Libby snorted. “You know where your driving tips are on my list of things to care about? Way down here,” she said, fluttering her fingers down to the floor. She smiled at her joke and began to scrape the sides of the Rocky Road container of ice cream.
“Are you going to polish off the other two pints?” he asked, amused.
“Maybe.” She paused, her spoon filled with melting ice cream. “Do you know how much weight I’ve gained in the last five months? Ten pounds. Ten pounds! And five of those since Mountain View! I thought nervous breakdowns meant you didn’t eat. Well, it’s quite the opposite,” she said, waving her plastic spoon around. She filled her mouth with the last bite of Rocky Road ice cream. “I have to stop.”
Sam didn’t think she needed to stop anything. He thought she looked good with a few curves on her.
He remembered the way she’d looked the night at the carnival, dressed as a scarecrow. She’d painted her face, big black rings around her eyes, a red dot on her nose, pink cheeks. She had straw coming out of the waist of her baggy pants, and sticking out her arms and legs, and from beneath the brim of her wide hat. Naturally, she’d had Alice and Max in tow—Sam rarely saw her without those two. Max was dressed as Buzz Lightyear, and little Alice was a ballerina.
He’d first spotted them at the kid’s spinning wheel. Alice spun the wheel, and it landed on an image of a piece of candy in a wrapper. Libby leapt into the air with a cheer. Little Max, his face tipped up to Libby’s, mimicked her.
They’d spun the wheel a couple more times, Libby celebrating with each draw. When the kids had their candy, she pointed to the petting zoo and started the children in that direction. As they walked past Sam, Libby said, “Great costume, Deputy Dog. You must have worked on that for days.”
He glanced down at his street clothes. “Hey, it takes a lot of creative talent to pull off the off-duty deputy look.”
Libby had tossed her head back with a gay laugh. “Then you should be proud, because that is exactly what you look like.” He recalled how she’d given him a fluttering finger wave as she led the kids away. Same as she’d given him a couple of nights ago out at the ranch when she’d wanted him to leave.
“I think Rocky Road is my favorite,” she announced now, peering into the empty container. “What’s yours?”
“I guess I’m a plain-chocolate kind of guy.”
Libby snorted. “Why does that not surprise me?” She tossed the empty Rocky Road container into the bag.
Sam wondered if she remembered that night at the carnival. If she remembered Jim Burton, or what she’d done. He would never forget it. He’d been watching an old couple two-step around the room, their steps so familiar to one another that they looked in opposite directions, seemingly lost in the rhythm of a lifetime together. He was so entranced by them that he didn’t notice Jim Burton or the beers he was holding until he was standing right next to him. “Hey, Sam, you call this working?” he’d asked jovially. “How about a beer?”
“Better not,” he’d said. Looking back on it, Sam didn’t think he’d felt that panic he’d felt fresh out of rehab when someone offered him a drink. He just remembered feeling uncomfortable. Annoyed.
“These Rotary boys won’t care if you have a beer. It’s a party, man!” Jim had held out the beer to Sam, swaying a little as he did.
Sam had put his hand on Jim’s shoulder, looked him in the eye. “No thanks, Jim. I’m good.”
“Good! You can’t be good if you’re dry. Come on, what’s one beer?”
One beer was the difference between life and death to Sam. That was a hard thing to explain to most people, much less a drunk one.
“Don’t be a wet rag,” Jim had persisted, and he pressed the beer against Sam’s chest.
Libby had come to his rescue. She’d suddenly appeared from behind Jim, and with her arms raised, she’d shouted, “Boo!”
Jim had jumped. “Shit, Libby, I didn’t see you,” he’d said, holding a beer over his heart now.
She’d smiled and handed Sam a bottle of water. The bottle wasn’t completely full. “Here you go, Sam. Sorry it took me so long.”
He hadn’t asked her for a bottle of water. He’d guessed it was hers and she was intervening between him and Jim’s beers.
“How are you, Jim?” she asked, shifting, so that she was standing a little in front of Sam.
“Hey, Libby.” Jim shifted his gaze to the dance floor and drank from one of the beers.
“Are you dancing?” she’d asked brightly, and did a funny little swing of her hips. “Let’s go dance the ‘Monster Mash.’ It’s a graveyard smash.” Sam remembered the sound of her laugh, light and easy.
“Ah, no thanks. I’m not much of a dancer.”
“Really? What about you, Sam?”
“I’m working,” he’d said.
“You can have a little fun, can’t you?”
“That’s what I was saying,” Jim had said, clearly disgruntled, judging by the sour look he’d given Sam.