Princess Charming

by Jane Heller

  “That’s because you and Bill had fantastic early years,” Jackie said, driving home her point. “I’m telling you, if you had them once, you want them again.”

  “Where does your whole bit about men not having an essence fit in?” I challenged.

  “I was talking about the later years, not the early years,” Jackie explained, as if it were obvious. “You don’t go looking for a man’s essence until the good times are over. It’s when he starts planting himself in front of the TV after dinner and can only manage a grunt when you ask him a question that the ‘essence’ thing crops up because you’re desperate to understand why he isn’t the way he was when you were first together.”

  I laughed ruefully. It all seemed so hopeless.

  “So, even after all the heartache, you still want to fall in love,” I said, shaking my head at Jackie.

  “Sure. Or at the very least, find a steady sex partner,” she said, taking us full circle.

  “Be careful what you wish for,” I warned. “There’s something to be said for waking up in the middle of the night, walking into the bathroom, and not finding the toilet seat up.”

  “There’s also something to be said for waking up in the middle of the night, turning over in bed, and finding a man’s arms around you,” she countered.

  “Not if the reason you’re waking up in the middle of the night is because the man whose arms are around you is snoring,” I retorted.

  “Elaine, you’re impossible,” said Pat.

  “I’m not impossible,” I said. “I’m just incapable of finding true love.”

  She smiled affectionately. “You’re perfectly capable of loving someone. You just haven’t found the someone.”

  “Who says I will?” I said.

  “Who says you won’t?” she asked.

  I considered the question, then stood up from the chair and stretched.

  “I don’t know about you two, but I feel like taking a walk on the Promenade Deck,” I said, needing time alone with my thoughts about Sam. “A little fresh air might do me good.”

  “I feel like getting into bed and watching TV,” said Pat.

  “And I feel like calling Henry Prichard’s room,” said Jackie, suddenly very perky, “to see if he wants to meet me for a drink.”

  “I thought you were tired,” I said.

  “I thought you were,” she said.

  She walked over to Pat’s phone, picked up the receiver, and asked to be connected to Henry Prichard’s room. “He said he had the six-thirty seating at dinner, so he could be back in his room by now,” she whispered to us, cupping her hand over the mouthpiece. After another second or two, Henry answered his phone. Pat and I listened as Jackie went right ahead and invited him to join her in the Crown Room for a drink. Apparently, after a brief back-and-forth, he accepted because when she hung up, she turned to us and pumped her fist like a ballplayer who’d just hit a home run.

  “He said he was in the casino when he remembered that he hadn’t taken his pills,” she said, explaining why Henry was in his stateroom when she called. “At the very second his phone rang, he was trying to decide if he should go back to the casino or go to bed.”

  “Pills?” I said, my imagination immediately focusing on the diseases from which Henry Prichard might be suffering. Communicable diseases.

  “Yes, Elaine,” Jackie sighed. “Antibiotics. He said he’s getting over a sinus infection. I’ve had one too, but naturally, I didn’t do anything about it.”

  “I guess Henry takes better care of himself than you do,” I said. “Even so, are you sure you’re ready to spend time alone with him?”

  “Alone? There are over two thousand people on this ship!” she laughed.

  “Jackie’s a big girl, Elaine,” Pat said.

  I nodded, thinking I’d like to see how Pat was going to react the first time Lucy, her only daughter, went off with a man she barely knew.

  “Well, I’m outta here,” Jackie said, opening the door to the cabin.

  “Have fun,” Pat called out to her.

  “Don’t let him sell you a car,” I added.

  Before heading down to the Promenade Deck for my evening stroll, I stopped briefly in my stateroom to get the blazer I’d worn on the plane. I threw it over my shoulders and walked toward the elevator. When I got there, Skip Jamison, the boy wonder of advertising, was standing there adjusting the rubber band around his blond ponytail. He was not alone: there was a large group of Japanese people waiting for the elevator too.

  “Hey, we’ve gotta stop meeting like this,” said Skip in between chomps on his chewing gum. “It must be karma or something.”

