The Trouble with Destiny

by Lauren Morrill

  Because breaking into Demi’s cabin to return her stupid lucky mike that Huck stole? Yeah, that was not on the list.

  I’ve tucked the mike into my purple satchel, ready to return it without anyone noticing I ever had it. I make my way up to the luxury suites. At her room, I try the door, but in a totally not shocking turn of events, it’s locked. I don’t know what I was expecting. Why did I think I could pull this off? I should have brought Huck. This is stupid.

  No, what was stupid was Huck stealing the mike. Of course, I’m the one who turned him loose in the first place when I sent him to take care of Mr. Curtis. Another plan that seems to have backfired.

  I hear a squeaking followed by a shuffling and, not wanting to be caught standing outside Demi’s door, I turn and bolt down the hall just as the maid rounds the corner with her wheeled cart, overflowing with fluffy white towels and bins of tiny shampoos, soaps, and foil-wrapped chocolates.

  I stop just around the corner and lean against the wall so I can work to quietly catch my breath, willing my heart to slow down to a dull thud. I peek back around the corner to see the maid stretching the key card attached to her belt to unlock the door to the cabin next to Demi’s. She takes a fat stack of towels off the top of the cart along with a handful of chocolates, then shoulders her way through the door. This couldn’t be more perfect. Demi’s room will be next.

  I crouch there, my ear in the direction of her room so I can know just when to strike. Only now it’s not the squeaky wheel of a maid’s cart that gets my attention—there’s a scurrying and a panting coming from somewhere near my feet. I glance down and see a little dog, about the size of a small cat, with long white hair fluffed up and sculpted in a way that tells me its owner spends more time on its hair than I do on my own. A small tuft of fur rises off the top of its head, held in place by a red ribbon with a heart-shaped rhinestone in the middle.

  As soon as it sees me, it sits up, grinning at me with a crooked underbite.

  “Shoo!” I whisper at little Fido, waving my hands over its head. “Go on!”

  But the command doesn’t do anything other than make the dog cock its head at me and start to whine.

  “Hush!” I say, my whisper growing more frantic. “Go on!” I lean over and wave a little closer.

  “Miss Gloria!” A thick, gravelly voice echoes down the hall, and the dog hops back up onto all four legs. It spins around in little hopping circles. “Miss Gloria, come now!”

  It takes me a moment to place the voice, but a peek around the corner at the greasy-haired, ample-bellied cruise director confirms it. Mr. Ferengetti is leaning against the wall, a phone pressed to his ear as he jangles Miss Gloria’s leash in his other hand.

  I fling myself back around the corner and out of sight, my eye on the dog to make sure she won’t smoke me out.

  “Yeah, it’s that shoddy maintenance schedule,” Mr. Ferengetti mumbles into his phone. “I told them they needed to be doing more frequent inspections, but what do I know? I’ve only spent my entire adult life on these damn boats.”

  There’s a pause, and I lean closer to the corner just out of sight, trying to home in on the conversation.

  “Yeah … yep … of course … it’s about taken care of, should be no problem. We’ll be back to full power soon. … Uh-huh, bye.”

  I hear the jangle of the leash once more. “Miss Gloria, I said come!”

  The dog gives me one last look that I swear says You were lucky this time, missy, then sprints off after her owner. The sound of her tinkling collar fades in the distance, replaced by the telltale squeaking and shuffling of housekeeping.

  I reach into my satchel, which is stuffed with all the little last-minute necessities a drum major usually needs. There’s a bottle of slide grease for the trombones, some pencils for marking music, a whistle, and some cough drops. And down at the bottom, fuzzy with lint, is a small roll of masking tape that we use to secure music to stands if the wind is high.

  I tear off a three-inch piece of tape, sticking it to my index finger in preparation.

  I peek around the corner just in time to see the maid swipe the lock on Demi’s door with her key card. Propping the door with her foot, she turns to count out a tall stack of towels, then leans her shoulder into the door. As soon as she’s through, I dart down the hall as fast as my legs will carry me. The plush carpet running down the middle of the hallways muffles my steps, and I have to hold my breath to keep from huffing and puffing.

