He fell silent for a minute, and Rhees wondered if he’d fallen asleep leaning against the wall on the porch or something. She didn’t have to wonder long before she heard him mumbling, but it sounded like he was talking to himself now.
“But the big baaad wolf couldn’t blow the house in . . . he hufffed, and he pufffed, but Rhees lived in a house . . . nawt a house made of bricks . . . oh, no, no. She lived in fucking Fort Knawx! . . . with a mm-moat.” He clicked the T sound with emphasis. He paused. “Filled with hungry alligators . . . and pi-rrraw-nhas . . . and zommbbies. I hate fucking zombies.” He paused again. “A category five hurricane . . . couldn’t blow herr house down.”
She threw her pillow to her mouth to stifle the giggles. He might be acting funny and cute, but she still didn’t think the situation was humorous.
“Dani Girrrl,” he cooed. It shocked Rhees to hear him call her Dani Girl. Of all the stupid nicknames he had tried to give her, he finally found one she didn’t mind. “Pleease let me in. I don’t l-like to sleep alone. I’ve never liked sleeping alone.” He sounded so sad, even through his slurs. “I used to sneak into my little sister’s room. I always told my mom that Mary was the one who was afraid, but it was really me.” He paused.
“She wet the bed sometimes. It was sooo gross.” He sighed loudly. “But . . . I still . . . I still preferred getting peed on than sleeping in my big ol’ room . . . all by my—s-self. I’d wake up awll wet, clean both of us up, and I’d carry her to Pete’s rooom so we could all sleep together—just like old times—before things went to shit. But then Pete started to ne-ver be in his rooom anymore.” He paused again. “When I got older, I found out why.” Silence again.
“That’s when I figured out that I could get girrls to sneak me into their rooms, too.” He laughed at his cleverness. “My parents ne-ver knew I wasn’t home . . . or they just didn’t fucking care.
“I’d spend the night with the girls. A few times . . . parents walked in on us . . . just sleeping—well one time, we weren’t sleee-ping . . . yet.” He laughed quietly. “After getting the shhi-it beat out of me by an angry father—I didn’t fight back. I could have, but . . .” He stopped to think. “If I found some dickwad like me in Mary’s bed, I’d beat the shiiit out of him too.”
Rhees listened to his story. He so rarely shared his past and he’d never opened up this much before.
“I got pa-ritty fast at grabbing my stufff and getting out. I’d go home and crawl into my own bed, all by myself—and nawt sleep. But you see . . .” His voice got louder, trying to make sure Rhees heard him. “Sleeping with you is like sleeping with my siss-ter. Or the just sleeping with girls—aff-ter the sex. It-snot so much the sssex—the sex isn’t bad, don’t get me wrawng. I like it—a lawt! Just not as much as I like the company. Pleease, don’t make me sleep alone.”
Rhees pressed her hands to her face. She felt almost guilty knowing so much about him, understanding that if he wasn’t so drunk, he would’ve never made such a detailed confession. She couldn’t stay mad at him, and decided to let him in. She unlocked the doors, but by the time she got outside, she found him asleep in one of the Adirondack chairs.
She worried about the way he sprawled out. His head hung over the side of the chair to his left, his mouth open and his jaw cocked to one side. His right leg propped over the opposite arm of the chair. He’d wake up sore in the morning.
She returned to her room and grabbed two sheets and all three pillows. She tucked one under his ribs so the wooden chair wouldn’t dig into him, trying to fix the pillow to give his head some support too. She tucked another under the leg draped over the arm of the chair. She covered him with one of the sheets and watched him for a minute.
“He’s sleeping off a drunken stupor for crying out loud! How can he still look so beautiful?” She put the last pillow on the floor in front of his chair and sat down. She wrapped the other sheet around herself and rested her head against his left leg.
oOo
Paul woke and it took a while to figure out where he was, but he couldn’t remember how he got there, or why he felt anchored to the chair. Rhees had wrapped her arms around his leg, her head rested against his thigh.
