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Aboard the S.S. Arabian Nights

Matt Gillick

Sandra and Jacob had ordered room service fifteen minutes before the Wi-Fi in their cabin shut off at the worst possible moment. They were frozen, sitting up in bed. Lost Connection blinked on their tablet screen. Jacob’s phone buzzed on the nightstand. An alarm to alert him that the S.S. Arabian Nights was about to cross the equator.

The vessel had shoved off from Madagascar a few days earlier and was on its way to the resort city of Malé, where the couple of 22 years had reserved an oceanside villa. A house on stilts, white lace curtains hanging, flirting with the clear Indian Ocean. After a week of safaris and visiting nature reserves—Sandra’s leggings stained, and her dyed brown hair matted under a wide-brim sun hat—ten days in the Maldives would be a change of pace. She also wouldn’t need to witness how out of shape her husband was: hands on his knees, sweat pooling around the gut of his golf shirts. She felt compelled to apologize for her and Jacob holding up the group. Their grasping onto rocks and branches to stay upright revealed this Connecticut couple was out of their depth. On the cruise portion of this trip, they were supposed to look out to the sea every morning, every night. Relaxation and serenity. This trip was supposed to be a spark plug for their now-sedentary romance but had proven to be a disaster, in Sandra’s mind.

Crossing the equator was a moment Jacob had looked forward to. He was a newly minted geography enthusiast. A quirky interest Sandra thought charming at first. He found something to occupy his time, that’s good, she’d say to herself. With their recently empty nest, Sandra recognized Jacob needed another outlet having just retired from Corker & Corker, attorneys at law. After decades behind a desk, she thought, it was only right he dive into whatever curiosity, especially one as sterile and non-threatening as geography. Sports cars would be cliché, and going to the gym would give her pause and make her paranoid that fitness was an excuse for a rendezvous, but he was never a head-turner. He was overweight, that was clear, but she took comfort in how his fullness wrapped around her, warm and safe whenever they did make love (not for seven months now). An issue she let slip at book club. They rarely discussed the books, except maybe to complain about vulgarity; a near-universal hate for Sylvia Plath’s poetry. During one meeting, several chardonnays allowed Sandra to talk about how she just can’t seem to get Jacob in the mood. And whenever she was in the mood, he wouldn’t have it. Like they were on separate rhythms. Her friend Rebecca declared Sandra should consider herself lucky Jacob still got in the mood and suggested maybe she should let it happen whenever he initiates. But why should he be the only one to get what he wants? Because sometimes she just wanted him there, next to her while they read, rolled their toes on the carpet warmed by afternoon sunshine, look at each other and feel the years, the strength and commitment they have for each other, all poured out in a mutual smile. Rebecca then retorted men experience such moments usually after fucking, which started an uproar among the group. To be so crass…

Jacob’s hobby became his mistress. He filled the home office with antique globes, scrolls of Renaissance-era maps bought at auction, even so far as ordering a 3-D printed model of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan. Sandra would look back on that being the moment she should’ve said it had gone too far. But he looked so happy, excited. Attractive, even. To pull the rug out would belittle him and lead to weeks of Jacob watching daytime television, office door shut. Maps collecting dust, cobwebs. He was sensitive. At times, weak. Though, there wasn’t much required in the department of male bombast in Rowayton. Most of the elbow grease a guy needed was for pulling out the main sheet rope on their sailboat. Sandra and Jacob did not own a boat.

Long before her husband’s retirement Sandra stopped teaching full-time; downgraded to substituting German at St. Vincent’s Prep whenever Frau Blickner fell ill or got pregnant again. Sandra was delighted to be finished with late nights grading papers, unruly students learning (and using) the term schiesse. Making a tidy home and translating Günter Graus poems seemed to be the leisurely life she always wanted, and it was. For about three months. She’d only been able to translate two poems and a mulchy weed garden collected standing water. She elected to do book club and tennis instead. She viewed solitude as more of a monkish quality to atone for past transgressions, and Sandra didn’t feel she had the time to reflect on those. She was more than happy ten years later when Jacob came home one day and announced he was retiring before Abby’s senior year at St. Vincent’s. Getting to spend a whole year with each other—all three of them. How wonderful. Summer trip to Paris. National Parks tour. A proper sendoff before a choked-up goodbye in front of her dorm hall.

That senior year, their daughter Abby became an intensified fixture in their orbit. These two retired fifty-somethings with too much time felt the undertow of impending dread. Soon they would only have each other. Instead of getting to re-know one another, Abby became the focus. Like she was a toddler again. Both hovered over her with sapping eagerness. Far too many photo-ops for previously mundane activities: leaving for class, returning home grass-stained after a regular season soccer match. Jacob attended more of her games, displayed a complete ignorance of the rules. Had no knowledge of the difference between onsides and offsides. Abby’s de-nesting to Merrimack wasn’t the worst adjustment for Sandra because of her years of practiced independence. On the other hand, Jacob spiraled past an event horizon into the unknown, groping for interests to pass the time, eventually landing on geography, cartography, and navigational history whenever he wasn’t checking in on Abby. Need anything…everything good? Who are you texting? I’m good, Dad.

The whole trip was Sandra’s idea. A Christmas gift. She always wanted to go on one of those adventures regardless of triviality, and this would provide her husband the opportunity to see many of the locations he became so obsessed with. Not to mention it could fan the ashen embers of their bedroom. A romantic getaway to the Maldives. It was exotic, a place where they didn’t have to be themselves, hamstrung to routine or obligation. But so far, they’d been too tired to engage in any consummation. All the hiking and bumpy rides in a jeep.

This portion of the trip was supposed to be a getaway of boozy nights spent on the main deck watching shooting stars trickle across the sky, ending in exhausted, hot afterglow. The way they used to be. But like most of the dry spells in their marriage, they came in tandem with change. New home, no sex for six months until a drunken explosion christened every room. Abby born; none until she began smiling on her own. A miscarriage, then oophorectomy; thirteen months.

