Detour Vacation

Sandrine squeezed dollops of hair cleanser, hair moisturizer, facial skin cleanser, facial skin exfoliator, and body cleanser and poured splashes of balancing toner and her favorite perfume oil, facial moisturizing gel, body cream, and a detoxifying clay mask into tiny clear jars, all labeled. She packed them carefully into a pod and slipped them, now snugly contained, into the corner of her suitcase. Moving on to medications and vitamins, she repeated the process, counting each prescription and over-the-counter medication, locking them in their tiny vaults, and placing each neatly inside their packing pod for safe transport.

She had already gone down the list of items they would need in the car, and any hotels they might stay at. Now that she'd finished toiletries, she could move on to clothing and then would get to rounding up anything they were still using, like electronics and chargers, tomorrow before they left.

Sandrine loved to travel, but this trip was weighing heavy on her knotted shoulders. She loved to be in control… not in control per se, just in charge… OK, that didn't exactly sound great either… she just liked to organize everything and make sure every aspect of the event would be taken care of. Surprises just made her uneasy was all.

She usually made an itinerary binder with locations they would be staying, restaurant options, road maps, pockets to hold paper stubs, and receipts from the trip, the whole nine yards. She was used to planning everything. It was one of the best parts of going on vacation for Sandrine.

Unfortunately, this go-round, Samantha insisted she would plan everything. It had been a nerve-wracking marathon getting to the day of embarkation. Samantha had evaded almost every single question she was asked. Even the type of vacation she was planning was tough on Sandrine.

"A road trip. Is a road trip even a vacation?"

That sentence had started a fight that didn't end where one would have wanted it to. In fact, that statement alone was probably how Sandrine had lost control of the vacation entirely. So here she was, "packing light" and with no clear picture of what they would be doing or where they would be going. That was literally an impossible task.

All she could do was stare periodically at the single duffle bag Samantha had pulled out that morning but had not even begun to pack. They were leaving tomorrow; it was infuriating that Sam could look Sandrine in the eyes and tell her she supposedly "had everything in hand" but hadn't packed one single item yet.

She hadn't loaded the items they wouldn't be using before they left into the car. Was it so hard to put a tote with the lap blankets, books, trash bags, tissues, and everything else we would need into the backseat? She hadn't told her any of their stops! It was like Sam wanted to say she was planning the vacation while leaving all of the work to Sandrine.

It finally became too much for her, and Sandrine started packing both of their clothes at the same time once it came time for packing clothes. Samantha walked in on Sandrine in the midst of mumbling under her breath about weather conditions and packing two pairs of pants, shorts, as well as every length of top, and a few sweaters for good measure.

"What are you doing? I told you I had everything well in hand. I am more than capable of packing my own bag, and why do you think I need so many pairs of pants? We will only be gone for a week. I need two pairs of jeans max, a few tops, and something to sleep in."

"Alright, so we are going somewhere cooler? I can put back all of the shorts. What about the bathing suits?"

Sandrine started shifting items on the bed and in her bag around and putting them away.

" OMG, Sandi. I literally don't know where we are going yet. I didn't want to tell you until we were on the road, but that is the surprise. I call it Detour Vacation!"

Samantha threw up her arms, a massive smile on her face.

Horrified, Sandrine backed away, dropping the tank top and bathing suit she'd grabbed on a second pass over the bags.

"You what? You just didn't plan the vacation and said you did? I knew I should have planned a backup just in case."

Sandrine's look of horror turned to anger and betrayal, suddenly seeing dozens of instances of Samantha brushing off her concerns flashing before her eyes. Those scenes weren't the only thing flashing. Red splashes tinged the memories, and the heat of blood rising to her face forced Sandrine to sit down and put her head between her legs.

"OUT, just get OUT!" Sandrine pointed at the door to their bedroom, desperately trying to choke air down her windpipe.

Samantha, stunned, turned and left in hurt silence. All of Sandrine's nagging and obsessive control over all of their previous vacations ran through her head. Sandrine couldn't even give her one vacation to relax and see the sights.

Tears seared her face.

She treats me like I'm a child, like everything I do is some attack on her, but I'm trying to have a happy life too, you know? Samantha thought to herself

"I just want to have a happy life too!"

She yelled impotently at the door from the sofa, realizing it would only make things worse before trailing off and hearing the wailing intensify from behind the shining plank of modern architecture featuring a red line in the center. It was referred to as "a door," though it barely functioned, and it made Samantha irrationally angry every time it was shut because it meant she would have to struggle to open it again.

