Summer at Sea: The Summer Series Book 1 Read online

  Not acceptable.

  And so, I’ve been secretly devising a little plan. Our cruise ship leaves out of Massachusetts. I live in Massachusetts. The ship holds two thousand two hundred and twenty-four passengers, half of which are probably men, a quarter of which are probably single. My totally arbitrary calculations lead me to believe that I’ll have a fairly large captive audience of eligible bachelors from my local area, and that a good portion of my female competition will be over the age of sixty.

  “Summer?” Mom yells from the house. “Did you remember to take the fanny pack that I bought you?”

  “Yes, Mom!” I shout back, shuddering at the thought of actually wearing that thing. It’s made out of stonewashed denim, and she thinks that I’m going to keep tissues in it. I take a deep breath. It will all be okay. I’m in the home stretch now.

  This is the week that I land myself a husband.

  It’s not like we need to get engaged before the week is over, or anything crazy like that. The magic of the cruise will simply set the foundation for our relationship—the slow dancing under the stars, the wine, the spray of the ocean, the dolphins leaping gleefully in the background. In a few short days it will feel as if we’ve known each other for years. Once we’ve gotten the initial sparks underway, we’ll exchange contact information and meet up a couple of times after returning home. Then comes the engagement, the wedding, and voila! Prophecy fulfilled.

  Look, I know it’s a stupid idea. Of course it’s a stupid idea. Don’t flatter yourself with the thought that I didn’t realize this myself. I know it’s exceedingly dumb. But as dumb as it is, there’s still a chance of it working. You know the old saying it’s so crazy it just might work.

  That phrase is what I’m counting on.

  It takes another half an hour before all of us and our belongings are squeezed into every available crevice of Graham’s car. The trunk, secured with bungee cords, looks like a hippopotamus vomiting Samsonite. The Duffle is strapped to the roof. My parents are strapped into the backseat surrounded by carry-on bags. I know I should have let Dad have the front seat since he is a slightly larger person, but I allow myself this one luxury.

  I cringe every time Mom and Dad try to speak, as I am convinced that they are going to ask Graham to turn around so they can get something they forgot—cell phone charger, Rolaids, extra pair of water shoes. I say, “try to speak” because Graham’s got this crazy Latin hip-hop/techno album going at full blast and all of the windows are rolled down. Mom and Dad look pretty frazzled, which I have to admit, is awesome.

  Don’t stop the paaaarty!

  Graham drums on the steering wheel while I stare out the passenger window.

  “Loosen up, Sum! You’re on vacation!” He glances into the rearview mirror at Mom and Dad. “You guys are going to have a blast this week!”

  Mom, who most likely can’t hear a word he’s saying, smiles and nods. Dad’s face has collapsed into a slack-jawed zombie kind of appearance.

  ‘You’re crazy,” I say, shaking my head.

  “Why?”

  “You just are, trust me. I know crazy.”

  “No, you trust me,” says Graham. “You’re going to have a great time. It all starts with a positive attitude.” He reaches over and slaps me on the thigh, then gives it a firm squeeze. I stare down at my leg, eyebrows raised. I’m somewhat taken aback, and somewhat wishing that he would do it again. I’m undoubtedly uncomfortable.

  Maybe he’s right, though.

  I can’t act like an old stick-in-the-mud and expect to attract a husband, can I? Even with my parents in the backseat—and they’re going to be in my metaphorical backseat for this entire trip—I’m going to need to loosen up. There’s no time like the present.

  I smile over at Graham and lean my head back against the front seat. I drum my fingers to the music.

  You can do it, Douchewell. You’re in the front seat of a good-looking car, next to a good-looking guy, even if it does happen to be Blenderman.

  The wind is in my hair and an inkling of excitement begins to make its way into my soul.

  “You know what I forgot?” asks Dad, his head appearing between the two front seats.

  And just like that, it’s gone.

