by A. K. Smith
Scout nodded as Tim handed him his credentials which showed he had the highest level of DiveCon, Master scuba diver and various certifications in cave diving training, as well as advanced rescue diver. Scout, who had logged more than 5000 cave dives, was impressed.
Tim pulled a large envelope from his backpack. “I want to hire you to arrange this trip for me and my son. A ten-day trip of cenote diving, with time in the beginning to refresh my son on cavern techniques. He’s certified open-water, rescue diver, and has a cavern certification from Florida, but has never dove a cenote.”
The bulging envelope was a lot of cash to be carrying around in Mexico.
“Let me know if you need more money, but this should cover all the transportation, camping equipment, diving equipment, and food for all three of us. I’m thinking same time next year, May first is my son’s eighteenth birthday.”
Without counting it, he knew it was more than enough. Intrigued by the cash, Tim Jackson’s character, his vibe, and the chance to explore an unknown cenote that until now had been unheard-of and off-limits to the diving world he happily agreed.
“One more thing,” Tim said as he pulled out a letter. “Can you sign this?”
It was a brief nondisclosure clause about the confidentiality of the map and the residents’ privacy, a paragraph in Spanish in one column translated in English on the next. Scout read it, signed the letter and wrote up a quick receipt for the trip. He stumbled on the amount; he hadn’t counted the money but knew there was a lot of money in the bag. Rolls of hundreds with rubber bands around them.
Tim stopped him and said, “I don’t need a receipt, just your word and your confidentiality.” He stuck his hand out and as their hands and eyes met, Tim asked, “I trust that should cover everything?”
“Everything,” Scout answered, thinking two things—one, this would really help him out, and two, he could finally publish his film and photography book on cenotes. Scout remembered contemplating how one moment can change your life.
After he had taken all his information, email, and specifics they agreed to keep in touch to finalize the date for next year.
“Do you have a safe?” Tim asked.
“A safe, yes, I will keep the money locked up.”
“Put the little map in it, keep it away from wandering eyes and don’t let anyone see it. I need your word on this.”
Tim held out his hand again, they shook on it.
Over the next year, he gathered everything he needed for the trip, sparing no expense as he had been paid more than ten times what he would have normally charged. He emailed Tim twice with updates.
One year later, the only response from Tim was a quick email:
From: Tim Jackson
Subject: Puerto Morelos Trip
Date: November 10, 2014
To: Scout Whitman
Scout,
I apologize for the short notice but I need to reschedule my son’s dive trip. My son Ryder has become involved in a contract job with a television show and he is unable to take vacation until they finish the second season. My thoughts are to reschedule it next year, same time in May. I will make it his nineteenth birthday surprise. I hope he will not be prohibited from taking vacations from any new job. I’ll tell him on his eighteenth birthday so he has a year to plan time off. Again, I apologize for the change in schedule. Please let me know if you see any issues with waiting a year. I will be in touch with the exact dates closer to next year; I’m still thinking beginning of May. Thank you in advance for postponing this trip for me, I will be in touch as soon as I know more.
Best,
Tim Jackson
Scout took a weekend last year to drive out near the cenote Tim wanted to dive with his son. He tried to follow the small copy of the hand-drawn map; Tim had kept the large one in the cylinder and taken it with him. The little one was difficult to read. His attempts to follow it faced him with locked gates. The entire area fenced in with angry barbed wires and a natural jungle barrier, with old worn small signs in Spanish, “Warning, Private, NO Trespassing” hanging everywhere.
He found himself in the middle of nowhere. One hundred fifty miles away from any town of significant size on rugged roads might as well have been five hundred miles away. His cell service was nonexistent. It was on that trip he decided to buy a satellite phone for emergencies on the upcoming excursion. He also decided, given the remoteness of the place, it might be worth renting a boat for a drop-off and pick-up.
