by Lia London
Ahead, a larger land mass loomed, clearly deforested. “Is that Anacortes?” asked Parker.
“Yep. Guy was born in the hospital there.”
Suddenly the plane jolted, as if it had gone over a speedbump too fast.
“Whoah, sorry. We’re experiencing some turbulence here.” Clay adjusted his instruments and consulted with the authorities as the plane jostled over unseen air boulders.
Parker’s stomach gurgled, and her mouth started to water. With a soft whimper, she shook open the barf bag again. She focused her gaze on the horizon and recognized the same mountains Guy had pointed out from the tower. The memory of their first kiss both distracted and settled her. Had that really been their first day together? Had she only known him since Sunday? After the slow pace of soap opera scripts, the speed at which their real-life narrative had played out startled her.
The plane banked back in a tight U-turn as it climbed higher, and Parker tried to identify some of the larger islands by their shape. She had studied the maps in the pamphlets, but everything looked so different from up this high. The turbulence faded, as if they’d left an off-road expedition and joined a new freeway, and soon she leaned back, more at ease.
“Decatur and Lopez,” said Clay, jerking his chin to point.
“Lopez is one of the stops on the ferry,” remarked Parker. “What’s special about it?”
“It’s mostly residential,” said Guy. “There’s a winter village gathering thing right after Thanksgiving that’s supposed to be pretty fun.”
“What do you guys do for Thanksgiving?”
“It’s usually just me, and Guy, and Bob.” Clay back-handed Parker’s arm lightly. “You could stick around and join us this year. We got our free-range turkey all picked out.”
Parker gulped at the sting in her arm. “You’ve met the turkey you’re going to eat?”
“Yep. Nice little guy.”
Parker slapped her hands over her face, crunching the barf bag flat. “I don’t think I could do that.”
“What?”
“Eat a bird I’d talked to.”
“We’re not talking about eating Tilly,” said Clay.
Parker mimicked the parrot. “Beeeeeeep! Beeeeeeep!”
Clay roared with laughter, but Parker moaned.
“Are you feeling sick, Daisy?” asked Clay.
“I’ll be all right.”
“Good. There’s Shaw Island. A few richies live there. I’ve air-dropped in some mail for them now and then.”
“Hopefully not orders for glass lamps or pricey electronics,” she droned.
“What? No!” Clay chortled and threw an elbow in her direction again, but Parker moved quickly to deflect it with her right hand. Clay laughed even harder. “Oh, so you’re a comedian and a karate kid, huh?”
“You’d better believe it.”
“Seriously,” said Guy quietly. “Thanksgiving. If you want to stay…”
Parker drew a deep breath, trying to calculate the costs. Was it even an option? No, she’d be too busy trying to recapture lost ground after the getaway. “I’ll definitely think about it.”
“There’s the main island, San Juan,” said Clay, banking slightly to his left. He warned the powers that controlled the airspace over the island he was coming in for a tour, and then gave her a wide smile. “There’s the famous Friday Harbor.”
“So famous I’ve never heard of it?”
“City chick, are you?” Clay made a grand sweeping gesture with one hand. “Friday Harbor is our little San Francisco.”
Parker squinted down at the colorful town clinging to the slope by a lovely marina. “A teeny, tiny San Francisco.”
“Hey, to us locals, it’s a bustling metropolis,” joked Clay. “Tomorrow’s Friday, Guy. You should take her there on Friday.” Clay’s face showed a level of tension, as if he wasn’t sure Guy would agree.
When Guy didn’t respond, Parker knew he was finally sick of her. Relief and regret wrestled inside of her, and she blinked back a tear.
“All right, Dad. You can take us home now. I’ll show her San Juan up close tomorrow.”
Parker noticed an odd strain in Guy’s voice as he said this.
The plane pulled in a wide arc, heading out over the water. Suddenly, the engine spluttered and coughed.
“What happened?” Parker’s stomach tightened.
