She felt like she had done something wrong. Clearly, she hadn’t. She hadn’t kissed him. She hadn’t cheated on Ollie, because it wasn’t possible to cheat on someone you weren’t dating—especially not by not kissing another guy. Elsa and Aidan weren’t exactly dating yet, so there was no betrayal there either.
But she felt wrong. Queasy. It was probably whatever that doctor had given her.
Aidan sat down in the chair and played with the tab of his soda can.
“So,” he said. “You feeling okay?”
“Sort of,” she said. “It’s not my best morning feeling ever.”
“No. Guess not.”
“Good dancing last night,” she said. It sounded very feeble and strange, and he just nodded in reply.
“So,” she said. “You’re going…out?”
“Yeah,” he said, squeezing the empty can and making a loud crinkling noise. “Elsa thought…well, we’re here. So. Yeah.”
Then they seemed to run out of things to say to each other, so he got up to throw away his can in the kitchen. He didn’t look at her again.
Elsa came back with her bag.
“All set,” she said, sitting on the edge of the sofa. “Your dad just called. They’re on their way. But if it’s all right…I’d like to go before they get back. I feel like if we’re still here when my mom gets here, she’ll make Aidan do something so he can’t go.”
“It’s fine,” Clio said.
“I feel bad that you’re stuck here,” Elsa said. “We’ll be back later. You try to rest, okay?”
“I’ve got that one covered.”
Aidan came back in from the galley. His walk was stiff and odd and he kept rubbing the back of his neck, blocking out any view of Clio with his elbow. It had to be deliberate. For some reason, he wanted nothing to do with her now.
As they left, Clio got just a quick hit of the fresh breeze coming in from outside, and then the glass doors slid shut, leaving her in the cool, sterile air-conditioning, alone.
Oyster Girl
The other three returned only minutes later. Clio stared out at them from her little tube of comforter, just a pair of eyes blinking out of seven pounds’ worth of down. They brought with them several bags of Italian pastry. And they had all gotten very loud. Maybe just walking around on an Italian street made you loud.
“Kiddo,” her father said as he leaned over. “You scared the hell out of me last night.”
Clio continued looking up from her little feather cocoon but decided not to speak. She didn’t feel like talking anymore. Talking had done her no good. Acting had done her no good. Not acting had done her no good. She was miserable, confused, and swollen. Maybe the solution in life was to hide in a rolled-up comforter and pretend to be some kind of non-thinking, nervous-system-deprived shellfish. She was a sea butterfly, after all. She was related to oysters. It was totally her prerogative.
“I think that stuff the doctor gave her knocked her for a loop,” her dad said. “She looks spaced.”
He stroked her hair.
They gathered chairs and sat around Clio, like she was a television they were all watching. They went on with their very loud conversation, which was about the pyramid of Giza, occasionally looking over at her to see if she was going to do anything. She didn’t. She watched them back.
Julia wore a sunny yellow tank top, and Clio saw her surprising resemblance to Elsa. Though Julia was more skeletal, they had the same wide, brightly awake features. Except that on Julia, they were stretched out flat. On Elsa, there was flesh on the cheeks and an actual blood supply under them to make them flushed and apple-like. In the morning sun, Julia’s hair had a high, unnatural sheen. The red had to be artificial. Underneath, she was probably as blond as Elsa—or at least somewhat blond. If she ate a few more sandwiches, she might be as pretty as her daughter.
Not that Clio was one to comment on personal appearance right now.
Martin was chuckling and being his usual friendly, funny self. He was also looking at her slyly. He knew she was choosing not to speak. Clio was certain of it. He communed with her through quick little looks.
“Throw your dad a bone,” his expression seemed to say. “He had a bad night.”
“What did you get?” she said.
“Almond tarts,” her father said quickly. “Cherry tarts and prune, I think. I know that sounds bad, but they’re really good.”
“Can I have a cherry one?”
