17. Cole
SEVENTEEN
Cole
The verdant foothills overlooking Dutch Harbor emerge through the morning mist. I’ve been to the Bering Sea hundreds of times, but never without Seb. Not even once. The only time he skipped a trip was when Lexie died, and I stayed home with him.
My phone rings, and my heart somersaults. Finn is the only person who calls me now that everyone I talk to is at sea with me. I ease up on the throttle, slowing our speed so I won’t have to rush Finn off the phone to enter the harbor.
Finn and I have talked on video every day for the last week.
Thank god for satellite internet. Sometimes we color, or I read to him, or we just sit in silence while I drive and he plays with his toys.
He’s trying to teach me how to play this block builder game with zombies, but I keep getting lost in the mines.
And he drives the damn boats on Bering Ship Simulator better than me.
“Hi, Uncle Cole!” Finn’s face fills the screen, light brown curls askew, marionberry jam smudged on his cheek.
I know it’s marionberry jam because I ordered it from the grocery store, along with some of his other favorite foods.
“Hey, Finn! I missed you.”
Finn rolls his eyes. “You saw me yesterday.” He takes a bite from his jam-filled croissant.
“If only you weren’t too busy with tee-ball practice and homework to talk to me.”
Finn laughs. “I don’t have homework.”
“Why aren’t you calling me three times a day, then?” He has a good grasp on my sarcasm, but I wink just in case. “Your game is tomorrow, right? How do you feel?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know.”
Shay told me he’s been pretty bummed about Morgan not being able to come.
“Hey, Finn.” I lower my voice, and inch closer, curling my hand around my lips. “Do you think Auntie Shay could film your game so me and Morgan can watch it?”
Finn practically levitates out of his chair. “Auntie, can you?”
“Sure, baby.” She appears behind him, and hands him a napkin, nails sparkling with the same glittery peach nail polish Finn’s wearing. “Five more minutes, then we have to go, okay?”
He nods, then returns his focus to me. “I’m so excited. You didn’t get to see last time!”
“No. I was there.”
His forehead wrinkles like Seb’s used to. “Huh?”
“I couldn’t stay long, so I watched from my truck.” Read: I was too afraid that Morgan or Finn would catch me. “You were the MVP! I didn’t see anyone else steal third base.”
I’m not just saying that because he’s my nephew. Both teams were terrible, but he was definitely less terrible than everyone else.
He beams. “I can’t believe you saw that!”
“Yep. There was no way I was going to miss it.”
He smiles and nods, then takes another bite of his croissant. We’re both silent as he polishes it off.
“Hey, Finn?”
“Yeah?”
“As long as you have fun and are a good friend, you’ll always win. Doesn’t matter what the score is.”
“Thanks, Uncle.”
I take a deep breath. “That’s what your dad used to tell me.”
His brows dart up. “He did?”
“Yeah. I used to get so nervous. I wanted to be as good as him.” I thought if I was, my dad would love me too. Damn, I feel bad for the kid version of me. “But your dad always made me feel brave.”
“Me too,” Finn says.
My heart cracks and repairs and cracks again as I grieve the last year that I didn’t share with Finn, as I grieve the insurmountable loss of my brother. Morgan was right. I hid from my feelings and my family. I never grieved.
Thank god for the resiliency of kids because just when I worry we’re both going to burst into tears, Finn says, “What’s your favorite animal?”
“Hm.” I feign a pensive pout, then snap my fingers. “Orcas.”
“Really? Even after they stole your fish?”
“What? Oh. That was one rogue orca. The rest of them are pretty cool.”
“Phew. They were my favorite too until they made you late.”
I’m going to hell. I lied to Finn and slandered my favorite animal. “I’m glad we cleared that up then. The good orcas usually come hang out with us after it gets a little colder, but if I see any, I’ll tell them you say hi.”
“Wow! That’s so cool.”
“Right? Have a great day, Finny. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
My smile fades as soon as I hang up, but I’m proud of myself for finally talking about Seb, even if it was only for a few minutes, and the only person I talked to was a five-year-old. If Finn can talk about Seb, I sure as hell better do it too.
I push the throttle forward and pick up the radio mic. “Harbormaster, this is the Briar Anteros. Permission to enter?”
“Harbormaster here. Permission granted.” His mic clicks off, then back on. “Welcome back, Briar Anteros. Sorry for your loss.”
My chest pinches with a mix of shock and grief, like someone jumped out from behind a corner to remind me that my brother died, instead of shouting boo.
In Seattle, our tragedy blended in with all the other boats in Fishermen’s Terminal, but the crab fishing fleet is vanishingly small, and in Dutch Harbor, we might as well be sharing a pond.