“Engine cut.” Clay scowled at his instruments and began flipping switches.
“What?!”
“Happens all the time,” he said, not showing nearly enough panic for Parker’s taste.
A sickening dread overtook her as the plane seemed to glide downwards rapidly. Were they going faster? Was the incline steeper? Were they going to drown? “Start it up! Start it up!” she screeched.
“Relax, Miss Daisy.”
Parker squeezed her eyes shut and screamed, her pulse pounding in her ears as her stomach soared into her throat. She was going to die. This was it. She was going to die never having truly loved or been loved. Nothing but a successful resume to tack to her tombstone. She could feel a greater darkness closing in around her. Doom.
“I got this …” More mechanical noises clonked and shook the plane, and then the engine growled beneath them again.
Parker opened her eyes to see the water rushing up to swallow them, and then all at once, he pulled them level.
“See? Best carnival ride ever, right?” Clay looked consummately pleased with himself as they skimmed several yards above the water.
Parker glared at him. “You did that on purpose?”
“Why would I do such a thing?” His eyebrows jumped, but mischief played at the corner of his mouth.
Fuming, Parker clenched her jaw shut and uttered about thirty oaths inside her head before finally blurting, “That was not funny! It was absolutely terrifying!”
“It happens all the time,” assured Clay, patting her knee. “Small planes are built to glide if needed for a while. There was never any danger.”
Parker hugged herself, trying to steady her shaking body. “Explain that to my adrenal glands.”
Guy’s hand rested on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”
She frowned but reached back her hand and squeezed his, not opening her eyes again until they landed.
Clay climbed out, and Guy exited from behind the pilot’s seat. Parker remained glued to her seat, her entire body a tense knot.
Guy opened the door for her, and reached in to unbuckle her. She slid, still shivering with fear, into his arms and stood trembling on the solid ground, holding him tightly around the waist.
“It’s okay, you’re safe,” he whispered into your ear. “Breathe in for four, hold for four, breathe out for four. You got this.” Breathing with her, he rubbed gentle circles on her back, smoothing her hair with his chin. When at last her shoulders released some of the tension, he cupped her face in his hands. “You were never in any real danger. You’re safe now. It’s okay.”
She placed her own hands over his, hot tears streaming down her cheeks. “Is that how you feel in a recital?”
“Probably close.” He kissed her forehead and embraced her again. “Except I usually need the barf bag.”
“So, what’d you think?” Guy kicked a pebble as they walked out to the end of the runway.
“Your dad was fun until he turned homicidal.”
“I imagine the same could be said of most people.”
Parker snorted. “Oh, I don’t know. Mostly, I’m probably just homicidal. I never get to the nice part.”
“I think you’re nice.”
“You don’t know me.” She shuddered, clenching and unclenching her fists, hidden in the deep pockets of the jacket he had loaned her. Guy really did have an alarming effect on her. “So, about Friday Harbor. Your dad kind of pushed you into that, but you don’t have to take me, you know. I can take a ferry. I’m a big girl.”
“I don’t mind.” His face said otherwise, but she couldn’t tell exactly what his eyes c
ommunicated.
Unhurried, they continued to a grassy patch, beyond which the water stretched dark green. Parker breathed in the fresh air. “Not a ton of airport security here, is there?”
Guy chuckled. “No. We don’t get a lot of bomb threats here.”
“Man, how nice. I hate—and I mean loathe with every cell of my being—going through LAX security checks. I set off alarms every other time with who knows what.”
“Setting off alarms everywhere you go, huh?” Guy chuckled. “Do you have a titanium plate in your head or something?”
“Nope. I usually forget to take my keys out of my pocket—”
“Or the ignition.”
“Don’t remind me.” She groaned. How could they have met under such embarrassing circumstances? “The security people never believe I’m not packing blades or a gun.”
“You do look sketchy. It’s those intense eyes of yours.”
