Emergency Contact(36)

“I take it you’re not drinking lately?” She leaned back into the booth.

“No,” said Sam, leaning in. “Haven’t since all of this happened,” he said, stirring the sky with his forefinger.

“Understandable. The smell of gin still turns my stomach.” Lorraine shuddered.

Shameful scenes from their breakup slammed into Sam’s head. The two of them screaming in the street after his debit card stopped working. She’d called him a “bum like his father” and he’d called her a “duplicitous bitch.”

“Lorr, why’d you ask me here?”

“Well, you picked the restaurant,” she said, smiling sweetly.

“Lorraine . . .”

“I don’t know,” she said, averting her gaze. “I thought it would be nice.”

Lorraine snapped another breadstick into ever smaller pieces and arranged them on the table.

He braced himself for the news that they were having twins. Or that she was engaged to someone else.

“That’s it? Really?” he asked. “No news?”

She shook her head.

Sam couldn’t believe he’d had to ask for an advance on his paycheck for this.

“You know what?” he said after a while.

She glanced up at him.

“Let’s create a pact.”

“A pact,” she repeated. Lorraine reached for another breadstick to pulverize. He took it from her. Wasted food made him crazy.

“Yeah,” he said. “The pact is we’ll table everything serious for the duration of the meal, and you and me, we’ll catch up.”

Lorraine’s wine arrived.

“We don’t have to talk about the other stuff.”

“Deal,” she said. She raised her glass in a toast and took a sip.

Sam wanted to excuse himself to look up fetal alcohol syndrome statistics but couldn’t in the spirit of the pact. Stupid pact . . .

“So,” said Lorraine. “What I want to know is . . .” She paused.

“What?”

“Never mind,” she said.

“No, tell me.”

“Where have you been living?”

Sam blinked. “Near campus,” he said.

“Where near campus?”

“Off Guadalupe,” he said. A partial lie at worst. “Why the Spanish Inquisition?” he asked, trying to keep his tone light.

Their pasta dishes landed on the table with a thud as Sam decided he wasn’t hungry. The ziti looked dry.

“Eat and switch?” she asked. “And don’t worry, dinner’s on me.”

Sam nodded and handed her the sausage first. She inevitably wanted the sausage first so she could pick out the crispy ends. The best parts.

“Well.” Lorraine tried again. “I know you’re not living in your car, unless you’re sleeping out of Fin’s. Which I obviously don’t envy.”

Sam’s cheeks burned. Lorraine had a habit of kidding in a way that made you want to walk off a bridge.

“And I talked to Gunner and Gash, so I know you’re not living with them.” Sam used to see Gunner and his cousin Ash (a.k.a. Gash) five nights a week.

He fell silent.

“How’s school?” she asked after a while. Sam shoveled a forkful of pasta into his mouth to mull over the answer. He nodded while he chewed.

Why was Lorraine on a fact-finding mission?

“Good.” He swallowed. “I’m taking a film course at ACC and it’s fine. A lot of freedom. I’m shooting a documentary.”

“Finally,” she said, picking at her meal. “Isn’t it expensive?”

“It ain’t cheap,” he said. “But you can borrow gear, and if all else fails, I’ve got my phone. I’ll shoot it fast and dirty.”

“Well, that suits you,” she said.

What the hell did that mean?

They ate in silence.

“Your turn,” said Sam, working to keep his tone even. “How’s the job?”

“Job’s good,” she said. “I got a raise. Nothing to write home about. Hopefully a promotion’s next. I’ll probably be a junior account manager by next year, which is what I want. I’ll get to travel to LA.”

“That’s great,” he said. He realized he meant it. Traveling for work was the height of glamour as far as Lorraine was concerned.

“And I love the people I work with,” she said. “They’re young and fun to hang out with. You’d think they’re corny.”

Sam immediately thought about Paul again. He had no idea what he looked like. Not that it mattered. Sam could imagine his type exactly. He envisioned Lorraine celebrating her promotion over eighteen-dollar cocktails with some douche-bag with a big shiny watch and buffed square fingernails. He probably plucked his eyebrows and bleached his enormous capped teeth. He thought back to when he and Lorraine met, when she described herself first and foremost as a DJ. He’d since learned most DJs or comedians or musicians were artists by the grace of their parents’ financial support.

“Sausage?”

Sam nodded. The plate of oily meat and tangles of peppers and onions made him queasy. Or perhaps it was something else.

“Lorr, what happened to us?”