23. A Three-Letter Word
A Three-Letter Word
Josie
“Boat shoes suit you,” Wyatt says, nodding down at my feet.
It’s been a few days since he gave them to me, and we’re having coffee on deck again—our new morning routine and one of my favorite parts of every day.
Jib is curled up in his lap in her pirate outfit.
She fell asleep a few minutes ago after ripping off her eye patch and chewing it up. I can’t even be mad.
Because I actually agree with Wyatt on this point: The eye patch was ridiculous.
“Thanks.” A pleased flush rises in my cheeks. I wiggle my feet, showing off the light brown leather shoes with their rubber soles. The ones I’ve barely taken off for the last few days. I would have slept in them, but they aren’t that comfortable.
But fit isn’t the reason I don’t want to take them off. It’s the same reason people joke about not washing their hands after touching a celebrity. Or—sort of the same reason. I’m still getting over the fact that Wyatt bought me the shoes I’d been stressing over just before we left.
And then had them mailed ahead to one of our stops.
“I’m not sure I want to know how you knew my shoe size.”
Wyatt smirks. “Please. I just picked up one of your shoes and looked.”
“Hey! That’s an invasion of privacy.” I poke him in the arm, tempted to leave my hand there. It’s a very nice arm.
But I’m still a little hesitant with my touches. Not because I’m nervous or feel uncomfortable. It’s more that I don’t know yet where we are. Or where I want us to be.
One minute, I’m totally feeling like I shouldn’t worry about the ending. About what comes after this trip. I want to enjoy the moment and whatever is blossoming here.
Carpe diem and all that.
The next minute I’m terrified to let anything blossom here because if something goes wrong, we’ll be stuck on a boat together for the next few weeks.
Also, he is my brother’s best friend and client.
Who plays a sport in another city hours away.
A professional athlete. One who has never shown any interest until now.
In fact, he actively didn’t like me until recently.
Maybe most importantly, after not dating for basically my whole adult life, is this where I should start—with Wyatt ?
So, yeah—I can’t decide how much touching is too much. How much to share. How much to allow myself to daydream or flirt without pulling myself back to safety. My question is not the classic Should I stay or should I go? It’s more Should I hope or should I nope?
Only now, each time I pull back, I’m disappointed in myself. I’m the Cowardly Lion personified. And wearing boat shoes.
“Should I send them back then? Since they were gained by invasive methods?” he asks.
“That’s okay. I’ll keep them. Just don’t let it happen again.”
“No promises,” he says, and the look in his eyes makes my stomach flutter. “But I wasn’t talking about the fit. I mean they suit you. All of this does, Josie.”
He glances around, and I do too. The water is glassy, and other than the occasional bird calling or fish breaking the surface only to disappear faster than we can see it, it’s a quiet morning. Cloudy, so even the sun is on mute.
Last night the marina at the River Rat Yacht Club where we planned to stay was crowded and loud, with a large group having some kind of reunion or meetup.
I was relieved when Wyatt suggested we press on a little in the fading light and anchor at the mouth of Campbell Creek—after a brief stop at the club for showers, a meal, and laundry.
I don’t know if the yacht reciprocity thing still works or if Wyatt just flashes his famous face and his wallet around.
Either way, I’m not complaining. I’ve never appreciated showers so much. Ones where I’m not cramped in a space so small I’m forced to wash my body with T. rex arms in the boat’s tiny shower. I don’t know how Wyatt fits in there at all.
It’s quiet here in a little inlet off the Ditch, and since the other boats pulled away this morning before I was even out of my bed, it feels...private. The perfect kind of morning.
I could do this forever , I think, looking back at Wyatt. He wears a soft smile as he looks at Jib. I could do this with you forever.
The words stay lodged in my throat. For now.
Though the idea behind them is starting to expand, growing larger by the day, too big to be held inside my body.
Even if there’s another part of me—the part that’s been playing protector for years— urging me to run.
My feelings for Wyatt kick my fight-or-flight instincts into overdrive, which I’m pretty sure is not what’s supposed to happen when you like someone.
It shouldn’t be terrifying, right?
