No thanks.
She circled her arms around my neck and nestled her head against my chest. Her feet shifted back and forth, her hips and shoulders swaying to the music. The steady rhythm of her heart thrummed through me.
Like I had any choice but to shut down my nerves, kick my self-consciousness to the curb, and follow her lead. Closing my eyes, I held her close.
Her sister calls her careless, but that’s all wrong. She’s carefree, full of spirit and life.
When the song faded into its final note, the trance I’d fallen into broke. I opened my eyes to find that we’d attracted a crowd of fellow boardwalk dancers, a whole host of couples in Hawaiian shirts and halter tops and flip-flops holding one another beneath the midday sun.
Piper grinned up at me, and my heart, which had only just started sputtering back to life that night she fell into the pool, swelled with joy.
I found her again, at exactly the right time.
***
A few days later, Piper promises to leave a ticket for me at the Marine Conservation Park’s will-call window, telling me to come around lunchtime so she’ll be free to show me around. She meets me near the entrance in cutoffs, her blue work T-shirt, and a pair of gray Adidas. Her stained Vans must’ve been retired or trashed. Her hair’s in a knot that sits atop her head, her legs are sun-browned, and her face is flushed. She’s cute as hell, and I smile as I lean in to kiss her cheek.
“Do I stink like fish?” she asks, scrunching her nose.
“Nope.” She does a little, but I don’t give a shit because seeing her in her element cancels out her mermaid perfume.
“I’ve got thirty minutes. You want to see the dolphins?”
We swing by a snack hut to pick up sandwiches and sodas,then head to the arena where a trio of dolphins live. They’re swimming lazy circles in the pool, which is smaller than I expected. We sit, and Piper tells me she eats lunch here most days, then explains about the series of pools behind the arena, which give Luke, Leia, and Han a lot more room.
“They’re rescues,” she says, picking a slice of tomato from her sandwich. “So while it probably seems like they’d be happier in the open ocean, they wouldn’t make it.”
“How’d they end up here?”
“Han was rescued when he was a baby. His mother stranded on a mudflat because she was sick. He followed her, and they both ended up with serious sunburns. She didn’t recover, but he did. Because he was so young, though, he hadn’t learned the skills he needed to survive in the wild. Leia’s story is pretty much the same, and when she came to the park, she and Han bonded. Now they’re a happy couple.”
“What about Luke?”
“He’s an old man compared to Han and Leia. He’s partially deaf and mostly blind, so he can’t hunt. But he’s the smartest of the trio. At least I think so.”
She’s watching the dolphins, pensive and peaceful. It’s obvious why. What I’ve seen of the Marine Conservation Park so far is awesome. Palms sway in the breeze, the air smells like sea salt and eucalyptus, and out beyond the dolphins’ pool, the gulf sparkles.
I nudge her. “You really love it here, huh?”
She turns a grin on me. “Don’t you?”
“Yeah. I think I do.”
“My mom and dad helped open it.”
I blink, this new layer of context dovetailing with all the things I already know about her. She’s got a lifelong history with this place, with marine life. A passion for it has permeated her bones, infiltrated her DNA. Makes perfect sense that she’d want to follow in her parents’ footsteps. “I didn’t know that,” I say, watching Luke chase Leia through the clear water of their pool. “Explains a lot.”
“Right? My parents used to say that after Tati and me, the Marine Conservation Park was their greatest achievement. Turtle, my boss, mentored them, then partnered with them to get the park off the ground; I’ve known him forever. The animals too. I grew up here, like Han and Leia. A lot of times, I feel more understood inside these gates than I do anywhere else in Sugar Bay.”
“Your home away from home,” I say, my chest tightening with empathy. I’ve felt isolated before too, but it must be so hard for Piper, shuffling through the world feeling overlooked. Underappreciated. I’m glad she has the Marine Conservation Park, these animals she adores, and this cool connection to her parents, but it’s bullshit that her sister and her supposed best friend have contributed to her loneliness.
She turns her face up to the sun. “I’m glad you get to experience it,” she tells me.
“Yeah,” I say, threading my fingers through hers. “So am I.”
Piper
I come home from work in the best mood.