  “Hi, Skip. Where are you off to?” I asked, hoping it wasn’t the Promenade Deck.

  “The library,” he said. “They’ve got one on Deck 3. I thought I’d do a little Deepak Chopra, if they carry his stuff. I’m really into the mind-body thing. How ’bout you?”

  “Absolutely,” I said. “I’ve always felt the mind and the body go hand in hand.” I suddenly thought of Jackie having an after-dinner drink with Henry Prichard and wondered if her mind was going hand in hand with his body.

  As if reading my mind, Skip asked where my friends were.

  “One’s in her cabin, watching TV. The other’s with a new friend, having a drink.”

  Skip touched my arm. “And you?”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah, where are you—”

  The elevator arrived. We all stepped inside. The Japanese people pressed Deck 5, where the casino was located. Skip pressed Deck 3, the library floor.

  “Elaine, babe. Which deck do you want me to hit for you?” asked Skip, who was standing right next to the panel of buttons.

  “Oh. Sorry.” Babe. “Would you mind pressing Deck 6?” I said.

  He did as I asked. “Going for a walk on the Promenade Deck, is that it?” he speculated. “To check out the stars?”

  “Yes,” I said hesitantly, sensing that Skip might change his mind about the library and want to join me for a little stargazing.

  I was right. He said, “That’s a cool idea. Mind if I come?”

  “Ordinarily, I wouldn’t,” I said, “but I’m meeting someone there. A man from my table at dinner.” Well, it wasn’t a total lie. Sam would be with me. In spirit, anyway.

  “Hey, that’s cool,” said Skip, looking disappointed despite his upbeat tone. “I’ll catch you later then.”

  The elevator stopped at Deck 6.

  “Enjoy,” said Skip as I got off. “Treat this night like it’s your last.”

  Now that’s an odd thing to say, I thought. And then I guessed that one of the hallmarks of Deepak Chopra’s work was probably the old carpe diem thing.

  “Thanks, Skip,” I said as the elevator doors were closing. “You too.”

  When I stepped out into the night, onto the Promenade Deck’s Astro-Turfed surface, I was immediately struck by the stark contrast between the air inside the ship, which was recycled and stale, and the air outside, which was fragrant and fresh. When you spend even a few hours inside a ship, with its boutiques and restaurants and wall-to-wall amenities, it’s easy to forget there is an outside. But there was no mistaking how achingly beautiful a night it was—clear, sultry, sensual.

  A row of lounge chairs, as well as a running track, extended along the perimeter of the deck. It was about eight-forty-five by the time I showed up, and there were far more loungers than runners.

  I wandered toward the rear of the ship, hoping to find a secluded spot where I could stand beneath the stars, which were out in force, as was a perfect, crescent moon. After several minutes, I found a totally deserted corner, directly over the stern of the boat. I took a deep breath and drew myself up to the railing, then looked down at the swirling waters below. A soft, salty breeze played with the ends of my hair as I watched the ocean churn with the wake the engines of the Princess Charming were stirring up. I inhaled again, more deeply this time, letting the sea air fill my lungs, clear my head. My mind
and body were in sync. Deepak would have approved.

  This is why people should go on a cruise, I thought dreamily as I took another breath and exhaled slowly, indulgently. Not for the six-course meals. Not for the duty-free shopping. Not for the lectures on napkin folding. For this. For the luxury of being able to stand on the deck of a ship in the middle of the ocean on a starry, moonlit night. As the TV commercial says, it is different out here. There’s nothing but you and the vastness of the sea, nothing but you and infinity. The sensation is thrilling and intimidating and totally unlike any other. My life in New York seemed suddenly not to exist. My mind was fixed only on the present, only on the sights and sounds and impressions of those moments.

  When I’d first thought of going out onto the Promenade Deck, I’d intended to exercise, to walk off my dinner, to compensate for not having had time to ran my usual four miles that day. But I just stood there, my hands on the railing, my skin tight and tingling in the salt air, my thoughts melting, one into the other.