  I make it to the door just before it clicks closed. I place my hand on it to stop it, then pause to make sure the maid isn’t right there. I peek through the crack and see the back of her uniform as she struggles to carry the stack of towels through the room, muttering to herself in a language I don’t recognize. I probably have less than a minute before she finishes, at which point she’ll come back into the hall and catch me red-handed, so I quickly pull the tape from my index finger and gently, quietly place it over the latching mechanism on the door. I stick it vertically, so once the door shuts, there will be no evidence that anything has kept it from locking as it should.

  I run my finger over the tape once to ensure it’s going to stick. I hear the water turn on in the bathroom, which means the maid is done depositing the towels and I may have only a few seconds. I place my hand flat on the outside of the door, letting it close with barely a sound. I give it a quick nudge, and sure enough, it gives behind me. The tape is working.

  I hear footsteps coming, so I pivot on my heel and bolt back down the hall, passing my hiding spot and going all the way back to the elevator. No need for the maid to see me at all. I don’t want to wind up in a lineup somewhere, a bright light in my face while she picks me out as the one who was around just before the room was broken into.

  I stand by the mirrored elevator doors and count by tens to a thousand before I start making my way back to Demi’s cabin. With my pounding heart and my full-body jitters, I’m afraid I look like I’m strolling through the hall with a live wire in my jeans.

  With a quick peek to make sure no one’s watching, I push through the door, letting it shut behind me.

  I glance around, taking in how the other half lives when they travel VIP. The door opens into a small sitting room, which is the size of my entire room six floors below. Instead of that flat, industrial hotel carpet, this cabin has dark, shiny wood floors with a rug so fluffy and soft it looks more comfortable than my bed back home. The back wall is all windows and french doors that open up onto a balcony overlooking the ocean.

  My cabin only hopes to be this cabin when it grows up.

  There’s an open door to the right, through which I can see a corner of fluffy white bedding. I tiptoe across the wood floors and back to the bedroom, which looks designed to give the illusion of a Cape Cod beach cottage. The whitewashed walls are accented by wainscoting and dark-stained trim, with glossy white beadboard on the ceiling. A sleek, silver nautical light fixture hangs from the center of the room, right above a bright white king-sized bed topped with a mountain of blue silk pillows. Dark end tables and a dresser match the trim, and a matching wooden deck chair sits out on the balcony.

  I’m so busy admiring the room that I completely forget why I’m here in the first place. But when I hear the beep of a key card in the door, all the blood rushes to my head, leaving me frozen in place for a split second. Before the door swings open fully, I race over to Demi’s open suitcase and shove the golden mike into the mesh pocket holding her underwear. Then, like a cartoon dog about to be caught stealing from the pantry, I dart mindlessly around the room. I hear Missy’s voice getting closer to the bedroom; her high-pitched cackle is like a warning siren that screams Hide!

  At the last second, I launch myself into the tiny closet in the corner, slide the door shut, and sink to the floor behind an oversized white terry-cloth robe, another item we don’t have down in our cabin. I’m starting to think Demi was rig
ht when she said we were in steerage.

  “I so did not pack for this weather,” I hear Missy moan.

  I hear someone rustling through a suitcase, and I pray that Demi doesn’t notice that the mike has been moved … and that this is the last of Huck’s stunts for this trip.

  “Seriously. I can’t believe this. I mean, what if we end up having to hang out in our cabin for the rest of the week?”

  My butt sinks into the plush carpet that lines the closet floor, and I have to roll my eyes. Yeah, forced to hang out in a luxury stateroom with a flat-screen TV, Jacuzzi tub, and twenty-four-hour room service? What a hardship. Hate that for you, Demi.

  “I think I’ll wear this,” Demi says, and from the tone of her voice and Missy’s squeal, I’m guessing she’s holding up Lenny’s Brentwood High hoodie.

  “God, he is so smokin’,” Missy purrs. “But I thought you said he kissed Liza.”

  At the mention of my name, my breath catches in my throat and I have to struggle not to choke on it. I lean back into the wall and work on not moving a single muscle.