“Rhees?” Paul’s voice came out deep and hoarse. “Rhees.” He leaned forward in the chair and rubbed her back with his hand. He nuzzled her hair with his nose, inhaling, feasting on her scent.
He tried again to remember how they got there. This isn’t right.
“You don’t have to sleep alone,” she murmured.
“Rhees? Hey, wake up.” He wondered what she meant.
“Ow. I have a kink in my neck.” She stirred.
“Why are you sleeping like that? Why am I?” A few memories started coming back to him. “Aw shit!”
“Hmm? What time is it?”
He checked his watch. “Damn, I should have been at the shop half an hour ago.” He wanted to jump up and get going, but she hung on to his leg, still groggy. “Come on Rhees, wake up. You’ve got me pinned down. We need to get to the shop.”
“I’m sorry. Oh . . . my neck hurts.” She put her hand to her neck and tried to rub the kink out. He reached down and helped her, massaging her neck and shoulders before taking her face in both hands and studying her.
“Is that better?” He kissed her on the temple.
Her memory of the early morning events returned and she sat up straighter, releasing his leg. She looked at him, afraid of what mood he would be in this morning.
“What’s wrong?”
She stood up, avoiding meeting his eyes. “Nothing. I’ll get ready.” She headed toward the screen door, but before she made it into the house, he asked again, right on her heels.
“What did I do last night? Did I do something—anything I shouldn’t have?”
“Not after you finally came home. I need to change.”
He rubbed the stubble along his tensed jaw and felt the leftover soreness from Dobbs’ punch. More and more of the events of the night before were coming back to him. He remembered everything, up until he followed Rhees, making sure she got home safely.
He remembered going to an obscure bar north of his shop, one, no one he knew well, ever frequented. He remembered Nicole. She showed up right after he did. He remembered realizing she’d followed him. He remembered buying her a few drinks, thinking she looked better than he’d originally thought . . . he hated himself. The thing is, he couldn’t remember if he needed to or not.
“Rhees! I need to go. I need to get to the shop.” He looked visibly harrowed about something. “Make sure you walk with Tracy and Regina. I’ll see you later.” He took off down the stairs.
“Paul? Wait for me! I’m almost ready. I only need a second.” She’d already changed into her swimming suit. She rushed out of the bathroom, threw on a T-shirt, grabbed her pack, and ran into the living room, ready to lock her bedroom door, but he’d already left.
She walked out onto the porch, looked down at the street and caught a glimpse of him running away. Turning to the chair where he’d slept, Rhees sighed, wondering if now that the alcohol had worn off, he was still mad at her. She sighed before gathering up the pillows and sheets and taking them to her room. She threw everything on the floor and sat down on the bed. She didn’t really cry, but she could have.
oOo
Dobbs and Claire didn’t show up for work, giving Paul even more to do after racing around all morning, playing catch-up for being late. Rhees showed up, not too long after him, and did all she could to help. With the work done, she stood on the boat as it pulled away from the dock without him, watching him wave. He never told her he’d opted not to dive, leading her to believe he still planned to. The look on her face made him feel even worse.
Paul had told Randy he had some urgent business to attend to. As soon as the boat headed off, he ran. He’d arrange
d to have Ignacio’s taxi waiting for him, out of view on the street, so Rhees wouldn’t see it. He hopped in, knowing he’d just left his shop unattended, but the odds that no one would show up before the boat returned were in his favor.
“Get me to the landing strip, and hurry.”
“You picking up guests?” Ignacio asked.
“Seeing one off.”
“I don’t think you’ll make it.”
“That’s why I said to hurry.”
Paul stared out the side window to let the driver know he wasn’t in the mood for conversation. Ignacio knew how to get through the pedestrian crowded streets fast, and luckily, the plane was late. Paul jumped out of the van before Ignacio had come to a full stop.