The satellite phone sat in the box in his jumble of an office. Since he didn’t have a phone in his beach house, he would have to shoo Lily off the computer. Tim Jackson had not responded to him for over a year. Well, he still wanted to see the cavern system, and Tim paid him a lot of money, so better late than never.
“Lily, can you dial the number for me on Skype?” Scout held out the pink piece of paper.
She pretended she was so engrossed in whatever she was reading she didn’t hear or see the paper four inches from her head. “Lily, por favor, dial the number for me…” She looked up, showed her white teeth in a fake smile, handed him the earplugs, and her hand flew across the keyboard.
“It’s ringing, Señor Scout.”
Chapter 9
“I’m sorry, is this Tim’s wife? Mrs. Jackson? I thought I was calling your husband back, my assistant Lily said Tim Jackson called.”
Kendall took a deep breath; at this point she didn’t feel like explaining.
“No, this is Kendall Jackson, his wife, I called back this morning, after you left a message on my phone yesterday, regarding a trip my husband planned in Puerto Morelos?”
“Yes, does your husband want to reschedule the trip for this May? I guess that would be your son’s nineteenth birthday? Since he postponed it on his eighteenth birthday?”
“My husband postponed a trip last May?” Her heart picked up speed—as she knew this was not possible—it was seven months after Tim was declared dead.
“Yes, in November he emailed me and said your son had a contract with some television show or something like that and couldn’t take any vacations.” Scout paused, “Would you rather have me call back when I can speak with your husband, Mrs. Jackson?” Scout cleared his throat. “I think I should wait to speak with him, can you please have him call me?”
“November of last year?” Kendall whispered.
She wasn’t sure if he heard her and her tone became a little higher-pitched and louder. “November of last year, my husband emailed you about a trip he had planned for this coming May?” Kendall’s voice quivered as she asked the question.
“Umm, no Ma’am, sorry, it was November of the year before, he emailed and said the May trip for last year would need to be pushed back to the next year, which is next month, so I just wanted to check in with him and see if he wanted to postpone it again or take his son next month. I have everything ready to go even a satellite phone.” Scout paused again. “Is there a good time to talk to Mr. Jackson?”
Kendall silent for what seemed like five minutes, couldn’t say the words.
“Hello, Mrs. Jackson, are you still there?”
“Yes, I’m still here…it’s my husband that’s not…here…at all.” Kendall’s voice cracked, and she let out a gust of air she was holding in her lungs, she swallowed and held the tears back. “My husband is dead.”
Scout was a bit slow to reply.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Jackson, I had no idea…ummm, my deepest sympathies to you and your family.” A long minute of silence filled the air. “I’m very sorry.”
“It’s been eighteen months, but it still feels like yesterday.” Kendall took a deep breath.
“Well, Mrs. Jackson, I could still take your son and a friend on the trip, since your husband wanted him to go…it’s a cenote dive trip, private and comfortable, all the gear, lessons included or I can…refund the money back to you, somehow, umm…I mean your husband paid in cash and he wanted it to be a surprise for your son. Seemed very important to him.”
He sounded like he was rambling.
****
Kendall touched the end button on the screen of her iPhone, her phone shaking and her finger still paused on the screen. Her eyes locked on some point as if frozen in place. She put the phone down and ran her left hand through her hair replaying the conversation in her mind.
Chapter 10
Ryder tried to move his arm on the chair rest, biting the inside of his cheek. He disliked Southwest Airlines because they didn’t have First Class. Head down, shades on, he acted immersed in the Netflix movie playing on his iPad. He didn’t want to be recognized. East Coasters seemed to be glued to the show Paradise Valley. He liked the crowds in Scottsdale, most girls and guys were self-centered enough to not make such a big deal of a reality star as they did on the East Coast.
His publicist/manager, Courtney Clay, was in his space. She was accompanying him to a paid appearance at some sixteen-year-old’s birthday party in New Jersey. The father willing to pay $12,000 for Ryder to go to his daughter’s sweet sixteen party. From the picture, she looked hot and not so sweet for turning sixteen, probably why Courtney was tagging along with him.
