by Kylie Walker
She popped the trunk and Luke watched curiously as she pulled a tote bag and a small insulated bag out. “What’s all that?”
“A blanket, a book, some water and juice…oh and a banana and those weird wheat crackers you like so much.”
Luke smiled. “You’re on top of it.”
She shrugged. “I called on Friday and asked what we should bring. You’re going to be here for three hours.”
“You don’t have to stay the whole time, you know. You could go out to the track and watch Conrad and just pick me up when I’m done.”
Sam slammed down the trunk on the car and said, “Come on. You’re not getting rid of me, so stop trying.”
Chuckling softly Luke followed her into the hospital. They took the elevator to the second floor and easily found the infusion center. As soon as they got there Luke was taken back for labs and when he came back out he said, “They said it would be about half an hour, I’m sorry, this’ll probably be longer than three hours. You can…”
“I’m not leaving.”
He shook his head. “You’re a stubborn one, you know that?”
“Hmm, well my mother wasn’t stubborn at all so I wonder where I got it from?”
Sam could see the fondness for her in his eyes and it warmed her heart. “Thank you, Sam.”
“You’re welcome, now that’s it, no more thanking me.”
“I’m stubborn, so I might do it once or twice more,” he said with a grin. “By the way, they want to know if I want a catheter or a port so I don’t have to get stuck every time.”
“They put it in surgically?”
“Yeah, they said it’s an easy procedure though and no hospital time.”
“That might be better, getting poked sucks.”
He nodded. “I guess I’ll tell them yes then. They said they could do it on Friday. This crap is taking up a lot of time I really should be at work.”
“Work can wait,” she said. “You’ll be back at it in no time.” Sam hoped that she sounded more hopeful than she felt. It was hard for her to hope for anything good when so many bad things had already happened in her life…but she was trying.
When Luke was taken to the back Sam went with him. He was placed in a comfortable recliner chair and a nice young nurse put in his IV. The doctor had already covered what kind of medication he was getting and what kind of side effects he could expect. Sam felt queasy as she watched the IV go into his vein but she didn’t turn away. She wanted to experience as much of this with him as she could. Once the infusion was started and the nurse left Samantha covered him with the blanket she brought and sat the drinks and snacks out on the little metal table attached to his chair.
“Do you want something to read?”
“No thanks, maybe I’ll just rest.” He closed his eyes and Sam sat and stared at him. When she first met him she remembered thinking how strong and young he looked. Somehow she’d missed how drawn and pale he’d become over the past few weeks and it made her feel self-involved and ashamed. She imagined how much worse it was probably going to get and a chill ran down her spine and caused her to shudder. After a few minutes he opened his eyes and said, “You can turn on the television if you want. I can’t really rest with you staring at me.”
“Ungrateful,” she said with a smile.
“I’m sorry, have I thanked you for being here?” he was grinning too.
“Hey Luke, did you know Conrad when he lost his brother?”
His smile fell from his face. “No. I met him about a year after. He was still grieving him pretty hard and so was his mom.”
“Is that why she killed herself?”
Luke nodded, “She just couldn’t deal with it. Every time she looked at poor Conrad she was reminded of Jake. She tried hard and for a while things were good…but there’s no way to even begin to fathom the loss of a child unless you’ve experienced it, I guess. It would just hit her hard sometimes all at once and if poor Conrad was around, she’d usually take it out on him. He spent more and more time with his father or in the shop with me. Toward the end they were barely speaking.”
“That’s why he said he killed her that night at the hospital? He blames himself.”
He nodded again. “He blames himself for all of it. I thank God that he’s as strong as he is. I’m not sure a weaker man could come out the other side of all of that. I think Conrad is still battling it, but I have faith he’ll make it.”
Luke closed his eyes again and Sam let him rest. While she sat there she thought about her life and how bad it had been and then she thought about Conrad’s. If she could trade places with him, she wouldn’t. He has to carry those demons around inside of him and she wondered how he was able to do that and still function as well as he did. It gave her a renewed sense of respect for him and to her chagrin, it only added to the feelings piling up inside of her where he was concerned…and that just pissed her off.
CHAPTER 21
Aaron couldn’t stop smiling and he couldn’t stop talking. If Sam hadn’t known he was with Conrad all day she may have accused him of being on something.
“He took that track so fast that I swear to God the car was like a fucking blur…”
“Language.” Sam was making dinner as he sat on the stool in the kitchen and talked a mile a minute. She’d dropped Luke off at noon and gone into work until three. When she got back home Luke was in the shop working on one of his cars. She thought about telling him he should be resting, but she could actually see in his face that what he was doing was more relaxing to him than sitting in a recliner and watching television or reading could ever be. She left him alone and went inside to shower and then started dinner. By four Aaron was home. She tried hard to hide her disappointment that Conrad had just dropped him off and left, but Aaron was so excited that he probably wouldn’t have noticed anyways.
“He said I could go back out there with him on Wednesday. He said I might even be able to drive the car one of these days.”