The first day after shoving off from Madagascar, Jacob asked the captain about strength of current and the vessel’s speed. After hours of calculations, he was able to coordinate with a navigator’s map (the old-fashioned way) which islands they would pass at precisely what time. He then set up dozens of alarms on his phone so he wouldn’t miss a thing. Not a single cartographical event. This resulted in mad dashes to the upper deck with binoculars wrapped around his neck, often dragging Sandra in tow, declaring with bottomless excitement, See there? That’sMauritius…If you could see it, out there would be Tremelin…Oh, look at that. Way out there is the Chagos Archipelago. His damn phone went off seemingly every half-hour and nothing took priority over his need to stare at yet another floating rock. Just yesterday evening while in the throes of foreplay, Jacob’s balding head under the covers sunken below Sandra’s waist, his phone buzzed. Then buzzed again, and again. In Pavlovian fashion, he hopped into a pair of jeans and ran out to the deck. Told her he’d be right back, his breath carrying her smell across the room. Are you sure you want to miss this? She elected to stay in bed, bare-breasted, picked at her cuticles. In her loneliness, she fancied the prospect of getting dressed up, making her way to the bar, and seducing a dashing first mate. Then they’d sneak onto the bridge late at night. Shadows pressed against the helm. Maybe their lips would lock while she fingered golden tassels laying over his shoulders while absorbing his salty taste. She wasn’t serious, but given she was jilted out of her first non-solo orgasm in months, she didn’t rule out the option entirely. It wouldn’t get past kissing, she thought. Feeling guilty moments later, she lamented her husband didn’t take up fly fishing instead.

Jacob—satisfied sigh interrupting his wife’s fantasy upon his return—had no clue she felt this way. He cuddled next to her thinking how wonderful, how wonderful to observe such places. Lulled himself to sleep thinking of the Egmont Islands. Looking to salvage any passion, Sandra ran a finger across the nape of his neck. The response, a snort.

Throughout their marital ebbs and flows, they adopted a settled, nonchalant attitude toward seduction. The kind where lovemaking gets infested with workmanlike maintenance. In Rowayton, Sandra would feel embarrassed, stupid for wearing a silk robe Jacob didn’t notice. And when Jacob gathered up aggression, groped hard, purred at her lower back, Sandra’s timing would be off or her mood possessed residual contempt because of a fight they had earlier in the day. Without ever telling Sandra, he would take these rejections in stride, believing he understood his wife and how she’d get past this some-such stage. Just like they had before. Their sensualities would realign one day. Of course, he never said any of this. Worried she would get defensive if he did. But in the last six to seven months, around the time Jacob went full-Magellan, no such double-edged sword of rejection took place. Both went to bed, wished each other good night, and settled into this unspoken waiting game where the other should make the first move, but never did.

Jacob could not imagine he would be so ingratiated in a subject he rarely paid attention to in grade school, but supposed decades reviewing case precedents until dawn beamed through his office blinds allowed a delayed interest to fill his retirement-shaped void. He nevertheless felt guilty for having this new hobby. Guilty for not retiring sooner so he could be there more often for Abby. He knew he didn’t attend enough matches. Sandra assured him Abby understood and, of course, was grateful that all his hard work had paid for training sessions, travel leagues, skills camps, and a regulation goal in their backyard after a three-month dispute with the neighborhood board. It was a protective lie, however. Abby was frustrated with her father’s circumspect involvement though she never expressed it outright. A familiar trait. Sandra intuited this agitation when Jacob would ask how practice went over dinner. Abby’s responses could not be labeled rude, just a calculated bare minimum of information given while spinning pasta around her fork. It was fine, she’d say, and divert to whatever coach talked about for their upcoming match. Sandra lobbed terse glances at her daughter that said we’ll talk about this on the way to school tomorrow. Now, Abby was a freshman at Merrimack. Starting left striker. Scored her first goal last week.

But soccer was the last thing on anyone’s mind as all three watched a blank screen on opposite sides of the world. The conversation just could not end there.

▪

MERRIMACK’S MAIN CAMPUS in North Andover was 14 hours behind, so when they saw their pony-tailed Abby onscreen, the sun blazed through her window. It was an unexpected call. She was serious. Her neck and lips throbbed, held back the words. Sandra immediately asked what happened. Abby started crying. Both parents leaned forward, anxious. The video kept pausing and pixelating as if Abby’s tears disrupted the connection. After several false starts, she wiped her face and gave the same look she’d have during a penalty kick. Stone and matter of fact, though pale and red-eyed. She cried again. Softer this time. Able to get her words out.

She asked if they remembered Keith, and Sandra did remember Keith. She remembered his moppy ginger hair with broad varsity shoulders and an overly defined jaw that shadowed acne scars along his neck. He was high the first time they met over parents’ weekend. Both of them were. She could tell. Peking duck. Inhaled it while hunched over at the table. Took Abby’s spring roll without asking. Jacob remembered that boy, but not his name, so he remained quiet. What did this Keith do to her? he thought, then began to ask but was promptly shooshed.

Keith was more of an idea. Someone they’d rather view as an abstraction because an abstraction wasn’t sleeping with their daughter. They viewed all college boys in this manner. Whenever Abby said she had been on a date, they didn’t expect all those outings had been with Keith. She was making so many new friends it was impossible to keep track of who was a romantic interest and who was just a nice guy, part of the going-out group. Abby then said she was late.

Thought it was nothing at first, but one week turned into two weeks. The app she used to track her cycle was wrong, she was sure of it. It was a leap year after all. She researched how Mercury was in retrograde, which might have been the reason for her tardiness. Jacob put a hand over his mouth and rubbed it violently, dreading what their daughter was trying to say. But those fears hadn’t been confirmed yet. Not explicitly. The conversation had a theoretical quality. An academic exercise. Abby and Sandra proceeded to hypothesize why and how the condom broke. Jacob provided support in the form of a monosyllabic chorus, Sure…of course…makes sense to me. Maybe it broke after he took it out. Sandra said being late is totally normal. Kept circling back to condom questions. Why use the extra-thins? What does ribbed mean? Their daughter beat around the bush until Jacob could not bear it any longer and interrupted to ask if she was. She held up the test to the webcam. He stood, then climbed back onto the bed, got up, finally settled down one last time. In his mind were far away, whispered cries of fuck, fuck, fuck! said in a voice not his own. His sitting and standing a way to escape that inner monologue. The screen went dark and then showed a pixelated dinosaur holding up a sign like Wiley Coyote that read Lost connection.

Jacob’s phone buzzed while they lay against the headboard, unable to muster a reaction. Then Sandra tapped furiously to reconnect, but no networks were available. They felt the ocean vibrate underneath. Jacob let the alarm continue to sound off. Sandra was no longer thinking about the hypothetical first mate or those stupid tassels on that stupid uniform because the thought was just so stupid now. The alarm on Jacob’s phone went off again. The S.S. Arabian Nights officially crossed the equator. The equator, thought Jacob, Jesus.