The entire fleet helped search for Seb. Losing him was probably hard on them too.
That should be a comfort, but it’s not. I didn’t prepare myself for an onslaught of condolences.
“Thanks.” I hang up the mic with more force than necessary.
“What did that radio ever do to you?” Morgan says.
I jump. “How long have you been listening?”
“Why? What clandestine conversations are you having with the harbormaster?”
“Haha,” I deadpan.
He saunters across the wheelhouse, and wedges himself in the small space on my right between the chair and the window. His decadent scent trails toward me as he crosses his arms, framing his pecs and emphasizing his biceps.
My cheeks heat. I haven’t been alone with him since that night he spit in my mouth. For the record, I wasn’t trying to tease him. I wanted to take care of his needs, show him my gratitude with no strings attached, connect with him any way I can.
“So what did the harbormaster say to make you so flustered?”
“I’m not flustered because of him.”
He arches a brow. “Oh?”
I walked right into that one, and I’m walking right back out of it.
“He told me he was sorry for our loss. I can’t be around that.” That, as in people in mourning, people pitying me. I glance at the photo of Seb on the beam, and steer my gaze back to the ocean. “I can’t talk about what happened, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to act around you in front of them.”
He sighs. “You’ll probably have to talk to some of them, unfortunately, but you won’t have to do it alone.” He bites his bottom lip and muses. “No one up here knows we’re separated.” He grimaces. “Unless Lawrence ran his mouth.”
“He wouldn’t.”
“Alright, while we’re in Dutch, we’ll keep to the Briar, but when we can’t avoid talking to outsiders, I’ll be right by your side as your husband.”
I hold my breath, fighting off butterflies. Is he saying what I think he is?
“Then we can go back to our estrangement once we leave Dutch. Sound good?”
My butterflies die all at once.
I trace the wedding band tattooed on my finger, irrationally afraid it will disappear. “Okay. Thanks.”
“No problem.”
He pushes off the window and stands behind me. Warm hands land on my shoulders and I bask under his touch.
“I know you didn’t come for me, but I’m grateful that you did,” I say. “I couldn’t do this without you.”
“You could.” He releases my shoulders and returns to his post at my side. “That reminds me, actually. We should talk about hiring another deckhand.”
My hand tenses on the throttle. “We have enough people.”
“I know, but if someone gets hurt—”
“If someone gets hurt, we’ll work a man short.” We need to mourn Seb as a boat before we talk about adding another person.
“It’s not about replacing Seb. You can’t plan on always having me here.”
Ouch.
“Shay has her own life to get back to,” he says. “It comes down to us. Even if we don’t work things out, we need to prepare for the future.”
Well, at least he finally brought up Shay leaving, even if he was vague as hell about the timing. I’d ask him about it, but if he lies, I’ll have to accept that he isn’t just lying by omission; he doesn’t trust me at all.
“Fine. Let’s get king crab out of the way first.” I chew on my thumbnail and scan the bay. “We’ve kept Briar a family boat for so long, we’ll have to pick someone we can trust.”
“What about Kent?”
“Kent has his own boat.”
“He wants a break. It’s a temporary fix, but we know him.”
“I know him.”
“You stopped returning his calls, so now I know him too. He’s been worried about you.”
“Tell him not to take it personally.”
“Kent’s having a really hard time. He needs to get away from his family.”
Luke makes my dad seem like a model parent. There’s an urban legend that he murdered a deckhand who slept with his wife by stuffing him into a crab pot and shoving it overboard.
“If Kent needs a place to stay, he can have it, but the crew needs to vote on it.”
“You got it. Thanks, Cole.” He releases my shoulders. “I better go help the guys get our girl tied off.”
Usually when Morgan uses my name, it feels intimate and possessive, but that felt like a conversation between coworkers. I don’t like it.
Sure enough, a steady stream of mourners greeted us upon arrival. Derrick from the Lady Wisteria invited himself aboard to reminisce, and have a drink at ten AM. Wes volunteered to talk to him, which was a huge relief because I could hear his tearful walk down memory lane from inside my en suite.
Derrick and my dad became best friends back in the boomtown days of crab fishing. He looks like he leads a motorcycle gang, but he’s a big softie who loves nearly everyone he meets and has a little too much practice vomiting out his wheelhouse window.
Morgan called me down to the engine room after Derrick left. I’m pretty sure he made up an issue with the water pump to spare me from the next handful of visitors coming to pay their respects.
He taps his wrench against my good hip. “I think they’re gone.” He cracks the door open, and ducks his head out, then turns to me and nods. “You should try to get some sleep.”