Blue Autumn Cruise (14 page)

“Same here,” said Guy.

Eventually, everyone had left except Guy and me. I felt aware of him sitting next to me, with his elbow on the table close to mine. I had memorized his Grand Cayman T-shirt with the turtle on it, and the pair of wrinkled khakis and the rainbow flip-flops he wore.

Then a silence fell between us. I remembered the kiss, how soft his lips had felt, and I felt goosebumps on the back of my neck.

The thought came into my head that I probably would never see him again.

He started twirling an empty glass on his tray, and I wondered if he was thinking the same thing.

I could feel my heart beating in my throat.

He tossed his hair off his forehead. “So … heading home,” he said. “Are you on Facebook?”

“No,” I said. “It was okay with Mama, but Daddy thinks I’m too young. I can’t do it until I’m sixteen.”

“Oh. Well, we could call or text.”

“Okay.” I had just gotten my cell phone out after not using it for the whole trip. We exchanged cell-phone numbers.

“I’m glad we had a chance to hang out.”

“Me too.” I twirled my phone on the table nervously. “Well, next time you sing karaoke, think of me,” I said, smiling.

“I will!” He smiled. “And when you think of
Pirates of the Caribbean
, think of me!”

I hesitated. “That was my first kiss.”

He looked at me. “Really?”

“Yeah. So I’ll always remember you.”

“Wow,” he said.

“It’ll be a good memory. You’re really a kind person. And I’ll remember your advice about Diana too.”

“I’ll remember you too, Stephanie.”

We stood up, and as we walked across the dining hall together, my mind was racing.
This is the last time I’m ever going to see him
, I thought.

We stood in front of the elevators as people hurried by carrying packages of photos and other last-minute shipboard purchases before disembarking.

I was shaking a little bit as I looked into Guy’s eyes, and I could tell he was trying to think of a way to maybe kiss me again. Part of me wanted him to, but another part of me didn’t want to do it in a public place like this with all these people rushing by.

Then he seemed to make a decision. He kissed the tip of his finger and touched it to my forehead.

“See you later,” he said.

“You too.”

And so neither of us said good-bye.

A
half hour later, Stephanie, Lauren, and I had packed up our suitcases and put them out in the hallway for the stewards to take, as we were instructed.

“Hey, let’s go up on deck and look around one last time before we leave,” Lauren said.

We went up the elevator to the top floor. Lauren didn’t have the video camera with her this time, and I thought about how mad I had gotten at her for wanting to videotape all the time. I wasn’t mad anymore.
Lauren and I would never be close like her and Stephanie, but we had figured out how to respect each other and work together to keep the peace. Stephanie had helped to show us that.

We walked out onto the upper deck and saw Port Everglades spread out before us. We’d sailed all night and had docked early this morning. The waves rolled in at the foot of the high-rises, and the sun sparkled in their rows upon rows of windows.

“It’s so strange to go to bed with water all around you and then wake up in the morning and be docked,” I said.

“I know,” said Stephanie. “That is so weird.”

“This has been an amazing trip,” Lauren said.

“It sure has,” Stephanie said. “I can’t believe I touched an iguana!” She was quieter than her usual self, though. I wondered what she might be thinking about.

“I can’t believe you did either!” I told her. “You were like a hero!”

I could see Lauren glance at me, and I wondered if she thought that I might say she’d been a hero too, since she had taken the videotapes. And I had to admit, taking those videotapes had ended up being a good thing for her to do. I took a deep breath.

The warm Florida breeze whipped our hair around
our faces. One of the other cruise ships blew its horn, long and loud and deep.

Finally I said to Lauren, “You were like a hero too, Lauren, with the videotape. Without it we might never have been able to convince Officer Decker that Ryan and Manuel were the ones who smuggled Iggy. Also, we never would have been able to help Manuel get the money for his son. I’m sorry I kept saying that the videotaping was getting on my nerves. It ended up really making a difference.”