Parker stood on tiptoe and flashed her eyes wide, playfully. “Focused. It’s called focused.”
“Laser focused on your career goals.”
Parker stopped walking, tugging Guy to pause with her. “Do you think I’m crazy to want what I want?”
“Do you know what you want?”
She searched his face for judgement, but found none. With a sigh, she tucked the long strands of her hair behind her ears. “I’m not sure anymore. I thought I wanted the Soap Star gig, but it was awful. Not my team, but everything else. I hated the producers, the celebrities, the crap they wanted me to shoot.”
“You shouldn’t shoot crap. It makes a big mess,” teased Guy.
Parker gave him a tight smile. “Don’t try be funny right now, Guy. I’m having a bit of an identity crisis.” She massaged her cheeks, drawing her skin down into jowls before letting go. “It’s kind of your fault. I knew who I was until I started blundering around like an idiot on the ferry.”
“You’re still worried about how you come across to others.”
“You just met me. You don’t know all my faults.”
“Then show them to me. I’m not afraid.”
Parker’s eyelids dropped to half-mast. “You’re acting like I’m a werewolf.”
“Vampire?”
“Stop it. I am part monster. Ask anyone who has ever worked with me.”
Guy shook his head, a faint smile playing on his lips. “I don’t see any monsters.” He took a few more steps, crunching down onto the narrow, pebbled beach. “Come on, let’s practice skipping rocks again. It’ll get your mind off the flight.” He glanced at her sideways. “And anything else that’s eating you.”
She followed him reluctantly. “If you say so.”
“We’ll make a game of it. Any time you get it to skip more than twice, you can take a guess as to what my second degree was in.”
“Do I really want to know?”
“I think it’ll interest you.”
Parker sighed. Her anger had dissipated with the short stroll, and a sense of comfort had returned. She could play a civil game involving rock throwing, right?
“Just guess. And when you finally guess it right, I might help you fulfill your wildest dreams.”
Against her better judgement, Parker couldn’t resist a coy response. “And what do you know about my wildest dreams? Maybe they keep changing.”
“I’m counting on it. Dream big, Daisy Parker.”
He moved to toe through a pile of pebbles, leaving her gaping after him. He had called her Daisy, and it didn’t irk her. What a mess she’d become. What a stupid little flower. She scooped up a handful of pebbles and chucked them all in the water.
Guy rolled his eyes. “Slow down and get it right. Think first. You know what to do.”
“You sound like a teacher in grade school or something.” When he didn’t answer, she snorted. “Skipping rocks. Thinking. Guessing.” Taking up another handful of pebbles, she smoothed her thumb over each, searching for one with the right feel. When she’d found one, she squinted out at the water thoughtfully. She marked the action twice before flicking her wrist and letting the pebble fly.
“Ha! I get to guess!”
Guy narrowed his eyes at her from where he crouched. “Are you cheating?”
She balled her fists on her hips. “I don’t cheat.”
“All right, then. Guess. What was my useful major?”
“Computer Science something. You said you spoke JAVA script.”
“Good memory and guess. I took quite a few computer electives, but no. Sorry. Try again.”
Parker grunted and found another pebble. This time she mentally guessed before throwing. It landed in the water with a splunk. Maybe she had guessed wrong. She mulled over a few more possibilities in her mind and then tossed another pebble.
“Focus and flick,” coached Guy. “You rocked it before.”
“Har har. No pun intended?”
Guy sent a pebble bouncing five times across the water. “I try to be very intentional in my speech.”
Parker’s eyes lingered too long on his lips. “I’ve noticed that about you.”
Guy caught her stare, and the faintest smile played at the corner of his mouth. “You can do it.”
“Not with you watching me like that.”
“How would you like me to watch you?”
Was he flirting? She ground her teeth. “Can’t we go inside? I’m freezing out here.” It wasn’t cold. Parker chided herself. She knew the difference between shivering and trembling.
“If you want to,” he agreed.
