Comfortable Distance

by Kenna White

  “Fast is fun,” Juliana said gleefully.

  “Fast is fun, Juliana,” Jamie agreed. “But swift is safe.”

  “Huh?” Juliana wrinkled her nose.

  “Fast suggests reckless uncontrollable speed. Swift means successfully using the wind and the conditions to your best advantage. You can be a swift sailor and win more races.”

  “She means you shouldn’t take chances that might hurt yourself or someone else,” Dana explained.

  “Why didn’t she just say that?”

  “I thought I did,” Jamie said, frowning in thought.

  “Dr. Hughes was giving you an analytical explanation, sweetheart.”

  “Do you have a Laser, Jamie?” Juliana asked hopefully.

  “No. I agree with your Aunt Dana. Lasers are better left to younger sailors.”

  “How come you are always talking about sailing if you don’t have a sailboat?” There was a childish skepticism to Juliana’s question.

  “She told you,honey.She took lessons when she was younger.” Dana was obviously embarrassed over the accusatory tone to her niece’s curiosity. “Don’t be rude,” she whispered in Juliana’s ear.

  “That’s okay. She’s right. I shouldn’t offer advice without current hands-on experience. And as luck would have it, I can do just that.”

  “You have a boat?” Dana asked.

  “A small one, yes.”

  “I saw your boat. It’s not a sailboat,” Juliana said. “It’s a motorboat.”

  “Most sailboats have some kind of motor to maneuver in and out of the harbor. Some are inboard. Some are outboard.” Jamie said, pointing toward a sailboat returning after a day of sailing.

  “But they have sails. Your boat doesn’t have sails.” Juliana watched as the skipper eased the boat into the slip.

  Jamie took a quarter from her pocket and handed it to Juliana.

  “I’ll bet you this quarter my boat has sails.”

  Juliana looked down at the quarter in her hand.

  “I win then. I get to keep the quarter. I saw your boat. It doesn’t even have a mast. How can it have sails without a mast?”

  “I think she has you on this one, Jamie,” Dana said with a chuckle.

  “I don’t think so. What you saw was the research boat I use. That is provided by a grant to the science department. My boat is moored at Boston Harbor.” She pointed past the mouth of the harbor.

  “You have a sailboat?” Dana asked just as Juliana was about to ask it first.

  “Yes. I haven’t been out on her yet this summer, but she’s still there. They keep cashing my checks for the slip rental.”

  “I don’t see it,” Juliana said, squinting at the horizon.

  “What? You don’t believe me?” Jamie chuckled.

  “Juliana is a doubting Thomas of the first order,” Dana said, winking at her niece playfully.

  “Do you want to see it?”

  “Yes,” Juliana said instantly. “I won’t believe you until I see it.”

  “Okay. Tomorrow.”

  “Oh, boy! Can I go on it? Will you take me sailing?”

  “Juliana, she meant she’d show it to you. Not take you out on it,” Dana said.

  “I don’t see why not,” Jamie said.

  “Jamie, you don’t have to do that. You know how kids are.”

  “It’s okay. I don’t mind. I should take her out once in a while to get my money’s worth out of the slip rental.”

  “But that’s asking an awful lot.”

  “She said she didn’t mind, Aunt Dana.”

  “You ask your father if it’s all right first.” Jamie wagged a finger at Juliana’s growing enthusiasm. “He has to approve.”

  “Oh, he’ll say yes. I’m sure he will. I know he’ll let me go. Won’t he, Aunt Dana?”

  “I have no idea. We’ll have to see if he thinks you should go out on a big sailboat.”

  “You’re coming too, Dana,” Jamie said in her direction.

  “Me?”

  “Absolutely. I need two mates to help man the missen.”

  “Should I know what that means?”

  “Help with the rigging.”

  “I know I don’t know anything about that. We just scooted around the harbor in a tiny boat like a water bug. We didn’t learn anything about missen rigging.”

  “You’ll do fine. Sailing is easy once you get the hang of it.”

  Just then a woman in the returning sailboat stumbled and nearly fell over the side of the boat. She grabbed the railing to keep from falling into the water. One of her shoes splashed and immediately sank out of sight. Dana gulped.

