Braving the Waves (Cruisin’ With Curves)

1. Marley

CHAPTER ONE

MARLEY

“Swim, Marley! I’m coming! I’m coming! Swim!”

I tuck my hands in as close to my body as I can get them and take a deep breath, turning on my heel and pacing back the way I came. There’s a good fifteen feet between me and the side of the ship, and part of me would really like to keep it that way, but the other part of me knows that I can’t spread these ashes if I don’t get close enough to tip the wooden box over.

I turn and pace back again.

“Foul! There’s no way! You can’t just fucking elbow me in the solar plexus, fuckhead,” someone shouts in an Australian accent.

My gaze shoots to the late-night basketball game going on nearby. There are four guys, all of them in loose-fitting shorts and t-shirts with little pockets, getting back into some kind of formation on the deck’s basketball court. One of them glances over at me and then says, loud enough for me to hear him, though I don’t know if he knows that, “Hey, there’s a lady over there. Maybe cool it with the ‘fuckheads.’”

I bite back a smile, my fists loosening a little bit. We hit a wave, the sound of the water sloshing into the side of the ship enough to make panic spike in my chest again. I slam my eyes closed and shake my head.

“You’re miles from that water,” I whisper to myself. “If it was that easy to fall off the side of a cruise ship, the mortality rate would be astronomical and the whole operation would get shut down.”

I take a deep breath, open my eyes, and inch toward the side. The sound of the basketball hitting the deck with a bonk bonk bonk is oddly comforting. I peer over the side of the ship, down at the tumultuous water. Late at night like this, it looks like an endless black void, ready to swallow me whole.

“Is there, uh, something I can help you with?”

I scream, jerking back from the railing and dropping my mother’s box in the process. The lid flies open and ashes spill out onto the deck, particles immediately getting lost in between the cracks of the floorboard.

“No!” I drop to my knees and scoop the ashes back into the carved wooden box, slamming and clasping the lid.

I’m holding the lid shut with both hands, like the ashes are going to burst out of it, and try to steady my breaths. When I look up, I realize all the guys on the basketball court are staring at me. There are only three of them now.

I turn my head and see the pair of sneakers beside me. My gaze crawls upward, scanning two hairy, muscular legs, a pair of blue shorts, a gray t-shirt, and finally, a man’s face. The same one who told the other guy to maybe not cuss so blatantly.

I can’t decipher the expression on his face. “Are you okay?” he asks, in an accent I can’t quite make out. French, maybe?

Even with the splash of the water churning behind the ship and the high-pitched whistle of the wind, it’s almost silent as I contemplate how to answer. No, I am definitely not okay. I am trying to spread my mother’s ashes over the ocean like she wanted, while also being terrified of that ocean.

“I’m fine,” I tell him, standing and tucking my mother’s ashes under my arm. His eyes follow the movement. Now that he knows what’s in the box, I’m sure I look like a mad woman.

“Isaac!”

We both turn to look at the men on the basketball court, one of them throwing his hands up like we’re causing a traffic jam or something.

Beside me, Isaac (I’m assuming) ignores them and says, “You shouldn’t hang around the deck in the middle of the night,” he says. “It’s not safe.”

I almost want to laugh. I’ve spent days, weeks, my whole life, contemplating the potential safety concerns of the water beneath this ship, the Infinity Voyager, an adults-only cruise ship that my mother never got the chance to try out, but it never once occurred to me to be wary of its passengers, which is why I’m out here in the middle of the night. I figured the staff that was still up would be busy with other duties and that any passengers still awake would probably be drunk and not paying attention to some random woman trying to gather her courage to spread some ashes.

I’ve been up here for almost an hour, trying to convince myself to put my arm out over the water, and in all that time, not a soul has come along.

And now, here’s this guy.

He confidently holds my gaze.

“Isaac, man, come on!” someone calls.

“Thanks for your help,” I tell him, mostly sincerely, wrapping my arms around the box and rushing away, feeling the eyes of all the men on me as I go.