The Secret of Othello

by Sam Cameron

  “No imposition,” Steven said.

  As soon as they were gone, Denny messaged Brian. Brian arrived twenty minutes later, his clothes and face creased as if he’d been sleeping.

  “You okay?” Denny asked.

  Brian stepped up on the Idle. “Long night.”

  Denny grimaced. “Was it my aunt? I know she was rude. I’m so sorry—”

  “No, it’s not your aunt,” Brian said. “It’s just my mom. And the lawyers, and the accountants, and the financial people at MIT.”

  “What about them?” Denny asked, alarmed.

  Brian sat and ran a hand through his tousled hair. “It turns out that my stepdad didn’t have as much money as he said he had, and what’s left is getting snatched up by his lawyers. Mom’s been hiding the letters from me while she tries to work it out, but I don’t know. I need twenty thousand dollars.”

  Denny sat beside him on the deck. “They can give you loans, right?”

  “Maybe. But we didn’t qualify for financial aid, so we didn’t fill out any forms, and now it might be too late…it’s all a mess.” Brian leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and made a visible effort to calm down. “How was your day?”

  Denny leaned back. “Well, the diving was good. Steven was kind of cranky. It would have been more fun if you’d been along.”

  “Maybe tomorrow,” Brian said, sounding not very interested. Then he lifted his head. “Actually, yeah, maybe tomorrow. It’d be nice to have a break from Mom.”

  Technically, Denny needed to ask for Brad’s okay. He might not want another person on the boat he was paying for. But a worse possibility, and one that Denny really should have thought of before he brought it up, was Brad or Tristan might figure out Brian and Denny were more than just friends.

  “We couldn’t…” Denny waved his hand. “You know. Be affectionate.”

  “Why not?” Brian asked.

  “Because this guy might tell his brother. His brother who’s the Coast Guard captain.”

  “Denny…” Brian started, but then he stood up. “Never mind. I’ve got to get going.”

  “No, wait! Don’t you want to…you know. Hang out for a while?” Denny didn’t mention there was a bed below deck and they’d be alone for at least an hour before Steven came back. He didn’t remind Brian there were exactly twenty-one days remaining before he had to report to New London. He just wanted Brian to stay and hang out.

  “Face it, you’re embarrassed to be seen with me,” Brian replied.

  “What? No! I’m not embarrassed,” Denny insisted. “You know what the situation is like. It’s about being discreet.”

  Brian took off his glasses and cleaned them with his shirt. “I know you want to keep things low. And I thought I could do okay with that. But this week—I need someone to lean on in public. You want someone to hide in public.”

  Denny corrected him. “What I want is a career in the military.”

  Brian slid his glasses back on. “And I want to go to MIT, and for my mom to stop crying herself to sleep, and for a boyfriend who’s not afraid to hold my hand in front of other people. We just can’t always get what we want, right?”

  Pressure squeezed against Denny’s lungs as if he was diving too deeply into the ocean. “Are you breaking up with me?”

  “No,” Brian said. “Maybe. I don’t know. Call me later and we’ll figure it out.”

  He walked away, up the dock, away from Denny. The sun was behind him, so bright it made Denny’s eyes water. He looked away and dragged his sleeve across his face. Stupid, stupid sunlight.

  Chapter Twelve

  Claire Donovan came from the village of Glendalough in County Wicklow, Ireland. Steven said he didn’t know where County Wicklow was, but he bet the scuba diving wasn’t as good as it was in Fisher Key.

  “There’s plenty of diving,” Claire said, full of mock indignation. “Caves and reefs, bays, coves, some very lovely wrecks. You’d be surprised.”

  Steven stopped for a red light. “But it’s not as warm.”

  She smiled. “Not as warm, I grant you that.”

  “Is that what you do?” he asked. “Commercial scuba diving?”

  Claire studied the shops on the side of the road—bait and tackle, souvenirs, and the Gas’n’Go. “Oceanographer,” she said, and it sounded deliberately vague to him. Because when you had a top-secret job, you had to use deflection.

