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Well, I guess that’s it for now. I am a little curious (okay, a lot curious) about what Lacey said about Tai’s past…how he’s been through a lot. It could explain why he’s such a prickly person….or maybe that’s just his personality. Either way, I would like to know more about him. I suppose with our shifts coming up, maybe I’ll get that opportunity.
Of course that doesn’t mean I’ll get any answers.
Over and out.
Seven
Tai
“Cheers. To the first day out at sea,” Richard says.
We all raise our drinks in front of the setting sun, the golden rays causing a prism effect through the wine glasses, distorting the dying light.
The newlyweds stare deep into each other’s bespectacled eyes as they drink, probably superstitious over that whole seven years bad luck (or bad sex) thing.
I figure Daisy must be wanting to avoid that also, since she’s had so much bad luck these days (not too sure about the bad sex, and I don’t want to know), but she’s avoiding my eyes, looking off into the sunset instead.
She looks astoundingly pretty, the red in her hair looking like fire in this light, dancing around her face in the ocean breeze.
There’s a pinch in my chest as I drink my wine, watching her. I’ve been a little harsh on her. I guess we all have been, though Lacey’s reasons I’m sure are different from mine.
Mine are pretty simple.
Daisy is a distraction.
She’s not sailing material, she’s drawn the ire of everyone on the boat, she tends to get in the way no matter what she does, and she rarely shuts up. This ocean passage isn’t as easy as I’ve made it out to seem, and I need to stay focused on getting us all to Fiji in one piece, if we all don’t kill each other first.
Plus…look at her.
Right now I should be scanning the horizon for freighters, but instead I’m watching her. I’m always watching her when she’s not looking. I like studying the real her, the one behind the bright smile, the one that pretends everything is fine.
Although, I have to say that’s been hard for her to do lately. Lacey has been going after her whenever she can, and even though their sibling rivalry is none of my business, and I’m staying out of it, I do think she’s being a little unfair to her.
Which, of course, makes me feel like a dick for being a dick.
Hey, I’m not heartless. Daisy may be a distraction, and she may live to annoy me, but I feel for her.
I just can’t let myself feel for her too much. Been down that road before.
At least everyone seems to have calmed down. The drinks help, of course. Though I don’t want to be a part of the whole social aspect of it, it’s good for the rest of them to loosen up a little.
That’s a tall order with Richard and Lacey though, and Daisy can take the loosening up thing a little too far.
Judge her all you want, but you loved the way she was falling all over you at the wedding.
I elbow that voice in my head to shut up.
For clarity’s sake, there’s truth in that.
When the wedding reception really got going, Daisy got going as well. As in drunk. At least she was a happy drunk and was running around taking photos of everyone. I kept watching her, wondering if she’d eventually get around to taking a photo with me.
Had to say, I think I might have been jealous of the attention she was giving everyone else.
It was almost as if she smelled those jealousy fumes coming from my direction, because then she turned her attention to me and would not let up.
I pretended it bugged me. I’m good at that.
In reality, I liked it.
She wanted photo after photo and I obliged her. I liked the feeling of her arm around my neck, I liked watching her smile and laugh and blush, I especially liked the feel of my cheek against her breasts, as playful as it was. Her skin is on a whole other level—warm, silky and sinfully soft.
Then she asked me to dance.
It was a slow song, some sappy Ed Sheeran, and I said no.
I guess I could see where she was going with all of this and I got cold feet.
Can’t really say why, just that it’s been happening to me a lot lately when an opportunity with a woman comes up. Those roads I don’t want to go down. Even when it’s just for a night, they never end up being what I want them to be, they’re always far more complicated than that.
She looked so sad and heartbroken for a moment, but she laughed it off.
I went back to the bar and watched her, thinking she’d turn her sights on someone else.