A plate with a cherry tart was placed next to her face on the sofa. Clio pulled herself up carefully and took it. The pastry exploded into a crumbling mess the moment she bit into it, showering her with crumbs, but she told herself she didn’t care. She was already covered in welts and was hiding under a blanket. A few pastry flakes wouldn’t change anything.
It was excruciatingly obvious that Clio and her father were going to have to have another talk, so after they were done eating their breakfast, Martin and Julia decided to go back and “look at that thing.” They didn’t even try harder than that. They actually said they were going to “look at that thing.”
Her father dragged his chair closer. Clio slunk down halfway into her tube.
“I sat here all last night,” he said, reaching for another pastry out of the box. So that hadn’t been a dream. He had been there.
“Is this where you yell at me for swimming and I say I only swam because you left us?”
“That’s the idea,” he said. “But I feel like we can skip a lot of that, don’t you?”
It almost sounded like he was trying to be reasonable, but Clio wasn’t so stupid. What he was actually trying to do was get out of any responsibility for his actions.
“You left us,” she said.
“And we came back,” he said. “But you had already gone off by that point. So we had to go back and look for you. So the whole thing could have been avoided.”
“If you had told us you were going,” Clio added.
He let out a long sigh and ran his hands through his hair, accidentally getting crumbs in it.
“You know what I wanted more than anything?” he said. “I wanted to give you something nice. It’s beautiful here. You don’t have to sit around the house all summer, working some stupid job.”
“I wanted my stupid job,” Clio said.
“Instead of this? Instead of cruising the Med on a gorgeous boat?”
“Cruising the Med?” Clio repeated. “You make it sound like I’m on some ship, sunbathing and playing Ping-Pong and stopping at exotic locations. You know what I really am? Your cook on some whacked-out mission that you won’t even tell me about. Do you know how weird that is?”
“Look,” he said. “This trip was set up before I knew you could come. It’s based on some research that Julia has been doing for a long, long time. Part of the reason we’re doing it this way and not through more-official channels is its highly sensitive nature.”
“Highly sensitive archeology?” Clio asked.
“When it came up that you could come,” he went on, “I asked Julia about it. Of course, she was dying to meet you. But yes, she was worried about what might happen if you were here and if you were e-mailing people at home. You do live around a major university, Clio. Your mother is there. We just didn’t want the details getting around.”
“So your solution is that you don’t tell me what’s going on?” she asked. “Why didn’t you just talk to me about it? If you’d told me to keep quiet, I would have.”
“Clio,” he said. “Look at yourself right now. Have you really done what I’ve asked so far?”
Okay. Maybe he had a bit of a point with that one.
“You have to stop this thing you have with Julia,” he said. “If you’re having trouble accepting the idea of my dating, just come out and say so. We’ll work through it.”
“How?” Clio asked. “How do we work through it?”
He leaned down to his knees. Clio noticed a single streak of gray in his floppy, sandy curls.
“Let me be honest with you
,” he said. “This search, it’s been a challenge. We knew it would be complicated, but…What I’m trying to say, Clio, is that I think we’re a lot more likely to succeed out here if you’re on our side. This is a chance for us to be like we used to be. Or something like it. I want you to make a deal with me. Work with me, not against me. This whole trip could take months. But it could be a lot shorter if you play along. There’s a chance we could find what we’re looking for in a matter of weeks. And if we do, you can go home if it would make you happy. I’ll work it out with your mom somehow. Maybe you can stay with a friend or something. I’ll handle the details.”
“What would I have to do?” she asked, sitting up.
“Help with the diving equipment. Take your job as the cook seriously. Follow the rules. No more drinking. No more snooping. You help me keep the boat under control, and you get what you want. I don’t want you to do anything against your will anymore—I want us to come to an agreement. How about this? You help us for two weeks and you get to go home.”
A trip home in two weeks…and all it would take was a little sucking up. She could be back in the aisles of Galaxy and out of this ridiculous place. That was what she wanted, right? To get away from all of this. So why weren’t her insides jumping for joy at the prospect of going home? Sure, there had been that whole moment with Aidan—but it wasn’t like that meant anything. She didn’t even like Aidan! He’d never been anything but a jerk to her. And on top of that, she’d already seen him kiss Elsa.
