“No, so I don’t have to hear Talon speak.”
Tia nods along empathetically. “Don’t worry, Choi, I have extras.”
Talon throws his hands in the air. “Can we just play?”
Sloan laughs, and I think all the windchimes in the universe start moving together, swaying in a phantom breeze caused by a beautiful girl who somehow ended up here with me.
She rolls her eyes when I wink at her, and picks up her ball.
Maybe fate’s not such a bad thing to believe in after all.
Bohdan
“I mean”—Jay leans forward, the chain around his neck lifting in the bubbles of the Jacuzzi, flush visible on his cheeks, eyes glossy and a smile tilting across his face—“it’s really about the tannins, isn’t it?”
It’s a sorry imitation of Talon carrying on during the wine tasting.
But it’s enough that we’re all laughing. Probably too loudly to be drowned out by the noises of the Jacuzzi and interrupting whatever sleep the neighbours on either side of our suite thought they’d be getting.
Talon makes a carry-on gesture, leaning back against the headrest. “Look, you can all laugh all you want. But I listened today. I learned.”
“I learned something, too.” Sloan sits up, straightening her shoulders. Wisps of hair fall out of her ponytail, framing her face and sticking to her damp collarbone, the tie of her bathing suit doing nothing to cover her tattoo, on display like she doesn’tcare who sees. But that might have more to do with the wine than her sudden apathy towards the faded ink on her shoulder.
I think it might have been on purpose, actually.
I definitely think the blue string bikini—the exact same shade as her eyes—was on purpose. I did my best to look away when she and Tia came out to join us because the idea of seeing that much of Sloan again, sitting so close to her, and being unable to touch her, made me simultaneously feel like jumping from the railings of this balcony into the depths of the ocean and dropping to my knees in front of all our friends and begging her to forgive me.
But Talon insisted on a soak after all that wine, saying it would help clear our heads, even though I’m pretty sure that’s scientifically proven not to be true.
“What’s that, Sloany?” Talon smiles encouragingly.
She raises her glass. “That you’re a douche.”
We all laugh again. But it’s not loud—everyone’s so quiet in their laughter because they can hardly breathe, and it should be a sound that echoes across the ship to annoy our neighbours and out onto the ocean to let the world know we’re all still here, and we can all still laugh.
Jay leans forward, ends of his hair falling into the water, clutching his side, practically wheezing. Tia can’t stop fanning her face, and Talon drops his head back before thumping a fist to his own chest when he chokes on a sip of wine.
Sloan smiles quietly, shoulders shaking, eyes scrunched up against the tears.
I’m not really making any noise, and I’m not really laughing either. I should be—it was a funny, too-stupid thing she said that reminded me of being in college. But she’s smiling in this real way I haven’t seen in over a year and a half, and I can’t really look away.
She looks at me, her lips turn down and her cheeks soften, and I can see it in her eyes—she’s looking for approval, waiting for me to laugh the way everyone else is. She thinks I don’t love her and she’s looking for something, anything to tell her brain to shut up, that I still see value in her. That she’s enough, even in some tiny, infinitesimal way.
There’s nothing about Sloan that’s infinitesimal to me.
Before I can think better of it, I wink at her.
Blue eyes go wide, her lips pillow and part before she blinks, swallowing slowly. I can see the flush on her cheeks from here, on her chest, curves just visible above the water, and I hate myself for that a bit, but she bites down on her lip, wrinkling her nose with a smile no one else would ever see.
Talon claps a palm against his chest again, finally swallowing, pointing towards Sloan before he practically parkours out of the Jacuzzi, and pushes to stand. “You’re funny. I’ll give you that.” He makes a show of checking his watch. “Free time is officially over. Thank you all for your participation in day two of my Retirement River Cruise.”
“I don’t think you can classify this as free time. You made us get into the Jacuzzi.” Tia fiddles with the yellow tie of her bathing suit before pointing at her brother.
“Not a river cruise.” Jay nods, emptying his wine and hopping over the edge of the Jacuzzi to get out.
Talon starts, “What is an ocean if not a—”
“It’s not a really big river, I’ll tell you that for free,” I offer, cutting him off.
