The first full day on the ship started off great.
After breakfast Rene and Dawn went to the guest services desk to see if any kind soul found her camcorder overnight and turned it in. As expected, no one had. Rene wondered if she should stop worrying about it altogether.
“It’s only the second day,” Dawn said. “You know it’s on this boat somewhere. I think you should pay more attention to some of these people walking around. One of them could be using your camera right in front of your face.”
Rene thought about that. She looked around and saw that nearly everyone had a camcorder in hand.
“There’s no way I can tell theirs from mine.”
“What color was yours?” Dawn asked.
“Gray with a black screen that flipped open.”
“Okay, so you can rule out all of the blue ones and anything with red on it,” Dawn deduced. “That’s gotta take away at least half of them.”
“There’s still too many to look at.”
“That’s ’cause you’re looking at it from a money point of view,” Dawn guessed.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re only thinking about how much it cost. Three hundred dollars ain’t that much to you. But it’s the principle of the matter. Back in high school you wouldn’t let nobody steal from you. You remember when one of those Perkins twins took your compact?”
“That was Clarissa,” Rene said with a frown. “I wanted to yank her weave out.”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” Dawn said. “Somebody on this boat disrespected you just like that, and you need to find them.”
Rene nodded. “You’re right. I’m going to start looking more.”
“Just don’t start no mess unless me or Mona is around,” Dawn advised.
“All right,” Rene said. “I won’t make a move unless I got some back-up.”
Dawn nodded gruffly, and the girls headed for the spa in the aerobics room. They were told they had to come back at eleven, so the twosome had to find something to occupy the next three hours.
“What do you want to do?” Dawn asked.
Rene pulled an itinerary form from her back pocket and unfolded it. “There’s so much. We could stay here two weeks and never fit it all in.”
“Do you want to look for Mona?”
“Nope,” Rene said. “She’s on her own mission. It’s just you and me.”
Dawn grinned. “I need to take some more pictures.”
***
The girls went to the Sun Deck and snapped a few shots, and they stood in line to “Meet a Golf Pro” while they were up there. Rene hoped it would be somebody famous like Jack Nicklaus or Phil Mickelson, but it was a relative nobody named PJ Mitchell.
PJ never played on a course with Jack or Phil, but he was a very talented. He taught Rene how to perfect her stance, and she sank a nine foot putt for the first time in her life. Dawn couldn’t match that success, but she still had a good time.
After their golf lesson, the ladies went to the Lido Deck to check out some temporary body art. The artists at that event were serious professionals. Rene and Dawn watched a woman get a full dragon painted on her back.
“Dang,” Dawn mused. “They’re good.”
“Are you going to get one?” Rene asked.
“I want to,” Dawn said. “But I’d have to go change into a swimsuit or something…”
“Let’s go change.”
“I don’t know.” Dawn frowned and looked down at her shoes.
Rene narrowed her eyes and took Dawn’s hand. “Girl, come over here.”
She led her to the main pool and pointed out a few unnatural wonders of the world.
“Look at that,” Rene said.
“She’s big,” Dawn noticed.
“Look at those two,” Rene said. She gestured towards two women in their mid-sixties. They were tanned to the max, and their wrinkly skin looked like burnt leather. Their age-appropriate figures sagged unattractively, but both of them still wore bikinis.
“All right. I get your point,” Dawn said.
“So you’re ready to change?”
“Yeah.” Dawn grinned. “I’ll meet you back here in fifteen minutes…”
***
Dawn’s swimsuit was solid black (because she heard that color makes you appear thinner), and it had a skirt attached to hide some of the cellulite in her booty. Even still, Dawn felt self-conscious about the pounds she had stacked on since high school.
When she met up with Rene, Dawn’s self-esteem plunged even further. Rene wore a fiery red bikini, and her figure was perfect in every way. She didn’t have big, chunky arms like Dawn, and her stomach was as flat as a clipboard. Rene’s facial beauty was the icing on the cake, and her Versace shades were to die for. Dawn shook her head and folded her arms over her stomach.
“What’s wrong?” Rene asked.
“I can’t be walking around with you,” Dawn said. “I look like your ugly stepsister.”
Rene laughed. “Girl, no you don’t. Why would you say something like that?”
