Chapter 23
Twenty-Three
No one was in the pool at Pelican Pointe when Kenny got back to the villa, and she realized she hadn’t taken a dip for the sake of relaxation since her arrival.
For a split second, she debated grabbing her goggles and getting in a quick swim workout but instead decided to soak up the peace and stillness of the surroundings.
It was a different kind of happy hour than the one she would be having if she was in New York at this time on a Friday night.
The direct sunlight that the pool received all day made the water feel like a warmly drawn bath, but Kenny still felt a rush of refreshment when she immersed herself under the surface.
When she came up for air, she kicked her legs up, spread her arms out into a T shape, arched her back slightly, and laid her head back on the top of the water like it was resting on a pillow.
Kenny loved to float. She found it freeing.
As a kid, she would float for hours basking in the feeling of weightlessness and staring at the sky, mesmerized by the movement and formation of the clouds.
She would be fascinated when the puffs of white took the shape of animals or letters or some other geometric object.
Thirty years later, she still relished the feeling of weightlessness, especially when she often felt weighted down from the stress she carried around on her petite shoulders.
But instead of looking up and imagining stories about the shapes of the clouds, she would close her eyes and get lost in her own thoughts, which could sometimes be dangerous.
The thoughts were usually self-reflective and reminiscent of the recurring dreams about where she was in her life, where she wanted to be in her life, and how she was going to get there.
Today she didn’t want to wander to that place.
She was happy with where she was for the moment and was trying to live by the Vienna lyrics that brought her to this paradise.
She was giving herself permission to slow down and not race through life.
At least for the next few weeks. Kenney opened her eyes just in time to see a cloud that was shaped like a butterfly blow by.
She floated a little longer and started to make her way to the pool steps when tiny droplets of water started sprinkling from the sky.
The drizzles collided with the pool’s calm surface creating a perfectly choreographed water show.
The circular ripples started slow, delicate and sporadic, and increased in speed, intensity, and amount as the rain crashed down harder.
Kenny felt like she was watching the musical fountains at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas, minus the music.
By the time she gathered her belongings and reached the back steps of Villa #5, sections of the coastal concrete walkway were flooded, and the palm trees whipped furiously back and forth against a darkened gray sky.
She got to the interior side of the sliding deck door just in time to hear an angry crack of thunder and see the outdoors illuminate from a bolt of lightning.
Wrapped in her wet towel and hair still dripping from her swift evacuation from the pool deck, Kenny stood in the glass door staring outside in amazement.
The intense, brief pop-up thunderstorms that blew out as quickly as they blew in captivated her.
Her appreciation for meteorology started and ended in her clothes closet every morning as she decided how she should appropriately dress based on the weather person’s predicted forecast. But these regular rain occurrences made her feel small, materialistic, and, frankly, embarrassed to realize how often she took for granted the beauty and perplexity of what was going on around her.
By the time Kenny showered and lathered aloe over her unevenly tanned and burned skin, the storm clouds had given way to a clear sky.
She stepped onto the back porch and hung her beach mat over the railing.
The air still smelled of rain and wet pine, and the mulch was a darker shade of brown than usual; but most surfaces had dried up and the standing water on the sidewalks had begun to absorb and recede.
She noticed that the small community of vacationers was ready for Friday night.
A large family with several boxes of pizza and cases of soda staked out a corner of the pool deck.
Two men sipped bottles of beer as they flipped burgers and turned steaks at the grills under the pavilion.
Three women who looked like they were dressed for dinner walked around the landscaping ponds holding plastic wine glasses.
The pickleball courts were fully occupied and a young couple that appeared to have gotten stuck in the rainstorm rounded the corner with two of the bright orange beach cruisers.
Text from Hailey: Hooked up? (Emoji: laptop) Plz let me kno.
Kenny had been so wrapped up in being present during the day she forgot that the service company was scheduled to install the internet and cable in Villa #5.
She walked back into the kitchen and found a laminated piece of paper and two television remotes, labeled Remote A and Remote B, on the counter that indicated the unit was connected.
Thank you for using Island Cable Services.
Wi-Fi Network: Pelican Pointe
Wi-Fi Password: Villa-5
Use Remote A to power television “On/Off.”
Use Remote B to change channels.
To report outages, contact Low Country Hospitality.
Kenny imagined herself the axis in a universe of information overload and incessant communication that constantly spun around her, and she was surprised by how quickly she adapted to being unplugged for a few weeks.
In the beginning of her hiatus, she was nervous she would be filled with guilt and anxiety.
How she imagined a soldier who had gone AWOL felt after leaving camp.
She feared she would need to go through a methodical and closely monitored digital detox.
But the freedom from it all over the last six days was liberating.
If Hailey hadn’t asked for confirmation that all the systems were working, Kenny would have gone at least another week before reconnecting to the outside world.
She reluctantly picked up Remote A and powered on the large television that hung on the wall.
The local NBC channel popped up and Jeopardy!
was on the screen. Kenny loved Jeopardy!
and one of her favorite assignments was crisscrossing Canada to produce a documentary about Alex Trebek’s death.
To people outside the news industry, filming obituaries before an ageing and ailing celebrity or notable figure actually passed away was perceived as morbid and offensive.
To those inside the circle, the jumpstart in production was viewed as a necessary evil so networks could immediately air an entertaining and informative documentary that a nation mourning the rich or famous deceased would be longing for.
