‘For now, yes. I have loved the past decade at sea.’ She laughed self-consciously. ‘God, has it really been a decade? But I’ve given the entirety of my twenties to this life and I need a fresh start.’ She smiled at Stuart, who nodded encouragingly.
Sofia let the news sink in. In front of her were two people, clearly in love and so confidently choosing each other. She was happy for Petra, but there was a part of her, the cynic, who worried. How could they be so sure? How could they be so willing to give up on the life they had built for themselves in pursuit of something that, as far as Sofia knew, they had only managed to verbalise to each other last night?
Then it struck her – it was basically what she was doing. Except she hadn’t even had the courage to verbalise it. She wasn’t even left with a chance of happily ever after. She was still trying to protect her heart, even as she tore it in two.
‘And who else?’ Patricio was growing impatient.
Sofia braced herself for what she knew the captain would announce next.
‘Well, after Stuart and Petra, I was visited by our very own Captain Carter.’ It took Sofia a moment to register what was being said, so sure had she been that she was about to hear her own name.
‘Jack?’ She didn’t realise she’d said it out loud until the captain looked her straight in the eye. ‘Yes, Sofia.’
Her thoughts were racing. She ran through the gamut of explanations of why Jack would resign. Maybe something had happened to his brother Danny and he had to go back to New York; or maybe he was taking a better job on another boat; maybe he had finally had enough of their incessant hot-and-cold and just needed to get away from her.
Unlike Stuart and Petra, Jack was not a man who felt the need to explain himself. He simply nodded curtly at the captain. ‘It’s been a pleasure and an honour working with you, Captain Mary.’ Sofia willed him to meet her eyes, but his expression was steadfast and fixed on the horizon.
‘And finally, after only a brief stint on board, Sofia too has decided to leave.’ The full force of all the eyes in the room bore down on her. She had known her time would come around but she had hoped that when it did she would suddenly know what to say.
She stared at her hands as she spoke. ‘Yes, um, I...’ She could not tell the entire crew the things she could not even say to the one person who might need to hear it. She glanced up and locked on to the only pair of eyes that mattered, those green pools so perplexed.
She took a deep breath, and looked at the captain as she spoke. ‘I no longer think that I can confidently fulfil my duties on board, in line with your... regulations.’ It sounded pathetic really, to boil down the enormity of her feelings into such a paltry sentence.
Even the captain was unimpressed. ‘Hmmm,’ she said, turning back to address everyone. ‘In light of this, I have been thinking about the best way forward, and I would ask that the four people who have resigned might stay back and allow me to propose a plan.’
Nobody moved for a second, and then the penny dropped, and Patricio nudged Declan to stand. Reluctantly Declan followed Patricio out of the room, throwing one last longing look over his shoulder as he closed the door. Knowing those two, Sofia felt sure that they would not be too far away on the other side.
The captain pulled out a chair and dragged it closer to face the remaining four. ‘Now, what I have witnessed today has been quite something. In all of my thirty years, I have never had one, let alone two...couples—’ the word seemed to stick in her throat, and she cleared it emphatically ‘—two couples resign in order to pursue a relationship, and in a single day!’ Captain Mary shook her head in bemused disbelief.
It dawned on Sofia that the captain thought that she and Jack were doing the same thing as Petra and Stuart, but that they had just chosen to be more deceitful about it. Maybe the captain had concluded that she and Jack had conspired to hide the real reason they were both leaving together. That they had carried on their relationship illicitly even after they had been found out.
‘Stuart and Petra, I am going to put an offer on the table. If I were to strike off the ban on onboard relations from the rule book, could you be convinced to reconsider?’ The captain was leaning forward, her hands steepled in front of her face.
Still clutching hands, Petra and Stuart exchanged a meaningful look, each nodding faintly as they reached the end of their telepathic huddle.
‘That is a very generous offer, Captain, but this isn’t just about the rule. I made a pact with myself that I could not grow old on this boat.’ Petra stopped, worried that her words were pointed. ‘I mean no disrespect by that, but ever since I was little, I have always dreamed of the white picket fence, of being a mother... as clichéd as that sounds.’
‘Not at all, Petra, it is a gift to be blessed with the clarity of what one wants in life, and it is each of our responsibility to be brave enough to pursue that.’
Petra’s eyes glistened, and now she reached for the captain’s hand. Maybe she did do sentimentality after all, thought Sofia.
As Petra clasped her hand, the two women seemed to be having an unspoken conversation of their own. The captain had chosen her path, even if it meant giving up on a family life. She seemed not to begrudge Petra for making the inverse choice.
The captain turned to Stuart. ‘And you, Stuart?’
Evidently uncomfortable talking about his feelings, Stuart picked at his thumbnail. ‘I guess sort of the same. I didn’t really have a stable base growing up and I think that if...’ He glanced at Petra who smiled encouragingly. ‘If I ever had a family, I’d like to be, you know, around.’
The captain nodded. ‘Very well, thank you both, for your honesty.’ Nowthatfelt pointed. Sofia was bursting to defend herself, but how?
‘Would you mind leaving me with Jack and Sofia alone?’ Unlike Declan, Petra and Stuart were all too keen to be out of the room as quickly as possible, Stuart ploughing into the door frame in his haste.
Jack and Sofia were left on either end of the large curved sofa. They could not have been sitting further apart. The captain looked from one to the other and motioned for them to shuffle into the middle. It was a deeply undignified manoeuvre and by the end of it, Sofia felt they were sitting far too close.
She started with Jack. ‘Now, I would be tempted to offer you both the same deal, but to be honest, Jack, I am disappointed that you didn’t feel able to tell me the truth.’
Jack hung his head. ‘I’m sorry. Mary.’ His voice was meek, like a child’s.
‘You told me that you wanted to resign because you felt like you had reached the end of your career development here, and that hurt me.’ Sofia had never seen the captain look so emotional. She almost felt like she should look away, like this moment between them deserved privacy.
