Page 71 of The Hitchhiker in Panama
I sipped my coffee while I watched Eivind in his deck harness and shorts. He checked the chartplotter and horizon, then walked the deck, checking lines and rigging. Then he stood in the cockpit, facing forward, and started squatting down and getting back up, squatting down and getting back up.
“What are you doing?” I giggled.
He looked at me over his shoulder. “Exercising.”
He did more squats, and I tilted my head, watching his butt flex and tighten.
“Do you do this every morning?”
“It helps me wake up.”
I ran a hand over my face. “God, you’re exhausting.” Though I had to admit, I didn’t mind the view.
Eivind did squats, push-ups, sit-ups, jumping jacks, and more until he was sweating. The movements were challenged byEik, who did her best to knock Eivind off his feet. Several times he tipped over onto the bench and had to right himself.
“IsEikbiting you?” I asked after a particularly bad lurch had Eivind rubbing his knee.
“Maybe you should be doing some of these. It helps get energy out.”
“I have all the energy I need for reading, thank you very much.”
“Marcella and Elayna do yoga sometimes.”
I blanched. “On a moving boat? How is that even possible?”
Eivind showed off by moving into downward dog.
“You tosser.” I threw a pillow at him.
Thirty-Two
A knock came on our cabin door. Through half-lidded eyes crusted with sleep, Eivind and I looked at each other and tugged the sheet up over our naked bodies.
“Yeah?” he said in a sleep-weary voice. Guessing by the light coming through the window, it was mid-morning and we were in the middle of our sleep time.
The door opened and Jonas poked his head into the cabin. “I’m going to need some help. We have a problem with one of the lines.”
“Ja,” Eivind replied, and Jonas ducked out of the room.
Eivind swung his legs out of bed and dressed. I followed, albeit at a slower pace. When I came up into the cockpit, with my harness strapped on, Elayna was still up and Jonas explained the issue.
“Elayna woke me up early. She was walking on the deck and tossing a flying fish overboard when she noticed the tack line for the spinnaker is chafing at the block. We need to bring the sail down and replace the line.”
Eivind nodded, and they discussed which line to use for the replacement. I knew from my book on sailing basics that the tack line was one of the three lines holding the sail onto the boat: the tack line was the bottom, the halyard was the top, and the sheet was the third line in the middle.
I stood out of the way while Jonas and Eivind prepared to furl the sail, putting lines on winches and bringing the spinnaker pole down.
Jonas started to crank the furling line in, twisting the drum at the bottom of the sail. Eivind released the sheet, allowing the sail to wrap tightly around the leading edge while Elayna waited at the tack with the replacement line.
I carefully maneuvered out to the middle of the deck, where I could lean against the mast and watch everyone work.
Suddenly there was athunkand Elayna called to Jonas, “Stop! Stop!”
She crouched down at the base of the sail, inspecting the hardware and line. Jonas waited at the winch.
“Jonas! We have a problem!” Elayna shouted back at him.
He quickly wove through the rigging and bent down next to Elayna. When he saw the problem, his eyes widened.