  “I see that.”

  “If you can handle one of those little boats, this should be a piece of cake. And there’s much less chance we’ll have to lay the boat over.” Jamie smiled at Juliana. “Unless you really want to.”

  “NO!” Dana said, her eyes huge. “No capsizing the boat. Once is enough.”

  “Agreed.” Jamie smoothed the top of Juliana’s hair. “We’ll have to keep her upright, kiddo.”

  “Will you teach me how to raise a big sail?” Juliana said eagerly.

  “Absolutely. You’ll be my first mate.”

  “And you can be Aunt Dana’s date.”

  “Juliana,” Dana laughed, trying to cover her embarrassment.

  “Well, she could,” Juliana argued. “You aren’t living with Shannon anymore.”

  “I know but—”

  “Are you a lesbian, Jamie?” Juliana asked as if it was a standard question.

  “Juliana Robbins!” Dana gasped. “You don’t ask people that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Yeah, why not?” Jamie teased, laughing wildly.

  “Because you just don’t.”

  “As a matter of fact, Juliana, yes, I am,” Jamie said. “But skippers don’t date their crew members. It’s a rule of the sea.”

  “Oh,” Juliana replied dejectedly.

  “I’m sorry, Jamie,” Dana said apologetically.

  “Don’t worry about it. How are you going to know these things if you don’t ask? How does nine o’clock tomorrow morning sound? Boston Harbor Marina.” Jamie took out a business card and handed it to Dana. “Call me if you need to change the time.”

  “Thank you for inviting us sailing, Jamie,” Juliana said, taking Jamie’s hand as they walked along.

  “You’re welcome, kiddo.”

  “Yes, thank you for the invitation,” Dana agreed.

  “I’m parked over there.” Jamie pointed. “I guess I’ll see you in the morning.”

  She waited at the curb while Dana keyed in the security code and opened the gate. Dana waved and followed Juliana down the gangplank. Jamie returned the wave then headed to her car.

  Chapter 9

  It didn’t take much convincing for Steve to agree to the outing. Once Dana explained Jamie was a marine biologist at the university who spent the summer scuba diving on a research grant, he could find no reason not to allow it. Dana wondered if it was Jamie’s PhD that impressed him most or that she was gay.

  “Have fun you two but don’t be a pain in the neck, Juliana. Dana is in charge. If she says no, it’s no. No whining,” he said when Dana came to pick her up.

  Dana packed hats, sunblock, snacks and a few bottles of water. She slipped a small sketch pad in the tote bag just in case anything sparked an idea for Ringlet. She often carried one with her, never knowing what might inspire a single cartoon or even a series of panels. Jamie was already on the boat cleaning and getting things ready when Dana pulled into the parking lot across the street from Boston Harbor Marina.

  “Hello,” Jamie called, waving them down to the dock. She was standing on the deck, unsnapping the canvas cover over the mainsail.

  “Wow. Is this your boat?” Juliana ran down the finger pier to where Jamie’s boat was moored.

  “Do I get my quarter back?” she said, helping her onboard.

  “No,” she giggled.

  “What
did you buy with it?”

  “Gumball. A red one.” Juliana opened her mouth to reveal a glob of gum.

  “She’s not into saving yet,” Dana said, trying to figure how to get the tote bag and herself onto the boat.

  “Give me your bag before you step over. It’s kind of awkward.” Jamie took the bag then offered Dana a hand as she climbed over the chrome railing.

  Jamie’s boat was a sleek vessel for its size. Thirty feet long, bright red with white mast and trim. A row of five small portholes lined each side of the cabin. The mahogany hatch was pushed open, revealing a compartment below deck. It contained a small galley, a bench long enough for a bed and a booth for dining. It also had two narrow doors in the forward part of the cabin Dana assumed were closets.

  “Juliana was right,” Dana said, peeking through the hatch. “This is definitely a wow. I didn’t expect you to have a sailboat sailboat.”

  “What did you expect?”

  “I don’t know. Something with scientific instruments and a big bookshelf full of textbooks, I guess. This is nice.”