  It wasn’t Sam who came to mind first, which surprised me. It was my father I conjured up; not the phantom father I hadn’t seen in years, but the young man I’d adored as a child. He had wavy dark hair like Sam’s, but he wasn’t nearly as conventionally handsome—or as tall. Still, I had thought him the most magical creature on earth, as he alone had the power to sweep me into his arms and make me feel like a princess. He was a pharmacist, and he worked at a drugstore not far from our home in New Rochelle. But dispensing prescriptions was only one of his talents: he sang better than Julius LaRosa, danced better than Fred Astaire, told better jokes than Milton Berle. At least, I’d thought so. Unfortunately, his many talents also included romancing women who were not his wife—a fact I probably could have lived with if only he hadn’t left, if only he hadn’t gone away to the redhead’s house, if only he hadn’t become the father of another little girl, a counterfeit daughter to sweep in his arms, sing to, dance with, treat like a princess. If only.

  Oh, give it up already, I scolded myself, as I always did when the hurt and anger began to well up inside me. That was then. This is now. Live your life.

  I swallowed the lump in my throat, gazed down at the sea, and watched the water bubble up as we motored down to the Caribbean. I couldn’t take my eyes off the ocean. It was hypnotic, like staring into a fireplace with a roaring blaze going. I allowed myself to think of Sam then, to focus on his face, the way he moved, the things he said, the things he didn’t say. I let myself get hopelessly sticky and sentimental as I wondered if he liked me, had found me interesting or entertaining or pretty, had formed any opinions about me at all. I closed my eyes and imagined an entire identity for him, the way you do when you meet a man who intrigues you and you don’t know much about him. I gave him a fictional mother and father, a few siblings, a steady girlfriend in college, an ex-wife, maybe two. And then, I gave him me. I actually pictured us together over the course of the cruise, permitted myself to believe that love wasn’t an illusion, that men could be faithful and true, that happiness was possible, even for me.

  I was having a wonderful time picturing and imagining and fantasizing when my concentration was broken by the sound of a voice on the PA system.

  “Ladies and gentlemen. Dis is your captain speaking.”

  It was Captain Svein Solberg, Mr. Personality. It was nine o’clock on the dot, and as advertised, he was giving us the second of his twice-daily reports on our position and the weather. Apparently, we were somewhere near the Bahamas, several hundred miles from Puerto Rico, and traveling at seventeen knots.

  “Da veather is fair,” he reported, obviously looking up at the same clear sky I was, “vith very little danger of rain. Barring any unforeseen problems, ve anticipate smooth sailing for da entire cruise.”

  Very little danger. Smooth sailing. For the entire cruise.

  I pondered the captain’s words. Could things really go smoothly from here on out? Was it okay to let go of my relentless worrying for once in my life? Was it time to relax and enjoy myself?

  “Why not?” I whispered to the seagull that kept circling overhead. “Why not?”

  As I stood on that deck of the ship, watching the seagull soar, I felt a sense of adventure and excitement I hadn’t felt in years. It’s only the first night of the cruise, I told myself. Anything can happen over the next six days. Anything.

  I thought of Sam again. It didn’t matter that I had spent all of two hours in his company, that he was a blank page at that point. What mattered was that I wanted him in a way that was frightening and wonderful.

  “Why not?” I said out loud this time. “Why the hell not?”

  Day Two: Monday, February 11

  5

  The phone in my cabin rang at 7 a.m., jolting me out of a deep sleep.

  “Yes?”

  “This is your wake-up call,” a male voice explained.

  “My—?”

  “Yes, ma’am. You instructed us to phone you at seven o’clock, and it’s seven now.”

  “Oh, right. Sorry. I completely forgot.” Before I went to bed, I’d called the Purser’s Office and asked to be awakened at seven so I could go running first thing in the morning. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. How was I to know that I would be up all night because my stateroom was located directly underneath the ship’s “Teen Disco” and that the bass from the music they were playing would render me a human vibrator? If you’ve ever lived next door to a construction site where the jackhammer is the tool of choice, you know what I’m talking about. I honestly thought my teeth would fall out. “Thank you for the call,” I told the wake-up man.

