The next morning, I get up early and join the family for breakfast. It’s always a little chilly out on the water before noon, so I pull my soft hoodie on over my T-shirt and pajama pants and climb outside.
“Hey, sleepyhead,” says Mom. She has her legs stretched out on the cockpit seat, and she’s holding a cup of chamomile tea. Her freckles are darkening after all this time in the sun, even though she’s still wearing that giant floppy hat. It actually looks kind of good on her, I admit to myself.
“Hi, Mom.” I take out my phone and snap a photo of her in the early light.
“Are you getting a signal?” she asks.
“No.” I put the phone back in my pocket. “It’s just habit to carry it around.”
“I’m sorry, Clem,” says Mom. “You must feel pretty disconnected, huh?”
“Not really.”
I ease onto the seat across from Mom and accept the cup of hot chocolate with big marshmallows that Olive hands up to me from the galley. As I take the first sip, edging one marshmallow out of the way and being careful not to burn my tongue, I see the sunlight sparkling on the water as seagulls dive in to catch their fishy breakfasts. The wind makes the sails bang around, and when the rigging vibrates it creates this sound that I’ve always thought of as the boat wind chime. I lean back in my seat and peek inside to see Dad just getting the pan out to make eggs. And somehow family breakfast seems like a really nice idea.
After eggs, Olive and I jump in the river.
“Do not splash me in the face,” she says.
This is a big rule with my sister. She hates water in her eyes. I think it’s because she’s worn glasses since she was four, so she feels vulnerable when she’s swimming without them. She even has prescription goggles.
“Then stop being annoying,” I say. This morning was peaceful until Olive admitted she’d borrowed my hairbrush yesterday and lost it. Don’t ask me how you can lose a hairbrush on a boat that’s the size of a peanut, but Olive has managed to lose two in the past three days—hers and mine. I had to use Mom’s comb on my hair this morning, and it wasn’t pretty.
Now that we’re swimming, though, I think I’ll let my hair do its own thing and be kind of curly for the day.
Last night we slept in a spot where the currents aren’t too strong, so Mom and Dad agreed to stay anchored for a couple of hours to let me and Olive jump in. We spent a few minutes doing dives off the bow of the boat, and now we’re closer to shore, practicing our Little Mermaid move. That’s when you go underwater and then jump up as high as you can, breaking the surface and throwing your head back at the same time so it creates a cascade of water over your profile. You have to stick your chest out too. Olive can’t do it really well with short hair, but I taught her the move anyway. It’s a good one.
I’m perfecting my form when I hear a small motor coming around the bend. It’s sputtering and hissing, and I feel my heart speed up a little.
James.
I haven’t seen him for a couple of days, but I’ve been wanting to. I’ve been turning over the word real in my head and wondering what he’d think if he knew me, really. If he knew what happened with Ethan and Amanda. If he knew everything.
But now that he’s heading toward me and Olive, I’m not sure what to say.
Olive, however, is never at a loss for words.
James turns off the choking engine and glides near. Olive swims over and hangs her arms on the side of the dinghy, pulling herself halfway out of the water.
“Hey!” she says.
“Hey!” says James, imitating her enthusiasm.
Then he waves at me. “Hi,” I say.
“Nice moves, Ariel.”
Ack! He saw us doing that silly trick. I have the urge to dive under the water and hide. But that would be extra weird.
“You know the Little Mermaid?” I ask sheepishly.
“Of course,” he says. “I spent a lot of summers at my neighborhood pool. My friends and I all loved it when the girls did that move, because—” He stops talking and laughs a little. “Well, because girls look good when they do it.”
He gives me a wide grin, and I can’t help but smile back.
“I thought you made up that move, Clem,” says Olive, looking over her shoulder at me.
I shrug. “I guess Disney made it up.”
Olive turns back to James.
“Are you taking us exploring again?”
“Not today,” he says. I feel a pang of disappointment.
“My dad just wants to know if we should bring anything tonight,” he says. “For dinner.”
“Dinner?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says. “You didn’t know your parents invited us over?”
“No.”
“Oh,” says James, his grin fading a little. “I thought maybe you—”
“Not that I don’t want you to come!” I interrupt. “I just didn’t hear about it.”
“Yeah,” he says, his smile brightening again. “They radioed over to us. We’re meeting you guys at the next marina.”
“Cool,” I say. And it is cool. Even though my parents are meddling a little, maybe they noticed that I’ve been happier these past couple of days. Maybe they imagine it’s got something to do with James. Maybe they’re right.
I look over at The Possibility and see Dad pretending to read. But the book has fallen beside him and his hat is over his face. Total nap.
“I’ll go ask what you should bring!” says Olive. She paddles toward the swimming ladder.
There’s a moment of silence as we watch her swim over to the boat’s ladder and climb up into the cockpit. It makes me nervous.
“She really liked the spaghetti,” I say, kind of lamely. I want to say something more, something meaningful, because I’ve been thinking a lot about James since I left the dock in Paducah. But nothing is coming to me.
“It’s good,” says James. “It was my mom’s recipe. It is her recipe, I mean. I guess it’ll always be her recipe.”
“Oh,” I say, not sure how to respond.
“Mom says just bring conversation!” shouts Olive from The Possibility.
“Roger that!” shouts James, smiling quickly and erasing the shadow that I know I saw cross his face.
He looks down at me. “See you tonight,” he says. With that, he starts up the sputtering engine and heads back to Dreaming of Sylvia.
There are more tall ship tales this evening, and Mr. Townsend has my parents laughing embarrassingly hard again. But it’s nice to have guests. Mom even made meatloaf from scratch. Dad helped a lot.
