In the days following Katrina, as the horribleness of the situation came to be known to the world, the sadness was replaced by shock, and then outrage at the government's inabilities to provide aid and help.
There was plenty of blame to go around; from the local city level, on up through the state officialdom, and onward to the clown college that the present administration had become in Washington, D.C., the politicos played the ‘blame game' as it had not been played in recent memory.
Slowly, the stories of rapes and murder in the Super Dome came to light, along with the ‘ghost tales' of Navy Seal teams infiltrating the city to take out the rogue gangs that had been firing on rescue ‘copters and the like.
Within a week of Katrina it was apparent that it would be a long time before New Orleans could sustain a population with basic services, never mind emergency medical or relief.
Bonnie and Sami were still at Sami's place, trying to put a game plan together of some sort. They knew that the fall semester of 2005 at their school would be non-existent, and they could only hope that the spring semester would actually happen.
Bonnie's home in Gulfport had sustained some damage, but nothing that couldn't be repaired. The problem was that the entire Gulf Coast of Mississippi couldn't provide any basics; water, electricity, telephone services were weeks away yet, so going home for Bonnie was not an option.
Uncle Joe contacted Bonnie and Sami, offering them their jobs back until there was some order restored to New Orleans and the girls knew when, or if, returning to school was going to be an option.
Sami and Bonnie talked about it between themselves, then with Sami's parents, and of course, with Bonnie's parents as well. The girls accepted the fact that they would lose the semester, and since that was a given, they decided that returning to Memphis was not a bad thing; at least, they had someplace to go, to live, and to work.
Not many of the residents of the Crescent City could say that.
Sami and Bonnie returned to Memphis around mid-September, returned to the apartment, but not with the excitement of early summer when they first came to Memphis. They weren't bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, carefree college students when they returned to Memphis; no, Katrina had taken that from them and replaced it with sadness and depression hanging over their heads like the Sword of Damocles.
They accepted the lot that fate had thrown them, and they would survive this set-back in their young lives. What was hard for them to accept was the terrible fate that had befallen the City and its inhabitants; they hurt for months for all who had suffered, and they suffered because they felt guilty at having relatively good fortune dumped in their laps.
Both counted their blessings at having each other in this moment in their lives to lean on, to cry with, and to be strong for.
Thank God, they thought, that, at least, they did have each other.
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"How's it going with you and your girlfriend?" AJ asked, between bites of her salad as she and Sami ate lunch together, in the station's break room.
"Girlfriend? What girlfriend?" Sami answered, and a bit too quickly maybe?
"Sami, please; who between the two of us, ‘knows' things?"
Sami put her head down and bit her lip, chewing on it for a bit before she looked into AJ's eyes.
"Is it that obvious?" Sami answered.
"Only to me, Sami, don't be alarmed."
Nodding her head a bit, Sami took a small bite from her sandwich, and looked at AJ again.
"It's going fine, AJ, and before you ask, I still haven't broken Rule Two, okay?"
"Why is that?"
"Because I respect your boundaries; I did tell her that I had a thing that weekend but never told her with whom," Sami confessed.
"That's a good girl, Sami," AJ smilingly said, finishing her last bite of salad, afterwards, "and would she also respect my boundaries?"
Not sure where this was going, Sami hesitated a bit before answering, "I'm sure she would, AJ, but why is that important?"
"Because, if the two of you accept my invitation to my annual Halloween party, obeying Rule Two is an absolute requirement," AJ said a bit smugly, "and, by the way, costuming is required, got it?"
"Got it," Sami said in reply; she sure is a strange one, thought Sami, as she gathered her lunch trash for disposal, but strange or not, she's a lot of fun, and a party might just be what she and Bonnie needed to get out of the doldrums that they had been in since Katrina.
"We'll clean up the dishes later, sweetie, why don't you pour us a shot and come and join me on the couch?" Sami said to Bonnie, punctuating her suggestion with a kiss to Bonnie's lips.
Bonnie gladly accepted the kiss but wanted more, desperately wanted more from her Sami-girl.
Since the return to Memphis, both girls' libidos had been off-kilter, their love-making less often than before the storm. Slowly, Bonnie had to admit, it was returning to them both and for Bonnie, it couldn't come soon enough.
"Here ya' go, baby," Bonnie smilingly said as she handed Sami her shot of Black Jack.
Touching glasses, they toasted one another and throwing their heads back, shot the Jack, causing them both to shiver just a bit, ya know?
That was the other thing about them since the storm; they both drank a bit more and smoked a wee bit more often than before.
Coping, they told themselves, massaging their guilt a bit.
"We've been invited to a Halloween party, costumes and all; interested?" Sami asked.