  4

  Graham drops us off in front of Black Falcon Terminal and drives away to park the car. As much as he gives me a headache, I kind of wish he was going to be there while we check in and go through security. Against all logic, he seems to have the same calming effect on my mother as a shot of brandy. But Eric and his girlfriend are probably waiting for us inside, so we load The Duffle—which looks alarmingly similar to a body bag—onto a luggage cart, and proceed to the check-in desk.

  Check-in goes about as smoothly as one can expect when assisting your parents with international travel documents. I’ve had this fear for the past few weeks that the agent will tell me there’s been a screw up and I have to stay in a cabin with my parents. It’s totally irrational since I have the travel documents that clearly show my room number, and my parents have their own documents that show their room number. But still. What if they overbooked the boat or something? What if they’re keeping an eye out for family members to squash together? The agent doesn’t know that the sound of my father scratching his big toe with his other big toe will make me dive head first into the ship’s propellers.

  I breathe a bit easier once the agent has handed us our keys and confirmed that our cabins are on separate decks. I don’t know if Eric did that as a favor to me; it’s more likely that he booked me into a room directly over the bowling alley.

  We’ve just gone through security, and I am gathering up my things on the other side of the metal detector, when I realize that Mom and Dad are no longer behind me. I turn around to find the two of them pulled off to the side, speaking to a security guard. Now they’re pointing at me. Crap.

  “Hi,” I say, walking over. “Is there a problem?”

  “Are you travelling with these folks?” He nods towards my parents. I suppose now is my chance to either admit that they are my parents, or leave them to fend for themselves and actually enjoy my cruise.

  “Yes, they’re my parents,” I admit. “Is something wrong?”

  “I’d like to take your father aside for some questions. Please follow me.”

  Questions?

  We follow the security guard to a small room containing a metal table, four chairs, and a water cooler. There is a poster on the wall detailing items not allowed onboard. Weapons. Illegal Drugs. Firearms.

  “Passport please,” says the security guard. Dad pulls a wad of papers out of his pocket, sprinkling receipts all over the table. From pocket number two come three small bottles of hand sanitizer and a sugar packet from McDonald’s.

  I glance nervously at the security guard, but he remains stone-faced. Dad finally locates his passport in his left knee pocket, and hands it over. The security guard reads it intently and studies Dad’s face, looking back and forth between him and the photo.

  Is that Richard P. Hartwell or Osama bin Laden? I joke to myself. Then it hits me. Dad’s hair is standing on end from the ride in the Camaro. He’s agitated from dodging the crowds of people and going through security. His pants pockets are filled with enough bottles of suspicious liquids to blow us all out of the water. And The Duffle. My God, The Duffle.

  They think Dad is a terrorist.

  Like, they seriously think Dad is a terrorist. Even if he doesn’t turn out to be one himself, he could very well be hiding one inside The Duffle. Despite the circumstances, a snort of laughter escapes me.

  “Is something funny, Miss?”

  “No, I’m sorry.” I clamp my mouth shut and look over at Dad. If only he had combed his hair down, we could be getting on the ship right now.

  “Have you left your luggage unattended at any point today, sir?”

  Dad stares at the security guard, speechless and frozen in panic.

  “Sir?”

  “Dad,” I mutter. “Jus
t answer the question.”

  “Um. Well, we, we uh, we came from the car and then we put the bags on, on the…what do you call that thing?”

  “The luggage cart,” says Mom.

  “The luggage cart, right. Then I went to the, uh, the men’s room. So, they may have been unattended, I believe. Is that right?” He looks to Mom and me for support.

  “Of course we didn’t leave them unattended!” I snap. “Mom and I were standing there with them!”

  “Oh, right.”

  “You seem nervous,” says the security guard.

  “He’s always nervous,” I mumble.

  “I’d like for your father to answer his own questions.”

  I stop talking and bury my face in my hands.

  “Sir, have you any reason to be nervous about boarding the vessel today?”

  “Do I have any reason to be nervous?” repeats Dad. My face is still buried in my hands but I can tell from the silence that he is looking to me and Mom for an answer. I try to shake my head inconspicuously. “Of course I have a reason to be nervous.”