As long as there are no cameras filming at the party, I’ll be fine. He tried to swallow, as his pulse picked up.
He still hadn’t confessed his social anxiety phobia. When the camera light turned on, the nausea, sweating and rapid heartbeat made it difficult to breathe. It seemed to be getting worse. Lately, he avoided any situation where there might be a video or movie camera. Something about a piece of film capturing parts of his life made him instantly feel a taut squeeze on his chest. He knew it was irrational.
He so wished his father were alive to ask his advice. If he could just talk to him, explain to him what was happening in front of the camera. He would be the one person who would understand him. He would not overreact and he would keep it private.
His father was a private person, never talking much about his Navy days or Uncle Tyler who died. Unlike his mother, who couldn’t keep anything personal or private. “What’s on her mind is on her lips,” his father had said under his breath many times. She would gossip, as if she were stating a fact. Any secret or issue would be shared with the whole family, sisters, mother, father, and cousins, who would then blab it to someone else and post it on Facebook.
Last year his future had seemed so bright, he finally knew what he was going to do with the rest of his life, and now this stupid phobia was making everything a disaster. Just thinking about it tightened his stomach. It was getting worse.
****
After the birthday party, Ryder returned to his hotel room, stating he was tired. He searched the Internet for information about social phobias, phobias in front of a camera, social anxiety…anything that would give him some advice on how to get a handle on this anxiety. He needed a grip on this. At the party, a young girl was shooting a video with her iPhone and he started sweating. He wasn’t going to get rich or famous with this phobia.
Glancing at his phone, he noticed three missed calls, all from Kendall. Kendall was the last person Ryder wanted to talk to. He gritted his teeth. Stay out of my life. Stop calling me. Just speaking to her reminded him of his father’s death, he wasn’t going to call her back. He didn’t have to, she wasn’t family and he wasn’t going to listen to the voicemail blinking on his phone, which he was sure was from her.
Not finding much on the Internet on social phobia anxiety, he lost interest. He found a few books, counseling options and possibly, hypnosis. He watched a YouTube video on hypnosis therapy and bookmarked it for later.
Bored, he decided he would listen to the voicemail he had ignored for the last three hours. He knew who it was from…not that he had any intention of calling her back.
The voicemail as he suspected was from Kendall. A long message explaining she needed to talk to him right away and to call her back as soon as he got the message. She had ended with a sad little stupid voice stating, “Ryder, I hope everything is going good in your life, I miss you and I love you…I really need you to call me back as soon as you get this. It’s important. It’s about your father. Please.”
He wasn’t going to call her back. Even though it was about his father it was probably something she found and wanted to give him. Or it could be about the college fund, which was the last thing Ryder wanted to think about right now. She was probably trying to persuade him to move back to Gettysburg and go to Western Maryland College, work at his father’s bar, which should have been left to him. His face became rigid and he clenched his teeth. Kendall only knew his father for six years, and he left her everything.
He would never, ever move back to Western Maryland College. He had a future in television. He just had to get over this phobia. He loved the atmosphere of television, film, the studio, the whole environment; he did not need to be in front of a camera, as long as he made the big bucks. Screenwriter or a director, he thought as he closed his eyes. Screenwriters were millionaires and famous.
****
The knock on the door jolted Ryder from a dream about diving with his father. His flight home was in less than two hours. Great, he’d forgotten to set the alarm. Jumping up, he opened the door with a sheet wrapped around him. Courtney, ready to snarl at him for being late, stopped in mid-sentence. Her expression changed from angry to embarrassed with a little hint of flirty in seconds. Her eyes ran down Ryder’s towel-clothed half-naked body.
