Her girlfriend sighed.
“Okay, let’s go. Help me up”.
Giggling, Rachel helped her to her feet. They grabbed their mobiles and left the cabin to explore the ship.
CHAPTER 5 - CHRISTINE
9:33am - 5 Days until outbreak
. . .
. . .
Where in the good heavens had that damned man gotten to now, Christine thought. He had been absent for well over forty-five minutes now. Drop of a penny her behind, anything to avoid work with him. Even on a ship with nowhere else to escape to, he had still managed to find a way to vanish. God only knew when he planned to return.
It had always been tremendously frustrating trying to maintain a relationship with a man who was in and out of their lives more than a cat with a ten second memory. How did one deal with someone so temperamental? Here today, gone tomorrow. It was like watching her life played out in a soap.
It wasn’t always like this; when they met, he was the perfect gentleman, putting her above all, disregarding messages from anyone and all in order to ensure that she was happy and in return for his attention whilst they were out, she was tremendously accommodating towards his work affairs. He ran his own business after all, not only was it his source of income, but it was his pride and joy, without him it would simply fail to function like a well oiled machine.
He had subordinates, but he was so hands on, skilled and unique at what he did, that even if he taught others, there was always going to be reservations as to how well they were doing the job that he could do without blinking.
He never really opened up about his past and Christine thought it best not to probe, but she couldn’t help but feel a little disheartened that he didn’t trust her enough with any of the emotional burden a discussion of his past brought along with it. It was only relevant because she had strong reason to believe that it had contributed to the man he now was, not by any means meant to be derogatory. He was a good man, if a little dismissive in the past few years. This tiresome disappearing act only began about five years ago; before that, he was attentive, if a little distant.
What was she supposed to make of this without being invasive? Was there the possibility he was cheating? That was often the cause for a man to stray.
She desperately fought off all urges to challenge him, especially with accusations of infidelity, or pry into his private affairs, she was a woman of God after all and he was a man of God, he wouldn’t be swayed by the temptation of adultery after taking their vows, would he? At least she prayed that was the case.
Christine sighed and set about folding some of her mother's clothes and placing them into the drawers. Her mother was a frail woman with terrible hearing and a weak disposition, something that had only begun to develop over the course of the past ten years. At the tender age of eighty, she was well on the road to physical deterioration, but only physical, that brain of hers was as active and on the ball as any younger person, if not sharper.
Her mother had once been a talented surgeon, held and abided by strict conservative values and by no surprise, was once extremely logical, forthright, unhindered by emotional restraints and ambitious. These traits might have served to help her become and continue to be an astounding surgeon, but also an unbearable and distant mother.
Christine's childhood had been a challenge and that was putting it lightly. With a mother like hers, all the luxuries that other children took for granted were but a bitter dream to her. Her mother was unabashedly mean and had so adamantly wanted for her to follow in her footsteps, that she bought nothing for Christine that could be deemed unnecessary or a distraction.
Where other girls grew up with dolls, she grew up being taught to master operation games and chess, both for honing patience and logic. Whilst they were reading Alice in Wonderland, she was reading surgical practise and theory. Whilst they were kissing boys and trying on different clothes, she was taking cram courses and entering general knowledge competitions. She hated it all, but never knew how to relay that to her mother and when she finally did, when she finally took hold of her life and made a choice for herself, it was truly the most invigorating feeling ever and a feeling she would forever cling on to, even if it meant her mother - which she won’t - literally refused to speak to her again.
Perhaps there were parallels she could draw from that to the relationship with her own daughter, but the difference here was that Christine only wanted to love her daughter, only wanted the best for her daughter. Her mother on the other hand was a stubborn, unbearable mare, which is why she was always alone and Christine was her only caretaker, nobody else would be able to put up with her, she had all but alienated the rest of their family and Christine’s father, her mother's husband, or the ‘sperm donor’ as her mother often referred to him.
There were parallels there too between he and her own husband, in and out of her life, returning only when he wanted or needed something. Her mother had already disregarded him like an old cloth, thrown out to the wind and if it were up to her, she'd have nothing more to do with him.
Why was everyone around Christine so flaky, so distant? Were her own daughter’s defiance and destructive choices a punishment on her? Persecuted for something she had done or not done?
Christine would have preferred her father to be more of a present figure in her life, though in hindsight, much of that could perhaps be attributed to her mother and her determination to ensure his negative influences did not pervade her life and impede upon her own influences. Maybe it was better to just be content that he was there at all, especially considering that he hadn't been present for the former part of her life.
See, her father was a bar owner in Tenerife. Her mother and his brief encounter and fling was the result of a trip she had taken there with a friend’s persistent nagging prevailing over her own stubbornness.
Tipsy and feeling frisky, she successfully seduced the barman and owner, her father, they had a one night stand that her mother would soon come to regret, not because the end result was Christine, but because it meant the sperm donor would become a regurgitated feature of her existence from now on.
