Page 94 of A Perfect Disaster

I fire off four questions in a row about deadlines, admission dates, exact amounts, and whether there’s an option to pay in installments, but it’s all just excuses. I listen to her answers, my gaze lost in the sea, blurred by the tears threatening to spill, and the roar of the waves echoing in my head.

When I hang up, I stand frozen in front of the water, staring at the black screen of my phone while the wind whips my hair against my face. Damn reality has grabbed me by the throat and is forcing me to face a truth I can no longer cover up with forced smiles: I’m between a rock and a hard place.

“Maika…” I hear Helen’s voice behind me.

I turn around, wiping my face with the back of my hand. She’s a couple of steps away, arms crossed and looking worried.

“What happened?” she asks me.

I’m dying to lie to her. To tell her it was nothing, to smile as if nothing were wrong, to go back to the group and have a beer. But I don’t have the strength to keep this up anymore.

“If I don’t make the deposit for the new treatment this week, they’re taking my grandmother to a nursing home in some godforsaken town in the mountains,” I blurt out, my voice trembling.

Helen freezes, as if I’d shot her. A flash of pure pain crosses her eyes, and I swear that for a moment it seems to hurt her more than it hurts me.

“Maika…” she begins.

“Don’t tell me you’re sorry, Helen, I’m begging you,” I cut her off. “I couldn’t bear it.”

She bites her lip, nods silently, and simply stays by my side. It’s exactly what I need.

“How ridiculous I am… And here I was thinking I could play the noble one on this ship by sabotaging my own work,” I say with a bitter laugh. “It sounded so good in my head, didn’t it? Maika the generous one, the hopeless romantic, sacrificing her future for the woman of her life as if this were some afternoon movie. What a slap in the face from reality.”

Helen grabs my cheeks with both hands, forcing me to look her straight in the eye.

“You don’t have to keep carrying this burden alone, Maika. I won’t let you,” she tells me with conviction.

“I know… but that’s just how it is, Helen.”

She looks down at the sand, and a thick silence swallows up all the words we have left to say. In the distance, the group is still partying, and Nico has turned up the music. The world keeps dancing while my entire universe is reeling because of a damn monthly bill.

“I need to get back to the ship.”

Helen makes a move to grab my hands again, but stops herself just in time.

“I’ll walk you to the port.”

“No, really. Stay with the guys, have a drink, and enjoy yourself. I need to get into bed and think.”

I make my way back to the Marine IV as if I were a zombie. The lights of the port of Palma reflect off the water at the pier, and as I cross the crew gangway, I feel a horrible crunch inside my chest. I’m cornered: there’s no way I can come up with that money without taking away the promotion Helen has been working her ass off for her whole life. Why didn’t I save more over the last few years?

“Damn it…” I groan.

I just want to get to my bed, take off this uniform, and pull the sheet up to my neck. I’m walking down one of the interior corridors on the crew deck when Arturo’s figure materializes in the middle of the hallway.

“Good evening,” he greets me, a company folder under his arm. “I thought you’d be on break with the rest of the team.”

I stop dead in my tracks, stifling a sigh of frustration. Just what I needed to top off the day.

“Hi, Arturo,” I say, forcing a smile. “I’m just exhausted, to be honest. So I decided to call it a night early.”

Arturo stares at me intently.

“I find it fascinating that you have the best résumé I’ve seen at this shipping company in the last five years, yet you’re so determined to throw your reputation overboard,” he blurts out.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Arturo tilts his head, looking at me with crushing irony.