  The light changed to green and Steven accelerated. Traffic was moderate at this time of day, with tourists coming back from their charters and people passing through on their way to other places. He asked, “You’re out there looking for that lost weather satellite, aren’t you?”

  Claire’s phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out, scanned the message, and typed something on the tiny keyboard. Her fingernails were short and unpolished. “How did you hear about that?”

  “Word gets around,” Steven said. “It’s not every day that a rocket misfires.”

  “A very expensive and valuable rocket with a very expensive and valuable payload,” she replied, putting the phone away. “Hopefully we’ll find it in a day or two and get back home to Norfolk. What is it you do? Still in school?”

  “Oh, no, I graduated,” he said, neglecting to mention it had only been a few weeks ago. “Working for the summer on a friend’s boat.”

  “And then?”

  “I’ve got some options I’m thinking over.” Steven spied the turn-in for Natural Ann’s, the health food store, and slowed down. “Here we are. I can top off these tanks and come back to give you a ride.”

  “I don’t want to be a bother,” Claire said.

  He dropped her off at the front door. “No bother at all.”

  As he drove to the dive shop he told himself it wasn’t as if he was asking her on a date, or trying to spark something between them—sure, she was pretty, and he liked her smile, but his interest was professional only. And when he picked her up and took her back to the marina, it was totally professional as well—he asked about her company, and what they did up in Norfolk, and what kind of jobs they had there. Claire said her department studied ocean currents and that she was employed as a doctoral student. She had to submit and defend her thesis in the fall.

  “Then you’ll be Dr. Claire?” Steven asked.

  “If all goes well.”

  Back at the marina, he carried a grocery bag for her down to the Othello II. A man in khaki pants and a white shirt was on deck. He wasn’t much older than Claire, maybe twenty-five or so years old, and he struck Steven as one of those rich kids like Jen’s friend Cole—good-looking, silver spoon, think they owned the world.

  “Jamie Harrison,” he said, introducing himself. “I’m the ship’s diver. Thanks for giving Claire a lift.”

  “Anything for a neighbor,” Steven said, not flinching at all under the man’s extra-firm handshake. “I’m Steven.”

  “You live around here with your folks?” Harrison asked.

  Steven understood that was a subtle dig. Or not-so-subtle. He nodded toward the Idle. “I’m living aboard there.”

  Harrison’s gaze flickered to Carter’s old fishing boat, with its peeling paint. He looked a little skeptical, or maybe that was amusement. Like he thought Steven was a kid playing grown-up.

  “How’s the engine, Jamie?” Claire asked.

  “Not so good,” Harrison replied. “Looks like we’re stuck in port for the night. Maybe there’s some place around here to kill time.”

  Claire climbed up on deck. Steven passed up the grocery sack and said, “There’s some bars if you’re in the mood for Jimmy Buffet and pink margaritas.”

  Harrison grinned. “Not my style.”

  “Your style is to obsess over charts all night,” Claire said cheerfully. “The girl at the store said the yacht club has a restaurant and lounge.”

  “Kind of quiet there,” Steven said. And, worse, the bartenders had a bad habit of chasing him out because they all knew he was underage and definitely knew his dad. />
  “I’m sure we’ll find something,” Claire said. “Thanks again, and maybe we’ll see you later.”

  “Okay,” Steven replied.

  Harrison grinned, a glint in his eyes, and Steven figured the man thought he had a crush on Claire. Which was totally not true.

  Still, as Claire went below deck, Steven had to force himself not to stare at her receding profile. Strictly professional, he told himself.

  Plus, she was older. A lot older, like six or seven years. A woman with a professional degree and a good job.

  And he was eighteen years old, no job in sight, no word from the SEALS, on his way to what was not going to be the happiest of dinners with his family.

  “See you around, kid,” Harrison said, climbing back aboard his boat.

  Steven walked back to the Idle and pulled out his phone. Sometimes you had to go it alone, and sometimes you needed reinforcements.

  “Hi,” he said after dialing. “What are you doing later?”

  Chapter Thirteen

  “You go first,” Denny said, dread filling his gut.

