Chapter 34
It wasn’t just a hangover, though it was certainly that too.
Annie’s head hurt more when she thought about Greg and even more when she thought about Keith Fiore.
Poor Keith Fiore! She felt like she’d sexually assaulted him with her mind.
It happened all the time, of course, women fantasizing about him.
It probably happened every day of his life, but somehow it felt worse having him physically nearby.
She looked across the room at Maira, who was asleep with her mouth open, her weighted sleep mask still Velcroed to her head.
Annie sat up and saw the giant decal of Shawn Fiore’s face on the floor between their beds.
The American Fantasy was moving more than usual, and Annie watched as the room rose and fell with the unseen waves. She swung her legs to the floor.
In opera, when women accepted their fate, it usually meant that they were going to marry someone they didn’t want to marry and then kill themselves.
Some people claimed that wisdom came with age, but Annie had never found that to be true.
Look at all the old people who lost their minds to invented stories on cable news channels, at the people who gave their pensions to strangers who called them on the telephone while they were watching Wheel of Fortune.
The only thing that Annie felt better about at fifty was her willingness to admit her own stupidity.
Fallibility. Confusion. It was great, actually—getting things wrong didn’t feel as bad as it used to.
The sun would rise the next day. She was a sturdy person.
If the divorce had taught her anything, it was that.
Another gift of age: Whatever grudges Annie had ever kept were long gone.
The woman who Chris had always flirted with too much?
Gone. The moms who’d been bitches to her when Claudia was a rowdy toddler who sometimes bit?
Gone. The college friends who had always ditched her for cooler people at cooler parties?
There were only so many hours in any given day, and there were too many people who Annie actually cared about.
She understood now when her parents had introduced someone as “their very good friend” and it was a total stranger, someone she’d never met before.
There were too many people to fit into a calendar year, with family vacations and school holidays and childcare and dinner dates and deaths in the family and illness and money and time.
That was it, really—there was never enough time, and Annie had gotten good at letting things go.
Maira croaked from her bed. “Want breakfast?”
“I’m not going to drink today,” Annie said.
“More for me,” Maira said.
—
A few minutes later, they walked into the restaurant, and Annie instantly felt like a fool. The buffet was like a shopping mall food court, and this was an actual restaurant. Annie exhaled, annoyed that she’d wasted so many meals walking around with a plastic tray.
“Right this way,” said a server wearing a vest and a tie.
“Why didn’t you think this was good again?” Annie asked. “There are waiters?”
“It’s so much farther away from the lido deck,” Maira said. “You’d have to eat so early in order to get a good spot. Takes too long.”
The enormous room was full of Talkers in groups large and small, just like the rest of the boat, but it was quiet.
The server stopped in front of a table next to a window and gestured for them to sit.
Outside, the water was blue and endless.
It immediately felt more like every vacation Annie had ever been on.
Everyone was sitting down. No one was screaming.
“Well, I am never going to the buffet again, I can tell you that much.”
Maira sat down and put her napkin on her lap. “You do you.”
The menus were enormous. It had only been three days, but Annie delighted at the choices in front of her, choices that someone would prepare and bring to her table.
“Hmm, hmm, maybe eggs! Or I don’t know. French toast actually sounds so delicious to me right now.
I don’t think I’ve had French toast in years. ”
Maira shrugged. “Okay,” she said. “So, you want me to tell you about your lover boy?”
Annie put her hand over her eyes. “I am so sorry you had to see that. I feel like a teenager who got caught having sex in her parents’ basement.”
“In the basement?” Maira asked. “Okay, creepy.”
“Not like a creepy basement,” Annie said. She felt embarrassment rise in her cheeks and took a breath. “Do I want to know? I don’t know. Do I?”
“Greg comes to everything. He comes on the cruises. He goes to the meet and greets. He’s a big fan.
But the thing about being a male Boy Talk fan?
It’s almost like—what do you call it? You remember that Steve Martin movie where he has the big nose?
And the cute firefighter pretends to be him to make the mermaid from Splash fall in love with him? ”
“It’s Cyrano,” Annie said. “I get it.” The plot was the same—the handsome hunk can barely string a sentence together, so eloquent Cyrano woos in his place, and the hunk climbs up to the balcony and makes love to her.
