Кейт Кристенсен - The Last Cruise

“Don’t come in me,” she gasped, finally.

“Okay,” he said into her ear, holding her hips still, pulling out of her. He didn’t even care if he came, it didn’t matter. As he did up his pants, she whisked her skirt down and ran her fingers through her hair. They looked blankly at each other. Valerie’s face looked frozen and tired. Mick turned away and oh God, there was Christine, lit by a glimmer of dawn light.

As Christine emerged from the stairwell, she saw Valerie first and then Mick, standing together against the railing by the solarium. Right away she knew they’d been fucking. She felt her stomach clench.

“There you are,” she said to Valerie as Mick pushed by her into the stairwell, avoiding her eyes. “I was looking for you downstairs.”

“I was up here all night,” said Valerie, talking fast, slurring her words a little. “I thought you were going to come join me. Then Mick showed up. We talked. We drank a gallon of wine. I smoked all his cigarettes.” She paused and took a breath. Her face looked wayward, challenging. “And then we totally fucked.”

“I figured,” said Christine. She felt a sting of betrayal but immediately quelled it. What right did she have to feel betrayed?

“Yeah,” said Valerie. “It just kind of happened.”

Valerie staggered over to one of the stationary bicycles on the deck in front of the solarium. Christine followed her and sat on the other one. She began to pedal hard, leaning forward on the handlebars, as if she could drive the boat with her own nervous energy. She wasn’t sure yet how she felt about Valerie and Mick, but her body was tense, and her heart was pounding, so she knew she was upset even though she had no right to be.

“What’s going on with you?” Valerie’s voice had an edge. She was sitting very still, turned toward Christine. “Why do I feel like I stole him from you or something?”

Christine stopped pedaling and forced herself to calm down. She took a deep breath. “Of course you didn’t steal him, Val. He’s not mine to steal. Nothing is going on.”

“It wasn’t personal, you know. He was there. We’re both single.”

“I know.”

“It’s not fair of you to be mad.”

“I’m not mad,” said Christine. She knew she was lying. “Don’t make this into a fight. It’s not a fight.”

“Mick was looking for you, ” said Valerie. She watched Christine’s face closely for her reaction. “And he found me instead. But he kept looking for you, waiting for you, all night.”

“Stop,” said Christine. She was agitated, on the verge of tears. “Why are you telling me this?”

“It’s the truth. Does it upset you?” Valerie looked curious now, detached, as if the journalist in her had taken over at the whiff of a good story. “Are you in love with him?”

“Maybe,” said Christine without thinking. She was shocked to hear herself say it. She added in a rush before she could retract or suppress it, “I might be. I probably am.”

“Then go and tell him!” said Valerie. “That was just a stupid drunken hookup, it didn’t mean anything. He wanted you. ”

“It doesn’t matter, he’s not the point,” said Christine. She paused as it hit her, the answer. “I can’t go back to Ed. I can’t give him kids. I can’t be a farm wife for the rest of my life. I can’t do it.”

“Oh my God,” said Valerie. “Are you serious?”

Christine looked back at her, feeling calm and at peace. “I’m serious.”

“But your life is so perfect.”

“You can have it,” said Christine. She felt so relieved, so light and buoyant, she was almost laughing. “I’ll make you a deal. You go live with Ed on the farm, and I’ll run off with Mick, okay?”

“Um. Have you met me? I would make the worst farm wife ever.”

They both laughed. A wind had picked up and was blowing off the sea, bringing clouds with it. The light from the rising sun was slowly being blotted out by the thickening vapor on the horizon. The air was cool.

“Are you really serious about not going back?” Valerie said at last.

“Yes,” said Christine. “I think I am.”

She got off her bike and wandered over to the end of the deck. Far down below, in the heaving, foamy water, she saw two tires near a clot of sun-bleached plastic caught in tangled buoys, as though it were some kind of new life form. The water was darkening, concentrating into a denser, colder mass. Waves ran in powerful ripples like muscles under skin while a weird greasy sunlight, diffused and refracted through clouds, slid along the ocean’s surface. Out of nowhere, Christine thought of Ariel’s song from The Tempest, which she had loved once, back when she was young and read books and lived in a world of words. “Full fathom five, thy father lies,” it started, and then, “these are pearls that were his eyes,” and something about a sea change. She’d forgotten the rest. “Sea change,” she thought. That was what this gathering cloud mass on the horizon was, the quickening of the waves, and then she remembered the line that went “something rich and strange.”

When she turned to look back at the bikes, Valerie was gone.

When the party was over and the suite had emptied and people went off to sleep or to look for food, Miriam left Jakov dozing on his daybed, and crept with Sasha into the bedroom and closed the door. For an hour or so, she lay with her eyes closed, naked in bed next to him, too revved up to sleep, her head filled with music, her left fingertips buzzing, her right arm aching a little, phrases of Bach mixing with the staccato of the Weiss and the melodies of the old jazz standards, the lilt of klezmer and folk songs, her inner ear still buzzing with the sound of the clarinet. The windows were open and a cool breeze rushed over her skin. She could hear the sounds of the sea far below, heaving, lapping at the ship, and Jakov, out in the living room, making gasping noises as he snored. He had kept the party going all night long, calling out songs whenever there was a lull, playing with such brio, such gusto, that Miriam had almost forgotten he was ill.

She opened her eyes to find Sasha looking back at her.

“So nice,” she said. “It’s cooler. Feel the air, it’s cooling off. The ocean is waking up.”

He reached over and cupped her face with his hand and kissed her. “I was just dreaming about you,” he said. He kissed her again. “I dreamed you were living in my house in Jaffa.”

They lay silent for a while with the chilly air blowing harder through the balcony door, the rushing, sucking sounds of the ocean. Then Miriam climbed on top of Sasha, stretched herself onto the whole length of him, stomach to stomach, nose to nose. He ran his hands along her naked back and lifted her hips in his hands. They both gasped aloud as he entered her, grinning at each other, holding perfectly still at first, and then gradually moving together. When they were breathless and sweating, she laid her head on his chest and settled her legs to nest in his.

“I loved my dream, Miriam. I wish for that more than anything.”

She lifted herself up and looked down at him and studied every wrinkle, every fissure in his face, and her chest ballooned, her head felt light. “I could die right now. Now I’ve had this, I can go.”

“Don’t go,” said Sasha, smiling at her.

“It’s an amazing feeling, to me. I’ve never had it before.”

“Yes you have. It’s like klezmer, like Schubert. There’s no word for it. There ought to be. Happy melancholy. In German, I’m sure there is a word but I refuse to learn it.”