“Sorry, Courtney, I guess the hotel never put in the wake-up call…I’ll be right there, just give me ten.” He shut the door and dropped the sheet, before he could hear Courtney’s response. The look in her eyes surprised him; he forgot how even good-looking girls responded to him.
In the car on the way to the airport, he noticed Courtney stealing glances at him. Oh, please do not hit on me, just give me space. He flipped open his iPad and noticed several new messages on Facebook and a text. One text and a private message was from Kendall, they read exactly the same: Ryder please call me back today. It’s urgent. I need to speak with you about your father.
Ryder did not want to call her back and wouldn’t. He didn’t want to talk on the phone, especially to Kendall. He replied on Facebook. On a plane flying back from New Jersey to Arizona. It’s been really busy, just text me or message me what you need to tell me.
Somewhere in the air space above Kansas, Ryder got the reply from Kendall.
He couldn’t believe it. His father had planned a diving trip to Mexico for his eighteenth birthday, and postponed it a few days before he died, because of Ryder’s commitment with Paradise Valley. She wrote, “Ryder, this was obviously very important to your father, he planned and paid for it almost two years ago. Will you go with me on this trip next month for your nineteenth birthday? Do this one last thing for your father?” And, for the hundredth time she asked him to call her when he got home, no matter what the time.
He used to love diving; it was something he did with his father since he was ten years old. The water a soft warm blanket wrapped around him and the closeness of his father created a happy place. For the last six years of his father’s life, they had managed to do ten dives a year. Their special bonding until he married Kendall. He tried two dive trips with his dad and Kendall, after they were married. Their special bond vanished with Kendall along. Diving, he was not interested in diving, especially with Kendall.
Ryder recalled the conversation with his dad in November. It wasn’t just any conversation; it was the last conversation with his father. He replayed it a thousand times in his head. He wanted to go on the Blue Hole dive trip with his father, but he was prohibited time off for the next year because of his contract. Ryder had never seen the Blue Hole and he wanted to experience it with his father…together.
“Can you save the Blue Hole dive for me?” Ryder had asked. They were eating pizza at their favorite restaurant in Scottsdale called Humble Pie.
“Save the Blue Hole for you, huh?” His dad smiled at him and grabbed his shoulders jokingly. “Now tha
t you’re a big movie star, I have to be on your schedule…is that how it works? Now, I see how it is.” He grabbed a piece of cheesy pizza and paused before taking a bite. “Sorry, son, it’s too late, we have the dive all set, I’m really sorry you can’t make it. How about we do some special diving next May? Just the two of us.” He smiled with excitement like a little kid about to tell a secret. “Celebrate your birthday, somewhere extraordinary.”
“Can’t do May either, Dad, the contract states I can’t take any vacations until the following year.”
“Wow! Even for your eighteenth birthday. You must be serious about this acting thing. You’ll be an old movie star by then.” Tim slapped the table. “So, Mr. Ryder Jackson, do you like this television work, that’s taking all your time?” His one eyebrow arched high as he did when he was trying to look inquisitive. “Are the movies in your future? I mean is this what you want to do with the rest of your life?”
“I think so, Dad, it comes easy to me and the money is not bad—or the girls.”
His dad was quiet for a long minute. “Well, when you’re rich and famous, you can take me to the Blue Hole and we can dive it together.”
The smell of garlic and loud cheering from the patrons diverted their attention to discover the Arizona Diamondbacks had scored, getting closer to winning the World Series. The rest of the night, laughs and one-liners passed between a father and a son. Like nestling back in an old leather chair, cozy and comfortable, all was right with the world.
Ryder had to be on set first thing in the morning, so they called it an early night. His father dropped him off and hugged him. If Ryder had only known. There in the concrete driveway of his mother’s house, it was the last moment to gaze upon his father’s face and feel his loving strength, he would have never gone to bed early. He would have hugged him harder; asked him his thoughts on breaking into movies or what he thought about celebrities. He would have discussed hot girls, sex and asked all the questions of the universe he needed answers to.