  “I said Lenny was just trying to make me jealous,” Demi snaps, her voice crackling with the same electricity as the lightning out over the ocean.

  I feel a torrent of rage course up and down my spine. Once again, I have to sit here and listen while someone acts like it’s totally unheard of for a guy to like me. First Russ, now Demi. If it weren’t for the precarious position I’m in, crouching in Demi’s closet, I’d burst out and give her the same what-for I gave Russ.

  “I mean, come on. Why else would Lenny kiss Liza?” Demi continues. I ball my fists at the way she says my name, like a guy would have to be blind with a head injury to want to kiss me. “I know he’s into me. It’s like I told Russ when I dumped him. Life’s too short for mediocrity.”

  I gag at the sound of the phrase, one that came straight from Demi’s mom and was oft-repeated in her house.

  “Why did you dump him again?” Missy’s voice goes up into a squeak at the end, and I wonder if she wishes she’d kept that one to herself.

  Demi pauses, and I lean closer to the door so I won’t miss the answer. “It doesn’t even matter,” she replies quickly. “Because Lenny is hot.”

  I hear the door to the bathroom slide open. The water goes on full blast, and Demi’s words are muffled by the spray of the sink. When the water shuts off, I hear Missy midsentence.

  “… so obvious Russ is jealous. He’s like, totally drooling every time you walk by.”

  “Toootally.” Demi drags out the word, her voice distant, probably coming from the sitting room. I lean into the crack of the closet door, but I can’t hear anything else except the click of the TV as the channels flip.

  I guess it’s going to be a bit before I can make my escape. Luckily this carpet is really soft, and the robe makes a nice pillow. So I settle in and allow myself to zone out, a heavy fog settling over my eyes. Wait … why am I so tired?

  And that’s when I remember the Tylenol I swallowed right before this whole little mission. And the Dramamine. And the seasickness patches. Those don’t make you drowsy, do they?

  About one second later, I pass out.

  Chapter 15

  I wake up with a terrible pain in my neck and drool crusted down my chin. But that’s not the most horrible thing facing me right now. No, that honor goes to an actual face. A tan one, perfectly smooth save for one freckle underneath a blue eye that’s partially obscured by a lock of sandy-blond hair.

  Russ’s face.

  I sit up with a start, nearly cracking my head on his chin. He leaps back in surprise, tumbling into the opposite wall of the closet, the other terry-cloth robe falling off the hanger and landing in a puddle on his head.

  “Didn’t I tell you to leave me alone? What are you doing here?” I yelp, then quickly cover my mouth with both hands, because the words sound weird coming out. Sort of thick and heavy, which is how my tongue feels right now. What is happening?

  Russ yanks the robe off his head, leaving his hair standing up from the static, which sends me into a giggle fit I can’t control.

  “Yup. Heard you loud and clear, boss,” he says, adjusting his oversized frame to the tiny square of floor in the closet. “And I could ask you the same thing.”

  I have to stop and think, because the shock of the wake-up and the fog of whatever I took have sent the reason I’m sleeping on the floor of Demi’s closet completely out of my mind. I have to close my eyes and block out Russ and the buzzing in my head before it comes back to me. It takes what feels like hours but is probably only a few seconds, but then I recall Huck holding the golden mike, that devious grin on his face.

  “Ugh,” I moan, and rub my eyes with the heels of my hands. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth, and I stumble to form any more words.

  “Are you drunk?”

  “I don’t think that was Tylenol” is all I can mutter by way of explanation, but I trip over the word “Tylenol,” and it comes out sounding like “Lylenylenol.”

  “Holy crap, you’re stoned?” There’s a look of total disbelief on Russ’s face, his eyes wide as he chuckles to himself.

  “No! Gooooo away,” I say, but the word “go” hangs on for two counts too long, just like Russ’s snare roll. In fact, it rolls around in my mouth until I’m sort of howling the word, and I break into another giggle fit.

  Russ rolls his eyes and climbs to his feet, bumping his head on the overhead shelf in the closet. He stumbles back out into the bedroom. “I really don’t get why your default setting for me is somewhere between suspicious and furious,” he says.