▪

A KNOCK AT THE DOOR. Room service. Grilled cheese sandwich and baked chicken breast with Caprese salad rolled in on a tray. An Indonesian man in a dark blue polo. Crackling walkie on his left shoulder. Harto asked where to place the table. Without reply, Jacob stood again and paced about, which forced Harto back toward the door. Jacob stuttered, practically pulling out his hair. Blurted why in the world was there no internet; held the tablet inches from Harto’s broad nose. Sandra looked at her husband with embarrassment before reaching into her tote bag. After receiving the apology tip, Harto nodded and before closing the door, said in deliberately broken English that a phone was going off. Harto continued down the hallway. Self-satisfied grin. He turned left toward the staircase leading to the galley. Word came in on his walkie about the network failure.

A cabin door swung open. The knob jabbed Harto’s elbow. His arm tingled with a hot metallic sting, which only made the soreness of yesterday’s fever shot worse. Ten percent of the crew had a stomach bug soon after leaving port. Many of them were still bedridden. Sweating it out in their cots. He squinted, flexed his hand like his mother would tell him. Get the blood pumping to where it hurts. The blood would take care of itself, she’d say. The pang blurred his vision. Returned after a moment. When the sting wore off, his face relaxed. The white scar next to his left eye (like a crack in a vase) de-accordioned itself.

Looking down at the golden, royal red carpeting, Harto saw feet with hooked black hairs, yellowing toenails, and a pimply birthmark on the left big toe. As he straightened himself, wetness settled on his groin. His pants were steaming. He looked down again. Hot tea burned, soaked through his pants to his inner thigh. Then finally a voice, but not one that said sorry or my mistake. Instead, a British grumble about how this skinny-minnie had gone and spilled his cup-a-tea. Harto kept a stoic gaze, though his black eyes watered.

The grumbler with the sordid feet and a sweaty tea mug was from Leeds. Wore a checkerboard Tottenham jersey with shorts much too tight for his overweight frame. They’d been worn well past their utility and their stained paleness further accentuated his leg hairs, which somehow had the same consistency and volume as the hair on his head: a desperate combover begging to be taken away. One slice from a razor. His name was Billy Rutherford, and Harto knew that. He knew the names of all the guests staying in the Alibaba Wing, although Rutherford wouldn’t be able to remember Harto’s. Billy had received assistance from him climbing the stairs to the dining hall just yesterday. Almost keeled over. Told him with a forced laugh his legs weren’t what they used to be.

Before taking a sip from the dripping cup, pretending the tea wasn’t a magmatic mass of Earl Grey, Rutherford informed Harto the internet was out. He then wheezed about how he and his wife were paying good goddamn money for this anniversary trip. What was there to do before dinner hours? Play with their thumbs? Billy lied about the anniversary business. Lied about pretty much everything. Did so on every trip. Aboard the S.S. Arabian Nights, he was a researcher for an oil company. One of those Chinese ones. His wife would play along, though more enjoyed his past fabrications about being a photographer, an artist. Billy rounded out his tirade, saying Harto better get it bloody-well-fixed. Concluded that they probably didn’t have this kind of problem in the hoity-toity rooms up by the main deck. Rich-arse welches. Who do think they are? he said. Harto looked at the thin black mold of Rutherford’s hair and then at the wall behind him to simulate eye contact. He explained that the Royal Zenobia suites were having the same problem. The whole ship was offline due to a network failure. Just got word on the radio. Clicked the walkie on his shoulder. Rutherford closed the door in Harto’s face, proceeded to complain to his wife.

From cabin to cabin, Harto delivered the same message. While giving autopilot apologies, he thought about that remark from Cabin 117. Calling those in deluxe suites rich-arse welches. This being his maiden voyage aboard the Arabian Nights, Harto had a difficult time identifying who was who in regard to class. Aboard this ship, some of the fat were poor, while many of the rail-thin rested their heads upon silk pillows. Some of the rich searched for bargains. Slumming it, he heard someone say. The hierarchy aboard this vessel was amoebic, unable to be segmented in the ways he was accustomed. Being from a kampong in Jakarta, people could tell who did and didn’t come from money, except if they were white—all the whites had money even if they said they didn’t have much. Back home, he was able to pick out individuals visiting from other parts of the capital. People who weren’t as skinny as he was…or used to be. Those were the folks with money. Those were the folks who came through buy drugs or pick up a young girl for whatever. Being well-fed now—his ribs disappeared—Harto now looked like the very interlopers he and his friends scowled at, mugged in street corners for petty cash, jacked their motorbikes to sell scrap.

Back home, he lived by the water and used a gas lamp that was decades old for light. Thin suar wood taken from refuse piles made up his home, shined bright red in the glow as bugs bounced around the gas lamp. Looking back, Harto didn’t know how he managed not to tip over the lamp and immolate himself inside his mosquito net with his English language books. Hungry Caterpillar, Mother Goose, he knew how to read from an early age. Something his mother supported, his father resented. Jealousy? or was it dread because he knew a day would come when he may never see his boy again? Still, his father did his best to keep him close. Took him out on the boat to fish in the Bay every dawn, hawked their catch at market. That’s how Harto got the scar. A line broke and gashed the skin next to his left eye. A millimeter to the right, and he would have lost it. They were on the boat the day Harto told his father he wanted to get into the hospitality trade. Father objected, declared he would never work for himself. Harto didn’t relent as he pulled in the nets. Next week, he stated, a car would pick him up and take him to the city center. A staffing agency would set him up with a job on a luxury cruise line. There was no changing his mind. He was twenty-five now and needed to make his own way. To make money for the family because fishing wasn’t going to support them forever. Mother and father were getting older. Promised he would send money, but hadn’t done so in months. Barely had enough to pay for a studio apartment above a supermarket on the outskirts of the kampong he used to call home.

Harto then lightly pressed his hand to his singed groin. Attempted to keep a straightforward gait. Refused to waddle or limp in his slacks.

He experienced a spectrum of guest interactions. Some were understanding—mostly families—thankful they were on such a glamorous vessel in the first place. They broke out board games and came up with on-the-spot amusements to pass the time. However, watching some children froth and convulse, scratch feral at furniture because their iPad wouldn’t log in put a sour, judgmental taste in his mouth. Some adult guests grappled with the concept of a lost connection. Harto feigned empathy for their anxiety. That he understood their frustration. In some collective forgetfulness, passengers forgot they were floating on a decorative slab of tin in the middle of the ocean, and somehow a Wi-Fi connection aided in that delusion. In the wing’s executive suite, a blonde Dutch family—their hair further bleached by the sun—one by one described what they were doing the moment the internet shut off. Like they were tired of complaining to each other and found a new victim to latch onto their miserable chain. They might as well have lined up. Bathing suits all from Frankie’s or Burberry. The baggy-eyed mother needed to get her iPhone to play Little Einsteins. Skinny teenage daughter was FaceTiming her boyfriend, worried Raul would break up with her. Broad-shouldered, high-cheek-boned father was just on a very important call with a Swiss bank. Something about a merger. As he began to go into further detail, the mother snapped at her husband while bouncing a gassy toddler on her knee. Then came the smell. A scrunched, displeased look washed over the toddler, not breaking eye contact with Harto. He quickly stepped back and watched the door shut in his face. The Dutch continued to complain as if he never left. He was deeply sorry, but there was simply nothing he could do at the moment.