Instead of waiting to hear the verdict on whether or not Sandrine would decide to come on the perfect vacation she promised her, Samantha grabbed a handful of clean clothes out of the dryer, stuffed them into a grocery bag, and left a note on the counter.

~~~~~

Gone on my detour vacation,

Don't know why I thought you would want to go with me.

Sorry, I fucked up as usual.

See you in a week when I get back.

Love you,

Samantha

~~~~~

The rain had been at it since maybe thirty minutes after Samantha pulled out of the drive.

She didn't mind it; driving in the rain. It was sort of therapeutic. Except for all the morons driving in the leftmost lane instead of passing. What was even going on?

Samantha sped around the cautious car, tutting along ahead of her. She rolled her window down to yell out of it, getting a face full of mist as she sped down the rainy highway.

"What's the deal? Is water your secret ingredient? It's a cup of idiot stirring up right in front of me! Christ!"

Passing the old brightly painted Volkswagen on the right-hand side, she thought about how odd the car looked, almost as if it were driving backward, it was going so slowly.

Samantha knew it was just a trick of the eye and some changing angles, but watching the anachronistic car disappear behind while it still technically chugged along lazily, like a silk scarf floating in the wind. It filled her with a bit of wonder, and thinking about it made her let out a tiny sigh of relief for some reason.

When she retracted her dampened face and rolled the glass back into place, she was slightly less animated and no longer felt the need to scream, though she was no less perturbed by the lack of decorum on the roads. She hated terrible drivers every day, but that wasn't what had her so worked up.

She couldn't help being on edge after everything that'd happened with Sandi. She just kept running things over and over in her head. She knew she was in the right, so why did she feel like such garbage over this?

---

After a good half-hour of silence - well, crying and sniffling could undoubtedly be heard from the bedroom, but silence blanketed the rest of the dwelling - Sandrine finally emerged, only peeking her face out at first.

"Samantha? Hello? Are you here? … tch… Who am I even talking to? And why? I know she's gone."

It took all of Sandrine's willpower not to break down into sobbing tears again. Instead, she grabbed some leftover Chinese food from the fridge. Usually, she'd make them both plates, all of the different dishes served up in equal portions, with fresh rice and a pot of tea.

On this occasion, she dumped her choice of sweet and spicy pork on top of the lo mein, ripped the metal handle out of the sides, and heated the lot in the microwave. After eyeballing the level in the bottle, Sandrine finished off the red wine that had been started earlier in the week, poured a serving and a half into a wine glass, and returned to the bedroom. Leaving the steamed edamame and Samantha's favorite, the beef and broccoli, untouched.

She carelessly dropped items of clothing as she walked back through the bedroom into the en suite bathroom, sipping her wine as she went, a pair of disposable chopsticks poking out the top of her cardboard receptacle. It was their custom to get extras when they got takeout, so they always had some. A single tear slid down her cheek, uncontrolled and unnoticed. Their custom…

She started the bath, setting her mostly full carton of food on the tub's rim, and got a pair of comfy pajamas out. Blowing her nose for the fiftieth time, she flipped on the television and set it to the evening news so there would be some distracting noise while she soaked, and ate, and mulled things over.

"I am obviously right here; there is no doubt about that. The real question is why Samantha would do something like this. Why make a huge vacation-ruining scene and run off without even attempting to fix things? There must be something more going on."

Sandrine mused over the news of the latest school shooting, and stock prices almost seamlessly interposed over each other. This was reported by a brightly grinning woman in her late thirties to mid-forties who showed no visible signs of aging or understanding the words she was transmitting.

Sandrine scooted deeper into the bath, setting the food carton back on the tub's edge, letting her hair float in the water around her, stopping at her earlobes, keeping the canal above the danger line. Trying to relax, she focused solely on letting go, but that was no good.

All she kept running through were the likely possibilities for where Samantha went.

---

The green sign to her right indicated food, fuel, and lodging were all at the next exit. Since Samantha had technically left early, she could stop anywhere and still be ahead of schedule. There had to be something good down here, where there was fast food and houses; surely there must be something better.

Since Sandi wasn't with her, she could stop anywhere, though this random exit off of the California coastal highway wasn't exactly wowing her. McDonalds? Taco Bell? Those were available all of the time everywhere. Where was the buried hole-in-the-wall gem she was sifting for?

Samantha was finally having the detour vacation she planned for. Just bumping around some little seaside town she didn't even catch the name of, and for once, it didn't matter where she was. All that mattered at that particular moment was finding some dinner.