Ollie was the one she was meant to kiss. Clio knew what she had to do. Forget the stupid phone call. Forget the e-mail. What she needed to do was get home as soon as possible and get her kiss from Ollie. The moment with Aidan had been nothing more than a post-jellyfish-attack moment of weakness. And now her father was making an offer she couldn’t refuse: help him find his dumb shipwreck or whatever, and she’d be home in two weeks. That was something solid. That was something Clio could do.
“Dad,” she said, extending her hand to meet his, “we’ve got a deal.”
Choices
Elsa seemed to have spent every euro she had buying presents for Clio, which she presented to her while Clio flopped on the Champagne Suite bed. There were three magazines in English that cost four times as much as they did at home, a few chocolate bars, and some fancy lemon sodas in glass bottles. The final triumph, presented last, was a box of pastels. Clio knew the brand. They were extremely expensive. She’d never owned a set of them before.
“You said you didn’t have these,” Elsa said. “I hope I got the right thing. I told the guy in the store all about you and what you did, and he said this is what you needed.”
“They’re perfect,” Clio said. “Elsa, you didn’t have to…”
Elsa waved her hand and hopped off the bed.
“You are sick,” she said. “I am Swedish. I don’t sound that Swedish, but in my heart, I am. The English just tell you to put your chin up when you’re sick, but the Swedish feed you and make you take steam baths. Except I don’t know if you should take a bath with those marks on your legs, so I’m just going to make you draw and eat chocolate. So draw! I’m going to take a cool bath, though. It’s hot out there.”
Clio’s sketchbook landed on the bed next to her. Elsa stepped into the bathroom and started running water.
“Also,” Elsa said, putting her head around the door, “I’m cooking dinner.”
“I heard,” Clio said. “Thanks.”
“Draw! Eat!”
The head vanished.
Clio stared into the box of pastels. They couldn’t have been easy to find, even if they were Italian. Elsa had obviously searched for an art shop (and who’d even known this town had one) and carefully gone through everything in it. She had paid attention to what Clio had said. It was so thoughtful that it almost hurt. Clio picked up a soft bamboo yellow, opened the book to the sketch of Elsa sleeping, and carefully began to fill in the hair. It was such a quality color. It went on the page smoothly. The people who made these pastels loved them.
She didn’t deserve these. Elsa had gotten them for her because she thought Clio had run off to help her and had gotten hurt in the process. The truth was that she had managed to betray everyone by doing nothing. No one in history had ever done less and yet been so wrong. Not cheating on a non-boyfriend with the non-boyfriend of a friend. The pressure of thinking that one through made her swollen body ache.
Clio set the pastel back in its box. Now came the real crusher. She didn’t really want to know, but she was morally, legally, and physically obligated to ask.
“So,” she called. “Last night. Who kissed who?”
Elsa smiled and cocked her head. She got up and turned off the water in the tub. Great. Now Clio was going to get it in detail. Why was she such an idiot?
“Well,” Elsa said. “You left. We kept dancing. I think you threw Aidan off a little when you ran out and I was just saying that you looked a little upset, like you had to fix things with your boyfriend…. How did that go? With everything that happened, I forgot to ask!”
She looked genuinely upset at this.
“Everything’s fine,” Clio said quickly. “I think. Well, it will be soon anyway.”
“Oh. Okay. So, I thought you were upset, and I was saying that. He looked bothered by that. He pretends he doesn’t care, but he really does.”
In a strange rush, Clio recalled the touch of Aidan’s hand on her head from the night before.
“I just realized that he was cute, smart, fun. And yes, the property of my mum. But you know what? My mum doesn’t get to call the shots about everything. She doesn’t even know about Alex. She never even asked me what was wrong, even though she had to know I was upset.”
This conversation had taken an unexpected turn. Clio hadn’t thought of Aidan as Julia’s property—but of course that was what he was on this boat.