At the final suite, he could feel the skin on his groin toughen, pushing pubic hair out of the way to make room for a cluster of blisters. A young boy opened the door. Immediately called his parents. Sounded like he came from Jawa. Harto began to rattle off his sincerest apologies for the inconvenience. While the mother and father looked Indonesian and clearly were Indonesian, he paused, uncertain if he should continue in English or switch tongues. The family of three was sweaty as if they had been running in place. Deodorant streaks in their shirt pits. Despite their beadiness, they looked full, healthy. Certainly not of a kampong. They talked over Harto throughout. Their Indonesian was rusty, reduced to domestic shorthand. Harto continued in Bahasa.

The mother was more concerned with the broken AC unit. She broke out a paper fan from the gift shop, cooled herself. Her son sprawled out on the bed. She used singular, declarative sentences: AC mati…Terlalu panas di sini. The AC was something Harto could fix right away. He had issues with this cabin in the past. Maintenance opted for quick fixes rather than replacing the unit. Budget cuts. Reaching for his screwdriver clipped to his belt, he stepped into the room. He felt sweat forming on his shoulders, dripping to the beltline. He stood on a chair and unscrewed the front panel. Tightened the pipe connected to the leaking freon, and like magic cold air started blowing.

They thanked him curtly as he left. No tip. The door closed, and before Harto could clip the screwdriver back to his belt, he heard the hum-dum-dee-dum voice of Emilie, Chief of Guest Services.

▪

EMILIE GÖTHBERG. Stocky, tall. Norwegian. Hapsburg’s jaw jutted out like the plank on a Man o’ War, stud piercing on the left nostril. Blonde bowl cut. Wide frame, but surprisingly light on her feet. The sight of Harto disgusted her. Loose-fitting clothes, wrinkles. Unkempt. A man ill-fitted for Arabian Cruise Lines. Emilie had been watching him for the last ten cabins, nearly a third of the Ali Baba wing. Hid around the corner. She wanted to observe how he conducted himself in a time of crisis. She found something wrong with his walk, his inflection. Didn’t forget how he nodded off during the training videos: At Arabian Cruise Lines, Fun, Safety, and Service all mean the same thing—You. Harto’s pleasant tone with frustrated guests meant nothing to her, and neither did his steely resolve in not reacting to curmudgeons calling him a boy, a kid. He was a waste. Watching him, she thought of her birthplace, Hamnøy. How the hamlets by the docks that used to house dozens of windswept fishermen after a long haul became overrun with foreigners. They spoiled her town, she thought. Spoiled the sight of the cold current breathing in and out in a black pool as fog dissipated upon the shore and then formed back out on the water like caught air; how midnight sunshine turned the barn-red rorbuer bright yellow. All now sullied. Not by tourists or rosy-cheeked hikers, not Indonesians, but by Nepalese men coming on a ferry looking for work. She scoffed at how they marveled at the snowy mountains, the September northern lights of yellow and algae green. Dirty people dirtying the snow, she thought. Called them lazy—sleepy-eyed—spat at the ground while passing them on the street as she walked to the supermarket to fetch canned soup for her sick mother. She couldn’t get away from these feelings, so here was Harto: wrinkled, slovenly, wet.

She heard the way they spoke to him—Oh, everything being done, eh? Don’t see you doing very much, but I guess that’s typical. Where are you from? Do you understand me? She’d never say it out loud, at the risk of termination, but she believed he deserved these insults.

She was far away from Hamnøy, a village in the Lofoten Archipelago. She, like the rest of her village, was a fisher. Started cleaning and gutting cod to get used to the smell before she’d eventually work on the boat. A broken-off part of the world, Hamnøy was isolated, but happy. One day, well, over several years but it felt like everything shifted overnight, their town got older. Fewer young people. Families died out. Those who had more at stake in keeping their businesses running saw an opportunity when a ferry carrying over two dozen Nepalese pulled in. Years later, some of them had collected enough money to buy boats and get permits to fish the cod grounds. They couldn’t work for her father, though. He didn’t want them. A middling fisherman, had a high turnover of deckhands. Payments came up short, had payroll service fees. Though, he could barely find the energy to fish himself. He was too wrapped up in sadness about his wife. Emilie’s mother. Cancer. It was not a quick death or a peaceful one. But a tumble down the stairs caused by chemo delirium, then pneumonia in the hospital, which slowly drowned her lungs. Emilie’s father couldn’t work after that. They bonded in mutual displaced hatred for change. They didn’t like how the Nepalese smoked cigarettes outside the local tavern, their wandering around town three, four at a time. What was their problem? Why come here? She walked on the other side of the street to avoid them on her way to the ferry to pick up her mother from treatments on the mainland. If they weren’t talking about these outsiders, they ate at the dinner table in silence, and soon Emilie became repulsed by her father. His bobbing neck, dead blue eyes, and unshaven face. That same face that told her to smile at a challenge hadn’t smiled in over a year after mother had passed. She held onto that venom above all else. He eventually moved to Reine, leaving Emilie with an uncle who taught Viking mythology at the University of Stavanger. A recruiter from Arabian Cruise Lines approached her at a job fair while she was barely passing classes.

▪

SHE COULD FIRE HARTO with little to no resistance. Leave him to sink into the technicolor carpet. Emilie reported directly to the officer who reported directly to the captain. She could tell this stringy little man he wouldn’t be going on the journey to Australia. Harto barely beat out someone more qualified, except he came at a cheaper rate. Budget cuts. She relished seeing gray dread splotch across his forehead as she approached. His rehearsed smile folded away. She held her hands behind her back, elbows at right angles. So aristocratic. She inquired in a controlled tone what the hell he was thinking and paused, which immediately instilled confusion. Harto looked around, then down at his wet pants. Made Göthberg all the more gleeful. Asked again what in the hell he was thinking wearing that shirt.