“I’m glad you had fun. Speaking of driving, I guess we should get you into a driving school so you can work on getting your license.”
His face lit up. Sam loved seeing him happy. He’d been unhappy for so much of his life that Sam actually thought he’d forgotten how to smile there for a while. “Really?”
“Yeah, but it’s not cheap so you’ll have to help pay for it. If you stay out of trouble between now and then I’ll pay for half.” Aaron displayed a rare show of affection by hugging his sister tightly. When he let her go he was still smiling.
“Thanks Sam. You’re the best!”
She laughed, “That’s not what you were saying on Friday night.”
He waved her off with his palm. “We’re past that.” He reached for one of the cucumber slices she’d just put into a bowl and she smacked his hand.
“Look at your hand, it’s all greasy. Go clean up before dinner.”
“You sound like an old woman sometimes.”
“Go!” He started out of the kitchen and stopped in the doorway and said,
“Hey Sam?”
“Yeah?”
“You really are the best.” She smiled as she watched him disappear down the hallway. It’s amazing how quickly life could change. She just hoped that the bad times were far behind them.
**
Conrad took Luke for his treatment on Tuesday. When he got there to pick him up, Sam had already left for work. On Wednesday when he picked up Aaron to go to the track, she was in the shower and he missed her again. By Thursday he felt like he’d lose his mind if he didn’t see her. When he dropped Luke off at home that afternoon he decided he’d go by the parts store just to see how things were going.
He was greeted by Mike the counter guy when he walked in and as soon as Aaron saw him he started asking if they were going out to the track on Friday.
“I’m going to take tomorrow off actually. They have races out there tomorrow night and they won’t let me use the track.” Aaron looked crushed and Co
nrad felt bad so he said, “Maybe I can take you to sign up for those driving classes.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, we’ll have to get Luke to sign the permission and insurance forms, but I think they’ll let me do the rest. I’m your step-brother, right?” As soon as he said that he saw Sam. She was coming out of the back room lugging a big box and the feelings he had when he looked at her were anything but step-brotherly. He was also a little pissed at the other guys who were all just standing around and not helping her. “I’ll talk to you more about this later, Aaron, okay?”
“Sure.”
“Hey Sam, let me help you with that.” She rolled her eyes and gripped the box tighter.
“I got it.”
“Seriously, let me help. That thing is as big as you are.”
“I’ve threatened to kick every man in this place’s ass more than once for acting like I can’t do the same job as they can. You want some of this?” That explained why they were all keeping their distance. Conrad smiled and plucked the box out of her hands. Damn did he want some of that. “Hey!”
“I’m not scared of you,” he said. “Where do you want it at?”
“Over by that display in front,” she said, still glaring at him. He carried it over and sat it down next to the display case. “So what are you doing here? I thought you took a leave of absence.”
“Yeah, I just stopped by to see how things were going. You look tired, Sam.”
“I’m okay.”
“You’re not over-working yourself are you? Are you sleeping at night?”
“Are you my father?”
He raised his eyebrows. “I thought I was your friend.”
“You’re what you want to be to me when you want to be it,” she said. She bent over to cut open one of the boxes.
“What does that mean?”
Standing up and sticking the box cutter down in her pants pocket she said, “I think it’s pretty self-explanatory.”
“No, it’s really not.”
“Well, when I first got here you acted like you wanted to be my friend. Then, you wanted to have sex with me and then you wanted no part of me. Then…”
“Okay, I get it.”
“See, self-explanatory.”
“Sam, it’s just so fucking complicated.”
“Yeah, it is. It’s hard to figure out from one day to the next which Conrad is going to show up. Way too fucking complicated, and I’m way too overwhelmed with everything else going on to worry about it.”
“I’m sorry Sam. I never meant to complicate your life. I can take Luke more if you need me to…”
“No! This isn’t about Luke. I’m fine. I’d like to finish this before I go home though.” She started taking the shiny chrome mufflers out of the bubble wrap they came in and setting them up on the shelves.
“Let Aaron do that and come with me.” Conrad wasn’t sure what he was doing, but he knew that he had to figure this thing out with Sam before it drove him crazy.
“Um…no, I don’t get off for another two hours.”
“I’m the district manager; I can give you the rest of the afternoon off.”
“For what?”
“Just go tell Aaron to finish this and tell Lee you’re leaving with me.”
“Conrad…” she was looking at him like he was crazy. He probably was.
“Please Sam.” His pretty green eyes were pleading with her. How was she supposed to say no to him? “Okay, I’ll ask Lee. I’m pushing my luck around here lately though.”
Conrad laughed. “You forget whose daughter you are sometimes I think.”
Her eyes looked sad then and he regretted his statement. She covered quickly and said, “I don’t want to take advantage of that. I’ll be right back.”
**
The whole drive to Malibu Sam tried to get Conrad to tell her where they were going but to no avail. She guessed everything she could think of and she was actually just about to get mad when he turned off the road and into a big parking lot.
“You’re shitting me!”
He laughed. “You like?”