“Wait for me,” Paul yelled as he ran to the crude lean-to covered waiting bench that the islanders called an airport. The college students waited for their flight, surprised to see him, but no one seemed more surprised than Nicole.
“Can I talk to you, please?” he asked. Nicole gave him a dirty look, but she agreed. Paul took her aside. “Did we . . . um, my memory of last night is a little fuzzy. Can you remind me what happened?”
“What, it wasn’t enough to put me through that once? You want me to relive it again?” Nicole huffed, angrily.
“That bad, huh?” He drooped.
“Yes, it was.”
“I’m so sorry. It shouldn’t have happened.”
“Right, you son-of-a-bitch.”
“I know,” he agreed. “But please. It’s important.” He did his best to smile the way that seemed to warm most women’s hearts. He wasn’t in the mood so it was hard to do.
“Don’t look at me like that. That’s how it all started.”
He almost panicked that she was on to him, but he turned up the eye power instead of turning it down as she’d requested. He had to know. He wasn’t above fighting dirty to get what he wanted.
“All right,” she agreed. He wanted to sigh in relief but didn’t give himself away. “I was tired . . . and a little depressed, so I decided to go back to my room and pack. Those guys—” she pointed at her friends, “—wanted to party up to the very last minute, so I headed back to the hotel on my own. That’s when I saw you wandering around by yourself.”
He must have appeared impatient because she smirked and started filling him in on every single minute detail. He wanted to scream at her to just get to the important part but she was already unhappy with him about something. He had no choice but to count his blessings she hadn’t started the story from the day she’d been born.
“It confused me to see you alone because of that whole violent scene at the party—I saw you leave with your girlfriend—you know, after three days of diving with you guys, I didn’t even know you and Rhees were an item, but there you were, all alone.”
“I remember this part,” he said, hoping to get her to move it along but she ignored him.
“You looked upset, angry even. I got my hopes up as I thought, hmm, maybe he could use a shoulder to cry on. I followed you to that bar in the middle of nowhere and when I walked in and saw the look on your face, I knew I’d made the right choice.”
“Maybe you misread the situation?” Paul’s cheek twitched, knowing what she meant.
“Hell no! My wishful thinking may have misled me at the party. I guess I read more into our dance than there was, but . . . I know when a man is undressing me with his eyes!”
He winced. “So what happened?”
“We had a few drinks. Well, I had a few drinks. You drank the bar dry. Then you asked me to dance. I had to practically hold you up by then, but things got cozy. I thought we were hitting it off.” Nicole frowned.
“What did I do?” Paul was sure she’d finally made it to the part he needed to hear.
“When a man leaves a party with one girl, and then shows up angry and alone at a remote bar—the way you looked at me—” Her eyes glazed over at the memory, but then she snapped out of it. “You were . . . friendly, and very attentive as you proceeded to get plastered, taking me along for the ride. Naturally, I thought you were out for some good old revenge sex.
“A fast song came on and you started twirling me around but then you said, very rudely, I might add, ‘You don’t dance like Rhees’. I said, ‘No one dances like Rhees, but I’m a better lover than a dancer.’ I asked if you wanted to go back to my place. I thought that’s what we both wanted.”
Paul closed his eyes and pursed his lips. He knew how the story ended. It just irritated him to have to hear her tell it.
“I’m sorry. It should never have happened.”
“You’re damn right. After being all, ‘I don’t like to be alone. I would rather hang out with you all night and drool all over you’, Mr. Dreamy-Eyes suddenly looked at me like I’d grown a second head or something. You can be a scary guy, do you know that?”
“Yeah, I know—so I didn’t . . .” He barely noticed her question. He finally felt hope that he hadn’t betrayed Rhees. He’d tried to dismiss Rhees’ concern about that, but from the beginning, he secretly worried he couldn’t be loyal. He’d never tried. He just never imagined it would be so soon.