Leaning back, then violently forward, Emilie’s barreled Nordic waist made Harto step back—take in her six-foot frame—and his right cheek knocked into a stainless-steel, double-pronged candelabra mounted on the wall. She held back a smile. A guest with a bag of potato chips and two beers walked by. Both Harto and Emilie smiled. Wouldn’t want to get another scar on that pretty little face, she said lowly. She then told him he’d been relegated to server duty on the dining deck. Harto thought his room service shift was done for the night and he’d be working the desk.

His being a server tonight, Emilie explained, was necessary given that ten of the waiters were out with a fever, and folks needed to pick up the slack. Harto opened his mouth, but Emilie raised her hand to shut him up. It just needed to be done. It would be good, she further explained, to learn something new. Hell, might even be of use. He belonged there, she thought to herself. Tucked away, coming out only to serve. All the times she encountered Hamnøy newcomers: seeing a server’s crooked smile at Restaurant Gammelrua, lost her appetite at the thought of those hands touching her lutefisk. Then came the image of her mother shaking her head, hair thinned from the treatments, saying it was no good wasting food and to stop repeating what her father says. At Harto’s slump-shouldered, downtrodden reaction, a scowl crawled from the corner of her mouth, put it away, and said he’d better get a move on. Upon her about-face, their belt buckles clanged. She remarked that he had fifteen minutes to get to his quarters and put on pants and a long sleeve shirt before service began. That he might want to be more aware of his surroundings from now on. They were serving French onion soup as an appetizer. Supposed to be good.

The walk back to his cabin would take ten minutes alone. Used his access card to unlock an Authorized Personnel Only door at the end of the hall. Went down a staircase to the main corridor. Pipes ran along the walls, up the ceiling. Constant clatter. Cold and gray like he was walking through a cinderblock alley. He didn’t notice fellow crew members saying hello, nodding, giving a friendly wave. That woman, he thought. No right to speak to him that way. But then he remembered a portion of the training video he actually paid attention to: Whatever culture or norms you come from, Arabian Cruise Lines expects them to be secondary for the good of the crew. He continued walking, staring at the white line on the floor, a meridian dividing the causeway. Harto’s pace gathered into an unenthusiastic jog, then back to a walk when he felt this phantom pain in his ankle. Cheap black loafers didn’t provide enough support. A cart with stacks of menus passed by, and he grabbed one, began memorizing. Recognized some of the French terms.

He made it to his cabin, inserted the key, shouldered himself into this tight closet of a room. As he looked up, he saw the frame of two half-naked bodies in his roommate Perry’s bunk. He didn’t know what to make of what he just saw. They seemed so cramped. A curtain jerked closed, followed by Perry (a sous chef) asking if he ever thought about fucking knocking. Harto apologized genuinely this time, except he didn’t possess the full English. Only let out half-words with the exception of sorry…so, so sorry. A reading lamp shined through the little slit openings on either side of the curtain, which backlit a joining, then separating silhouette of two people in bed.

▪

PERRY FELT SO STUPID. He was already late to his kitchen station. Listened to Harto rustle about. Hangers rattled against the wood. Perry wished he didn’t invite Omari to his room. Omari was a lifeguard and water aerobics instructor. Those chlorinated, still-wandering fingertips felt cold…clammy now against his burned pale chest. Red-faced embarrassment settled deep within his freckled skin. He wasn’t even out yet. But was he out? Or did Omari pull him out, had him pinned for what he was the moment they spoke by the pool in front of three don’t-cha-know sisters from Minneapolis slurping strawberry daiquiris? Perry remembered their encounter so well; white sunscreen on Omari’s nose. A string pulled his lips apart into a nervous smile. Gave way to a conversation surprisingly natural. Exchanged jokes, one-upping each other in vulgarity. All ones they’d heard from somewhere else. No performance or ulterior motives dangling them, or so Perry thought.

Before Harto barged in, this was just something to do, something that happened, something private. And now someone besides Omari knew. The veneer had shattered. This wasn’t an experiment anymore. Never was. Perry’s jagged nose let out whistling sighs as he reached around for nothing, flustered. Omari (dark tan across his already-olived torso) cackled as he peeked out from behind the plaid curtain. Said the roommate was gone and tried to roll back on top of Perry, but the latter sprang up and out of the bunk. Perry looked for his clothes, didn’t know where to start. Shirt? Apron? And where the hell was that black toque hat? Omari didn’t have anywhere else to be for another hour, so he stretched out and watched this guy fumble around the tight room, knock his wrist against the closet door. He laughed, then thought about his wife. The way he’d stumble about hot and elated before he went to the bathroom to wipe himself after making love. The thought came and went. Perry then said there wasn’t anything funny about this, and he needed to go.

Omari came up from behind. Perry straightened out his apron with help from a small mirror nailed to the closet. He felt the knot in the back come undone, so he smacked away Omari’s hands. With a click of his teeth, Omari pointed out that Perry had put on his apron first and was shirtless. Pantsless as well. That would’ve been quite the sight for the rest of the kitchen staff to see. Perry apologized but repeated that he really needed to go. Omari asked when they’d see each other again—hands cupping his face like a coquettish movie star. Really, he needed to go…he was late, Perry explained, but maybe in a few days they could get together. Omari whined about how that was too long. Explained he was working double shifts at the pool for the rest of the week. While annoyed, Perry did enjoy being wanted. Desired. Not the brunt of a joke about his waddling gait.

He wasn’t ugly but had a constant uneasiness with his body. Large forehead with ears slightly fanned out. His lankiness amplified his lack of athleticism. Penguin Perry was his nickname. In gym class, he would run, pumping his left arm while lifting his left leg and vice versa. Then that lankiness morphed into disproportionately skinny arms with a beer gut, though he was never a drinker. When Perry looked at old family photos, one particular troll-like scrum of a man would pop up. Great-uncle Lucas owned a dairy store in rural Indiana at the end of the 19^th century. Being so short, Lucas needed to build special countertops so he wouldn’t require a stool while greeting customers. So, this was where he received all those recessive genes, Perry thought. The name-calling subsided during his fourth year when kids became more focused on college and prom night. That summer, he actually got invited to a few keggers out by a dirty lake.

His father desperately searched for activities he might enjoy. Mom and Dad were Friday night light heroes (quarterback and cheerleader) of an Indiana town no one ever left. He put Perry through the deep-end approach. Took him to karate but his son couldn’t break the boards. Football, but didn’t have the willpower to bring anyone down. Hockey with no coordination. Hunting, fishing, bowling. All futile. Perry would catch his father giving a look, not to him, but looking away with the twang of a grimace. Until one day the summer after his freshman year in high school, he called Perry over to the grill during a cookout. By the second steak, Perry was asking each person how they liked theirs steaks cooked. Neighbors walked by and took in whiffs of the spices, the rosemary burning into the ribeye. They became vocal, supportive, and commented that he looked like he’d been doing this for decades. The grill, the knives, the tongs, and the spatula extended beyond him, merged into a symbiotic joy, creating a rare moment where all the neighbors at the cookout looked on and smiled, grateful they bore witness to someone finding himself.

