When You Were Young

Samantha awoke to a child's scream. She sat, her eyes flashing open. As in the Savannah hotel, she ran a brief inventory to make sure she hadn't changed into a little girl overnight. I'm still me, she thought with despair.

She leaned back against the brass headboard, pressing a hand to her throbbing head. She hadn't suffered from a hangover in years; she'd forgotten how bad they could get. Miss Brigham only added to it with her bright, "How are you feeling, dear?"

"Like I got hit by a truck," Samantha said. She rolled out of bed to search for the bathroom. She found it an instant before a sour concoction rose up in her throat. After she finished vomiting out the entire bottle of whiskey and then some, she collapsed next to the toilet.

"Do you need a doctor?" Miss Brigham asked.

"No. I'll be fine in a few minutes," she said. The words reminded her of what she'd told Andre that morning in the mountains. Only then her sickness had been caused by something much better. She put a hand to her barren, forty-year-old stomach. My baby, she thought. I killed her.

She had to bite down hard on her lip to keep from crying in front of Miss Brigham. The poor woman probably had seen enough already to convince her Samantha was nothing more than a washed-up, useless wreck. "What time is it?" she asked.

"Half-past noon," Miss Brigham said. She still wore the gray dress, but sometime in the morning had taken off the apron and bonnet. She could almost pass for someone from the 20th Century now, Samantha thought. "Do you need anything, dear?"

"Some aspirin would be good."

"Aspirin?"

"Pills. Don't they have headaches in Amish country?"

"Well, yes, I suppose, but the reverend always says prayer is more powerful than any drug." Miss Brigham's face reddened after she said this as if on the verge of tears herself.

"I don't think God looks too favorably on hangovers." Samantha got to her feet and checked the old-fashioned medicine cabinet over the sink. It was empty save for a tube of toothpaste older than her. She could check at the front desk, but talking with the old lady would give her more of a headache.

She stretched out on the bed again, throwing an arm over her eyes. She could sense Miss Brigham fidgeting at the edge of the bed, working up the courage to ask something. "Give me a few more minutes," Samantha said.

"Yes, of course. I don't mean to pressure you, dear."

"And can you stop calling me 'dear' like you're my grandmother? I'm older than you in case you haven't noticed."