It called to her, through a break in the row of heavily weathered short wood board-sided houses, a taco truck on what appeared to be a thoroughfare filled with businesses. There, she could see folks in work gear of several professions in various states or ordering and eating. Even a few people in business suits took up the two plastic sets of lawn furniture the family had set up in front of the truck.

This was it. She just had to figure out how to get there.

"Ahhh, screw it…"

Samantha was hungry, tired, and emotionally spent; she screeched to a halt, parking the car on the street where she was. Before she made her mad dash, she looked both ways, of course.

---

"HA!"

Sandrine exclaimed, jutting out of the water like a torpedo. Bath water came sheeting off at the sudden movement, spilling in all directions into her wine, her half-eaten carton of food, onto the floor. Some even got on the counter behind her, traveling like a stealthy snake, moistening her pajamas before she could see or do anything about it.

"NO!"

Leaping into action, Sandrine went for the towel hanging on the closet door, only to kick the wine glass into the front of the toilet, shattering it and splattering red wine across the entire bathroom, rendering it almost entirely impassable.

A single gasping screech escaped her throat as she stood frozen, offending leg hanging in midair, dangling precariously as she watched drops of wine fade into the bath water. Concerned she may have sent shards of glass flying into the tub and unsure if it would be wise to drain glass shards into the plumbing, she was stuck in a feedback loop. Should she drain the tub and work from there, or should she leave the water for now and find another way out?

But what other way out? She finally escaped the circular logic path.

"The Towel!"

Almost falling over, naked, into the shards of paper-thin glass littering the ground in front of her from the force with which she uttered that realization. After gasping, to tighten up her core and save her face from the nightmare that was her once pristine bathroom floor, Sandrine refocused her gaze. All her attention, really, on the towel. She had to get the towel, her pajamas, anything she could lay over the glass and use to get out of the danger zone.

---

"I will have one of everything, please!"

Samantha said with a huge smile on her still slightly strained face. The soft older woman who took her order looked momentarily surprised, laughed to herself, and then spoke to the cook at the griddle just a few feet away from where she sat in the window. Samantha couldn't quite hear what she said but hoped it was something along the lines of extra peppers or throw in something special.

It was something like that, as a few items were not posted on the fairly limited menu board. Samantha was still blown away by the inexpensive price and how quickly her order reached her hands. She contemplated taking it to the car, but knew she would get caught up trying to find somewhere to stay if she did that, so instead, sat at one of the patio tables that had just opened up and tucked in.

They were by far and away the best tacos she had eaten in years. Every meat was juicy and succulent, not to mention piled onto the lightly warmed soft corn tortillas just crisped on the edges. Each morsel of shredded chicken, carne asada, and al pastor was completely saturated in flavor. The onions and peppers were crisp and fresh, barely touching the grill's sizzling heat. The jalapenos and carrots were spicy, freshly pickled, not from a can.

It was good there was no one here for her to talk to because the only things escaping her mouth right now were dribbles of spicy juices and uncontrolled omm-noms. Usually, Samantha would be embarrassed by the mess she was making, but she had run out of fucks to give.

Once all the napkins and foil wrapping had been disposed of, Samantha pulled out and around the block to a small but clean-looking Motel 6.

"Cheap and close. Is there anything better than that?" Samantha asked to no one in particular as she grabbed her grocery bag filled with clothes out of the back seat.

"Not that I can think of, Hoo Boy!"

Shocked to hear someone answer her, Samantha stood up quickly, slamming the door to her car in the process, unknowingly trapping her shirt when she did so. She was faced with a heavy-set man in his… fifties? It was a little tricky to tell with a full head of blonde hair and a grey mustache. He seemed especially jolly to be checking into a Motel 6 on a Friday night. Samantha looked around but didn't see anyone else. She wondered if he had a family somewhere around, in the car, or already in a room, or if he was traveling alone.

Almost as if he could read the questions running across her furrowed brow, the man took a half step back and introduced himself quickly.

---

The sound of glass crunching beneath her thick, absorbent bath towels was both anxiety-inducing and an audible relief since her feet seemed fine. She didn't want to run across, possibly slipping and causing more mayhem, but Sandrine felt like she was moving in slow motion. Not the beautiful, floaty, catching butterflies in a field of falling flower petals, slow motion. It's more like the horror movie, strapped to a runaway shopping cart, while clowns jump out from behind barren trees on fire, kind of slow motion.