  “What reason is that, sir?”

  I raise my head and look over at Dad. Yes, what reason is that? Maybe he actually is a terrorist. That would be something. Maybe he’s been such a nervous wreck all these years because he’s been plotting how to bring down the United States government. Even the security guard seems to be holding his breath in anticipation of the big reveal.

  “Well, I wasn’t able to receive final confirmation from my contact before arriving here today,” says Dad. His face suddenly looks quite grave.

  Oh my God. What is he talking about?

  “Final confirmation of what?”

  “Of whether or not I would be able to acquire the um, the necessary materials once I had made it onboard.”

  The security guard reaches for his holster and glances quickly from me to Mom. Holy shit. This is really happening. We’re going to jail.

  “What contact, sir? Exactly what type of materials are we talking about? Chemical? Biological?” He reaches for his radio. “I’m going to need backup in holding room one.”

  “Antibacterial,” says Dad. “My cousin Morty came on this cruise last year, but he couldn’t remember if they sold Purell in the gift shop.”

  “Cancel request for backup.” The security guard puts his radio back down on the table. “Purell?”

  “Yes, hand sanitizer. I’m not sure if I brought enough. I also may have forgotten my fanny pack and an extra pair of reading glasses.”

  “Not wearing a fanny pack is not a federal offense, sir.”

  “What about the hand sanitizer?”

  “I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised once you get onboard” says the security guard, who I imagine is quite looking forward to ushering us out of his office. “You three are free to go.”

  “What a relief,” says Dad. “For a minute I thought you were accusing me of trying to blow up the ship!”

  And we’re still going to jail.

  “Richard!” Mom snaps. “That’s not funny! My husband doesn’t know what he’s talking about!”

  “He really doesn’t,” I say. “Look at him.” Mom and I both motion to Dad like he’s Exhibit A in the People Who Could Never Coordinate a Terrorist Act display.

  The security guard apparently agrees, because he pushes back his chair and stands up.

  “Please refrain from making jokes of that nature. We take them very seriously around here.” He hands the passport back to Dad, clearly not taking the joke seriously at all, and ushers us out of the office. “Enjoy your vacation.”

  We thank him profusely, as that’s what you do when you’ve narrowly escaped life in federal prison. Our bags, which have clearly been searched for weapons of mass destruction, are waiting for us outside the room. The Duffle has been carelessly repacked so that there is a series of odd lumps and protrusions along the sides—making it look even more like it’s filled with dead bodies. One of my nicer shirts is hanging out of my suitcase, caught between the zippers. I yank open the zipper, tearing a hole in the fabric of the shirt. If only I could tear a hole in the fabric of the Universe, I could travel a week into the future when this ridiculous vacation would already be over.

  Okay, maybe I’ve been reading too much science fiction lately. But I work in a middle school library, so give me a break. I’m just saying, how handy would it be if you could shoot into the future and see how everything turns out? I could see if The Prophecy is ever fulfilled, or if I’m still forty-seven years old and living in my parents’ basement. Then I could pop back into present day and go about my business with a bit more peace of mind. I suppose one might also find out a lot of awful stuff, like when Ebenezer Scrooge travels into the future and finds out that everybody’s glad he’s dead. But even that story had a happy ending, right? I’m telling you, time travel could change my life.

  As the three of us arrive in the waiting area, I scan the crowd looking for my brother. I’m sure he assumes that I will be entertaining Mom and Dad for the entire week, and I am eager to inform him that I will be doing no such thing. This vacation was his idea and he’s going to do his part to spend some quality time with them—preferably starting within the next five minutes.

  Since Eric’s become rich he’s been growing his hair long, like he’s in a boy band, and wearing a lot of linen pants and Hawaiian shirts. He should be fairly easy to spot, but I don’t see him anywhere. I’m starting to get nervous when a flash of Blue Dye #1 catches my attention from the far side of the room. It’s Graham, waving to us. As we head over, I check to his left and right for either Eric or Eric’s girlfriend Tanya, but he appears to be sitting alone.

