(Formerly) Capt. Jack has a plan

By Sarah

“Okay, so maybe we’re in over our heads…” Sarah admitted and she stood in front the back-upstairs wall of the fire station-now coffee house. The whole surface was plastered from one end to the other with various posters the fireman had put up over the years in the ‘40’s and ’50 during their residence. And while by today’s standard they wouldn’t be considered “scandalous” the two girls didn’t exactly want their whole wall covered with 1940’s pinups. After some thought, the two realized that some of the vintage posters were worth quite a bit, but the trick was finding a way to peel them off the wall with limited damage-it appeared the firemen had used everything from wallpaper paste to tar to get them to stay.
“Ahh, we’ll be okay.” Grace replied from her spot on the opposite wall, where she was stripping layers of paint from on and around the window sill-“After all, it’s only after Halloween, once we get all this stuff cleared, we’ll have plenty of time. Plus technically, as the owners, we could just let the kids run the coffeehouse.”
“The kids? What are we, senior citizens?”
“Oh crap! Did I just say that?”
“Yes!”
“Okay-the college students? That doesn’t sound much better, does it?”
“Not really-oh well, maybe I can do some age make-up and then we can get discounts at Wal-Mart…hey, maybe if I steam it off-“ Sarah ran downstairs to find the clothes steamer she’d shipped out west and stored in the garage of the firehouse. As she opened the garage door she spied the fire pole and grinned to herself, remembering the day that Cameron had talked Grace into letting him slide down it…that had been a sight to behold. Sarah was pretty sure it entered Grace’s thoughts plenty, after all, that had been the day of the infamous “first kiss”-even if it was only on the cheek. She found the steamer back in the corner and proceeded to drag it back upstairs, stopping several times to catch the falling nozzle and empty out the bewilderingly full bottle of water…she hadn’t shipped it that way, had she? How was that even possible? When she got back inside the coffeehouse she happily had to navigate through a busy room, with a line backed up nearly to the door- and it was only 10am.
“Hey, guys you need any help?” Sarah asked, stowing the steamer in a far corner and going over to her student workers.
“Yeah, actually, we’re kinda swamped here!” Olivia, a quiet, sweet-faced music major with dark cocoa colored curls replied gratefully. “Kyle is full up making cappuccinos over there.” She pointed to a short Korean guy with blue and green spiked hair and an anime tattoo peeking out from under the collar of his bowling shirt.
“Alright, hold up a sec.” Sarah slipped around the counter and tied on an apron, “Hey what can I get for you?” She asked the business man in the loud tie at the beginning of the line.
“Yeah, can I get a Grande Americano with a shot of vanilla?”
“Sure-anything else?” The guy shook his head and Sarah turned to make the drink, skillfully navigating around Olivia and Kyle with his multiple Cappuccinos.
“So guys, are you going to be in town for Christmas this year?” Sarah asked as she helped clear the rush.
“Yeah, actually my parents are going on a cruise for their 35th wedding anniversary, they got married on Christmas Eve-so we’re doing Christmas early this year.”
“Wow…a cruise-are your siblings jealous?” Sarah knew that Olivia had seven brothers and sisters-all younger than she.
“Yeah a little, but I think the fact that we’re all going to Grandma’s in Wisconsin is making up for it-we haven’t seen them for years!”
“That’s awesome! My grandparents were from Wisconsin too-in Monroe.”
“Really? My Grandma lives in Edgerton, on the lake.”
“No way! My aunt lives in Edgerton!”
“Cool.” Olivia smiled shyly and handed a middle-aged woman in a apple sweater her hot tea.
“What about you Kyle? Exciting plans? Going back to the “homeland”? Kyle laughed.
“Nah-I think Mom and Dad plan to stick around here-they’re on furlough ‘till spring.” Kyle was an MK from Seoul, South Korea-adopted, which immediately had put him in kinship with Sarah. He was a huge fan of punk music, Ska, and sported several awesome tattoos, which put him in immediate kinship with Grace.
“So you guys think you might wanna help us out at New Years?” I know everyone has plans, but we could use it-“
“What’s at New Years?” Kyle asked, and Sarah explained the whole death-defying plan to entertain at the coffeehouse.
“Who’s the band? Kyle wanted to know.
“I dunno, someone new called “Event Horizon” Grace says they’re good.
“Well then, they probably are.” Kyle grinned and polished off the last customer’s drink.
“Well hey guys, I’m gonna get back to trying to get these posters off the wall before I forget, now that the rush is gone.”
“Hey thanks for helping out!” Olivia called as Sarah started lugging her steamer upstairs.
Grace was on the phone when she finally made it up there-chatting away, her face animated in a wreath of smiles. She finished up the conversation while Sarah plugged in the steamer and went to work trying to disengage some of the cheaper posters from the wall.
“Guess who that was?” Grace said, snapped her phone shut.
“The president?” Sarah inspected a corner of poster, and noticing it seemed mostly unharmed, continued to peel.
“Yes, he wants his dog back.”
“Already?”
“No, that was none other than Brigadier General Jack O’Neill.”
“Really?” The girls had meat Jack, Sam’s often absent (and apparently newly wed) husband when he’d come to visit from Washington D.C. Apparently he’d worked with Sam, Daniel and their team for several years before “retiring” to D.C.-which also allowed him to finally marry Sam-a move that was apparently still kinda hush-hush. He’d been huge pain in the ass the whole visit- Grace and Sarah liked him a lot.
“Yeah, apparently he’s been calling around town-he’s got some big secret surprise for Sam this Christmas-he didn’t say what-but wanted to know if we’d be up for distracting her for several hours sometime around Christmas, here at the coffeehouse while he “completes his mission.” And apparently, he’s got some rather specific ideas on how to do that.”
“Oh? Do tell!”