When she reached the bedroom and spotted a pair of shoes, she put them on first thing. Then, beelined for the bed. Still damp, though mostly drip-dried from how long it took her to get out of the bathroom, Sandrine slipped the shoes right back off and curled up in the bed, getting dry and warm. Unable to cope with the series of increasingly distressing issues having occurred throughout the day. She fell into a fitful sleep.

---

"I'm Sorry, I should introduce myself. My name's Sam, Samuel Tankler. I tend to sneak up on people, but it's quite by accident. When I hear someone talking, I just can't help talking back. My friends always joke I should have been named Sam Talkler! Bwahhh hahahaha"

Eyes wide, Samantha took a moment to register all that had just been said before bursting out laughing, slapping her knee, and ripping her shirt in the car door.

Before turning in, the two Sams spent a good hour chatting around the fireplace in the hotel lobby. It was a pleasant conversation; Samuel shared about working on the road and only seeing his wife on the weekends. They laughed about the tear in Samantha's outer shirt. Samantha even grabbed one of those exorbitantly overpriced fix-it kits from the hotel "gift shop" selection hanging on the wall next to the register.

She wasn't as handy as she'd hoped, however. Instead of sewing the tear, when she couldn't get the needle threaded, even with the strange contraption that looked like a flimsy dime on a wire, she used the three safety pins included to hold the shirt together instead. Instigating a new round of chuckles, holding up the slightly mangled flannel to the light, now shining through the "mended" crack.

---

The middle of the night came much sooner than Sandrine would have liked. Remembering the mess she fell asleep to just before it was too late, she grabbed either side of the doorway, managed to keep both feet planted on the ground, and pushed her way back out of the bathroom door. Narrowly avoiding a foot full of wine-stained glass, she padded across the living room to the guest bathroom in the darkness.

Trying not to lose the sleepiness in her eyes, she didn't bother to turn on any lights, bumping her tender shin on the coffee table as she wasn't used to contending with it on the way back from the bathroom. That, unfortunately, kept her awake a few minutes longer than she would have liked. Sandrine plopped back under the covers after the massive ordeal of taking a midnight pee, rubbing her slightly swelling foreleg in the darkness, and drifted back into a fitful sleep. Distressed and alone in a bed made for two.

---

Samantha awoke refreshed but with a pit in her stomach. It was small enough to ignore, at least for a time. So she got in a quick shower, put on a new set of undergarments, and redressed in the clothes she had been wearing when she arrived. Laughing again at her overshirt as she put it on; it made her look like she was permanently stuck in some sort of phase teenagers go through.

Sam made a quick Google search on her phone, looking for "attractions near me," and found there was a flea market only about half an hour away, which seemed as good a start as any. So she made herself a cup of coffee in the tiny machine they have in most hotel rooms. She grabbed an apple from a basket on the desk before dropping the key in the quick checkout slot and drove through McDonald's on her way to the freeway ramp.

She was trying to surreptitiously look at the GPS on her phone while merging with other drivers onto the onramp and eating an egg McMuffin. Something had to give. Those splotches of mustard falling from the greasy conglomeration of egg bread and cheese onto her shirt were the universe being kind. The words escaping her mouth may not have made it sound like she agreed that was the most preferred option, but Samantha knew it was, given the other two.

---

Finally, up for real, Sandrine sat sulking over a cup of coffee and the last few bites of an English muffin with deli ham and pepper-jack cheese when she let out a grunt and harumphed herself up into cleaning mode. She had sat around moping long enough and was rested well enough to clean the bathroom top to bottom If it came down to it. Which it just might; in her mind, the entire room was bathed in blood-red wine.

She had put on some old sweats she wouldn't have to worry about getting the odd wine stain on and some trainers to keep her feet safe. Fortunately, a good majority of the wine had dried by then, and though it was a shocking mess, it just looked like a splatter of wine on the wall, more purple than red. So she started sweeping up the broken glass first, then got down to the nitty-gritty of locating all the little bits she knew she'd missed.

"Next order of business, how to drain the tub?"

---

As she walked around the flea market, trying to ignore the greasy bright yellow stain on her shirt, Sam's eyes bounded from one junk crowded stall to the next. Her eyes sparkled at the sheer possibility of it all. Anything could be found at a flea market, literally anything. Why she had read articles about people finding old landmines or hand grenades for sale, the person who found it and was selling it had no idea they were hauling around a live grenade. Sam laughed to herself as she practically skipped up to a booth.

