“You want to do all these extravagant trips. Wouldn’t you rather do all that with money? Mom and Dad’s money? And if you leave you—what? You think they won’t look for you? You haven’t even picked out a specific place to go to first. And what are you going to do in a few years when your steam runs out, and you don’t have a degree or a resume, and you have to come crawling back to Mom and Dad for help?”
Tia stared at him, this boy who looked and sounded like her brother but whose words hadn’t been his own.
They sounded like their parents’.
She sucked in a breath. She wanted to shake him and scream, but she didn’t. If she was ever going to convince him, she had to be patient. This vacation hadn’t even officially begun.
“I swear, Ry, I have thought this out. I swear it’s going to work. We can pick out what we want to do together, and I swear to God that no matter what happens, I won’t be crawling back. Ever.”
Rylan set his pencil down on the sketchbook, then straightened it so it was parallel to one of the monster’s tentacles. “What if I stay? Would you...”
He couldn’t finish his sentence, but he didn’t have to. Tia understood. It was a question she had asked herself over and over, one that kept her up at night.
Would she leave him behind?
Tia detangled herself from the couch. She wasn’t ready to answer that question. She would prefer to never find out. “I’m gonna go hang out on deck for a minute. Watch some stars before bed. Tomorrow’s a big day.”
Rylan kept his head down, leaned into the space she had vacated. “It’s going to be the trip of a lifetime, T.”
“Sure. Night, Rylan. Night, Pirate.” She ruffled the cat’s fur.
“Good night.”
The Old Eileenwas different in the dark. Tia climbed onto the deck and stretched out on one of the sunbathing mattresses where she and her mom had drunk daiquiris together earlier that day. Everything that had been warm and golden was now cool and smattered with silver moonlight. Tia couldn’t wait to be out at sea where the stars would be even brighter, and the lights of the other ships in the harbor and of the buildings on land would no longer be visible. They had never sailed overnight before.
The nav lights at the top of the mast peered down at Tia, mismatched eyes in the black. Tia hugged her arms across her chest in a tight embrace, thinking about her brother belowdecks.
Would I leave him behind?
The answer was no. It had to be no. Rylan could be convinced; she was sure of that. She’d have to do it with more logic than passion. She’d have to drag him to a mirror and make him look at what he was becoming and think about what he could become.
Running away was terrifying, and Rylan sometimes let himself be ruled by fear. She’d need to be gentle.
The catwalk creaked, and Tia sat bolt upright.
Someone was boarding the ship.
She fumbled for her phone to put on the flashlight, but her fingers slipped, and she dropped it. She watched, helpless, as a tall, slim figure walked onto the deck. Were they getting robbed? Attacked?
The figure stopped dead, and Tia inhaled sharply. Had it spotted her? A scream boiled up in her throat. She wished Rylan had come with her.
Then the figure looked straight at her.
“Hey! Is thisThe Old Eileen?”
Tia blinked. She breathed out, her heart hammering. The man stepped forward into the faint pool of light from atop the mast, and Tia could see he had a guitar case strapped to his back. He was maybe a couple years older than her, early twenties, with deeply tanned skin and loose brown curls. He had a dusting of facial hair, and when he moved to adjust his pack, the light revealed little tattoos up and down his arm.
“Uh, yeah. It is. You must be the new crew member?” she asked, getting to her feet and taking a couple steadying deep breaths.
She felt stupid for having been afraid. She also felt stupid for standing there in her Snoopy pajamas, alone in the dark. Why had this guy shown up at night anyway?
He crossed the deck with his hand outstretched. His skin was warm and wide, palms lined with calluses.
“Sure am. You must be Captain Cameron’s daughter.”
“Tia,” she told him, and the man grinned disarmingly.
“Very nice to meet you, Tia. I’m Nico de la Vega.”