She initially had zero intention of informing him he was a father, successfully keeping it from him throughout her pregnancy, throughout Christine’s birth and only finally revealing the news to him when Christine was old enough to question his absence. She could have made up a story, but in a mystifying show of complete contradiction to her persona, she told Christine the truth and even went as far as to introduce the two of them.
Who knows what her mother was thinking, or what she had to gain from it. She wasn’t capable of guilt, guilt was an emotion synonymous with the empathetic and her mother was as apathetic as she could get.
Understandably, her father kicked up a fuss at the time, as any parent would or should, had information like this been kept from them, only to discover they had a child much further down the line, but his words and anger didn’t count for much, having become so unreliable later in her life. Perhaps that was her mother’s goal, to show Christine his true nature and nip her dreams of having a father in the bud.
At least she couldn’t accuse her mother of not being consistent, consistently in a foul mood, turning her nose up at anything and everything she didn't consider up to the standard of quality she had come to expect, consistently rude to others and consistently heartless.
She was a self-proclaimed snob and proud. She had not a shred of interest in adventure or anything that broke her routine, reluctant to try anything new. She had zero interest in other inferior countries and not the taste buds for food she wasn't accustomed with.
Her mother was consistently a woman of habit and age had not dulled her perception towards life, on the contrary, she was as much a stubborn bloody mule as ever, only now equipped with a lifetime worth of reasons to be so and an unwarranted bitterness towards the youth that she believed were more useless, unambitious, lazy, unreliable and technology obsessed than they ever were in her day.
> She never expressly made her opinion clear about Rachel's frolicking, but Christine wouldn't put it past her to disapprove, heck, she wouldn't put it past her mother to think that she was responsible for her daughter’s choices with lax upbringing.
Consistency was most definitely her forte.
She stood up and stretched, her knees aching from all the kneeling and crouching.
“Mother, how about we go for a walk? I've just about hit the peak of my patience waiting for that man. If I find him, I'm going to give him a piece of my mind. Now, would you like to witness that?” Christine asked, having to raise her voice for her mother to hear, to which her mother just shrugged and grunted. This wasn't unusual behaviour for her, if anything, the grunt was typically about more than Christine could ask for, but now, in light of her best efforts to use this trip to patch broken relationships, she wasn't going to encourage typical behaviour.
“That's not really a yes, mother. If you don't give me a reasonable answer I'll simply leave you here to pout by yourself”.
“Considering the circumstances, that would be ideal. As you may have noticed already from my aloof attitude, I'm not all that interested in your half baked itinerary. I'm not happy that you forced me on to this abhorrent excuse for modern engineering. It wasn't my decision to leave my home”.
“Come on, mum, don't be like that, I certainly didn't drag you onto it”.
“No, what you did was worse”.
Christine sighed.
“Stop being so melodramatic, I'd hardly call giving your maid paid leave and taking you away from your rigid schedule for a while worse. Your maid looked as though she had just escaped the slave trade, I'm sure she was over the moon to get a much deserved break for once”.
“That woman doesn't work nearly enough to deserve a break and I pay her more than enough, I didn't need you giving her more than she deserves and in doing so making me look like the villain”.
“You can be irrational at the best of times, God forbid she sees you at the worst”.
“She was lucky to have the job she had, she should have seen that as a blessing given the conditions of her backward third world country”.
“It isn't third world, mother”.
“Pft, then why are they all here seeking a better life, benefiting from hard working people like myself and conceiving spoilt, lazy, self-entitled, selfish sprogs like the one you have, to leech off of the success we founded out of blood, sweat and tears for them”.
“Watch your mouth, mother, that's my daughter you are talking about”.
“Don't I know, as they say, like mother, like daughter, it's just a darned shame that didn't apply to you and I”.
“On the contrary, I'm precisely the person I am today because of you, so if I seem controlling, sometimes judgemental, God forgive me, it's because of the person you shaped me into”.
“I'm not responsible for you becoming… this, that's the result of your own foolish life decisions. I wanted more for you and you were content with being an average nobody, don't you dare try to draw comparisons between us, frankly it's insulting”.
“Now you are just getting personal. Who is acting like a spoilt child now? How the heck did we even get all the way here, I asked you a simple yes or no question and you are detracting from the point to vent all your personal vendettas, do you want to go for a walk or not?”
“I have to get personal, it's the only means of which to penetrate your thick walls, not something your husband seemed to have an issue with when he got you knocked up, look at him now…”
“Mum! Stop it! I'm not having this discussion with you, I'm especially not having one about my sex life or relationship difficulties with you, that's my business and mine alone. Now are you coming or not?”
“Maybe he should have kept his penis in his pants…”
“Are you coming or not?”
“No”.
“Suit yourself. Christ, how difficult was that?” Christine sighed and grabbed her handbag. “Will you be okay on your own, or did you want Irini or someone else to look after you?”
“I'm fine. You want to go, so go. Stop bothering me already”.
