Adam spent the rest of the day helping out around town, not that there was much to do, but he was feeling too energetic to just sit still and too wary of overtaxing himself to head out again, even to somewhere nearby, so he compromised by doing whatever sort of odd jobs he could find.
Eventually night came and he sat down for dinner in his usual spot. Mandy was behind the bar, cleaning a glass while she did.
"Heard you're leaving." She said while her eyes remained on the glass she was cleaning, her tone awfully flat.
"Yeah." Adam said as he took his seat and pulled out some caps preemptively to pay for a meal, 12 in total. Mandy glanced at the caps and then took them, heading over to the stove to cook some food for Adam now.
"Well at least you got Salvatore going with you." She said with the same tone.
"Are you… mad?" Adam asked, confused why she was speaking like that.
"No, I'm not mad." She said with a tone that suggested she was mad. She then sighed and turned around to look at Adam. "I'm worried. With all the nonsense going on out there it would be a shame to let a good man die."
"I'm not going to die Mandy." Adam said with a softer tone.
"You say that, but ain't nothing stopping a Deathclaw from tearing you open." She shrugged and then turned back to cook. "All I'm saying is why go through that effort?"
"The same reason I became a Scaver, there are things I can only do by leaving the safety of the walls." Mandy doesn't say anything for a bit, letting the space fill with silence between them for a bit, the sounds of the various other patrons filling the air. After a bit she left the stove on and left the food sizzling in the pan to cook while she walked over to the hose and sprayed out a glass of water for Adam, placing it in front of him. But as she placed it down she held the glass firmly and didn't let it go yet, looking him in the eyes.
"Just, don't die." She said seriously, now finally letting the glass go, heading back to keep cooking again. Adam smiled and laughed a bit.
"You aren't the first to say that to me. Don't worry, I have no plans on dying." He grinned and then chuckled before adding: "Careful, you keep talking like that people will think you are going sweet on me." Mandy turned back around from her cooking to look at Adam with a roll of her eyes and then a grin.
"Don't you go starting any strange rumors." She teased with a sharp but playful tone. Adam just laughed and she went back to cooking.
"Oh but I do have a question." Adam asked as he sipped at the glass of water.
"Oh? Well free to ask, honey. So long as I don't have to answer."
"I saw Salvatore's room today." Adam said before Mandy laughed a bit.
"Oh? You saw his little hovel did you? Man has a damn armory in there." She chuckled. "It's where he lives, what he does with his space is his business."
"Wait, do you mean he owns the room?"
"Oh yeah." She said turning around again. "That's his, practically his house." Adam laughed.
"I didn't know that was an option. Can I buy out the room I'm staying in like that?"
"No." Mandy said back quickly. "His was special. It's a long story that goes back to when he was helping my mom, but we don't sell rooms. He is the exception." She then grins. "You are going to have to get by paying me your room fees." Adam smiled and waved her off.
"What did he do to earn it?" Adam asked, curiously.
"It's a long story, as I said, besides you can just ask him."
"He doesn't seem the type to tell long stories." Adam smiled as he sipped at his drink again.
"Come on, you can't just leave me hanging like that. Besides I hired the guy, it would be good to know a bit of history." Mandy sighed as she flipped the meat cooking in the pan to let the otherside cook now.
"I was just a young girl, I hardly remember anything from back then, I really was too young, Eric was just a baby so he wouldn't know any of this…" She began, still not looking at Adam but instead at her cooking. "We used to live in a town called OakWood to the west, I can't tell you anything about it because by the time I could tell what was going on around me the town was already destroyed, a super mutant raid." She paused as she collected her thoughts.
"My parents and I became drifters for a while, wandering from place to place, scavenging what we could to survive… I hate dog food…" She muttered softly, mostly hidden behind the sound of sizzling. "Anyway, it was during one of these days that my father died, it was unceremonious, he just got an infection that we couldn't cure, died just like that. Then Salvatore appeared, said he'd bring us somewhere safe." She paused as she turned off the stove, plated the food, and then put the plate in front of Adam.
"He brought us here, took weeks, I don't know what he was doing that far out west, he never spoke about it, but thanks to him, me, my mother, and my brother arrived safely." She paused again as she leaned against the counter and sighed softly. "My mother made a deal with the town, it was still newer back then, it had only been around for a few decades then. She promised to run an inn and bar in exchange for having a building to house us in." She shook her head and smiled wistfully.
'I don't know how she did it, but she raised me and Eric, and ran the place all by herself. I mean, that is until she met our step father." She got off the bar and went back to cleaning glasses now. "When she died, our step father left, don't know where he went, and truthfully, I don't care. But then the Inn became mine, and now we are here." She laughed softly.
"Sorry. That became more a story about me than I intended." She smiled. "The fact of the matter is my mother, to thank him for bringing us all the way here, gave him that room to use as his for as long as he wanted it, free of charge."
"Stingy ass bastard has been leeching off me since I was a child." She grinned as she looked towards the door to Salvatore's room. "He will likely outlive me and he's got a room in this place for his entire life so long as someone takes over this place." She laughed softly.
"But, truthfully, I guess it's fine, it's nice having him around. He's almost like a grumpy old uncle to me, he was the one who taught me how to defend myself… and who taught me how to smoke." She rolled her eyes, put the glass she was cleaning down and then put her hands on her hips.
"When I finally quit smoking I made him quit too, not that he did, but I banned him from smoking inside. Of course I had to smack him a few times before he did." She grinned. "Well there you go, that's how I know Salvatore and why he gets a room for free and you still gotta pay. Hope that sates your curiosity for the day."
"Oh it most certainly does." Adam smiled. "I knew Salvatore had been around for a while and you mentioned him being involved with your parents but it really puts in perspective that he was doing this when you were just a kid.
"Yup, that old bastard will never die." She shook her head. "As much as I would like him too!" She shouted at Salvatore's door which was now open as Salvatore was walking out of, presumably to grab a drink.
"Yeah yeah, just pour me a glass will you?" Salvatore said with a nonchalant shrug as he took a seat at the bar. "And stop telling stories about me would you? I'm not the same man from back then."
"Sure~" Mandy responded with a teasing tone as she grabbed a bottle of liquor off the back shelf and poured Salvatore a glass. "The same grumpy old man with a bad attitude as ever~" She grinned. Salvatore just grunted dismissively and Adam laughed.
If nothing else it was nice to know that the man he was bringing with him had enough experience for multiple lifetimes. He already knew that, but it seemed as though Salvatore had a softer heart than he let on. Though if he said that to him he'd probably get a nasty look, so perhaps he'd just keep that much to himself.