Page 12 of The Second Chance in the Mediterranean
The whole meal was like dinner the night before, loud, rambunctious, with lots of teasing and laughter. I wondered how long it would take for me to fit in like that or, with the tension between me and Seb, would I ever get there?
Six
My first weekhad flown by. Every day was busy from dawn to dusk, planning out the menus for the upcoming charter week or helping Roy with crew meals. We were transitioning into a long-term, stable working relationship. Roy was deferring to me, accepting my suggestions, and asking for advice.
And I had met most of my vendors and had sources for everything on my list for the upcoming week. Roy and I had gone over the entire inventory and made sure the boat was well stocked. When I suggested a change in organization from how the past chef kept things, Roy took it in stride.
Thankfully, I had received messages from my friends onEik—Jonas was including me in the regular email updates on their position, Lila had gleefully announced that her and Eivind’s wedding was going to happen in New Zealand, and Elayna, my former roommate, had leftEikand sent me several long and winding emails, the kind filled with the existential crises of someone trying to find their place in the world. I wrote each of them back, and though messages were slow to be returned thanks to the vast time difference, it made me feel better—more settled.
As for Seb, hellos and thank-yous were the most words we had shared all week. We hadn’t avoided each other, which would be impossible, even on a ninety-meter boat, but we’d barely talked when we were in the same room, which was surprisingly often.
Seb and Roy were very close for roommates. Instead of sitting in the lounge and eating, Seb often took his meals standing up and chatting with Roy while Roy cooked or cleaned. He was always popping in for snacks, and Roy was often setting aside something Seb might particularly like.
“You and Seb seem pretty close,” I’d commented once, after an extended visit by Seb had the guys cracking up while I chiffonaded basil at the opposite end of the galley, ignored.
“Yeah, he has been a great roommate. Hard worker, funny. I think we’re a good match because we have such different jobs. Normally I’m just bunked with the token male stew.”
“Do Will and Percy bunk together?” Percy was another stew.
“Yeah. I’ve never worked on a boat with this many guys in the interior crew.”
“And this many women in the exterior?” I asked.
“That too.”
We hadn’t talked about Seb much since then, but by the end of the week, my nerves were frayed. When I’d first met Seb and I’d seen him naked, it had constantly popped up into my mind: him stepping out of the shower, toweling off, droplets of water everywhere.
After that night in Antigua, though, now anytime Seb came through the galley, when he groaned while eating something delicious or closed his eyes or even when I saw his hands, I flashed back to our night together. Seb’s noises echoed through my head, and these memories surfacing were making it hard for me to concentrate on anything when he was around.
After a week of this, I was frustrated, mentally and sexually.
I was almost done for the afternoon, and Roy and I had a break on the schedule. We were tidying up the galley, and Seb was on a break too, fifteen minutes in the afternoon to come inside and eat a snack. Depending on the day’s chores, deckhands would spend a lot of time out in the sun and heat. Washing the boat, cleaning windows, and various other projects all burned a lot of calories, so most of the crew opted for afternoon snacks and Seb was enjoying some of our fresh pastries.
He stood next to the sink, leaning over to eat apain au chocolat,letting the flaky crust fall into the sink. He groaned around the bite, laughed at something Roy said, and licked his lips.
Ugh, he had such great lips.
Seb turned and caught me staring. Roy was focused on his dishes and the story he was telling, but Seb’s gaze lingered, and then his eyes narrowed, as if I were the interloper in my own kitchen!
Absolutely not. I had to nip this in the bud and Seb had to know this was my domain.
“Seb, can you take your snack into the crew lounge, please? You’re getting crumbs everywhere and Roy is trying to work.”
Seb froze, and his gaze flicked from me to Roy and back. He looked down at the sink. “I’m just getting crumbs on the dirty dishes, Marce. Roy’s chugging through them; they’ll be clean in no time.”
“I’d prefer Marcella. And enough with the crumbs; go eat in the lounge like the rest of the crew.”
Seb looked at Roy again, but I couldn’t tell if Roy was looking down or if they communicated somehow. He didn’t move.
I pitched my voice sharper. “Seb, seriously, out.”
He shoved the rest of the pastry into his mouth and dusted off his hands over the sink. His cheeks puffing up as he tried to chew would have been comical any other time, but we were both flushed with anger. He tossed his hands out, palms up, and stormed out of the galley.
Huffing, I made my own noise by stomping across the galley to the laundry bin and taking off my apron and chef’s coat. “Roy, you got the rest of cleanup?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Good. I’m off. See you in an hour.”
