“Hiya. How much is the green dress in the window?” Sam asks.
“Ah, the pure silk evening dress. You have excellent taste. It will look wonderful with your red hair.”
“It’s not me. It’s for her.”
The woman doesn’t blink an eyelid. “It would look amazing with your chocolate hair too.”
“So how much is it?” I ask.
“It’s a steal at two thousand dollars.”
Sam and I look at each other. It is well out of both our budgets. “I’ll find something else.”
“Okay,” she agrees and we start to look at the racks. Sam finds a red dress with a plunging neckline. I try it on, and both Sam and the shop assistant assure me it is ‘the one’. Sam comes close to me. “What’s that?” she asks, touching the amulet.
“A gypsy gave it to me,” I explain.
“Really? Wow! For a moment there, I thought it was precious. It looks freaking real.”
“It is real,” I whisper.
Her eyes widen with surprise. “Whoa! Okay, you need to tell me more, my girl.”
I nod. “Yeah, there is a lot I want to talk to you about.”
The dress is carefully packed for me, then I reject all attempts by Sam to pay for my new dress, and put it on my credit card. Then we go back to the gallery, get into my station wagon and drive back to the caravan.
Chapter 33
Autumn
“Living in a caravan is actually pretty cool,” Sam declares as she deposits her luggage on the floor and walks around the place.
“Make yourself at home,” I invite, and go off to use the toilet. I can hear her opening cupboard doors and closing them.
When I pull the door open, she is standing outside the door with a spatula in her hand.
“You don’t have any food in your fridge and there are only packets of ramen noodles in your cupboards,” she points out.
“I know,” I reply, my eyes going to the utensil. “Why are you holding a spatula?”
She brings it down and smacks me on my head.
“Hey!” I shriek, but before I can catch her, she evades me and with a cheeky laugh sprints away. She takes refuge behind the table. I make a few tries to catch her, but we end up going round and round the table. I give up and toss an empty box of oats at her. She ducks easily and it sails past.
She grins at me. “Missed.”
“Don’t be so smug. You’re sleeping in my bed,” I warn.
She stands with her hands on her hips and huffs, “How many times do I have to tell you to stop eating that poison?”
“But I like them and they’re so easy to make,” I say in my defense.
“They taste like freaking plastic.”
“No, they don’t.”
She sighs elaborately. “Look, I plan to live a very long life and I want us both to be two old ladies together. If you keep eating this shit I’m going to be burying your sorry ass way before your time.”
“You’ll get on like a house on fire with Rocco. He’s fastidious about eating pure food too.”
Her eyebrows rise. “Really? I’m starting to like the man more and more.”
“I bought a cake for you, but I gave it away to the gypsy last night.”
“Mmm… yes, the mysterious gypsy. You’ll need to tell me all about that too, but first, let’s go to the grocery store and get you some food. My treat.”
It’s always been like this with Sam since I was fourteen, when I walked into my third-grade class to find my seat partner was a girl with a riot of flame-colored curly locks. She has refused to let me go since then. Always mothering me, worrying about me, protecting me.
Thirty minutes later, we’re strolling through the aisles of the store. I watch bemused as Sam dumps into the cart packs of whole wheat cereal, organic rice, the good orange juice. Then she drops a bag of frozen spicy chicken wings in.
“Surely that’s not healthy?” I ask surprised.
“Nope, but this is for tonight. We’re celebrating, remember?”
I try to hide my smile as I roll the cart behind her and watch her pick a large bag of nachos, sour cream, microwaveable popcorn, chocolate cake, and two bottles of champagne.
Soon we’re done, and return to my car in the lot. We dump everything in the back, and I start my car and reverse out of the lot and drive home.”
“So what’s new between you and Mr. Ghost?”
I glance at her. “That’s what we’re calling him now?”
“Do you have a better name for him?”
“Rocco.” I answer dryly.
“And how exactly are you sure that’s his real name as he doesn't seem to exist online?”
I roll my eyes. “Not everyone alive right now exists online, Sam.”
“Only those that are alive and have something to hide don’t exist online.”
I turn to see her lips twitching from barely held back amusement. “You’re having a blast, aren’t you?”