The Winters(8)

I asked him how old he was.

“Old enough to be your father, I guess. Your young father.”

His eyes lingered on me as I did the math, seemingly searching out my reaction, as though to ask, Do you mind? Am I too old?

Truth was I didn’t mind. He was about as old as I thought he’d be. Yet I had always assumed, being fatherless only a few years, that I’d be immune to those unconscious paternal tugs that seemed to draw young, aimless women (mostly beautiful) to older (mostly wealthy) men. I saw that dynamic play out all the time at the club. The more pronounced the age difference, the more it seemed to stunt both parties’ growth, the women with their babyish voices, the men, with their tufts of white chest hair and fat tanned shoulders, growling at them. Often all that remained between these mismatched pairings was a permanent sense of disappointment in each other, one for getting older and one for never having been young in the first place.

“So. Where’s my boat?” He peered through the blinds into the marina.

“Oh, right!” I leapt to my feet and fetched the keys from the locked cupboard in the back room. “I’ll bring it up to the dock. It’s fully stocked with all the things Laureen told me you liked. The big key’s the ignition. Little one is for storage under the seating in the stern, where the fishing poles—”

“Actually,” he said, pressing them back into my hand, “I won’t be able to do the driving today. It turns out I do have some work to do. So I’ll need a captain after all. And I’d like to put in a request for you.”

Before I could disappoint him, John-John entered the office, breathless with the news about the oil spill. At fifty-five, he was still spry. As we caught each other up, my eyes darted over to Max, who seemed to be figuring out how this news affected his day, our day.

When John-John’s attention drifted to the picnic evidence, I quickly introduced him to Max. They remembered each other from previous years.

“So as you’ve probably figured out, Mr. Winter,” I said, “I can’t help you today. We’re all that’s holding down the fort until we can pull in some backup.”

Max looked sternly at John-John, giving the impression of a customer trying to stay calm. “So are you saying this young woman can’t pilot my boat? I booked this yesterday. Should I call Laureen?”

I stared at my shoes as John-John reassured him.

“That’s not necessary. Of course I’m not saying that, Mr. Winter.” To me he hissed, “You’ll have to go.” He said he’d man the office the rest of the morning until he took a wedding party out for their lunchtime cruise. If there were drop-ins, too bad, he said, they’d just have to go somewhere else. “We can’t do the impossible,” he said, shrugging. And one of us would be back in time to lock up at night.

Max went to the kitchen to order a cold lunch while I ran to my quarters, navigating around the remnants of the previous night’s party. I took a fast shower, threw a clean uniform over a bathing suit, and let my hair loose.

By the time we returned, John-John had brought around the boat. Max and I hopped aboard. I started up the engine. I could see him behind his sunglasses smirking a little as I slowly steered the boat out of the marina. In full command of the vessel, I let out the throttle once we passed the last buoy.





FIVE


What can I say about the four weeks that followed that wouldn’t sound ripped from a paperback romance? That’s how long Laureen was away, and to this day I count those weeks as the luckiest and happiest of my life. Except for two quick trips Max made to New York, we saw each other nearly every day after that first foray, when I took him for a half-day cruise around Grand Cayman, he insisting I point out landmarks related to my childhood. There’s where I went to school, that building with the white bell tower; we lived there in Bodden Town, before I had to move to staff lodging when my father passed away; here’s Spotts Beach, where my mother taught me how to swim.

Strangely, talking about my parents didn’t tip the mood to maudlin or sad, even when Max gently pressed for more about what happened to them. I knew too much about the nature of grief to think mine was gone for good, but that morning I was momentarily relieved of a heaviness that had dogged me for years, a gift which I wholly attributed to Max Winter.

I threw down anchor off the coast of Rum Point, where we ate our lunch in the helm out of the sun. I began to try to see the island through the eyes of a grateful tourist rather than a disappointed inhabitant who felt jailed rather than liberated by all that blinding water. Buildings that looked shabby up close glowed white with promise from a distance. Even the red-roofed shops dotting the harbor looked like a pretty foreign canton, and not a cheesy tourist trap.

“Born on a boat, lives on an island, now an orphan, working for a witch. You’re a Grimms’ fairy tale set in the Caribbean.”

I laughed. It was an odd compliment, considering how those stories generally ended. I hadn’t talked about myself that much in years, not even to my more inquisitive roommates.

“What about you? Tell me about you, your home. Laureen says it’s stroyt atava Deezney movay.”

“Yes, Asherley,” he said, busying himself with attaching a long lens to an elaborate camera. “You do a great impression of her. What else does Laureen say about me?”

I hesitated. I didn’t want him to think we gossiped about him. “Well . . . she said you’re an important man who’s been through a difficult time.”