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“A pain in the butt.” I nudge his attention toward the drink cart, where Pearl is glancing around, clearly looking for him. “I think your grandma has another hot chocolate with your name on it.”
He gets up but stops after taking a couple of steps. He turns and asks, “Are you going to still be here?”
My chest cinches. I nod. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Okay.” Satisfied with that answer, he takes off toward Pearl.
Cute kid.
Good kid.
Fucked-up kid if he’s got any of Jason in him.
Speak of the devil…
Jason and Kenzi reemerge from…wherever they were hiding, walking up the deck. Jason, who can’t lie to save his life, looks not like the cat that ate the canary, but more like the canary that ate the cat.
“How’re we hanging?” Jason asks, tossing himself beside me and throwing his arm over the back of the bench and, consequently, around me.
Jason has a habit of taking up enough space for three humans.
“This is a family event,” I inform him, “and your breath smells like pussy.”
As quickly as he settled, he retreats—Jason pushes off of the bench and starts toward the bathrooms. “I’ll be right back.”
“Good idea. Wash your beard.”
Kenzi takes his spot. Now it’s the two of us. The carolers finish their mournful rendition of “Ave Maria,” and everyone claps because it’s over. Now, the band—the real band, some guys from Brooklyn that they had to pay the LIRR fare for, probably—starts up. It’s a brass band, and they launch into a jazzy version of “Santa Baby,” immediately livening up the audience.
“Are you having fun?” Kenzi asks.
“Living the Christmas spirit,” I respond acerbically.
Her eyes are distracted, glancing around worriedly. “Have you seen Otto?”
“Yeah. He’s with Pearl.” The dim twinkle lights that hang from the ship give Kenzi’s skin a soft glow. She rakes her fingers through her thick raven hair, taming it a bit.
I hug my arms over my chest. “About Otto. Anything you want to talk about?”
She blinks at me. “What do you mean?”
I purse my lips. “Jason is crap at math. I’m not. You want to change your story about his father?” She squints at me. I expound. “At dinner. You played with your earring. It’s always been your tell.”
“Jesus.” She exhales the word. “You have the memory of an elephant.” She rolls her hands over her thighs uncomfortably as she looks everywhere except at me. She’s looking for an exit.
“I get it,” I say, because I have to say something to keep her here. “Eighteen. Pregnant. I’d run, too. Does he know?”
She looks back at me, and I see it now—the fear in her eyes is raw. Palpable. “You can’t say anything,” she says, her voice a rushed whisper. “Please. It’s complicated, you wouldn’t understand—”
“Wouldn’t I?”
Her lips seal at that. The look in her eyes, it’s that of a cornered animal.
“Please, Donovan,” she repeats. The urgency in her voice is sharp, metallic. It’s that feeling of having a razor pressed to your skin—not deep enough to draw blood, just enough to make a dent the flesh. The chilling anticipation of pain.
She thinks I have her heart in my hand. She has no idea that the opposite is true.
“I won’t tell him.”