Soon after being around like-minded folks at Johnson and Wales Culinary School, his shyness completely eroded. Out bloomed a chatterbox. Someone who talked like he was making up for lost time, which gave way to a jolly sense of humor. Did he expect to be chopping vegetables aboard a cruise ship with angsty clientele after a first-rate trade education? No, but it was an experience, and he’d never gone anywhere outside Rhode Island or Greene County, Indiana. He was seeing the world, albeit mostly from a porthole.

Aboard the ship in the mess area, anyone lucky enough to grab a seat near Perry would be inundated with self-deprecating stories about drunken J&W cookoffs (one ending in a five-alarm fire after a blackout attempt at flambé). Anecdotes like when a classmate cooked deviled eggs for Wolfgang Puck that gave him food poisoning. Overshared soliloquies about how sex became more of a mistake; to the point that hooking up was just a timepasser when he was drunk. He overshared about how any woman who’d slept over would always treat him like a friend afterward—those who were kind enough not to tiptoe across the quad. One morning-after was enough for them to see the futility of pursuing anything further. Maybe those women knew something he was only starting to realize now. Omari pushed Perry’s head through the head-hole of his shirt. The delicate touch of his fingers brushed his back as he tied the apron. Raised his skin.

Perry’s presence (not his words), his good nature (not his jokes), his meekness in the brief moments he was quiet. Those were the reasons Omari wanted to sleep with him. Not love or infatuation, but the concept, the wonder of him. To be so innocent. Omari was an exhibitionist. Whenever he wasn’t performing the Heimlich on a Georgia good ol’ boy who ate their crabcakes too quickly, he was scoping out a potential memory. When he first saw Perry, he knew what he wanted. Wouldn’t it be nice, he thought, to sleep with someone that kind? Of course, Omari assumed Perry was gay. But their first night … he was so apprehensive…so foreign to brash, naval aggression. But, just like past flings and nervous mornings over brunch, this was never going to be anything long-term. He only hoped Perry assumed as much.

Perry turned around and gave Omari a kiss and felt his tongue graze his upper lip. Thin mustache brushed against his clean shave. They continued to dress, kissing between each article of clothing. Then Omari declared he was going to rent an Airbnb by the port and they’d spend the whole weekend together. Perry felt warm in his chest. To be catered like that.

Walking down the gray, concrete corridor, several technicians in polo shirts jogged around Perry, rushing to the main server in the upper hull. He walked around the produce carts filled to the brim with romaine lettuce he’d eventually dice up. They always needed more lettuce, more greens, because folks were on that vegan kick. Perry hated cooking vegan. Fake burgers and beat-based Reuben sandwiches were what stopped him from getting perfect marks. He darted past the laundry carts that weren’t in any hurry to reach the massive, humming washing machines. The clothes smelled like stale chlorine, sedentary alcohol sweated through, salt air, and a collective body odor only achieved aboard a cruise ship. A kind of blackened, heavy-footed stench guests didn’t notice after a while because everyone else smells like it, except the staff. They existed in separate worlds, and this highway was the portal through which the crew could teleport, appear out of thin air for your convenience. These walks were a respite from the rank air laminated upon every guest with leathery burns cooking them from the inside. Those invasive whiffs, however, did not distract Perry from his running thoughts about Omari; afraid of how much he missed him.

He fixated on their first night together. Came back from a nightclub in Manila. The club was loud and crowded and Omari asked if Perry wanted to go outside for a smoke. After getting away from the body heat and bumping bass, they stood under an awning to hide from the rain. Close. Drunken heat and sweat and Pall Mall exchanged through close breaths. Tight space. Candied teeth. Sweet liquor. Perry so free and far away. Omari remembered what it felt like that first time in a Cyprus bathhouse. To be that new. Yourself. And then it happened. All it took was a hand brushing Perry’s sweaty crew cut. A flirtation capitalized. They got a hotel, a cheap one. Dim lamplight concealed the mold by the air vent, the flaky wallpaper. A filter giving the illusion of finer things. Motorbikes revved outside, muzzling Perry’s confession that he’d never done anything like this before, so he had to say it again, twice embarrassed.

Omari breathed out a smiling, cigarette-vapor laugh. Misty wind thwapped through open windows, shook rice paper orbs—red and green—floating over his head. And their sweat congealed.

While stutter-stepping around a housekeeping trolley—as more technicians ran in the opposite direction—Perry remembered Omari’s tingled, barely touching hands on his shoulders. He was afraid to be opened this way, this jump-to-conclusions infatuation. But Omari did not think the same. Finding distractions was what Omari did on every voyage. Not in a conquering way, but in the it-is-what-it-is manner of being. Natural, commonplace, expected as a passing cloud, rain. He spent more time and energy shaving shoulder hairs, thinning his chest to give it more of a Grecian, Mediterranean consistency with the help of a five-clip Remington. When he’d go out, he’d wear hazel contacts. Others in the crew would stare and whisper suspicions, but he welcomed it, knew they were transfixed by his being unstuck from the commonplace.

Somewhere else on the ship, him scrolling through an article on his phone and reading texts from his wife sent earlier in the day. No one aboard knew he had a wife. Not even his superiors; listed his mother and father as emergency contacts. Omari wasn’t even thinking about Perry, thought instead about what gift he was going to buy his daughter on the return journey. Was Omari gay? He would never identify as such, although the past few voyages would imply a pattern. Somehow, it felt worse if he messed around with another woman. He knew if she ever found out, she would think it worse he was sleeping with men. It would dishonor their daughter. But with enough ocean between them, he knew he could leave that guilt at sea, for now. Soon, there would be enough water between him and Perry. Once they arrived at port, they were done. Shouldn’t have said anything about an Airbnb. He only hoped it wouldn’t devolve into letting Perry down easy with—God forbid—a conversation.

▪

THE DINING AREA was three decks high encircling a fifteen-foot fountain with terracotta statues of Arabian folklore spiraling upward: at the base, the giant fish Bahamut, dark olive-shaped eyes creeping above the water, ready to swallow Ali Baba and his Forty Thieves hauling their latest plunder on camels; the unicorn Shadhavar—horn spackled with rivets—rose on its hind legs, hoofs nearly grazing Aladdin flying by on his magic carpet, and at the top Sinbad the Sailor reached down, offering a thick, flexing forearm to the pauper boy. Certain tables had views of the ocean if those guests paid for the deluxe package and wore a special bracelet. Had food brought to them. No need to labor in front of the chocolate fountain when there’s a lava cake with sliced strawberry garnish right in front of you.