  “Hey,” I say, setting down my bags. “Where’s Eric?”

  Graham rubs the back of his neck and stares down at the floor.

  “Hello? Where’s Eric?” I ask again.

  Graham stretches and yawns. I whack him on the shoulder.

  “What’s wrong with you? Where’s Eric?”

  “Rich! Joan!” Graham exclaims, jumping up and greeting my parents as if he hasn’t seen them in years. “How’d everything go at check-in?”

  “Wonderfully!” says Mom.

  Wonderfully? Sure. I guess the interrogation by Jack Bauer was no biggie.

  “Graham, look at me.” I wave my hand in his face. “Where is Eric? The ship is boarding in like fifteen minutes.”

  When we finally make eye contact, I don’t like what I see. Graham gives me an unnaturally large and guilty-looking smile. Uh oh.

  “What is it? What happened?”

  “Well, see, the thing is...”

  “WHAT?”

  “Eric’s not coming.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “He texted me a few minutes ago saying that something came up. Tanya’s sister invited them out to San Diego for the week.”

  “WHAT?”

  “You know how spontaneous Eric can be.”

  “WHAT?”

  “Don’t worry, the cruise line let him cancel his suite. He’ll get a full refund.”

  The room starts to spin. Is this some kind of elaborate prank? Are there hidden cameras? That would help to explain the terrorist investigation we just went through. I take a deep breath and count to ten in my head, but it doesn’t change a thing. By this point the hidden camera people should have come out. I mean, it doesn’t make for good television to just sit there and watch a person suffering indefinitely. After a reasonable amount of time it’s customary to jump out from behind the potted plants, say Gotcha! and then ask the poor fool to sign a bunch of release waivers. But nobody’s coming. This isn’t a joke. Eric has booked me onto a cruise ship with my parents, and then ditched me.

  “You think I care about his money?” I say, sinking down onto the bench. “Eric’s ditched me for a week with them. What am I supposed to do?”

  Yes, I know, I live with my parents on a daily basis. But I go to work during the day, and Mom and Dad have their normal routines, how
ever weird they are, that don’t typically involve me. That time and space apart, it makes life relatively tolerable. But eight days and seven nights trapped aboard a sea-faring vessel with Mom and Dad and motion sickness pills and fanny packs, without a sibling along to share the burden? I mean, that’s the reason Mom and Dad had two children, wasn’t it? So that Eric and I could share the burden. There is no way that I can be expected to go this alone.

  “What’s the matter?” asks Mom. She didn’t hear a word of what just happened as she was fussing around inside Dad’s fanny pack the whole time. It looked a bit perverse, if you must know.

  “Eric’s not coming,” I say.

  “What?”

  “He ditched us to go to San Diego.”

  “Oy! Richard!” Mom grabs Dad by the fanny pack. “Are you hearing this? He’s not coming!”

  “Who’s not coming?”

  “Eric!”

  “What do you mean he’s not coming?”

  “I mean, he’s not coming,” I say, just to clarify.

  “Are you sure?” asks Dad.

  “Well he’s in California and we’re about to get on a boat in Boston Harbor,” I say. “It doesn’t get much more not coming than that.”

  “WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?” Mom shrieks. She is yelling at the top of her lungs while squeezing Dad’s fanny pack between her fists. Other guests are eyeing us in concern, because, well, it looks as if she’s got him by the—

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Hartwell,” interrupts Graham, standing up and draping his arm across her shoulders. “You guys have still got me.”

  “Are you insane?” I ask. “Why would you possibly still want to go on this trip?”

  “Why not?”

  I don’t exactly have the eternity that I would need in order to answer that question.

  “What do you mean why not?” I ask.

  “I mean, why shouldn’t we still go?” repeats Graham. “Eric was going to be hanging out with Tanya all week anyway. It’s not going to be that different.”