Christine shrugged and left the cabin. That woman tested her patience to the utmost degree, even the saintliest of saints would have to repent for thinking the possibility of scot-free murder should the opportunity arise by the time they were finished with that venomous snake of a woman. Why was it such a chore to love someone unconditionally?
She ran her hands across her face, all this stress was doing her health no favours, slowly her precious beauty being chipped away by the lumber of life's infernal hassles.
“The glass is half full, the glass is half full”, she reassured herself, “now where did that man wander off to?”
She wandered aimlessly throughout the corridors of the ship, partially in search of her husband, but also to satisfy her curiosity, taking a mental reminder of the spa quarters, manicures, pedicures, hot rocks, acupuncture, mud baths, full body massages with ship exclusive oils and soothing scents, hot tubs, a steam room and the list seemed to go on.
“Ooh, I must treat myself here; I'd say a trip here followed by a cold cocktail daily would make me one happy lady. No one can say I don't deserve it”.
Returning to her mission at hand, finding her wayward husband, she made her way to the upper decks, suspecting he was most likely at a bar; she knew him all too well.
Just as she had suspected, based upon his predictable nature, she found him nonchalantly sipping away at an alcoholic beverage and engrossed in what looked to be a very entertaining conversation, totally liberated of all responsibility.
Propping her hands upon her waist and glaring at her husband, the barman noticed her first and put an abrupt end to the conversation, pointing her out to her wayward husband.
Finally spotting her, he composed himself, clearly embarrassed that he had been caught in the act.
“Christine, you erm… found me”.
“Don’t you Christine me; I spent the past half an hour unpacking and I’m still not fully done, without your help. Why? Because you said you were going to check up on the girls and that you’d be right back, so I came looking for you. I gave you the benefit of the doubt and what did I find instead? This, you sitting here downing drinks without a care in the world. What do you have to say for yourself?”
“I… err… don’t really have an excuse… but… maybe we could get tipsy together? Like the good old days?”
“Christ, Edward, can’t you see I’m pissed off with you? Get a clue”.
“You’ll get over it, come, we’re on vacation, don’t be so uptight, drink with me. It’s not like we get to do this often”.
“And whose fault is that? On another note, we’re a Christian family, we don’t drink excessively”.
“We don’t… usually, but this trip is an exception. Come on, relax a little. You said this was our opportunity to rekindle relationships, well… let’s rekindle”. He took hold of her wrists and playfully pulled her towards him.
“Edward…”
“Rekindle”, he sang.
“Fine”, she conceded and took a place at the stool beside him.
“What can I get you, miss?” The barman asked.
“A gin and tonic”, Christine replied.
CHAPTER 6 - RACHEL
10:03am - 5 Days until outbreak
. . .
. . .
Sitting by a pool with her girlfriend, a stunning view of Southampton, sipping on cocktails pretending to be posh, this surely had to be the life… well, all that bar the weather, but that wouldn’t be an issue for much longer.
The ship wouldn’t be leaving for at least another hour, so there was ample time to settle in and squeal with giddy anticipation.
The premise of being out in the vast expanse of the ocean, on a vessel large enough to fit a town worth of entertainment, shops, accommodation and people, was a marvel to behold and ridiculously exciting.
&n
bsp; It would probably take the first two to three days to fully explore and partake in everything that there was to offer.
Would she make use of all these pools before the end of the trip? Would she have the chance to make the most of all the excursion opportunities? Would she be able to get tipsy at every one of the bars onboard? So many things to do, so little time.
She had initially been reluctant to join her parents and grandmother; there was nothing conceivably worse than being stuck in a confined space with three bigoted people, even if they were blood. In fact, that probably only compounded matters.
Still, there were benefits to coming along and maybe, just maybe, she could knock something into their clouded skulls. Besides, her holier than thou parents had their own dirty laundry and in the worst case scenario, she’d just highlight the glaring double standards that this family seemed to thrive on. They could say many things about her, but if there was one thing she wasn’t, a liar and coming from self-proclaimed Christians, the irony wasn't lost on them.
If there was ever a crime she was guilty of, it was the crime of lying to herself, once upon a time pretending to be someone she wasn’t, but that girl, that girl who kept convincing herself that she was normal, that girl was gone now and she’d never return, not to this world.
As she watched her girlfriend sip from the straw - yes, a straw in a cocktail - and chatter away, her mind zoned back to a time when she had lied to herself the most, a time before she moved out, a time when she had just graduated.
Her graduation should have been something magnificent, a feeling of elation, but instead she only recalled relief, relief that it was all finally over. Even the first class degree did nothing to really improve her mood. She just wanted the hassle her parents were making over her done with, which meant trudging through a tedious day of wearing the most uncomfortable gown ever, sitting, collecting a certificate, more sitting, fake celebrations and photos.
Cryptophobia | Book 2 | Hell & High Water [Fear The Unknown] Page 5