All those guests, all that food, all those tables to serve, buffet trays to fill. The ship required a staff of hundreds. 258 to be exact. Perry was the only veggie cutter who wasn’t sick, and the appetizer section was already well underway when he emerged from the pipe-lined hallway to see the backlog. Head Chef Mendoza had been barking about where that fucking sous chef was with the vegetables. It seemed like everyone wanted house salad and soup tonight. Mendoza continued, instructing the plate-finisher to swirl the raspberry dressing along the radius, not the diameter of the plate. Hiding behind a tray cart of baked naan bread, Perry waited for Mendoza to move on to the grills where racks of lamb sizzled, charred under the supervision of fifteen sweating Filipino and West African men. He then assumed his position, apologized to the dressing mixer on his left. No one looked up to see him. No one cared if he was late or not.

The kitchen ran like a factory with the artistry of each individual repeated and repeated. Long sections of grills and pans, bowls, and rows upon rows of finishing tables. No feeling or thought, just execution; a flick of the wrist perfected in rhythm, and that rhythm could never be broken no matter how much the ship rocked. Everyone maintained balance. Garnishers rested parsley on the medium-rare lamb. The grill masters developed an innate sense of timing, smelling the meat, and knowing when to flip it over. Runners went from station to station, taking trays to the next step or out to the buffet area. Perry got into the swing, chopped the garlic, made sure the onions were circular and smooth. Eviscerated the romaine. Every step needed perfect execution, or else it would be abandoned outright. If a minuscule amount of sauce meant for the roast stalk carrot spilled over onto the filet mignon, it went into the refuse bin. No compromising flavors. Perry felt Chef Mendoza breathing down his neck as he made quick knifework of ripened broccoli. First, he cut off the hard base, then snipped away each floret with a pairing knife. Nuggets of green rattled onto the tray until it was full. He slid it to the next station—picked up by a runner—where it became broccoli and gruyere soup. The kitchen was low on onions for French onion soup. Mendoza sniffed loudly and moved on, a sign of approval. Perry smiled to himself and moved on to shaving the next batch. Then he thought about his father. That face, that painful face after a fishing line broke because Perry pulled too hard. Whenever he missed a shot, whiffed at the puck. That face. Years later when his parents visited him and his partner in Chicago, Perry (now a head chef at Capital Grille) asked his father (gray and hazy with dementia) why he was always so disappointed. He could see it in his face when he thought he wasn’t looking to the sideline or in the stands. His father responded—lucid—with shock, then sadness but opened up as he peeled off his tearful glasses. Said he was never disappointed, just hurt to see his son feel bad for making a mistake. He could never feel embarrassed about his son trying his best but felt inadequate as a father in providing a space where he could thrive. Then he forgot the name of his son’s partner who came in with their attempt at a charcuterie board.

            He had a clear view of the prep tables, where delegators polished the plates and servers carried them from the chrome kitchen, escaping the sounds of hissing ovens, clanging dishes, and into a dining room that carried a muffled undertone of chatter. Servers filed in, napkins folded across their arms. Male servers had a variety of hairstyles. Tied in buns, others in fades, combovers, short crops, balding, and close-shaven. The female servers all had their hair in a ponytail. They were all silent and at attention, but soon their voices filled the kitchen, asking Mendoza about those appetizers and where the hell they were. Their section was rowdy. The buffet was low as well, so how about someone refill those trays. One complained that he had a herd of elephants in his section, and they didn’t want to wait another five minutes for some damn soup. The one complaining was Harto.

Perry thought his roommate was supposed to be on the other side of the ship manning the Guest Services desk. Not feeling any particular warmth toward Harto given their last encounter, he presumed he got off on being some middle-man with power. Handing out tasks rather than fixing them himself. At least Perry worked with his hands, but then he felt wrong for being so judgmental. Had no business thinking that way, not with how he conducted himself in their room. No sock on the door, nothing. Perry had to make nice. He could get fired for fooling around on the clock like that. He stopped his chopping and trimming for a moment to see Harto confused, looking around, trying to refamiliarize himself when he walked back into the kitchen. He appeared to be so out of place with those gray slacks and long-sleeve white shirt that was too big for him. Perry thought they made eye contact, so he waved. Harto didn’t see him.

Perry’s roommate was too busy navigating through the pots and carts and colanders and trays floating around as he made his way to the finishing table. He knocked into a pile of stacked chrome bowls. Caught them before they had a chance to tip over. Spun around and dodged a tray of roasted broccoli that almost clocked him in his V-shaped chin. This pinball divergence erased his memory of where the finishing table was. All he saw were bodies moving back and forth, shimmying, shuffling. Then he saw someone pour reduction sauce beside the lamb and wipe black crumbs off the plate. Harto walked over. Looking at the table, he saw no more soup. What was he going to say? No soup? He couldn’t get two complaints in one evening. Emilie would reem him.

He shouted where the fuck were those soups. No one heard or cared to react. Chef Mendoza, irritated, rolled his eyes and said the soups were right in front of him. There they were. Quite literally under his nose. Before placing five bowls on a circular serving dish—how many were at his table?—his hand sizzled on the mahogany ceramic. Mendoza had witnessed this blunder and hissed like a disappointed stage director; pointed to the napkin folded over Harto’s wrinkled sleeve. Said to Mendoza he was sorry, that he wasn’t supposed to be here. Mendoza said that much was perfectly clear.

The deluxe dining area. Low lit. Quieter. More spacious. Chatter among tables about the broken Wi-Fi as low-hanging small talk. Chandelier swayed, twinkled. Tables with red candles encased in glass. A pianist played a serviceable rendition of Beyond the Sea. He compensated his lack of vibrato with adlibs, devolved the prosody into a kind of stutter, saying how he knows bey-ond…a…doubt his heart would lead him there soon. Beyond the sea. While his fingers remained soft and deft, his voice wasn’t salvageable. Too many cigarettes. Harto, without thinking, gave him a nod. Past the velvet ropes of the host’s station, he found Table 43, but not before bumping into the table next to it: Jacob and Sandra’s.