  “You’re very welcome and have yourself a pleasant day, Mrs. Zimmerman.”

  Mrs. Zimmerman. “I will. You too.”

  I washed, dressed, and was ready to go by seven-twenty, eager to take advantage of my first full day at sea, hopeful of seeing Sam. Unfortunately, the first person I saw upon bounding out of my cabin, into the hall, was Mr. Lube Job.

  “Lenny!” I whispered, not wanting to wake the other passengers. “What are you doing here at this hour?” When Jackie, Pat, and I had first met him at the mustering at the Crown Room, he had told us—bragged to us—that his room was on Deck 9, the so-called Commodore Deck, where all the fanciest cabins were. So why would he be standing around at seven-thirty in the morning in the hall of Deck 8? What’s more, he was still wearing the same clothes from the night before.

  He laughed, assaulting me with his booze breath, and nodded toward the cabin two doors down from mine.

  “Didn’t I tell you lovelies I was a swinger?” he grinned, teeth clicking, bracelets clanging. “I went to the show last night, got lucky, and ended up with the doll face in 8026.”

  “Gosh, that was lucky,” I said, trying to share his enthusiasm. What was lucky was that, given his age and lifestyle, Lenny didn’t die in the saddle.

  “Where are you off to?” he asked, not bothering to notice that I was wearing running shorts and running shoes and was, therefore, very likely going running.

  “The Promenade Deck,” I replied.

  “All alone? What about your friends?”

  “They’re probably still asleep.”

  “In their cabins?”

  “No, in the engine room.”

  Lenny laughed. “I just thought maybe they got lucky too,” he said, nudging me in the ribs. “You never know where people will spend the night on cruises like this, huh?”

  “No, you never know,” I agreed as I tried to sidestep away from Lenny, who was literally blocking my path.

  “I’ll tell ya what I know,” he said, sticking his hairy, bejeweled chest in my face. “I was on my way back to my room to shower, but I just might pay another visit to 8026. Stamina’s my middle name, you get what I’m saying, honey?” He nudged me again.

  “I sure do,” I said, nudging him back just enough to slip past him. Feeling extremely sorry for the doll face in 8026 if Lenny Lubin was her idea of a good time, I took off for t
he elevator.

  The weather was glorious, and as I stepped out onto the Promenade Deck, into the brilliant sunshine and warm, tropical air, I experienced the same sense of adventure and possibility that I’d felt the night before.

  There were quite a few passengers doing laps around the running track, I discovered: some jogging, some walking; some young, some old; some wearing headphones, some wearing those seasick patches people stick behind their ears. I tightened the laces on my new sneakers, did a few stretching exercises, and set off on the track.

  Boy, this sure beats the FDR Drive, I thought, comparing the scenic route that the Princess Charming afforded me with my daily run on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, which was fraught with garbage trucks, exhaust fumes, and muggers. Yes, I could get used to this, I decided as I sprinted past a pretty white sailboat that was making its way down to the Caribbean.

  I was on my fourth or fifth lap on the track, working up a nice sweat, when I turned to my left and noticed that Sam Peck was running up alongside me. He was about to pass me, but then he recognized me and slowed down.

  “Hey,” he said between breaths as he kept pace with me. “Look who’s here.”

  Yeah, look, I thought. I wasn’t wearing a drop of makeup, my hair was pulled back into a sloppy ponytail, and my perspiration-soaked T-shirt was hanging out of my shorts. I looked like an unmade bed. Sam, on the other hand, was a vision. His blue eyes were as entrancing as the color of the sea; his dark lashes and dark hair were shiny, lustrous; his legs were long and tapered, yet muscular too. I could easily imagine them draped around mine.

  “Hi. How’re you doing,” I said, trying to sound casual as we trotted next to each other.

  “I’m doing fine, thanks. Mind if I tag along with you?”

  “Not at all.” Mind?

  “I didn’t figure you for a runner,” said Sam in that cool, detached way he had.