Title: Vices to Live by
Characters: Samantha, with bits of Jack and Danny
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: none
Disclaimer: Without a Trace and its characters belong to people more creative and wealthier than I.
For a ficathon on LiveJournal. Prompt was the quote: "Here's a rule I recommend: Never practice two vices at once." --Tallulah Bankhead
Vices to Live by
The Academy's requirement that all agents take a psych course meant that Sam had to be here, but damn, this guy was boring. She forced herself to tune back in to the lecture: "...the case of risk-seeking behavior poses an interesting puzzle for psychologists. Studies show that persistent risk-seekers tend to be intelligent and well-educated, yet they do not seem to be deterred by harmful consequences. In the case of pathological gamblers, for instance..."
Jack, predictably, is yelling. Sam really wishes he wouldn't yell – the whole office can probably hear him by now.
"Look, Jack, I'm sorry –" she interrupts "– but he would have gotten away if I hadn't gone in, and then we wouldn't have –"
"You. Wait. For. Backup." Jack's now tightly controlled voice silences hers. "Honestly, Samantha, how many times are we going to have this conversation?"
Sam thinks he's blowing this whole thing out of proportion. "Jack, I know I took a risk, but –"
"You took a risk?" Jack looks incredulous. "He nearly got your gun!"
"I handled it!" responds Sam as she pointedly ignores the throbbing in her wrist.
Jack stares at her with an intensity that's broken many a suspect and she struggles not to flinch. "Go home," he says quietly.
Sam protests, "Jack, I really don't think that's necessary –"
"Go home!" he bellows, and Sam knows the argument is over.
"I know, settle down..." Samantha listened as Mrs. Pomroy's voice rose above the giggles of her 8th grade American history class. "It may sound silly now, but the prohibition movement was quite real and especially successful here in the Midwest. For example, the members of the Women's Temperance Society in Evanston, Illinois were famous for saying, 'Lips that touch liquor shall never touch mine.'"
Sam barely pauses in front of the refrigerated case at her local market before she opens the door and grabs a six pack of bottled beer. She walks quickly past the other aisles, deciding she really doesn't need anything else right now, and heads straight for the counter.
"This is the lung of a smoker." The guy from the cancer society brought up his next slide on the screen, prompting a chorus of "ewww" from the audience in the junior high auditorium. Samantha wrinkled her nose at the picture, strangely fascinated by the lump of putrid, black-green flesh.
The Asian man behind the counter is placing her beer at the bottom of a brown paper bag when he asks, "Would you like anything else?"
On impulse, Sam replies, "Yeah, actually, I'll take a pack of cigarettes."
"Sure." The cashier turns around to face the shelves of cigarette cartons behind him. "Which brand?"
Sam hesitates slightly before replying with the brand that her mother used to smoke.
"Hey Bogart, what do you think you're doing?" Sam looked up from her table in the student union to see the rumpled, clearly displeased face of her coach. God, she hated that nickname. He pointed at the burger in her hands. "You can't put that kind of crap in your body and expect to play well. Crap in, crap out – and that's more than literal."
Sam gets an Ace bandage from the cabinet under her bathroom sink and carefully wraps her injured wrist with a practiced ease. She walks back to her kitchen and opens one of the beer bottles on the counter before putting the rest in the fridge. She's on her second by the time the pizza arrives. She manages to smile at the familiar face of the delivery guy as she hands him a generous tip.
It was pointless to hope that her high school hadn't heard about her attempt to run away. Now that she had been officially labeled "troubled," she had to endure weekly chats with the school's counselor. Sam was feeding her some bull about how things were getting better with her mother when the counselor surprised her with her next question.
"Are you having sex, Samantha?"
"What!" Sam responded.
The counselor continued, "Sometimes, girls with your...background...turn to sex to fill their emotional needs. But it's an empty solution, Samantha, and you'll more than likely end up hurt."
Sam flips open her cell phone and starts scrolling through the stored numbers. There was Jack, and Martin. Even Keller was still in there. There was the guy from two weeks ago when she just needed to feel something, and the guy from six months ago when she had too much to drink...
She finally pauses on a name and presses the send button.
"You mark my words, Sammie." Her mother's slurred, bitter voice cut through the cigarette smoke that was slowly filling the small kitchen. "The only person you can depend on is yourself. You remember that. It's the most important thing you'll ever learn."
After two rings, Danny answers. "Hey Sam, what's up?"
It takes Sam a second to find her voice, as if she wasn't expecting him to answer. "Oh, hi – I, uh, I was just calling to –"
Danny must hear something in her voice because he interrupts her with, "Sam, are you okay?"
Suddenly she loses her nerve and is prepared to lie, but then her gaze travels around her cluttered apartment – from the beer bottles and open pizza box to the unopened packet of cigarettes and finally lands in her lap where the bandage is tight around her swollen wrist.
"Sam?" Danny is still waiting for her answer.
Sam takes a deep breath. "Um, you know what? I don't think I am."
Danny's voice is urgent and concerned. "What's wrong? What happened?"
"Nothing, it's just – " she pinches the bridge of her nose and sighs.
She finally says in a small voice, "I think I could use a friend right now." Then she adds quickly, "but if you've got plans, it's really not a big deal – "
"Hey, no worries, I was just leaving the office now," Danny says.
"Are you sure? Because –"
Danny cuts her off with a slight chuckle. "Sam, I'll be right over. You're at home, right?"
"Yeah. I mean, that would be great. Thanks." She closes her phone.
Sam sinks back into the couch and closes her eyes. She's surprised to feel the sting of tears and blinks them away furiously. She stands up and walks over to the window where twilight is descending on the city that never sleeps. She sits and curls herself upon the window seat, her head leaning against the glass, facing the direction from which she's mostly likely to spot Danny approaching her building.
Fin.