  “Don’t be a wimp.” Steven swung open the door to the Bookmine’s upstairs apartment. He took the stairs two at a time and called out, “Mom! We’re home!”

  The apartment would never be home, but it definitely looked better than they had left it. The unfinished floor had been covered with blue area rugs, the sofa was wrapped with a blue and green slipcover, and vintage posters of Cuba had been moved upstairs from Mom’s office. Potted plants dotted the windowsills and the whole place smelled like chicken and plantains. Denny’s stomach growled despite his nerves. He stood back while Aunt Riza gave Steven a big hug and kiss.

  “Look how tall you both are,” Aunt Riza said, fawning over Steven. “My handsome nephews. Denny, come here, give me a kiss.”

  He submitted as gracefully as possible, trying not to wrinkle his nose at her heavy perfume. “The place looks great,” he said.

  “You two did most of the work,” Mom said from the counter, where she was tossing a salad. Neither of Denny’s parents was adept in the kitchen, but under close supervision you could trust them with small vegetables, frozen dinners, and soup from a can. “We just added the womanly touches.”

  “And manly ones, too,” Dad said, trudging out from the small bathroom. He rubbed a towel against his wet head. “How was your day at sea?”

  “It was great,” Steven said cheerfully. “No problems.”

  Denny was trying to check his phone without being too obvious about it. He’d called Brian on the ride over, but there was no answer. He added, “And we met the contractors looking for that weather satellite.”

  “They haven’t found that yet?” Dad asked.

  “What satellite?” Mom asked.

  They told her about Steven’s shooting star and the NASA satellite. Aunt Riza bustled around, busy with the frying maduros. Denny volunteered to set the table but as soon as he did, he worried Aunt Riza would see it as a girly thing, a gay thing, and he got mad at himself. He’d set the table at home a hundred times.

  Just to be safe he said, “Steven, get the glasses.”

  Steven let himself be drafted into helping. Dad sat on the sofa and asked them more about Brad Flaherty. Steven volunteered he’d been paralyzed in Iraq.

  “Poor man.” Aunt Riza wiped her hands delicately on a dish towel. She was probably the only person in Fisher Key making dinner while wearing a dress and high heels, but that was Riza for you—always properly dressed, never barefoot. She continued, “And scuba diving! So dangerous. How does he kick down if he can’t use his legs?”

  “You don’t descend underwater by kicking your feet,” Denny said. “That’s what the vest is for.”

  Aunt Riza had never been scuba diving—neither had Mom. Dad was the one who’d gotten the boys interested, back before they started high school, but he hadn’t done much of it lately. Denny didn’t understand why someone would give up all that beauty and the challenge of going places few other people got to go. Dad explained to Aunt Riza how the BC vest was inflated or deflated and thus controlled ascent or descent. By the time he was done with the details, they were sitting at the table and digging into a mountain of food that could probably feed a restaurant full of customers.

  “Tastes great, as always,” Dad said.

  To Denny, the chicken tasted bland and the plantains burnt. Not that he could say anything. He picked at the food, darting glances every now and then at Mom. She was trying to look pleasant, but her expression was strained. Riza was the sister who had cared for her, raised her and loaned her the money to buy the Bookmine. Her approval was really important to Mom.

  But so was Denny’s happiness, right?

  The clock in the kitchen ticked quietly. The only sounds were the scrapes of forks on the dinner plates. Denny’s phone did not vibrate with any message from Brian asking him to come over. Steven darted his gaze from his parents to Denny to his aunt, and too late Denny recognized the look on his brother’s face.

  “So,” Steven said, “what about the gay thing?”

  Denny kicked him. Dad coughed.

  Aunt Riza’s expression remained unruffled behind her pink-rimmed eyeglasses. “There’s no such thing. I didn’t see what I thought I saw.”

  Denny’s face grew hot. “Sure you did.”

  “Denny,” Dad warned.

  “She did!” Denny insisted. “She saw it and I’m not embarrassed about it.”

  “There’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” Mom said, patting Denny’s arm.