She shook her head. Her competitive nature insisted she skip the rock and guess successfully. “Flick like a frisbee,” she repeated, and tried again. “Yes!”
Guy clapped politely. “You may guess.”
Parker folded her arms and regarded him in the breezy sunlight. It suited him, and she found herself blinking slowly at the vision.
“Yes?”
“I’m thinking!”
“I doubt it.”
“What do you mean?” She stiffened with mock consternation.
“I think you’re feeling.”
Parker started to speak, but she had no words. She pointed at him. “Psychology!”
Guy gave her a lazy smile. “Another good guess, but I’m afraid my knowledge of psychology is limited to symptoms and treatments for enochlophobia.”
“Eunuch what?”
He waved her words away vigorously. “Definitely not eunuch!”
“I’m glad to hear it,” she purred. Blushing at her own reaction, she snapped herself back to business mode. “Are you going to tell me what it means?”
His jaw tensed for a second. “I’ll let you Google it.”
She ran her fingers through her hair, snagging them on wind-tied knots. “Guy, seriously, how often do you do this?”
“Do what?”
She stared at the ground, weighing the wisdom of speaking her mind. Her heart overruled her brain, and she turned to look at him. “Turn a girl’s heart inside out and make her crazy like this?”
Guy’s fingers sifted through the hair by her ear gently. “What kind of crazy are we talking about?”
“Crazy enough to—don’t change the subject.” His simple touch thrilled her even as she tried duck away. “Seriously. Are you the resident Romeo because I never—and I mean not in a decade—have been so … Gaaaah!” She spun in a flailing circle before coming to a stop closer to him than before.
“I’m not exactly familiar with your terminology. Help me out here.”
Parker pounded her forehead on his chest a couple of times before letting it come to rest there. She sighed heavily and spoke to the zipper on his hoodie. “I can’t stop thinking about you. I can’t stop wanting to be with you. I can’t stop questioning why I even feel that way, given how we’ve just met. I can’t stop wondering what I’m supposed to do when I go back to L.A. and you’re not there. And I can’t stop wishing you could come with me.” She raised her face to his, fearing his reaction. It was insane to say
things like that. “Crazy, huh? Like a sappy movie.”
His whisper sent shivers through her. “I’m thinking all those things, too.”
Her eyes widened. “So, come with me. Let me show you L.A. like you’ve show me Orcas.”
Guy opened his mouth to speak, but seemed to chew back the words. At last, he faced the open water. “I don’t think it would work.”
“Why not? You could stay in my apartment.”
“Your apartment is only your world when you’re not at work.”
Parker felt him slipping away. “But you could go out. You could explore the sites.”
“The concrete jungle and packed traffic? No. Not my kind of exploring. That’s … torture.”
“But …” Parker hung her head. It would never work. He would never be happy in the city. Especially not one of the largest cities in the world. She swallowed. “I’m supposed to go home on Saturday. What’s going to happen then?”
Guy drew a deep breath. “You’ll get on a ferry and head back to the world you came from.”
“And say good-bye to you,” she said dully.
He lifted her chin with his finger. “You will have to decide if it’s really good-bye.”
“Am I being desperate, Dad?” Guy sat in his father’s desk, chin in hands, feet reaching towards the space heater. He’d pulled the giant doors closed to cut out the wind and block the view of Parker driving away.
“It’s hard to tell.” Clay’s voice came out muffled from beneath the engine of the plane. He had removed the panels behind the propeller and was tinkering with valves. “I didn’t exactly get to know her well on the flight besides she’s cute and funny. I mean, I’ll give her props for not cussing me out or barfing on me.”
“Have your barf bag ready!” chimed Tilly.
“Shut up, Tilly!” barked Guy and Clay together.
Booster nosed the corner of the bird cage and gave her a scolding glare.
Spinning the blades manually, Clay examined the mechanisms as he talked. “Guy, it comes down to whether or not you’re going to get stalled and crash.”