Sandra did not notice and continued to half-listen to this couple at the neighbor table. She looked out to the sea. The offing before the horizon had a hump, or was that a cloud resting close to the water? So dark and flat when looking through a window four stories up. Like a giant waterbed. Jacob’s phone alarm notified him the ship was about to pass a giant reef that was fifteen miles south of an active volcano he couldn’t pronounce correctly. Out of reflex, he almost rose to his feet, but Sandra stopped him under the guise of holding his hand. Tight smile. Frustrated squinting eye contact. The sunset a deep purple, the lights in the dining room turned on—obscuring the water—reflected aureolin bulbs off the windows.

The news regarding their daughter left them catatonic. They’d stayed in the room, silent for a whole hour staring at a blank tablet, then ate their room service cold, but Jacob eventually said they should get something to eat. Because…what else was there to do. On the walk over, Sandra drifted to the lounge bar. Jacob had to double back to find her. Each had four silent martinis and the alcohol served as no distraction, instead obscured all else save for the prospect of their becoming grandparents, having to care for another baby. Sandra, headache settling in, checked her phone every five minutes until she stopped looking for the Wi-Fi signal. She wanted to be left alone but remain tethered to Jacob, who only wanted to have his mind wander across the surface of the ocean, the jagged coral reefs, but both oscillated in a cycle of guilt. That all this was meaningless now. Abby was pregnant and alone in a Merrimack dorm room, seeking comfort from a boy named Keith. Maybe she thought they hung up on her. Disowned her and her promiscuous ways. How dare she ruin our vacation. Sandra didn’t want to have sex anymore, but it would be a respite from the present—to feel Jacob’s warmth, his nervous sweats fall on her. It would take her back to how they both shivered early in the relationship after two nervous dates in a Fairfield dive bar. Two minutes, five, ten at the most. They’d both use each other to stave off the thumping reality nesting in their minds. But this couple from Nebraska talking their ears off was killing any potential mood.

The Nebraskans (never caught their names) were large. Fat was what Sandra called them when they returned to their cabin. But honestly, right? Who thinks those are interesting stories to tell strangers? Tractors? Rib-eating contests? A simple nod and hello would be fine, but the Nebraskans took politeness as a cue to ask Jacob if he had been to the observatory deck. Jacob said, Of course, been up there many times. A cascade of unrelated garble followed.

The Nebraskans just emitted sounds. Narratives that possessed a delusional gravity. They did not ask a single question and wore Birkenstocks with matching T-shirts promoting a local restaurant in Lincoln. Pumby’s, best barbecue in the county. Blue ribbon. Don’t think I didn’t see you staring. They had been doing this to other couples all day (cornering them into conversation) and mentioned several times how they’d just made so many friends. People were so friendly because it was true what they said about Midwesterners. Jacob was unaware of what everyone said about Midwesterners but did not have time to ask. The Nebraska husband interrupted his wife with a story. Something about how he got a settlement when a tractor ran over his foot—and the wife provided confirmation that it was quite a scare. Yes, it was.

Ten minutes and the Nebraskans had moved on to talking about their experience at a football game and met Tom Osborne. Jacob and Sandra had no knowledge of Cornhusker lore, so they nodded. Jacob’s phone blinged again, then again. They were getting closer to the reef, and he really wanted to gaze upon it. He heard at a certain angle of the moon the algae gave off this phosphorescent shine. Could be seen for miles. An underwater light show. An escape. A time to forget what (or who) they had waiting for them back home. Sandra held his hand tighter. The Nebraska husband interrupted himself, chuckled, and said Jacob better answer that phone, asked how the hell he had cell data all the way out here. It was fine, Jacob replied out of reflexive politeness. Sandra dug her fingernails into his palm.

Then the affirmative Nebraska wife interrupted the whole flow of the one-way conversation to comment on a little Dutch boy at the buffet dousing a carrot under the chocolate fountain. She apologized for interjecting, but just take a look at that over there. There he was, doing it again. Sandra looked instead at what she thought was French onion soup, so why was there broccoli? She was sure they were nice enough but goddamn…Did her stern looks, tight-lipped smiles, turning to watch the sunset, looking at her husband every so often…any of that not give a hint that maybe they wanted to be left alone? She interrupted some story about milking goats.

Sandra lowered her voice and proceeded to give a dissertation on why she doesn’t want to talk anymore. She began by asking what their names were but proceeded without giving them a chance to answer. All the while smiling, she said she presumes they were nice enough people, and on any other night, any other day on this floating fantasyland, they probably would’ve hit it off. Have a few drinks at the bar, get sentimental, share stories, and be pleasant memories for each other in the future. But tonight, they’d just received some pretty heavy news. The couple stared, unsure of what heavy meant. Sandra further explained their daughter took a positive pregnancy test. She’s nineteen and a freshman in college, and it’s her second semester and the fact these two hadn’t read Sandra’s body language, that maybe she and Jacob did not want to talk to anyone was alarming, almost infuriating. What was even more infuriating, she went on, was that Jacob—her dear, dear husband—continued to exercise this obsession with nautical geography, or whatever the hell it was. That he only doubled down on his obsession, and wouldn’t even think to touch her if there was any chance romance interrupted his staring at some dumb island he could barely see on the horizon. God forbid! So if it wasn’t too much trouble, she concluded, could they all just return to their meals, and maybe they’d catch each other in the omelet line tomorrow at brunch?

The Nebraskans stood. Well then. Waddled away. They made parting comments under their breath about people from Connecticut. So snooty. Left the table with their food half-eaten.

Sandra breathed out and looked at Jacob. He was daggered, wincing. Unsure where the comments about him came from, yet absorbed them. His phone dinged again. They had passed the reef. They gave each other a heavy gulp of the throat as if to say they were both sorry. He looked close to crying, and that made Sandra breathe in, sniffle herself back to composure. She reached for his hand. Jacob was about to take it. At that moment, Emilie Göthberg approached their table and said pardon the interruption, but she wanted to come by and inform them that Wi-Fi had been restored to the cabins, but not common areas yet. Apologized for the inconvenience.

Without saying thank you, they both got up and went directly to their room. Harto, carrying two racks of lamb, saw his Nebraska table walk right by him. He sighed and made his way back to the kitchen. The pianist was playing Eubie Blake’s Charleston Rag. He stopped to listen. Never heard that sound before. He took one of the plates and placed it on the piano, walked away. The pianist played on, taking in the aromatics of the finely cooked lamb with the sautéedstalk carrot, and smiled, but then shook his head, realizing the waiter hadn’t provided any spoons, forks, or knives.

▪ ▪ ▪

Matt Gillick is from Northern Virginia. Recent or forthcoming work is in Currant Jam, Hidden Peak Press, and Bruiser Magazine. He serves as the managing editor of Cult. Magazine. Right now, he is working on a novel. Read the author’s commentary on his story.

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