Page 105 of A Perfect Disaster

“You’re three minutes late for the cutoff. I was about to file the report,” she says, with incredible seriousness.

Although, a second later, she smiles at me from ear to ear.

“I hadn’t realized I was running so close to the deadline,” I reply with my usual sarcasm, trying to catch my breath.

Gonzalo, from behind the counter, lets out a whistle.

“Clear your throats, gentlemen, this is going to be good,” whispers Nico.

I have no time for them, nor for the shipping company’s regulations, nor for my damn pride, nor for speeches rehearsed in front of the mirror. I drop my bag, take a step forward, and grab Helen right by the lapels of her uniform.

Her eyes widen, and for a second she loses all composure.

“Maika, what are you doing? We’re in the service area; the captain might…”

“Shut up,” I snap at her, staring intently. Then I think better of it and correct myself: “Shut up, please. I have to say this before I lose what little courage I have left after running the 100-meter dash with suitcases.”

Helen stands still, stiff, but without moving away, so close, and so beautiful with that scent of the sea and expensive perfume, so much a part of me, even though I still doubt whether I deserve her.

“I was an idiot,” I confess. “A proud, stubborn idiot—a combination that’s highly dangerous to anyone’s mental health. I got mad at you because I wanted you to tell me.”

Gonzalo mutters from the back something that sounds like “a point for the cheerleader.”

“But I’ve realized something important,” I continue, feeling my eyes well up with tears. “You did it because you love me. Because you saw my fear, my panic at not being able to handle it, and your rigid mind couldn’t just sit still. Because even though you’re a controlling officer, you also have a heart so damn big that it doesn’t know how to ask permission before saving the people it cares about.”

Helen’s eyes shine brightly in the sun on the access deck.

“Thank you for helping my grandmother,” I whisper, gripping her lapels tighter. “Thank you for loving me so badly and so well at the same time. Thank you for not telling me to go to hell, even though I’m chaos personified.”

Nico whispers from his hiding spot:

“I’d give that speech a nine.”

“A ten,” Gonzalo corrects him. “There are tears, and the ship is about to cast off. This is cinema.”

“I love you, Helen,” I say, no longer caring about anything or anyone. “I love you when you’re unbearable, when you make absurd lists to be a little more human, when you try to control everything because you’re terrified that life will leave you behind. I love you on the promenade deck, in the crew quarters, in the ports, in your officer’s uniform and with that ‘I’m going to file a report on you’ look that, inexplicably, I find the most attractive thing on the planet.”

Someone claps in the background. I don’t care who it is.

“And yes, I want to work with you. In the office or wherever they send us. But not running away, not sacrificing myself, not letting you decide for me or me for you. I want to fight by your side. I want us to be a mess, but the kind that wins battles and survives any storm together. A perfect mess.”

Helen lets out a laugh, purely emotional, and drops the control tablet onto the security counter.

“I love you too, Maika,” she says with that resounding clarity that reaches deep into my bones. “I love you so much that I was terrified of losing you, and that’s why I didn’t know how to do it right.”

“Well, we’re going to have to practice a lot,” I say, smiling through my tears.

“A lot.”

“A whole lot.”

“Maika.”

“Yes?”

Helen grabs me by the waist with a firmness that takes my breath away.

“Just kiss me already and shut up.”