“Is she nice to him?” Clio asked.
“Nice?” Elsa said. “My mum is not nice to anyone. Maybe your dad. Definitely not to her assistants. I don’t think she sees them as people. The university gives her an office, a computer, grant money, and an assistant. It’s all the same to her.”
There was something in this…something Clio knew she would want to discuss later. But for now, they had to keep going with this other complicated, confusing topic.
“So, you—”
“Right! Sorry. So, it’s always seemed clear that Aidan is pretty much there for the taking. Not to sound mean. But he’s an engineer. He doesn’t get out much. He doesn’t have a girlfriend. He’s on a boat with two attractive females and has been desperately trying to pretend he hasn’t noticed this fact because of my mum. But you know. He’s gasping for it. I just leaned in a little, put my hand on his leg. With guys, a little goes a long way when they reach a certain state.”
She laughed.
Clio hadn’t noticed that Aidan was gasping for it. She had been too busy being annoyed at her dad to notice the guy who was there, ready and willing. Could that also explain what had happened—well, almost happened—last night? What was that about?
“And so he kissed you?” Clio asked. “After you put your hand on his leg?”
“Not quite,” Elsa said. “I had to play with him a little more. You know. Give him a little view down the shirt. Not much—just a little. You know what I mean.”
Nope. Clio really didn’t have a clue. That was not something (a) that she had ever done or (b) that would have occurred to her to do. Because she was very, very stupid when it came to boys. That much was proven.
“Sure,” she lied.
“And I leaned in close. Talked to him a little. It was fun, Clio. The windup was fun. And the kissing was better.”
“So he kissed you?” Clio asked, trying not to sound too urgent or demanding. This fact had to be established, though.
“Mmmm,” Elsa purred.
Clio swallowed hard.
“Today was different,” Elsa went on. “We didn’t make out. He was
being shy. He’s worried about my mum finding out. But I can work on that. It will all be taken care of. Now, something more serious.”
Elsa jumped off the bed and opened one of the drawers of her dresser. She shuffled through some stuff and produced a single photograph from the bottom.
“I lied to you,” she said to Clio. “I told you I shredded all the photos. I didn’t—I kept one. Sometimes I take it out when you’re not here.”
She passed the photo over. Elsa and Alex were sitting on a bed with a deep gray duvet over it and a car poster on the wall. Alex’s room. Elsa was her usual glowing self, hugging him tight and looking happy. Alex wore a soccer uniform—a maroon V-necked shirt and long black shorts. He was a smirker. He had a long face, a thick, strong neck, and muscular legs. His hair was almost black and was spiked up along the midline of his head. He wasn’t looking at the camera. His smirk was directed toward something just next to whoever was taking the picture. Everything about him said asshole. With a capital A.
Strangely, it occurred to Clio that Aidan didn’t say asshole. He said something else. Seeing this picture made the difference clear.
“Good-bye, Alex,” Elsa said. “You don’t know what you’re missing. Wanker. It’s time for that to go. Give it here.”
Clio passed it back. Elsa tore it up, then gathered the pieces and pushed them out of the window.
“That little boy caused me a lot of grief. But as they say…” She turned from the window and grinned. “Living well is the best revenge. I have a new man now. And I have you.”
Temptations and Voices
The prospect of release changed Clio. For the next week, she forced herself to conform, keeping herself on a rigid schedule. She rose very early, getting together breakfast before the morning meeting at eight. She helped move and prepare the diving equipment. She also became the official topside person during the daily dives, waiting on the deck after her dad and Martin had gone under. She forced herself to sit and draw for four hours each day, training her arm to hold steady when the boat lurched. She planned menus and had dinner on the table on time each night. While she prepared these meals, she rehearsed different versions of what she’d say to Ollie when she returned. She tried to recall her beach fantasy, but it was fading, so she threw herself into inventing new ones. The welts on her body gradually went down, leaving spidery traces of red. They itched like crazy for a few days, but she got used to it. In short, she had finally achieved a state of near Zen.
Girl at Sea Page 16