In Annie’s case, Boy Talk was Cyrano, wooing en masse out of reach, and then all Greg had to do was wear a nightcap and offer her a beer.
It was pathetic, but it worked. A classic was a classic for a reason.
“No, it was called something else. Anyway, that’s what Greg does.
He sees all of us with hearts in our eyes and he just tries and tries until someone says yes.
He’s probably slept with as many people as Corey West has, honestly.
All of them Talkers. He still lives with his parents. Did he tell you that? He does.”
Annie cringed and was glad when the server reappeared to wipe the slate clean. They ordered eggs and French toast and regular toast and orange juice and coffee—and some fruit and some sausage. Why not? It was all free. When the waiter left, Annie took a sip of water and started.
“And what about the guys? I feel like there’s a lot I don’t know about them, at least anymore.”
Maira batted her eyes. “I told you that you’d want to meet them.” She reached around and patted herself on the back. “Which one? Still Shawn? Or somebody else?”
“Keith.” Annie blushed. “Just tell me. What should I know?”
Maira rolled her head on her neck, and Annie could hear the crackling noises from across the table. She took a deep breath. “Honestly?” she said. “I think he’s lonely.”
“How could you possibly know that?” Annie shook her head. “Come on.”
“ ‘Come on’ nothing,” Maira said. “Some people are experts at nuclear physics, and I’m an expert at this.
Body language. The way he talks in interviews.
I don’t know what’s happening in his personal life, obviously, but I know that everyone brings their personal life to work in one way or another. Don’t you think?”
Annie thought about her office, at least pre-Covid, when they were all together all the time.
No one had been surprised when she’d told them she and Chris were getting a divorce.
They’d all told her a thousand times how wonderful Claudia was, how precious, how smart.
They’d watched the videos of her karate belt ceremonies and drum recitals.
No one had ever said something nice about Chris.
It wasn’t the same exactly, but wasn’t it at least a little bit? Maybe Maira was onto something.
“And why are these girls so mad at you?”
“I told you. I was working for Scotty’s SkinSentials—which is actually really high quality, by the way—and I signed up a whole bunch of Talkers, but it’s not always easy to sell, based on your location or your social media followers or whatever. So people got mad. It’s not my fault.”
Annie nodded the way she nodded when Claudia was telling her a story about something she didn’t want to admit, like getting a bad grade or a friend who’d ditched her.
It wasn’t an answer, but it also wasn’t a denial.
Maira was right—they were all in the middle of their own storylines.
The ship was full of them. Annie thought of the sign on the deck, the woman looking for a kidney.
Maybe she spent the parties walking around staring at women and wondering, Is it you? Is it you?
“Come on,” Annie said. She crossed her arms on the table. “Tell me one thing.”
Maira waved her hands in front of her face. “You tell one person to drop dead, and all of a sudden, you’re dangerous. Enough, enough, judge and jury.”
Annie sucked in a breath. “Ouch. So why do you come if you know there are going to be people like that here, people who are really mad at you? Doesn’t it make it uncomfortable?” Annie had had a hard enough time climbing aboard—she couldn’t imagine coming when she knew there would be trouble.
Maira was wearing beaded bracelets that had the guys’ names on them.
Annie could picture Maira making them one bead at a time.
She understood. This—whatever this was—was not easily replaceable.
You couldn’t make old friends, and you couldn’t make old love.
Joy was important, even if you also told people to drop dead.
“I like to meet new people. I like to have fun. I can take it,” Maira said.
“If no one messes with me. They just better not mess with me. Because I do not deal well with that. My husband always tells me, ‘You’ve got anger issues.’ ” Maira shrugged.
“This is my happy place, and I don’t need people messing with it. ”
“I don’t love the sound of anger issues, but I get it. I think I get it, at least. I’m starting to,” Annie said.
The server came by and set down a giant tray of plates, enough to cover their entire table.
“Oh, I know you are,” Maira said. She looked at the bounty on their table. “Goody, it’s my cheat day.”