AN: The Southern Vampire Mysteries and all characters therein belong to Charlaine Harris. I'm just playing around with her Sookieverse.
Sam stopped at a gas station just over the Texas state line. He was close to his goal, but he desperately needed a nice strong cup of coffee right now. When he climbed back into his truck he heard a soft "pop" noise and looked to the passenger seat to see Claude the fairy there.
"We need to talk," Claude said.
"Start talking," Sam said "but I hope you don't mind if I keep driving while you do it. I need to get to the hospital to see my mom as soon as possible.
"That's fine", the fairy said as he checked out his profile in the side mirror of Sam's truck.
Sam pulled back onto the interstate-headed west. He turned the stereo off and waited for Claude to say whatever it was he needed to say.
Claude absentmindedly twirled a strand of hair around his index finger as he spoke. "People think that just because I'm self-absorbed that I don't notice everything around me. I do. I can tell how much you care for Sookie."
"Well, it's not like I've ever tried to hide my feelings for her," Sam said. Now Sam was starting to get irritated. It was just like a damn fairy to pick the worst possible time to try to have a serious conversation.
"While you're not as suitable a mate for her as a fairy would be, you're certainly more acceptable than that lovely hunk of dead Viking," Claude said in a matter-of-fact tone.
"I can't say I don't see the attraction there, if not for the probability of death involved I might give that a go myself."
"Have you met Sookie Stackhouse?" Sam laughed. "I don't think she's gonna care about your opinion of her love life. Besides, I've already tried everything I could think of. " Sam had a wistful look in his eye as he drove westward.
"Listen," Claude said. "I may not be interested in women, but work in a strip club. I see them everyday. I see what type of women go for what type of guy. I can tell you how to land Sookie". Claude looked steadily at Sam with one eyebrow raised in an almost Spock like expression.
"You've got my attention", is all Sam replied.
Sookie plopped down in Sam's chair and took a deep breath. She'd finished her morning shift as waitress, but now she needed to go through some applications and see if she could find a replacement for Arleen. Amelia said she could take some shifts while Sam was away, she still needed to line up a more permanent replacement.
'Poor Sam', she thought. She felt so bad for her friend. On what was supposed to be the best day of his life, the day he could finally be himself, his mother gets shot and he has to drive all the way to Texas.
Sookie shrugged and started sorting through the applications. She sorted out six applications and called them back, asking if they were still looking for work. Two out of the six were still looking for work, so she set up a time for each of them to come in for an interview with her. She figured she owed it to Sam to try to make sure he wasn't getting another bigot like Arleen. Sam deserved better than that.
With that out of the way, Sookie was free to relax for the first time that day. It'd been a little under twenty-four hours since the big "coming out" for the two-natured community. 'Poor Sam', she thought. She felt so bad for her friend. Sam should be here, enjoying being truly himself in public, but instead he had to drive to Texas because his stepfather freaked out and shot his mother. From Sam's call earlier, Sookie knew his momma was going to be all right, but wasn't sure if she was going to stay in Texas or come back to Louisiana with Sam.
Sookie was so tired. She stretched and yawned a bit as she sat there and before she knew it, she'd drifted off to sleep. Into a very strange dream...