“Yes! You did.” Nicole’s voice went up an octave.
He ran his hand through his hair, hating himself, knowing he would never change.
“You bought me drinks, danced with me—you told me I was pretty—with your eyes when I first showed up, but it’s the same thing. You led me on.” She pouted. “But then you leaned down and told me, right in my ear—I thought you were going to kiss me, but instead, you told me I wasn’t your type—anymore. You really hurt my feelings.”
His expression went blank. “That’s it? I hurt your feelings?”
“I told you. You led me on, made me think something was going to happen, and then you just stumbled out of the bar, leaving me there to lick my wounded pride.”
It took all of his restraint not to smile. They heard the approaching plane and watched it land on the dirt strip.
“Look, I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt your feelings.” He hoped she wouldn’t catch the mockery in his voice. “But you just made my day.”
“You really are a son-of-a-bitch.”
“Yeah, I said, I know.” He winked before he grabbed her shoulders and gave her a kiss on both cheeks. He felt almost giddy with joy. “Thank you.”
She looked up at his smile, hopeful and dazed, as if he’d just professed his undying love.
“For calling you an SOB?” she asked in a breathless voice.
“Yep. Thank you. Don’t miss your plane.” He didn’t want to hang around another second, explaining something so important to someone so unimportant to him. He ran back to the taxi.
“You’re a good-looking SOB!” Nicole called out after him. “I’ll come back next year. Maybe we can hook up then.”
Paul didn’t bother to respond.
Chapter 7
Mitch and Randy were still out with the divers, and with Rhees diving too, Paul was on his own at the shop and didn’t have a second to breathe. Dobbs and Claire still hadn’t shown up, and Paul knew he’d have to do something about that, but at the moment, he couldn’t take the time to figure out what.
The office phone rang and he cursed under his breath as Emil, the ferry operations manager, informed Paul he had a package. For important, hard to find in this country items, Paul just asked his buddies in the States to pick them up for him and bring it on their next visit, but if Paul needed something readily available from the mainland, he’d either pick it up himself, send someone he trusted, and occasionally, he could convince the vendor to deliver the package to Emil personally and Emil would bring it across on the ferry—for a price.
“I don’t need this right now,” Paul grumbled. He said the next sentence in Spanish. “I’ll p
ick it up later this afternoon.”
“Not possible, my friend,” Emil answered back in his native tongue. “It’s my wife’s birthday. This is my last run today. Hector is taking over the ferry until tomorrow, so if you want this package, you’ll have to come before we head out in thirty minutes.”
“Thirty minutes,” Paul grumbled again. He told Emil he’d be there and slammed the phone down on the receiver. He ran out of the office to the end of the deck and looked out over the bay, hoping to see the boat headed back—it should be back any minute. He glanced around to see who’d trickled in. A handful of students were huddled under the gazebo, talking, and obviously absorbed in their conversation. He decided to take his chances and took off toward the ferry at a run.
To his dismay, he’d not been able to find the ferry manager right away and it had taken him forty-five minutes to get his package, a small envelope filled with new O rings—hardly worth the trouble it’d caused him, he thought. The shop needed to supplement their supply of the emergency item on a regular basis but he wondered why they had to arrive on this day of all days.
oOo
Rhees wondered all morning about where their fake relationship stood. The dives relaxed her, but the boat ride and the surface interval were miserable. Dorene and Krista talked endlessly about the previous night, not caring she might hear, but she tried to pretend she didn’t. Mitch and Randy gave her sympathetic glances every now and then, but she couldn’t wait to get back. She needed to talk to Paul, or more, she needed him to talk to her.
The boat docked, and Rhees jumped off to look for him before putting her gear away but discovered he’d left the shop, though no one knew why or when he’d left. She despaired, worried about Claire and Dobbs, about Paul—it became all she could do to rinse her gear and put it away before she ran back to her apartment. She needed to cry, really cry this time.
Wet: Part 2 Page 8