“I’m so fat,” Dawn pouted. “I hate it. I hate my body!”
Rene saw that she was serious, and her smile faded. “Dawn, don’t talk like that. You’re beautiful, you know that. If you want to lose weight, you can. I can help you, if you want. But don’t worry about it while you’re on this cruise. You’re here to have fun. And you look better than half of the women here.”
“Whatever.”
“I’m serious,” Rene said. “I think you–”
“Hey, y’all headed for the pool?”
Rene looked back and saw a familiar group of men. She recognized one of them as the nice guy who took her and Mona’s picture in front of the Rolls Royce last night.
“Maybe,” Rene said.
“Can we go with y’all?” the cameraman asked. “We just gotta go throw on some shorts.”
“You can go anytime you want to,” Rene said. “We might not even get in the water.”
“That’s cool. We just want to hang out with some pretty girls.”
Rene grinned. “What’s your name?”
“Hector,” the cameraman said. “This is my brother Lupe, and those are my cousins Abel and Mike.” The whole crew smiled brightly.
“All right,” Rene said. “Go put on your shorts, and we’ll meet you out there.”
“Awesome,” Hector said, and they took off.
“See,” Rene said when they were gone. “He said they wanted to hang out with some pretty girls.”
“I know,” Dawn said, and she was clearly excited. “Did you see the way the tall one was looking at me?”
“Doesn’t Henry look at you like that?” Rene queried.
“Come on,” Dawn said, heading for the pool. “If you want me to have a good time, stop asking about him.”
“All right,” Rene said with a chuckle, but her eyes returned to the purple marks on the back of Dawn’s arm as she followed her friend outside.
***
Hector and his crew were a joy to be around. They were carefree and fun-loving. Nearly everything cracked them up. Rene learned they were all from San Antonio, and they loved to meet new people and have a good time.
After a ridiculous game of pool volleyball, Rene and Dawn had lunch with Hector’s family on the Sun Deck. Mike bought a round of Coronas after the meal, and Rene downed hers graciously even though she wasn’t into drinking that early in the day. Rene and Dawn bid them adieu at two-thirty. Hector promised to find them for more fun in the sun on a later date.
“Did you have a good time?” Rene asked on the way back to their cabins.
“Yeah,” Dawn said, her smile big and blissful. “That tall one grabbed my booty while we was in the pool.”
Rene’s laughed. “Nuh-uhn.”
“For real,” Dawn said. “I thought it was an accident, but when I saw the look in his eyes, I knew it was on purpose.”
Rene shook her head. “What’d you do?”
“I told him, ‘You better watch it,’ and he was like, ‘I am watching it,’ you know, trying to look all sexy and stuff. I couldn’t do nothing but laugh.”
“Hmph,” Rene said with one eyebrow raised. “Dawn, Dawn, Dawn…”
“What? I didn’t do nothing.”
“I’ll say…”
“Whatever.” Dawn pushed her friend’s shoulder. “You didn’t see Mona out there, did you?”
“Uh-uhn,” Rene said.
“You think she’s still with those two guys?” Dawn asked. “Do you want to look for her now?”
“She’ll pop up when she’s ready to,” Rene predicted. “I’m sure she’s having the time of her life.”
***
Rene and Dawn changed into sexy dresses and met on the Empress Deck for a dance contest. They thought they’d be shoe-ins because only a handful of blacks chose to participate. But much to Dawn’s dismay, a German couple in their late forties walked off with the shiny trophy.
“That’s not fair,” she told Rene. “They look like dance teachers or something. This is supposed to be for amateurs.”
“Just because they made you look like an amateur doesn’t make them professionals,” Rene quipped.
“You lost, too,” Dawn pointed out.
“I blame that on my amateur partner,” Rene said with a grin.
“Whatever,” Dawn said. “I bet if they have a rump-shaker contest, I’d win that.”
“I’m sure you would,” Rene said. She checked her itinerary again. “Have you ever been to a wine tasting?”
Dawn shook her head. “No. But I want to.”
“Come on,” Rene said. “It’ll be over in thirty minutes.”
The girls went to the Atlantic Deck and tried to play the part of true connoisseurs. They sniffed expensive liquors and swished them around their mouths like they really knew what they were doing.
