Bright and early the next morning, as planned, Sam followed Seth out to his truck, with Asami in tow on her leash.
—
"Alright, now you're sure you've got everything? Food, water bottles for pit stops, some toys in the back seat?" She went over to open one of the back doors and check for herself.
"Yes, yes, and yes ma'am." An exasperated Seth answered.
As much as Sam claimed not to be a morning person….and she generally wasn't, a morning person, Seth definitely was not.
Sam, though agreeing that the backseat did meet her standards, shot him a glare at the usual snark in his attitude.
"...and don't let her hang her head out the window for more than like five, maybe ten minutes, at most. I actually probably shouldn't let her do it at all, but you now what? What Kinsey's mom doesn't know won't kill her." Sam let slip a slight chuckle.
"Yeah, for a vet, she sure does hate when dogs have a little fun, doesn't she?" He laughed.
Sam shook her head to herself, trying to hide her amusement.
"Seriously, I have got everything covered." He sighed. "Come on, don't you trust me?" He was leaning up against the truck, staring at her with his best and most pathetic looking puppy dog eyes.
She shot him another glare. "This is my baby, Seth. Forgive me for being a little thorough."
"Yeah, I get that, but also, like, gremlins come with less instructions than this." He whined.
"Because she's not a gremlin, Seth. She's a Tosa Inu mix. Any more questions?"
"No, Ma'am." Seth sighed.
Sam shot him a more devious smirk. "Good boy."
She then looked over at Mandy, who was just putting the rest of her own stuff in the back seat. "You got all that, in case he forgets, right?"
"You know it." She laughed.
Seth smiled mockingly at Sam. "Okay? Can we go now?"
"Okay, in a minute." Sam mocked back, turning and getting down on her knees to face Asami.
She grinned at her and bega giving her lots of scratches.
"You be good for Uncle Seth and Aunt Mandy, alright? Yeah?" She cooed.
Asami just answered with a bark and several slobbery kisses to Sam's face.
"That's my good girl! Yes you are, mommy loves you! Oh yes, she does! She's gonna miss you so much!" She gave her some more scratches before unhooking the leash and signaling for her to jump up into the truck. "Alright then, go on!"
Asami, her tail still wagging a mile a minute, obediently turned and jumped up into the truck and laid down in the backseat, where she could still see Sam.
"Good girl! Kinsey and I will be right behind you, okay?"
Asami just let out a little happy whine, watching as Sam shut the door and turned back to Seth. "Now you can go."
"Finally." Seth sighed dramatically.
Sam rolled her eyes, smiling when she turned to see Kinsey, who had been standing by and watching from afar, unbeknownst to either her or Seth.
"You ready?" She chuckled.
Kinsey adjusted the strap to the small backpack she was carrying. "You know it."
"Perfect." Sam pulled her in closer as they kissed, looking up briefly when they were done to see Seth pulling the truck out. "Let's hit the road, then."
"Right behind you." Kinsey assured eagerly.
Seth and Mandy were at least about a half hour or so into their part of the journey when Mandy made the observation.
"Alright, now I won't tell Sam if you won't…" She chuckled, taking a drag from her cigarette and hanging it out the front passenger window. "...but, it has most definitely been more than ten minutes."
Seth smirked as he looked back at Asami, eagerly standing with her head hanging out the window, her tongue hanging out and looking like she had the biggest grin.
"Good thing I'm not a narc, then." Seth laughed, reaching back briefly to pet her. "Isn't it, girl?"
Asami just let out an equally eager bark.
Mandy laughed at the little interaction as she took another drag from her cigarette.
"Actually, I take that back."
"Take what back?" He asked, starting to play around with the radio stations.
"I won't tell Sam about Asami's window time if you won't...tell her about my little smokey smoke in the same car as her precious baby."
"Are you? She's got her head out that window, you're pointing your smoke out this one." He pointed to Mandy's window. "...you're not even breathing the same air, from what I can tell." He laughed. "...but, deal."
"Good." She chuckled. "...Ooh, can you turn that up?"
"A little Christmas tuneage?" He observed, reaching to crank the volume up til The Little Saint Nick was practically blasting through the truck. "...Why not?"
Mandy laughed. "This used to be one of my favorites as a kid. It always makes me think of those old Now That's What I call Christmas CD commercials. You know, the ones where they'd play it and there'd be an actual little Santa in the little sleigh? ….Or do I just sound crazy?"
"Oh yeah, no. I remember those." Seth chuckled. "For me, it was Dominic The Donkey….kid Seth would lose his shit over that one."
"Wait, shit, I remember that one!" She recalled excitedly. "The Italian Christmas Donkey!"
"Because the reindeer can not climb the hills of Italy…" He quoted, almost in song. "Yes, that one! Oh, thank god, you're cool." He said the last bit more under his breath, though Mandy still picked up on it and laughed.
"...almost everyone just thinks I'm crazy, like it's my fault all they do nowadays is replay every version ever of fucking White Christmas and Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, you know what, maybe I would if they'd actually play something good once in a while!"
"Oh, I'll smoke to that." Mandy chuckled, hanging her cigarette out the window again. "Give me that good shit.'
"Exactly, you get it!" Seth laughed. "...So, what is that good shit to you?"