She picked up Remote B with her left hand and flipped through the channels to ensure both remotes were working.
She clicked on the local ABC station that was previewing the upcoming episode of 20/20.
It was the story of an oil broker from Texas who “accidentally” killed his philandering son-in-law while the pair were on a big game hunting trip in Wyoming.
She was somewhat familiar with the story, but WBS passed on covering the drama noting there weren’t enough twists and turns to the hold viewer’s attention for the duration of a show.
Kenny had no plans to tune in and determine if the executives’ assessment was correct.
She powered down the television. Having confirmed that both remotes and the cable were working, she placed the clickers back on the counter next to the laminated instruction leaflet.
Kenny lifted the lid of the ottoman where she stored her laptop bag and pulled out the computer.
She fired it up, connected it to the Pelican Pointe network and typed out V-i-l-l-a-5 in the password box.
She was about to instinctively double click on Outlook when something in her gut stopped her.
The mouse cursor hovered over the icon for several seconds while she contemplated what she was about to do.
Opening Outlook for the first time after several days would be akin to opening Pandora’s box.
Thousands of emails would need to be read, processed, and responded to, and she wasn’t prepared to do that.
While part of her yearned to know every detail—real and rumored—surrounding what prevented NBC from airing the Clinton White interview, Kenny knew that reading just one article would be like eating a piece of forbidden fruit that could change the course of the rest of her trip.
She was further confident that one brief reply to any email would escalate to an exchange of dialogue that would morph into text messages, phone calls, and ultimately result in her disabling the sacred “Out of Office” feature.
There was no turning back from either scenario if she gnawed on the carrot that dangled in front of her.
Kenny took her hand off the mouse, closed her eyes, and breathed like Marah taught her.
Breathe in, two, three, four. Hold two, three, four.
Out two, three, four. Breathe in, two, three, four.
Hold two, three, four. Out two, three, four.
She opened her eyes, put her hand back on the mouse, double clicked on Chrome, and typed into the toolbar rather than opening her email.
She searched “Hilton Head Island” and the five vertical boxes boasting graphics of bright yellow suns and double-digit numbers that started with sevens and eights quickly populated her screen.
The balmy forecast reinforced there would be no time for phone calls, text messages, or email exchanges over the next few days.
Text to Hailey: Cable works or if Kenny would have had no patience for and envied the assumed carefree blonde from afar, while she was busy being overly serious and focused on the future and post-college plans.
Text to Hailey: Yes! Kayaking on the ocean in the a.m.
Text from Hailey: Love it! (Emoji: dolphin)
As hard as Kenny tried to not think about the morning kayak excursion, it consumed almost every other thought in her head.
And as much as she didn’t want to tell Colby about it, because she was still slightly annoyed with him and wasn’t prepared to be totally truthful about the solo vacation, for fear he would find a cheap flight and crash for a few days—he was spontaneous in every way that Kenny wasn’t—she knew she should let someone aside from Hailey know she was going to be paddling on the Atlantic in a plastic boat.
Since it was pushing 8:00 p.m. on a Friday, Kenny predicted Colby would be a few cocktails deep, and she’d be able to keep the conversation short.
She scrolled through her recent calls log and tapped on Colby’s name.
“We were just talking about you, darling.” Colby enthusiastically picked up on the first ring.
“I’m here with Ed! Say ‘hi,’ Ed!” Colby’s voice was muffled as he pulled the phone away from his mouth so his friend could send a forced salutation.
“A new biergarten opened around the corner from the office and Eddy-boy dragged me here!”
Kenny rolled her eyes and heard the commotion of clinking glasses and accordion music in the background.
Colby could drink vodka sodas “until the cows came home,” a phrase he’d overuse when he had too many of the mixed drinks and started reverting to his midwestern roots, but he could not handle a night of Oktoberfest beers.
“Hey, Colby! Hi, Ed! Sounds like you guys are having a time for yourselves. I was just calling to say ‘Hi!’ and see what I was missing up there on a Friday night.” She tried to make it sound like either of those two statements were true. “I won’t keep you!”
“I’ll call you tomorrow morning, love! It’s loud in here,” Colby screeched into the phone.
“I’m going kayaking in the morning, so I’ll call you when I get back from the beach. Don’t do anything dumb tonight!” Kenny said, relieved the conversation was kept short and she was able to relay her plans in case something went wrong. Even if Colby didn’t remember, Ed would.
“Kayaking! In the ocean? You’re terrified of the ocean! I’m impressed you’re facing that fear. And Ed wants to know when the two of you are going on your second date. But he’s standing right here so I better hang up before I say anything else that’ll piss him off. Love you, mean it, bi-yeee!”
Kenny dropped the phone on the couch next to her, smiled, and slunk into the cushions.
She was happy she had forgiven Colby, and that their relationship was on the mend.
She couldn’t remember a time that Colby didn’t answer when she called him.
No matter how monumental or trivial the topic, or how long or short the conversation was, she usually felt better after talking to him.
No one knew Kenny like Colby and that was both comforting and annoying.
Few people knew Kenny was terrified of the ocean, but Colby did, and he was proud of her for facing the fear.
He’d be doubly proud if he knew a handsome man was at the root of her facing it, but that fact was irrelevant.
For Kenny, this pending exercise fell under the “try something new” category on the Condition List. She also knew Colby was correct about her personal life even if she was resistant to admitting it.
For a fleeting moment she thought maybe she should give Ed a second chance when she got back to New York.