“This one is quite exquisite,” Rene said about their third selection. “An excellent concoction, indeed.”
Dawn sniffed the same chardonnay and wrinkled her nose. “I dare say it smells like the sweat from a baboon’s balls,” she countered, in her snootiest voice. “No, I’m afraid I shall not be making this purchase!”
Rene laughed, along with a few nearby patrons.
At six o’clock the friends headed for the Windstar Dining Room for the first of what was to become the most memorable meals on the cruise. The Windstar was gracefully decorated like the dining rooms on the Titanic, and all of the wait staff wore crisp tuxedos. The tables were set expertly with more forks and spoons than Dawn could ever figure out how to use. The menus had real leather cases with the most beautiful calligraphy written inside.
For dinner that night, the guests could choose from sugar glazed pork loin with apples and prunes, fettuccine with sautéed shrimp and salmon, or fresh scampi Provencal sautéed in virgin olive oil.
Mona had been gone for so long, her friends didn’t wait to order, but she showed up midway through the meal with much a huff and puff. She took a seat next to Dawn and looked around for a menu.
“Am I too late? Did I miss dinner?”
“Where the hell have you been?” Dawn asked. “We haven’t seen you since breakfast.”
“I been with Bart and them,” Mona said, looking around furtively. “You haven’t seen Dwayne, have you?”
“Who’s Dwayne?”
“That boy I slept with last night,” Mona groaned. “He’s been following me around everywhere. Every time I look up, he’s in my face.”
“Who’s Bart?” Rene asked.
“Bartolo Romero,” Mona said with her best Spanish accent. “That’s the guy I met this morning. His friend’s name is Xavier.”
“Dwayne’s been following you around?” Dawn asked.
“Oh, my God.” Mona sighed. “He’s a stalker for real. He saw me with Bart, but he still won’t leave me alone. He followed us to, like, two different places. I swear he’s starting to creep me out.”
“Who’s Bart?” Rene asked again.
“I told you,” Mona said. “That’s Bartolo.”
“I know, but which one was he?”
“Oh, he’s the taller one,” Mona said. “The one with the curly hair. He’s from Brazil. His friend is, too.”
“That black guy?” Rene asked.
“Yeah, they play soccer for some university,” Mona explained. “Except they don’t call it soccer. They call it fútbol. They’re so funny—and fine. Bart took off his shirt and I wanted to rape him right then. He got some–”
“Y’all had sex already?” Dawn asked.
“Not yet,” Mona said. “But we’re gonna! Girl, I’m hungry. Where can I get a men–”
Before she could finish her sentence, their waitress approached the table. “Good evening, ma’am. Would you like a menu?”
“Naw, just gimme…” She looked from Rene’s plate to Dawn’s. “Gimme what she’s having,” she said, pointing at Dawn’s meal.
“Very good,” the waitress said and disappeared.
“How come we haven’t seen you?” Rene asked Mona. “Were you in their room or something?”
“For a little bit,” Mona said. “But we were walking around mostly. I saw y’all at lunchtime. You were in the pool with those Mexicans.”
“Why didn’t you say something?” Rene asked.
“I was headed the other way,” Mona said. “Plus y’all were having fun on your own. I saw you hugged up with one of them,” she told Dawn.
“I wasn’t hugged up,” Dawn said.
“Girl, he was close enough to kiss the back of your neck,” Mona recalled. “I thought that’s what he was doing at first.”
“No, he was grabbing her booty,” Rene informed Mona.
“No, he wasn’t!” Dawn said with a giggle.
“Don’t be shy,” Mona said. “Just ’cause you got a man don’t mean you can’t get something popping on this boat.”
“I’m not like that,” Dawn said.
“And that’s fine,” Rene said. “But I do want to talk about your boyfriend. You cut me off every–”
“I don’t want to talk about him,” Dawn said. Her smile vanished, and Mona raised a curious eyebrow.
“That’s, um, that’s what I’m talking about,” Rene said. “Whenever I bring him up, your whole mood changes.”
Dawn sighed loudly and looked down at her plate. The food was delicious, but her appetite was completely gone.
“I don’t, I don’t want to accuse him of anything,” Rene said, “but does Henry have anything to do with those bruises on your arm?”