I wondered what Dr. Shrink would say about what I just said. It hadn’t been easy to say it. I cut my eyes at Lauren and kind of held my breath.

“Well, thanks,” Lauren said. “I know I’m obsessed, and I need to work on that, but it’s really great that it helped.” She hesitated, then went on. “And you were a kind of hero too, Diana. What would have happened to Iggy if you hadn’t found him and taken care of him? He might not have lived. One of the rarest creatures in the world might have died if not for you.”

I felt self-conscious, listening to Lauren’s compliment, so I looked at my feet. But then, feeling my throat tighten, I met her eyes, and nodded. I thought maybe Stephanie might have said a lot more, but she just smiled at us and said, “I’m proud of y’all.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I miss him. I loved his golden
eyes and that funny wise-crack smile he had. He was my little dragon for two days. I’ll never forget him. I want to picture him bright blue and wandering free on Grand Cayman. Amazing to think that he could grow to be five feet long and live to be eighty years old!”

“Older than our Grammy!” Stephanie said.

And just at that moment, we saw our parents and Grammy and Luke coming up the stairs toward us. Grammy’s new birthday necklace sparkled on her neck.

I thought,
Yes
,
she’s my Grammy too. She made me feel like she was my very own grandmother
.

“There you are!” said Grammy. Her voice was like a song.

My new relatives surrounded us. The warmth of the sun embraced me, and a breath of wind caressed my cheek.

“Well,” said Uncle Ted, “at the end of the day, I think we can say that this has been a fantastic trip!”

“Yeah!” we all said together.

Special thanks to Frederic J. Burton, director of the Blue Iguana Recovery Programme, for patiently answering my questions about blue iguana hatchlings. His book
The Little Blue Book, A Short History of the Grand Cayman Blue Iguana
, is a fascinating account of the heroic efforts of a large group of volunteers to save this rare and ancient creature from extinction. He captured my imagination with personality profiles of many of the iguanas that have been rescued by BIRP. Since my book is fiction, I have taken certain liberties with iguana behavior, and any inaccuracies are strictly my responsibility.

Another thank you goes out to my dear writer friend Chris Woodworth for reading yet another manuscript of mine and making such creative and helpful suggestions. Thanks, too, to my critique partner Liz Hatley for her comments and support. Ann Campanella and her daughter Sydney always make such sensitive observations and their gentle suggestions inspire new scenes and angles. When Sydney wrote me that while reading my books she sometimes forgets to eat, it was a compliment of the highest order.

Thanks to my dear friend Betsy Thorpe and her resourceful daughter Georgia for answering my questions about life with type 1 diabetes, and for reading and commenting on the scenes dealing with it. I admire Georgia so much, who is cool and level-headed and lives a happy, healthy life with diabetes.

My walking partner, Deb Waldron, deserves great credit for listening to me endlessly ruminate out loud over plot twists.

This series of books would never exist without Caryn and Kim. Thanks to Jennifer Lonas for her thorough proofreading; I really felt like she had my back! Thanks also to the staff at Zondervan for designing such beautiful books for the series.

And last but not least, I’d like to thank Etta Kline, my mother-in-law, for making it possible for me to write about going on a cruise! Our family cruise for her 85th birthday was an unforgettable experience.

L
ISA
W
ILLIAMS
K
LINE
is the author of
Floods, The Princess of Atlantis, Write Before Your Eyes,
and
Eleanor Hill
, winner of the North Carolina Juvenile Literature Award. Her stories for children have appeared in
Cricket, Cicada, Spider, and Odyssey
. She earned her MFA from Queens University. Lisa lives in Mooresville, North Carolina, with her veterinarian husband, where their grown daughters visit frequently.

Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

Praise for Sisters in All Seasons:
“Funny, gentle and compassionate… A fresh take on an old story.”

—Kirkus Reviews

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Blue Autumn Cruise

Copyright © 2012 by Lisa Williams Kline

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