This one had Rubbermaid bins filled with CDs and DVDs. Most of them were ordered and alphabetized, but one large bin was filled with blank, unlabeled cases. Samantha was sure they couldn't be anything good, but her curiosity was still piqued. She grabbed one of the unlabeled DVDs and opened it up; it was a DVR with "All My Children Season 15 episodes 1–4" written on black marker across the front of the disc.

Sam snickered, closed the box, and put it back. She wasn't sure the whole bin was filled with soap opera discs, but it was a safe bet. That was when Sam saw it from across the Flea Market at another stall. The perfect gift, something she had seen Sandi looking at on Pinterest and commenting on whenever they'd seen one come up on some home decorating show. A real, old card catalog with those little windowed drawer pulls and dozens of tiny drawers.

---

A coffee filter would work, but how could she weigh it down and keep it tight around the drain?

"I know!"

Sandrine was on the kitchen floor with half the things pulled out of the cabinets when she found the silicone bowl lids she had been searching for. They were weird gadgets her mother had given her, and she'd never even opened them. Well, today was the day to try them out, just not around the edges of any bowls; all of their bowls had matching lids, for heaven's sake. She got the smallest one and went back to the bathroom. She put the coffee filter and silicone ring together how she thought they should go first, with some of the silicone ring covering the filter's edges and half hanging off to hopefully adhere to the bottom of the tub.

It took a couple of minutes, fighting the water and the drain plug to get the thing down there and secure, but it worked as well as anything was going to, and she pressed down, popping open the drain; it took longer than usual to drain since the water was being forced through the coffee filter, but eventually, the tub was empty. Well, mostly empty, three tiny shards of glass shone in the wetness when all was said and done.

Sandi picked them up carefully, then got a thick towel to do a final pass, absorbing the last of the water and picking up any splinters she couldn't see. Repeating this process with the rag, passing it over all the surfaces, picking up handsoaps and knick-knacks, and making sure there weren't any slivers left. She probably shouldn't have let go of any momentum, but before finally getting started on the wine wall, Sandi rested, heaping up on the couch and changing the blasting pop music to some more relaxed classical.

---

Samantha raced to the Card Catalogue, worried someone else would lay their hands on it, and yell "sold!" right before she could get hers on the coveted item. Thankfully, that sort of thing only happens in the movies, for the most part. When Sam arrived, out of breath, she slapped her hand down on the box and yelled

"SOLD!"

She nearly knocked the little old lady sitting in her lawn chair over with the shockwave.

Embarrassed, Samantha tried to take a step back, open a few drawers, and act like she was thinking about it a little, but once the woman selling the cabinet got up and came around to speak with Sam, the excitement had returned. She was all handshakes and thank yous.

Samantha couldn't help but wonder while loading the item into her vehicle if she shouldn't have tried to barter some. There wasn't really a price tag, and when the lady said it was $300, she hadn't even considered trying to haggle her down.

All that matters is that this will make Sandi SO happy, and without another look at her GPS, Sam got back on the highway and headed home. She wasn't sure Sandi would be in the mood to see her, but she was at least not coming back empty-handed. It only took a few hours to get back since she hadn't made it that far, and Sam was pulling into the driveway by lunchtime.

---

Not satisfied with how any of her cleaning products had affected the wine stain on the wall, Sandrine was in the kitchen with the fridge door open, simultaneously looking at paint prices while looking for something to eat for lunch. She was saying out loud to herself.

"I obviously can't paint a five-foot square of the wall; even if I had the right paint, It would still show. I am just going to have to paint the whole bathroom. What sort of paint do I need for…"

As she was project planning aloud, she heard the car pull up and almost dropped her phone when she closed the fridge with the other hand to see who it was. Sam hadn't called or texted, so she didn't expect her back just then. So, seeing Samantha pulling a card catalog cabinet out of the rear hatch of her vehicle in a torn-up shirt covered in mustard was a bit of a shock. Smiling no less!

When she saw Sandi's angry and confused look, her smile faded a bit.

"I would have called, but I wasn't that far, and I was on the road when I thought of it. Sorry"

Sandi took a deep breath, trying to push out the rush of questions crowding her mind and pick the most relevant one to the current situation.

"Okay… Where did you get that?"

"Oh My God, so today I found a flea market, and it was great; there were all of these soap opera DVDs, and when I saw this, I knew it was perfect! You always say how you want one."

Sam starts to carry the drawers inside, pausing, sets them down, and instead runs to Sandi. Finally, they both let out a big sigh as they embraced. Everything may not be settled, but Sandi realized there was no big secret issue, Samantha just didn't and doesn't plan things her way. It might not be okay yet, but it will be.

K.B. Silver