Dawn turned slowly and gave her friend a terrible look that was stuck somewhere between anger and shock. It was such an ugly expression, Rene flinched and subconsciously inched away from her.
“Your boyfriend’s beating on you?” Mona asked. In a split second she was on the verge of a hissy fit, and this was why Rene waited until the three of them were together before she posed the question. Dawn could put off Rene’s curiosity with no problem, but Mona’s personality would not allow such a thing. If there was a mystery afoot, Mona would get to the bottom of it.
“Why you tripping?” Dawn asked Rene. “I told you I don’t want to talk about him.”
“I don’t want to talk about him, either,” Mona said. “I just wanna know if he’s hitting you. Let me see your arm.” She reached for it, and Dawn jerked away roughly. Mona was shocked, and she backed away, too. “What the hell?”
“He don’t be hitting on me,” Dawn said, looking down at her plate again. “He just grabbed my arm.”
“Why’d he grab your arm?” Rene asked.
“It don’t matter,” Dawn said.
“He never hit you?” Mona asked.
Dawn hesitated two seconds too long, and Mona’s mouth fell open.
“Girl, he be hitting on you?”
“It’s, it’s not that bad,” Dawn said. Her eyes filled with moisture and the room faded in a saltwater blur.
“What do you mean it’s not that bad?” Mona said. “One time is that bad, Dawn. How long he been beating on you?”
Dawn gave Rene another hard stare, as if to say, Do you see what you did?, but Rene was on the same page as Mona.
“It’s not right,” Rene said. “You shouldn’t stay with somebody who hits you.”
“It’s not–”
“Or pushes you or grabs your arm like that,” Rene said. “A man should never put his hands on a woman. You can do better than that.”
Dawn felt like she was being cornered. This was embarrassing and hurtful, and if her so-called friends really cared about her, they wouldn’t assail her like this.
“You don’t know what I can do better than!” she spat. “You don’t even know me, so get out my business.”
Rene’s jaw dropped. “What?”
“Who you talking to?” Mona asked.
“I’m talking to you!” Dawn said. “To both of y’all.”
“Why are you getting an attitude?” Rene asked. “We’re only trying to help.”
“I already told you I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I know,” Rene said, “but if you got problems like that at home, I think you do need to get it out in the open. You can’t let some man hit on you, Dawn. That’s, that’s–”
“That’s stupid,” Mona offered.
“So, what, I’m stupid now?” Dawn said.
“I didn’t say you were stupid,” Mona said. “I said that was stupid. If you stay with a man who’s beating on you, that’s stupid. You can do better than that.”
“How do you know?” Dawn’s voice quivered. “How do you know what I can do better than? I didn’t go to college like you did. And I got two kids. You don’t have any. You don’t know what it’s like.”
Rene shook her head. “None of that–”
“And I’m fat!” Dawn reminded them. “If I looked like you, maybe I could pick and choose. But I don’t. You don’t know what my life is like. You don’t know what it’s like to be me!”
By then people from other tables were starting to notice the commotion, and Dawn felt like the biggest loser ever. Who was she trying to fool? This cruise ship, expensive dinners, margaritas under the moonlight; this wasn’t her life.
Dawn was a poor, hardworking, uneducated mother from the hood. That’s all she ever was, and that’s all she would ever be. She was crazy to let Rene and Mona talk her into this ridiculous trip in the first place.
Tears streamed down her cheeks, and Dawn covered her face in shame. Rene reached for her, but Dawn pulled away and made it to her feet.
“I’m going to my room.”
“Wait,” Rene said.
“No! Leave me alone!” She stormed away with her hands hiding her eyes.
Rene started to go after her, but Mona grabbed hold of her arm.
“Let her go.”
“No, I’m not going to let her go! That’s wrong. I don’t want her crying all night. We need to talk to her.”
“She’ll be all right,” Mona said reassuringly. “She probably never talked to anyone about what’s been going on, and it’s hard for her. Give her some time to calm down and think about it. She knows we’re trying to help.”
“Yeah, but–”
“And,” Mona went on, “we’re on a boat in the middle of the ocean. She doesn’t have anywhere to run to. She has to talk to us sooner or later.”