  “I do have a spare tank and regulator in the forepeak and a portable spectrometer in the storage compartment. Do you want me to get them out?”

  “No, that’s all right.”

  “What’s that mean?” Juliana asked, leaning over the railing and studying the name on the side of the hull.

  “Can you read it?”Jamie continued to get the boat ready to sail.

  “Carpet Ventum,” she said awkwardly.

  “Carpe Ventum.”

  “What’s Carpe Ventum mean?” Juliana asked.

  Jamie raised her eyebrows at Dana as if asking if she knew.

  “Seize the wind?” Dana offered.

  “Very good.”

  “My high school Latin teacher would be so pleased.” She chuckled.

  “Latin, the language of science,” Jamie said proudly. “With a little Greek thrown in for flavor.”

  “Don’t be too impressed. My vocabulary is pretty minimal. About the only other thing I remember is veni, vidi, vici. I came, I saw, I conquered.”

  “Julius Caesar. Forty-seven B.C.”

  “No one told me Latin was a dead language when I signed up for it as my foreign language credit.”

  “Didn’t you use Latin in biology class?”

  “Should I remember that?”

  “Scientific names all come from Latin.”

  “Is bug a Latin word?” Juliana asked with a giggle.

  “No. But Lumbricus terrestis is. That’s an earthworm.”

  “What’s a fish called,” Juliana said, as if testing her.

  “There are hundreds of kinds of fish. Carcassius auratus is a goldfish.”

  “How about a dog, like Ringlet?”

  “Are we going to spend the day talking Latin or are we going sailing?” Jamie asked, obviously amused with Juliana’s curiosity.

  “Sailing!” she cheered.

  “Good. Put your stuff down below and help me cast off.”

  “Okay.” Juliana put the tote bag in the cabin then scrambled back up on deck.

  “By the way, Ringlet is a Canis lupus familiaris,” Jamie said, untying the forward line. “Can you get the stern line? Just toss it on the dock. That one stays here.”

  “How about me? What can I do to help?” Dana said.

  “I need you to hold the tiller.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you. You took sailing classes didn’t you?”

  “Yes, but this is three times as big. I could steer right into something.”

  “No, you won’t. Just hold it in the middle.”

  Dana held the tiller as she was instructed, watching the sides of the boat as they bobbed back and forth in the slip. Jamie turned the key and started the engine. It belched a bit of blue smoke then chugged into service, slowly inching them away from the dock. Jamie scurried around the deck, coiling rope and stowing the fenders that cushioned the sides of the boat.

  “Um, Jamie?” Dana said, nervously gripping the wooden tiller as they motored past the other boats. “Do you want to take this?”

  “You’re doing fine. Steer for the green buoy. Keep it off your starboard bow,” she said without looking up. “Put this on, Juliana.” Jamie handed her a life vest.

  “Aw, do I have to? This boat is bigger than the Laser.”

  “Yes,ma’am.You do,”she said emphatically even before Dana could say it.

  Juliana put it on then sat cross-legged on the top of the cabin, watching as they eased out of the marina.

  “Here’s one for you,” Jamie said, bringing Dana a vest. “You’re welcome to wear it but you don’t have to,” she added quietly. “She has to. It’s for her safety and it’s the law. Adults don’t have to wear them, just have them accessible.”

  “Are you wearing one?” Dana asked.

  Jamie pointed to the life vest hanging on a hook by the hatch door. Dana hung hers on top of it.

  “Which way are we going?” Juliana asked.

  “Up Case Inlet,” Jamie replied, snaking her hand to the right then back to the left. “We can’t go up the west side of Hartstene Island and around.There isn’t enough clearance under the bridge for sailboats.”

  “I bet you’ve sailed every inch of Puget Sound,” Dana said, adjusting their course as they cleared the last row of boats.

  “Some of it.”

  As soon as they were out of the harbor Jamie turned off the engine and flipped the switch to raise the sail. The electric motor raised the red and white striped sail into place and it immediately filled with air, jerking the boat forward, nearly pulling the tiller out of Dana’s hand.

