't know when she was coming back, and that was it, she was gone. The plan had been to see America. Sample clams in Boston, gumbo in Louisiana, lobsters in Maine, maybe even shoot down to Mexico for a churro. She'd wanted to see Vegas, the Grand Canyon, San Francisco...
Then she'd saved a girl from the back of a garbage truck, a crazy, ditzy girl with bright red hair, and the plan went out the window.
Next thing she knew, she had a roommate and a job babysitting a bunch of snot-nosed brats. The contents of her saddlebags were in drawers and the bike spent most of its time in the backyard.
It was almost as if the girl had a power over her. In the weeks since she'd moved in it had happened time and time again. Sam, a girl who had been happy to coast through life, always putting in slightly less effort than was needed, suddenly found herself going above and beyond for that silly red-haired girl. Not just getting the red-haired girl a souvenir from the set of her favourite sitcom but instead getting the entire set from her favourite sitcom installed in their house, not just getting the money back from those British brats that conned the red-haired girl but also making sure they returned the girl's girly pink bike. Hell, Sam had even allowed herself to be dressed up as the red-haired girl for Halloween.
What was it about this girl that made her go the extra mile? Even with Carly, her best friend since she was a child, Sam had been happy to let problems play out, only making an effort to help when there was a threat of jail time or death. There was something about this girl, though. Her innocence, her optimism, her childlike wonder; all qualities that Sam usually found grating but in this girl were strangely endearing.
It had been the same thing tonight. They had been lying on the sofa bed, which at that moment was more bed than sofa, watching a movie. It had been Sam's recommendation, a classic fifties science fiction movie about one-eyed blob monsters from space who invade a small Midwestern town just before the annual corn festival. The girl had been resting her head on Sam's shoulder, clutching her arm whenever the blob-monsters oozed on screen. The film ended with the hero managing to freeze the blob-monsters in ice and the conversation had naturally turned to ice-cream. The girl had started babbling about "double chocolate fudge ripple frozen berry blast" and how it was the nicest thing she'd ever eaten, and she'd looked so excited about it that before Sam knew what she was doing she was pulling on her coat and telling the girl she was just popping out for a minute. She'd thought she would only be going as far as the nearest grocery store.
Sam lifted her head from her thoughts and stared at the road stretching away from her. It shimmered in her vision and she screwed up her face trying to will back the tears that were forming in her eyes. "Well enough is enough," she thought to herself. She'd already done more than enough, she'd looked for the ice-cream and failed; it was time to go home. She sidled the bike out into the road. Was it really worth nearly dying for just to get ice-cream for a girl she'd only known a few weeks?
Cat sat on the sofa bed gently rocking back and forth, her arms wrapped around her knees. She checked her watch again, then she checked the time on her phone to see if it matched, then she ran into the bedroom to check the time on the clock in there, then frightened she may have missed a knock on the door she raced back to the living room.
"Where is Sam?" she wondered to herself, sitting back on the sofa bed and resuming her rocking. One minute they'd been talking about frozen blob monsters and the next Sam had thrown on her coat and run out the door telling Cat she'd be back in a few minutes. That had been hours ago. In that time Cat had gone from bored to worried to hungry, back to worried, then a little sleepy, then anxious, then terrified. What if something had happened to Sam?
Cat was just thinking about phoning Sam's mobile, hoping that this time she wouldn't just get a busy signal like the last twelve times she'd tried, when she heard the sound of a key in the front door.
Sam hadn't even taken one step through the front door when she was enveloped in a hug that almost knocked her off her feet. Cat cleared the room in two steps, slipped her arms under Sam's jacket which was soaking wet and wrapped her arms tightly around the blonde's warm body.
"Sam! I was all alone and I kept trying your phone and it was busy and I was so worried." Cat was babbling, the words dancing past each other as they rushed from her mouth. "I didn't know what to do, I, I, I..." She squeezed Sam even tighter then quickly leapt back as Sam flinched in pain.
"Sam, what's wrong?" Cat asked looking at Sam for the first time. The blonde's usually magical hair hung around her face in bedraggled rat-tails, water dripping from the tips onto the laminate floor. The right hand side of her leather jacket was scuffed and ripped, the lining showing through in places. Absent-mindedly Cat reached out and stuck a finger into one of the larger holes and fiddled with white acrylic lining. "Sam?" she asked her voice barely audible. "What happened?"
"Nothing. I just came off my bike, that's all." Sam replied, trying to make the crash sound as inconsequential as possible, but still causing Cat to gasp in shock and clutch a hand to her mouth. "Don't worry, kid," she continued quickly, "it takes more than a little tumble to shake up Sam Puckett."
"Who's Sam Puckett?"
"Me," Sam laughed with a shake of her head, showering Cat with droplets of water.
"Oh," Cat replied thoughtfully. "I thought your name was Puckle."
"Well it's not."
"Oh." Cat was silent for a few seconds, as if she was trying to let this news sink in. Finally she looked back up at Sam. "Why were you riding your bike? Where did you go?"
"Just getting some Double chocolate fudge ripple frozen berry blast. I heard it was someone's favourite." Sam said taking her hand from behind her back to present the slightly melted carton of ice-cream.
"It was meeeeeeee!" Cat screeched clasping the ice-cream in both hands. "It's my favourite!"
"I know," Sam smiled. "Why don't you grab two spoons and I can see what all the fuss is about."
"Okay!"
As Cat skipped off to the en-suite kitchen, Sam carefully lowered herself onto the sofa bed. Lifting her T-shirt she inspected her side. The skin was a mottled patchwork of yellow and purple bruising. In places the bruising was so dark the skin was almost black. As she lowered her t-shirt gingerly over her aching side she looked over at Cat. The young redhead was skipping round the kitchen opening cupboards and drawers in her search for spoons, the carton of ice-cream clutched in her hands. Sam wasn't sure she'd ever seen her look so happy.
"Yeah," Sam thought as she leant back on the sofa bed with a groan. "It was totally worth it."