“Hell yeah!” They drove through a tunnel made out of huge tires and into the parking lot of the Malibu Grand Prix. It’s an arcade that Sam had always wanted to go to. She read the sign as they walked up to the main building, “High performance Go Karts, banked curves, hairpin turns, and exhilarating straight-away, what’s not to love?” Conrad laughed again and pulled open the glass doors with the handle shaped like a wrench. Samantha stepped inside and instantly stopped in her tracks. The carpet was black and yellow and formula cars and checkered flags decorated the walls. The floor was wall to wall arcade games, most of them racing games. The back doors rolled open like a garage and the smell of the burning fuel and the sound of the little 300 horsepower engines wafted through.
Conrad took her hand and led her across the floor and out the doors toward the propane-powered dragsters. Sam was grinning from ear to ear as they got in line. “Are you sure you can handle getting beat by me again?”
“The first time was a fluke,” he said with a laugh, “It’ll never happen again so get ready to cry like a girl.”
“If anyone is crying like a little girl when I cross that finish line, it’s going to be you, big guy.”
Conrad paid their way into the gate and Sam took off to pick out her car. As she buckled herself into the rumbling little red car she saw him across the way climbing into a black one. She gripped onto the steering wheel and looked out at the track. It was grooved to keep the rookies from veering off track, but even fake racing was better than not racing at all. She felt the familiar rush of adrenaline as she tamped down on the accelerator and revved the engine. When the Christmas tree changed from red to green she floored it and seconds later she was flying around the bank track, passing everyone on the inside…until she got to Conrad who was in front. She tried to get on the inside and he pulled his wheel left so she tried to pass him on the outside and he went right. Frustrated, she was about to go inside again when she had an idea. She pulled her foot off of the accelerator and dropped back a few car lengths behind him. Predictably enough on the next turn, he looked back to see where she’d gone. That was when she floored it. While he was looking over his left shoulder she passed him on the right. They were back and forth and neck in neck for the next three passes and twenty minutes later she was crossing the finish line as the checkered flag waved, with Conrad on her bumper.
“You going to grin like an idiot for the rest of the day?” he asked her on the way back up to the building.
She laughed. “Yes, I think I am. Are you going to whine all day?”
He laughed too. “Yes, I think I am,” he said.
“Come on I’ll buy you a piece of pizza to make you feel better.”
“And a Pepsi?”
“Greedy.”
“You crushed my pride, is a piece of chocolate cake really too much to ask?”
“Chocolate cake too?”
“I’ll need the sugar to pull up out of my depression.”
“Shut up. Fine, you can have the chocolate cake. You better have two because I want to play that Formula 500 game over by the back door when we finish.”
“I won’t need two pieces of cake to beat you on that one,” he said. “When I was thirteen I actually won a weekend competition on that game. I got a trophy and everything.”
“Wow, a trophy and everything. Do you still have it up on a shelf in your bedroom?”
He laughed. “Shut up.”
After eating their lunch and their cake they went over to the large sleek game and Samantha slid into one of the faux leather seats. Conrad fed quarters into the slot and took his seat. They both used the yellow button and joysticks in front of them to change the view and then she reached over and pushed start. Sam pressed down on the accelerator like this was a street race and there was five grand on the line. Conrad’s car passed hers on the inside around the first turn. She
waited until he was flush in front of her and then she rammed into him from behind. The clip sent his animated car veering into the wall.
“Hey! This is a no-contact sport.” She ignored him and kept her focus on the car on the screen. She was a good two car lengths in front of him when one of the other cars…computer driven…veered over in front of her. She hit it and it exploded into a ball of orange and yellow flames. She had to slow down to keep from slamming into the wall and Conrad chose that moment to slide past her. “Ha ha!” She pulled her little car up next to his and pulled the wheel to the left, slamming into the side of his car. It sent them both careening into a spin and they both ended up sliding off the track and into what appeared to be shark or maybe it was alligator infested waters. Neither of them one that one, but as soon as the words, “Game Over” flashed on the screen Conrad fed in four more quarters. They each set up their view once more and they were off. This time they both crossed the finish line, but Conrad finished first. “Ha ha!” She found his smile both sexy and annoying. “Good race,” he said. She rolled her eyes at him and he slipped his arm across her shoulders. Her mood was instantly elevated by his touch. “How about a round of miniature golf, I suck at that.”
She couldn’t resist, “So you’re as good at that as you were on the track?”
“I was setting the stage to let you win, but you’re going down now.” He pushed her lightly on the shoulder and her body moved away from his. She instantly wanted him back. While they went through the nine holes of the silly little miniature golf game, she watched the couple in front of them. The big, strong boyfriend would stand behind the pretty little helpless female and wrap his arms around front. Taking her dainty wrists in his big hands, he’d show her how to stand and hold the golf club as she pressed back into him. Sam wished for the first time in her life that she could play the part of the helpless damsel…but she knew she could never even pretend to be that helpless. She was who she was and if this was the most she could have with Conrad, she’d take it. This had actually been the best day that she’d had in a long time.