  “Watch the boom, Juliana.” Jamie tightened the rigging as they began to move toward open water. Juliana stretched out on her stomach with her hands under her chin to watch as they skimmed along. “That’s it. Keep on this heading,” Jamie said as she fine-tuned the set of the sail. She noticed the whimsical grin on Juliana’s face and nodded to Dana to look. “Having fun yet?” she said, straightening the strap on Juliana’s life vest.

  “Yeah!”

  “Good. Want to steer?”

  “YEAH!” She scrambled off the cabin and rushed to Dana’s side.

  “Show her the heading on the compass. It’s there by the hatch.”

  “Are you sure about this, Jamie?” Dana said nervously.

  “Sure, I’m sure.”

  “I can do it, Aunt Dana. I steered the Laser.”

  “Okay, but.” Dana wasn’t sure what to warn her about. “Hold it steady. See the compass. Keep the little line on the three.” Dana slowly relinquished control to Juliana’s eager little hands but she stood next to her, ready to retake the tiller at a moment’s notice.

  “Can you come help me untangle the jib sheet?” Jamie didn’t seem at all concerned that a twelve-year-old was skippering her thirty-foot sailboat.

  “Yes, but...”

  “She’s doing fine. You sound like a mother hen.”

  Juliana stood proudly, her fingers wrapped firmly around the tiller.

  “I’ll be right back, Juliana. If you need me, you just call, okay?”

  “Okay,” she replied nonchalantly.

  “She has no fear,” Dana said as she made her way along the railing to where Jamie was working on the forward rigging.

  “Someday she may be racing a Laser. It’s good to see that kind of courage in a kid.”

  “She gets it from her dad.” Every few seconds Dana looked back to check on Juliana.

  “Ouch,” Jamie muttered, catching her finger in the pulley and wincing.

  “Careful. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” She shook it then went back to work. “It wouldn’t be a day at sea if I didn’t pinch or cut something. Would you like to do the honors?” she said, finally freeing the last tangle.

  “What?”

  “Pull this rope, hand over hand, until the jib is set. You’ll feel a tug when it fills so be prepared to hold on.”

&nb
sp; “Will she be okay?” Dana nodded back toward Juliana, still happily steering their course.

  “I’ll watch her. Just pull nice and steady. I need to adjust the boom.”

  Dana unfurled the jib. Just as Jamie had predicted, once the wind filled the sail, the line snapped in her hand, threatening to fly away with her. She hung on and finished unrolling it. She tied it off as Jamie had explained and went back to where Juliana was standing. The boat had picked up speed and began porpoising through the water, slapping spray onto the deck. Jamie adjusted a rope here and a pulley there as if she was perfecting the boat’s performance. Dana was impressed with her expertise as a sailor. Her image of a middle-aged biology professor did not include such agility. She somehow expected Jamie to push her glasses against her nose and squint at an instruction manual on how to hoist a sail—in Latin, of course. Instead, Dr. Jamie Hughes scampered about the deck, balancing precariously as she tended the complex web of ropes that kept them on a true and swift course across Puget Sound.

  “Juliana, do you see the lighted buoy off your starboard quarter?”

  “That’s to the right, isn’t it?” she said after a moment of thought.

  “Yes.”

  Juliana stared out the right side of the boat as if searching for anything lighted.

  “That?” she finally said, noticing a blinking light off the point of land in the distance.

  “That’s the one. That’s the tip of Hartstene Island. I want you to ease the rudder until you’re headed right for it. After you’ve got the bow pointed toward the light, check the compass heading.”

  “Okay.” With two hands on the tiller, she gradually pushed it over until the bow lined up with the blinking target. “Like that?”

  Jamie ducked under the sail to take a look.

  “That’s it. What’s your heading?”

  “The compass says forty-three.”

  “Then that’s the heading from Boston Harbor to the tip of Hartstene Island. Forty-three degrees. If the buoy light went out or if fog rolled in you’d know which way to go. And if you add one hundred eighty to forty-three that is what it will read when we come back.”

  Juliana looked pensive for a minute.

  “It’ll be two hundred twenty-three,” she said brightly.

  Jamie nodded and gave her a thumb’s up.