I realize Wyatt is studying me, his gray eyes soft in the morning light. How much of my inner struggle is written all over my face? I get the sense he knows me maybe better than I know myself. At least some parts of me.
Others I’ve hidden away, blocked from his view, burying them so deep no one could know. Not without some kind of excavator to unearth them. Or by dosing me with a truth serum.
I could talk to Wyatt. It’s strange to realize when I think back to how I’ve always viewed him, but I may trust Wyatt as much or even more than Toni. And if I decide to ignore my fight-or-flight instincts and consider exploring the feelings I think are mutual, I’ll need to talk to him.
I’m looking forward to that about as much as I’m looking forward to the stinky task of pumping out the boat’s holding tank at the next stop.
“Shall we go over our day?” Wyatt asks.
I nod with a thick swallow. Our day. People talk about four letter words, but this three-letter word is the one that does me in. Every time.
Our trip. Our dog. Our day.
Wyatt pulls out his iPad with the Aqua Map, and I grab my guidebook and chartbook—the next part of our morning routine.
Wyatt is team tech and I’m old school, using books and binoculars.
We bicker about it every time we discuss routes.
Honestly, it’s probably better that we use both.
And I think we both enjoy the back-and-forth about it.
Just one more part of our morning routine.
Today’s potential issues on the route include rough water in the Pamlico Sound and shallow waters in the Neuse River. My guidebook says we’re likely to see porpoises today, which has me kicking my feet. We haven’t seen any since the first day, and I’m hopeful.
Wyatt glances at the sky, overcast in towering clouds, muting the sun. “We should keep an eye on the weather. Don’t want storms during this stretch—winds could take us off course and leave us stuck in the shoals.”
I nod. Off course is the current story of my life.
“But if we avoid trouble, it will be a short day,” he says. “And a night in a real bed.”
A bed. I’m already grinning at the thought. It’s why I’ve been looking forward to our stop at the Oriental Marina & Inn. Emphasis on the Inn .
Not that I mind sleeping on the boat. Actually, I love it.
This has honestly been some of the best sleep of my life.
I’m not sure if that’s due to the gentle rocking at night or simply because traveling by boat in the middle of summer is exhausting.
I fall bonelessly into bed every night and pretty much crash the moment my eyes close.
But...I can hear a hotel bed calling my name. A real mattress, one thicker than a few inches. Sleeping on firm, unmoving land. With really good air-conditioning and maybe even a bathtub.
It’s the last one that does it for me.
I hop up from my seat, which wakes Jib. She scurries in circles with a bark, looking for danger or excitement. Finding none, she shoots me a dog version of a glare and stalks off to the fake grass—which she still refuses to use as anything other than her personal sunbathing area.
“Then let’s get a move on, slowpoke,” I say, holding out my hand to Wyatt. Not that he needs help getting up. I’ll never forget the way he smoothly went from the floor to standing on one leg the night he got all the splinters.
Why does that night feel like it was years ago, not weeks?
When Wyatt slips his hand into mine, he doesn’t move for a few seconds, his eyes on me and our palms gently pressed together.
My heart beats an unsteady rhythm that I feel all the way in my toes.
Then, Wyatt stands, gives my hand a quick squeeze, and disappears into the galley with both our empty mugs.
I’m still standing there, palm tingling, when he returns— with the Cool Whip container. His expression is hesitant, and it makes my throat tighten.
“Is this...okay?” he asks.
“It’s not about me, Wyatt. Is it okay with you ?”
He glances down at the container cupped in one big hand, then nods. I follow him to the stern, imagining him standing here alone, honoring his uncle’s wishes. Saying his goodbyes.
I stand next to him, unsure what I should do, what I should say. I settle on leaning in and wrapping an arm around his waist. I feel him relax against me with a sigh.
He opens the container, hesitates for a moment, then dips his fingers inside. I swallow, pressing even closer, feeling more emotional than I have any right to.
Wyatt opens his fingers, releasing a handful of ashes quickly carried away by the gentle breeze.
We stand there for a few moments, the humid heat pressing in on us both, as a gull circles overhead, for once not laughing. I give myself a silent pep talk until I’m able to ask a question that I’ve been wanting to voice for days. “Would you like to talk about him?”