  Blithely Steven said, “I’d be embarrassed if Mom caught me making out with Kelsey. Some things you just don’t want to share with your closest relatives.”

  “And I think that pretty much sums up the matter,” Dad said, obviously hoping that they’d move on from the topic.

  Denny’s fingers had gone numb from gripping his fork too tightly. “It doesn’t! If anyone caught Steven—and believe me, it’s not hard, he makes out with every girl on this island—you’d all just laugh it off. But I kiss a boy and it’s a national emergency.”

  Steven protested, “I don’t make out with every girl on this island.”

  Dad muttered, “Seems like it.”

  Aunt Riza sliced into her chicken with sharp strokes of her knife. “Of course it’s not an emergency. But soon you’ll be away, the first ever in our family to go to the Coast Guard Academy, and you’ll meet some nice smart girls.”

  Before Denny could answer that, Mom swiftly said, “And to celebrate your going away, Riza’s going to have a pool party at her house. All your cousins will be there, and your aunts and uncles, and there’s going to be a big feast of food.”

  “For you and your brother both,” Aunt Riza said. “For when he gets his waiver on this silly eye test that’s causing so much trouble.”

  Steven flushed. Denny was glad to see him squirm. Lying about being admitted to BUD/S had been one of the stupidest things Steven had ever done, and their parents hadn’t been pleased.

  “I could do a party,” Steven said casually. “When?”

  “Saturday,” Mom said. “In Miami.”

  Denny really couldn’t feel his fingers anymore. He dropped the fork and flexed them, hoping he hadn’t given himself permanent nerve damage. “We can’t!”

  Simultaneously Steven said, “We have our black belt test Saturday.”

  “I told you,” Denny said to his father.

  “Did you?” Dad asked, surprised.

  Denny was sure that he had, but now he couldn’t specifically remember. “I thought I did. This morning, when you brought the doughnuts.”

  Steven said, “It’s an all day thing. We’re going down Friday night, just to make sure we’re not late.”

  “They can reschedule the test,” Aunt Riza said confidently. “All of your family is coming, and I can’t change the invitation.”

  Denny said, “You could have asked.”

  Mom looked desperately unhappy. “Denny. Please.”


  He felt bad for her, he really did, but still he said, “You can’t just call up your sensei and tell him to move the test.”

  Aunt Riza remained unfazed. “I’ll call him. Surely he’ll understand.”

  “Maybe you could even invite him,” Dad suggested.

  Steven stopped eating. Which was so rare for him that it usually meant a medical or emotional emergency. “Dad, you’re not helping.”

  “Maybe he could postpone it if you explain it,” Mom suggested. “Or you could take it on Christmas break.”

  The table fell silent. The only person eating was Aunt Riza, who had devoured her chicken all the way to the bone.

  “Well,” Dad finally said, “how about some dessert?”

  “I’m not hungry,” Denny said.

  “Neither am I,” Steven added.

  Aunt Riza said, “But I made flan. Your favorite!”

  Denny almost told her where she could take her flan and stick it. But one look from his father quelled the impulse right away, so he kept his mouth shut and ate the damn custard.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Eddie was home, just as he’d promised he’d be. The house didn’t look much cleaner than the last time Steven had come over. In fact, it looked worse than the last time Steven had come over—dirty clothes piled in the living room, stale pizza boxes stacked on the kitchen counter, and garbage overflowing out of the kitchen trash can. It could have won an award for “Stinkiest House on Fisher Key,” but Steven didn’t think Eddie would appreciate the honor.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Eddie asked. “You look pissed off.”

  “One awesomely awkward dinner for five, done with.” Steven flopped down on the sofa and ignored the jab of a broken spring against his hip. “I hope I never have to go through that again.”

  Eddie leaned back in an ancient, threadworn recliner. “Why so awkward?”

  “Long story.” Steven didn’t think Denny would appreciate if he shared all the gritty details. “Anyway, what’s new here?”

  “Still unemployed, still no chance of going to college, and I broke up with Lisa,” Eddie said.