Chapter 32
32
W hen they got back, Bonnie pushed open the screen door on the back porch. “Mama?” she called out. “Where are you?”
“In the living room!” Grandma Pearl shouted back. “We’re going through some of the things we salvaged from Sam’s room.”
“I can check on them, if you want a little space,” Bonnie offered.
“Thanks,” Sam said. She pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and plunked down into it.
Bonnie pursed her lips, then headed toward the living room. Sam watched her leave and contemplated her options. Bonnie claimed that Pearl had kept them apart for years. Was it really possible that Bonnie had just decided not to reach out, even when Sam became an adult? Even if that was the case, was she supposed to blindly believe Bonnie? Would the only way to the truth be to confront Pearl? Her grandma had been Sam’s support system for so many years that ambushing Pearl with this didn’t feel right, either.
“Sammy girl.” Grandma Pearl came into the kitchen. “Your mom seems to think this broken CD player might be worth something on eBay. Do you want me to save it or toss?”
Sam’s eyes widened at the CD player in Pearl’s hand. The CD player she’d tried to find, but hadn’t been able to. And there it was, just waiting for her. She pushed herself up from the table, came around and grabbed it from her.
“I told you she’d want it,” said Bonnie. “Your grandma doesn’t know how much this nostalgia stuff goes for, but I’m telling you, what’s old is new.”
“She’s here to clean the house out, not keep more junk.” Pearl opened the cupboard under the sink and scowled. “Where are my trash bags? Sam, did you move them?”
“But these are her things.” Bonnie opened cabinets above the sink, and eventually found the box of trash bags that Sam had moved. She peeled one out and handed it to her mom. “The same way my room had my things.”
Bonnie and Pearl were bickering once again, but Sam was busy trying to turn the player on. She hit the power button, but the screen wouldn’t light up. She opened the lid, made sure the CD was placed correctly, then closed the lid. It was still dead.
“What did you do?” she asked.
“If you really wanted your stuff, wouldn’t you have come back for it sooner?” Pearl directed at Bonnie; apparently, she hadn’t heard Sam.
“Yes, I would have,” Bonnie said pointedly.
“Grandma.” Sam’s voice was loud, and the women turned.
“Yes?” Pearl asked, maybe annoyed.
“It’s not working.” Sam held the player up to demonstrate her point.
“I know, hon, that’s why I assumed you’d want to toss it.” Pearl shot Bonnie a look.
“But it was working before.” Sam was agitated now. “What did you do to it?”
“Huh?” Pearl asked as she shook open the trash bag. “I don’t know what you’re getting at.”
“I listened to a CD on this the night of the storm, and now it’s not working. Did you do something to it?” Sam realized then that she was upset. Maybe she should be relieved—after all, the CD player had too strong of a hold on her—but she was clawingly desperate to have it light up again. There was one song left, and she needed to know how Damon and Alt-Sam resolved their issues.
“Well, check the batteries,” Pearl said as she headed back to the living room. “Maybe the tree hit it or something.”
“Can you play the songs on your phone?” Bonnie tried to be helpful, but she just didn’t get it. Neither of them did. Not that Sam completely got it, either.
The CD player worked without batteries. It worked after being abandoned for over a decade. But now it’d suddenly just stopped? That didn’t make any sense. Maybe she had to be in her room, or close to her teenaged things, or...
“Give me a sec,” Sam said as she raced out of the kitchen and toward her bedroom.
“Be careful in there! I think I cleaned up all the broken glass, but you never know,” Bonnie called out after her.
Sam’s room was darker than usual with the power still out and the boarded-up window in place, so she used the flashlight on her phone to illuminate the floor as she made her way to the bed. There were leaves and broken branches that had been swept to a corner of the room, and various items that had once been on her desk—the Twilight books, gel pens and Lip Smacker balms—were now on her bed. The only thing left on her desk was, miraculously, the somehow intact lava lamp. Sam sat on the bed, pushing aside the items from her desk, and furiously hit the play button, but the screen remained blank. She opened and closed the top again, found batteries in her desk drawer and popped them in. She whispered, Come on, come on, come on , on a loop as she stared at it.
But there was just...nothing.
Unless that was it, and there were no more visions to be had; Alt-Sam stayed in Tybee and ended up with Myles instead of Damon. Or neither of them. No flight school, just cookie dough ice cream and gummy bears for the rest of her life. And maybe Alt-Sam grew to be happy with that, but Sam was upset that she’d never get to know.
Sam:
The CD player stopped
Rachel:
Good. That thing was probably giving you some kind of radioactive powers that would make you grow a third arm.
Sam:
But this is weird. Why won’t it turn on? There’s supposed to be one more song on the CD.
Rachel:
Who cares. It was weird that you were seeing things. At least now you’re being saved from yourself.
Rachel:
Speaking of which, you need to get back to work, because they’ve put Steve on as my copilot. No one should have to be trapped in a small cockpit with Steve and his steamed broccoli. He eats the stuff for breakfast, Sam. brEAKFAST brOCCOLI, he calls it. And then he has the nerve to SMILE.
Rachel:
Please get back soon before I forcibly eject him from the plane.
Two knocks on Sam’s bedroom door startled her, and she looked over to see Bonnie inching the frame open.
“Are you hungry? The power’s back on at Jessie’s, and your grandma is going to grab a rotisserie chicken from Publix. Apparently, it’s a ten out of ten on their Cluck-Cluck scale, whatever that means.” Bonnie gave a small smile, and Sam forced herself to smile back.
“Yeah,” Sam said. “Sounds great.”
Bonnie held on to the frame, tapped her fingers against it, then said, “Sam, you can ask me anything, you know.”
“Okay.” Sam would use the opening to do exactly that. “How long are you staying?”
Sam wasn’t totally convinced Bonnie would give her an honest answer, but she didn’t want her to think she was just welcome to be here for as long as she liked. Not that it was her house or anything.
“As long as your grandma needs me,” Bonnie said. “There’s a lot to do.”
And then Sam just decided to say the damn thing. “Are you here because you think Pearl is going to give you money or something?”
“No, what are you—” Bonnie’s brows furrowed.
But Sam plowed forward. “Because whatever she gets from selling the house is staying with her. I’m going to make sure she’s taken care of.”
“I don’t want anything from your grandma,” Bonnie said. “But I do want you to try to have a little more faith in me.”
“Why would I ever do that?” Sam asked.
Bonnie gave two taps on the frame, then closed the door shut behind her. Sam couldn’t be with her mom. And since she couldn’t vanish into her music, she turned to the only other safe place she had—Damon.
Sam:
I’m coming over.