"Sorry?" She chuckled.
"Well, you said Little Saint Nick was one of your favorites, and if nothing in the played to death rotation does it for you, what is your very favorite Christmas song?
Mandy shook her head to herself. "You're gonna think I'm the biggest sap in the world."
"I will not think you are the biggest sap in the world…." He teased. "...Probably, but, there's no shame if you are."
She smiled a little and started fidgeting some with her hoodie strings.
"Alright, bet."
"Try me."
"The Christmas Shoes…" She chuckled nervously, appearing somewhat more shy and quiet than before, but still smiling.
"That's not sappy." He chuckled. "...It's a good way to get even me crying, but it's not sappy."
"Even you.." Mandy mocked, laughing again. "You cry watching Saw!"
"Lawrence left him in that room and never came back!" He tried to defend.
"Totally helping your case, here." She snickered, putting her cigarette out.
"Whatever…" He scoffed.
Mandy laughed again at him.
"...but yeah I don't know, it- " She continued, back on the original subject, and shrugged. "It just reminds me of my mom. She always loved Christmas…"
"...Loved…?" Seth repeated, sympathetically, picking up on the tense it was said in.
Mandy nodded. "...yeah, she died when I was young."
"I'm sorry." Seth said a little more gently
Mandy nodded. "Thanks."
Seth nodded.
—
—
Seth turned to her again, after the silence that had passed between them.
"...So, what was her favorite?"
"What?"
"Your mom." He explained. "...What was...her favorite Christmas song?"
Mandy smiled a little more at that, catching Seth off guard a little with how she seemed to light up just a bit, over what had just been a pretty sullen subject.
"What?" He chuckled softly.
"Nothing, it's just." She cleared her throat. "No one…..no one's...really asked me that, since….." She shrugged. "I don't know, it's like…...you tell someone your mom died and it's like...I- it's always, you know, Oh, that's awful or How'd she die? And like….they..don't really know how to talk to you after that. You know?"
"A little bit...yeah." He admitted quietly, smiling sympathetically. "My….dad left when I was about nine or ten, and I know that's.. not really the same thing or even remotely similar, but...I don't know, the way people talked about it after, talking about him behind my back and never really to me, worrying about me hearing his name in conversation and that I'd get my hopes up. I kinda just wished they would've just told me to my face he wasn't coming back, you know?"
"Ohh, I've had days like that too." She sympathized. "...right after it happened, people at school would whisper behind my back, or oh that poor girl when they thought I couldn't hear, and...I know that's not really the same, but…."
"Yeah. Seth said gently.
Mandy smiled back at him again.
"My mom really liked Have Yourself a Merry little Christmas ... .yeah, I guess I was kind of just doomed to be a sap."
Seth nodded, a chuckle escaping which he'd tried to conceal. "...kind of feel bad for shitting on it earlier, now."
"Please don't." Mandy laughed along with him. "If she were here she'd probably just laugh it off and remind me just how many times I made her listen to The Little Saint Nick and Rudolph…...that's the kind of person she was."
"Well, then she definitely sounds like someone I'd get along with."
Mandy chuckled again. "Yeah, I think you would."
At the first rest stop they came across, they decided to stop and pull into a gas station, so that Asami could get her water and potty break and they could grab some road snackage, as they'd deemed it.
Seth opted to be the one to take care of Asami while Mandy went inside.
"Alright, I'll call you over if they don't have what you want." She promised.
Seth chuckled and waved a hand up as she went in "We'll be here!" He reached down to give Asami a few head scratches. "Won't we?"
Mandy looked back, smiling at the two of them, as she went in.
The inside of the store wasn't necessarily big, but it was decently sized for a little roadside gas station.
There was a small TV hanging off one of the walls, near the register at the front of the store, that was playing some new station that she was paying almost no mind to, as she made her way toward the back of the store to skim over some of the aisles.
By the time she had finished, she had filled two large slushie cups and found most of what she'd set out in here to grab and started to make hr way back to the front register.
"Alright, your total here is….$19.43." The cashier lady at the counter told her after she was done putting the last of her finds on the counter. "Need a bag?"
"Uh, yes. Please." She answered.
"You got it."
Mandy returned the friendly smile and was just starting to pull some money from her wallet when the news report playing on that TV caught her attention.
"...witnesses report that what they DID see was the suspect leaving the scene, wearing a Ghostface Halloween mask."
Wide eyed, Mandy glanced over at the woman who was currently bagging the rest of her stuff.
"Could you turn that up, please?" She finally asked.
The woman glanced up at the screen, suddenly becoming caught up in it as well, and pressed a button on the remote.
"Thank you…"
She stood there, staring at the screen, as the news reporter continued to relay the rest of the details.
—-
She didn't even realize how long she'd zoned out….or that she even had, really, until Seth came in looking for her, with Asami in tow behind him.
"Hey, what's going on? Everything- ?"
But he stopped, mid sentence, when he noticed what she was watching.
"Jesus…" He blurted out.
It was then that Mandy finally snapped out of it and noticed he was there, jumping slightly.
"Should we tell Sam?"
Seth shrugged. "It's in Woodsboro again, she's gonna hear about it either way."
"Yeah." Mandy sighed.