Rene stopped and eyed her friend queerly, surprised by Mona’s insight. Reluctantly, she returned to her seat.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Mona said. “How could someone as beautiful and talented as myself also be good at psychology?”
Rene wasn’t in the mood for jokes. She shook her head and rubbed between her eyes. “Actually I was wondering how someone so understanding could still be such an asshole.”
“I must’ve learned that from yo mama,” Mona said.
“Don’t be talking about my mama,” Rene warned.
“Don’t be talking about my mama,” Mona mocked.
Rene glared at her and then rolled her eyes. “Girl, you stupid.”
***
Rene and Mona remained in the Windstar for the next thirty minutes while Mona devoured her gourmet dinner. They talked about Dawn mostly. Part of Rene still wanted to run to her friend’s cabin and force Dawn to talk to them, but Rene always had a good deal of patience. She knew Mona was right about giving Dawn time to think things through on her own. Surely their friend would be more approachable tomorrow, after a good night’s sleep.
“So what are you going to do tonight?” Rene asked Mona. “Or do I even have to ask…?”
“I’m kicking it with Bart and them,” Mona said. “And you’re coming, too. I’m telling you, his friend is fine as hell.”
“He doesn’t mind you calling him Bart?” Rene wondered.
“That’s what everybody calls him,” Mona said.
“I assume he knows about The Simpsons…”
“Everybody knows… Oh, my God.” Mona stared over Rene’s shoulder, and her eyes grew very large.
“What’s wrong?” Rene asked, and then she looked back and saw for herself. “Damn. Is he serious?”
Dwayne approached their table wearing blue slacks and a heavily starched white button-down. He toted a bouquet of roses acquired from God knows where.
“I gotta get away from him,” Mona said under her breath. “Can you give me a head start?”
“What do you mean?” Rene whispered.
“Just thirty seconds,” Mona hissed.
“What?”
But the stalker was at their table by then.
“Hi, Mona,” Dwayne said. “I, I bought these flowers for you. I was, I was–”
“I’ll be right back,” Mona said. She threw her napkin onto her plate and promptly left the table. Rene finally understood what she meant by give me a head start, and she didn’t like it at all. Dwayne was Mona’s problem. She shouldn’t be pawning him off.
The stalker stood quietly and watched her go. And then his eyes settled on Rene.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hi.”
“She, um, she went to the bathroom?”
“Yeah, I think so,” Rene said.
They watched each other for a few seconds, and an uncomfortable silence ensued.
“You wanna, you wanna sit down?” Rene offered.
“Okay.” Dwayne took a seat across from her, and Rene looked around for the relatives he was supposed to be on vacation with. She didn’t see them anywhere. Rene took a deep breath and sighed. She didn’t like to hurt people’s feelings, but this was getting out of hand.
“Listen, man, I don’t think Mona likes you.”
Dwayne didn’t look totally shocked by this. “She told you that?”
“Not in so many words,” Rene said, and then she caught herself. No, she shouldn’t let one morsel of hope linger. She had to nip this in the bud. “Yeah, she did say that. It’s kinda obvious, isn’t it?”
He shook his head. “We, we spent time together last night. We had–”
“Yeah, I heard about that,” Rene said. “And Mona hasn’t spoken to you since. That doesn’t tell you anything? I mean, has she been nice to you at all today?”
Dwayne knotted his eyebrows in confusion. “I brought her these flowers…”
Rene stared compassionately for a second and then shook her head. “Yeah, I ain’t gon’ be able to do it.” She stood and walked deliberately away from the table.
“Where are you going?” Dwayne called.
“To get Mona for you.” Rene hated to treat him like that, but she was starting to understand why Mona would rather flee the scene than have a rational conversation with him. Dwayne had to be at least a little mentally defective.
When she stepped out of the dining room, Rene almost got run over by a rowdy group of teenagers who didn’t bother to stop to say excuse me. One of the boys was tall with long hair, and in his left hand he carried a camcorder that looked exactly like the one Rene was missing.
She started to go after him, but Rene didn’t have the backup or the courage to approach a complete stranger and accuse him of stealing. She did make a mental note of him, though, before she continued on her way to find out where the hell Mona had gone.
After a few steps she looked back at the Windstar to see if Dwayne was following her. He wasn’t, but the thought gave Rene a fresh crop of goose bumps.