  “Because I don’t trust you,” I snap at him. I rise to my feet ready to get the hell out of here, but as soon as I’m up, I’m down again, my vision tunneling to black in an intense head rush. I collapse into a heap on the floor of the closet.

  “Need a hand?” Russ asks.

  “No, I do not,” I say. Since standing didn’t work out for me, I decide to give crawling an attempt. I rise to my hands and knees and slowly start to ease my way on into the bedroom. But I don’t get far before I accidentally stick my hand into a high heel, which sends me tumbling down face-first onto a pile of laundry. When I sit up, there’s something bright pink and covered with rhinestones wound around my arm, so I shake it hard to get it off. Whatever it is gets flung over my head. I turn to see Russ coming out of the closet with a heavily padded bra draped over the top of his head. He reaches up and pulls it off, dropping it to the floor, and I dissolve into a hiccuping case of giggles from which I fear I will not recover.

  But as my giggles finally wind down to little gasps, I realize that I really can’t stand up. And crawling through the ship back to my room isn’t going to be an option. In fact, the only option may be standing in front of me, a blood red blush spread across his cheeks as he tries not to look at the rhinestone-adorned bra that was very recently on his face.

  “Um, do you think you could maybe—hiccup—help me?” I ask.

  Russ rolls his eyes and shakes his head, but he steps forward and offers me a hand, which I take. With a surprising amount of muscle, he drags me effortlessly to my feet.

  “Ooh!” I groan, dancing from foot to foot, giving my legs a series of hokey-pokey-style shakes. “Pins and needles!”

  “Smooth,” he says, unable to suppress a smile.

  I mean to tell him to shut up, but I only get as far as “shut” before I sort of lose my train of thought. “Why you here?” I mumble.

  “I came to get back my sweatshirt that Demi’s been holding hostage since the breakup. Demi wasn’t here, but I found this in the door.” He holds up a balled-up piece of masking tape between his thumb and forefinger. He arches an eyebrow at me, as if to say you wouldn’t know anything about this, would you?

  A crack of lightning illuminates the dim room, and an epic rumble of thunder follows closely
behind it. Through the window, I can see that the sky is covered with a thick coating of heavy gray clouds and the ocean is nearly black, save for the cresting whitecaps. The wind roars, and I feel the boat pitch slightly. Between the sleep still holding me in its clutches and the pins and needles that haven’t left my legs, I start to collapse. Russ takes one giant step toward me and catches me before I can land hard on my knees.

  He moves to my side, throwing my arm around his shoulder and securing me with one strong arm around my waist. His hand rests right on my hipbone, holding it firmly like a handle, and I’m surprised at how small and delicate he makes me feel.

  When he squeezes my hip, I stiffen and try to walk ahead of him, but he tightens his grip around my waist, his other hand reaching up to hold mine around his neck.

  “Liza, just relax. Let me help you,” he says. I want to hip-check him into the wall and run away, but the fuzz in my brain is spreading to my legs, so I sink into his side, letting my steps fall in with his. “See? Just like that. Not too bad.”

  “Lots of marching practice,” I reply, my eyes drifting closed as I lean into him.

  We make our way through the suite and to the front door. Russ lets go of my hand and pulls the door open, giving a quick glance down either end of the hallway. Then he props the door with his foot and grasps my hand again.

  “Ready?”

  “Yup,” I reply, but it comes out as more of a hum.

  I lean back into Russ as we start down the hall, focusing half on my breathing, and half on my steps. My legs are starting to wake up again, but they’re still not ready to deal with what high winds and rolling seas are doing to my balance.

  We get about thirty feet when I hear chattering coming down the hall. A short, elderly couple wearing matching souvenir sombreros turns the corner and comes toward us. As soon as they pass us, I reach up and pluck the sombrero off the woman’s head and plop it atop my own.

  “Cool hat!” I giggle, gazing up at Russ from beneath the brim. I hear a gasp behind me, and Russ looks horrified. He takes the hat off my head and leans me against the wall.