When he says nothing, I mentally kick myself. It’s such a big, vague question. I should have asked something specific rather than a yes or no question. I already know Wyatt’s favorite answer to those.
So I’m shocked when he starts talking. “He was his own man. Not like anyone else and not trying to be anyone else. He laughed often and loudly—he sounded a bit like a honking goose when he did it.”
His smile is faint but there, and I find myself smiling back. “Your mom said you spent summers with him? You and your brother or just you?”
“Just me.”
I almost ask why but think better of it when I see his jaw clench. I’m not as adept at reading him as he seems to be at reading me, but I don’t need a Wyatt Instruction Manual to recognize tension. To feel it where my arm is still curled around his waist.
“And we’re sailing the route you took with him each summer?”
Wyatt nods once. “Many people travel this way in fall and winter. The weather’s much more pleasant.”
“But you had school.”
“And hockey.”
“Did you start playing hockey when you were really young?”
“My dad wanted me to take over the restaurant group,” he says, and I open my mouth to say something because this isn’t what I asked, but Wyatt continues.
“From the time I was, oh...about eight. When other kids were playing tag outside or reading picture books, I was learning how to use spreadsheets, being hammered with information about portfolios and investment capital. He made me sit in on business meetings wearing a little suit. One time someone laughed—chuckled, really—and made a comment about me playing dress-up. It wasn’t mean.
Just a statement about a kid looking out of place in a board meeting.
Which I did.” Wyatt pauses. “Dad fired him.”
I want to laugh. I want to cry. It’s ridiculous and so, so sad. My throat feels too tight, not unlike the way it did when I had my poison oak encounter. But this feels worse.
A boat passes by, sail billowing, and a gray-haired woman on deck in aviator sunglasses and a tank top waves. We wave back, Wyatt still clutching the Cool Whip container in one hand, my other arm still locked around his waist.
He waits for the boat to move away before he continues.
“Hockey was my way out. I’m not even sure why my father allowed me to play, but I fought for it.
” He pauses, and I can see how difficult it is for him to swallow.
“Mom fought for it too. Fought for me—maybe one of the only times she stood up to him.”
It’s hard to imagine the vivacious woman I met who tricked me into a shopping spree being cowed by anyone. Then, I think about a man who would fire someone for making an innocent comment about a child being a child.
“And then I was good at hockey. I thought it would just be an escape, but my father decided he didn’t want a son with a divided focus. He saw it as a character flaw. So, he moved on to Peter.”
“What do you mean, moved on ?”
Wyatt is quiet for a moment. “I mean, it’s like I didn’t—and don’t—exist to him anymore. Peter got all of Dad’s attention, focus, and training. At home it was like I wasn’t there. At least not to anyone but my mom.”
“Wyatt,” I whisper. Stunned. Horrified. Aching for the boy he was, the man he is. The surge of protectiveness almost bowls me over.
“And your brother went along with it?”
“Not at first,” Wyatt says, and I catch him rubbing his thumb on the edge of the plastic container in his hands. His voice is steady, carefully blank, but this motion continues, almost like a tic. “But Dad didn’t want me being a bad influence, so he discouraged our relationship.”
Discouraged our relationship.
This is the kind of thing a parent might say when their child is dating someone sketchy or hanging with the wrong crowd.
Not something a father should do with his own sons.
And most certainly not because of something like Wyatt wanting hockey as a break from the serious business stuff he was too young to be doing anyway.
“So, hockey became who I am,” he finishes. “And it was the start of my summers with my uncle.”
I want to tell Wyatt it’s okay, that he’s okay. I want to tell him his dad really, really sucks. I want to tell him he’s more than hockey.
But Jib runs up, issuing a sharp bark and a little butt wiggle. I drop my arm as Wyatt steps back, the thick emotional tension of the moment lifting like fog.
“If you’d learn to use your fake grass like a good girl, you wouldn’t be so desperate for us to get going,” he tells her, then bends to scratch her behind the ears.
Then he disappears below deck, leaving me alone with my thoughts and a dog dressed as a pirate.