James looks at me a few times during dinner in a way that makes me think he wants to talk to me. You know, in that eyes-a-little-wider-than-usual, head-pointed-outside way? He isn’t very subtle, actually, but I guess it’s up to me to make it happen.
When Olive excuses herself to use the head, I create an opening.
“I’m going outside for some fresh air,” I say, grabbing my extra-big UNC sweatshirt from the couch. It sounds like what people say in movies or something, and it works.
James follows. We walk out to the cockpit and then along the edge of the boat to the bow, where it will take longer for Olive to find us, and we’ll hear her coming. I sit on top of the hatch over my parents’ bedroom so she can’t pop up that way.
And at the same time, James says, “I want to—”
“You go,” I say, laughing.
“I have to tell you something,” he says.
I nod. He looks serious.
“It’s kind of sad,” he says. “But don’t stop me until I’m finished.”
“Okay,” I say solemnly.
“Last summer, after this trip, my mom and dad got separated,” says James.
My eyes widen in surprise, but I stay quiet.
“My family’s been doing this summer sailing trip for four years now, so it’s kinda weird without her.”
“Oh,” I say quietly, thinking of Mr. Townsend and that day I saw him get emotional out on the water. “Yeah, that must be … weird.”
I’m frustrated by how obvious I sound. I just don’t know what to say.
But James doesn’t seem to notice.
“It’s been sort of okay—I’ve been trying not to think about it. She moved out and stuff, but I guess I thought …” He pauses. “Well, right before we left to go sailing, my dad got papers from her filing for an official divorce.”
“Oh.” Again, my eloquence is unparalleled.
“Yeah, it hit him kind of hard. I mean, me, too, but I knew when she moved out that it was probably … I don’t know, the end or something. Anyway, I know I acted funny when you asked about her the other day, and I’m sorry I didn’t explain that sooner.”
“James, you don’t have to—” I start, but he puts a finger up to my lips.
“S’mores!” shouts Olive from the cockpit. I turn to look at her and she sees my serious face. It quiets her, but it also makes her curious. She starts climbing toward us on the bow.
“Olive, not now.” My voice is stern.
“It’s okay,” says James, softly to me. Then louder: “Crazy Olive, I love s’mores!”
Olive smiles tentatively. “Mom’s using dark chocolate.” She knows that’s my favorite.
“Okay,” I say. I hold my hand out to stop her from coming out to the bow. “Go back down and we’ll meet you in the cockpit really soon.”
She pauses for a minute, and then I guess she realizes I’m being serious and not just shutting her out of something because I’m annoyed with her. She slinks down to the cockpit.
James puts his arm around me and squeezes.
“Hey, Clem,” he says. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. I’m okay.”
I nod and pull my sweatshirt sleeve over my hand.
“My dad, though,” James continues. “He really doesn’t like to talk about it. So can you maybe not mention this?”
I nod again, and suddenly I remember that Mom thinks James’s mother is just off volunteering in Africa or South America or something. Maybe she got that wrong?
I shake my head and exhale loudly to clear my mind. I want to go back and make s’mores with a cheerful face, especially if Mr. Townsend gets upset around this topic.
Everyone is settled into the cockpit already, having after-dinner coffees. James and I sit near Olive and open a box of graham crackers. We have a little kitchen blowtorch—it’s not quite traditional s’more-making, but it’s fun to do out on the water. We even own four metal sticks that we use specifically for this purpose.
“Whoa, Crazy Olive!” says James as Olive goes first and lights her marshmallow on fire, totally scorching it.
“I like it when the outside gets all black,” she tells him, arranging a square of chocolate on her cracker and topping it with the poor marshmallow and another cracker. When she bites into her s’more, she gets melty goo on the sides of her mouth.
“Hey, Crazy Olive, you’ve got a little …” James points at the edge of his mouth, but Olive just stares at him, smiling and content with her dessert, not appreciating what he’s telling her.
“Wipe your mouth, Livy,” I say, reaching below deck and grabbing a tissue. I’m still processing what James told me. Why is their boat still named Dreaming of Sylvia if James’s parents are divorced? I’m trying to act normal, but I’m staring at my mom, who’s talking animatedly with Mr. Townsend about the moon cycles. She is so far from her law office right now.
“Clem, how do you like yours?” James asks me.
“Huh?” I ask, tuning in to him slowly.
“Your marshmallows?” he asks.
“Oh, golden brown,” I say. My voice comes out soft and quiet. James seems as cheerful as ever.
“May I?” he asks, spiking a marshmallow on his metal stick.
“Sure,” I say.
He approaches the flame cautiously, turning the marshmallow at a slow and steady speed, making sure each corner gets heat and rolling the stick in his hand. After a minute, he pulls the stick from the fire and blows lightly on the marshmallow.
“Is it right?” he asks.
“It’s perfect,” I say, impressed by the even tone he got.
“Here,” he says, putting it down on my waiting cracker-with-chocolate.
He makes one for himself, too, and I wait to eat mine until he’s done. Then we crunch in together.
“Hey!” says Olive. “You have chocolate on your faces now!”
She sits back with her arms folded across her chest, satisfied that we’ve gotten what we deserve after calling her out.
James and I look at each other and start to laugh. I hand him a tissue and take one myself, but I don’t feel self-conscious, and the sadness of what he told me about his mom being gone is fading. He’s here, in the moment, and he’s okay. So I can be okay too.
Just before James and his dad step off the boat to leave a little later, he pulls me aside with a touch on the small of my back.
Mr. Townsend is telling Mom and Dad what a good time he had. Olive is licking her fingers from her fourth s’more.
James whispers in my ear, “Come swimming with me tomorrow?”
I turn to face him, my mouth just inches from his, and I say, “Yes.”