by Lisa Doan
Olive suddenly slapped her forehead and cried, “You don’t know yet! That’s why you’re dressed in rags! You’re still a servant living in the attic with the mice!”
“What?” Cinderalla asked.
“That’s why you have on that ugly dress,” Olive said, “you’ve been cleaning for your evil stepmother! Don’t worry, your fairy godmother is gonna fix up your face and get you a pretty dress and glass slippers so the prince will fall in love with you.”
“Fix my face?” Cinderalla said, reaching up to touch one of her weather-worn cheeks.
“Yeah,” Olive said. “But it’s not your fault! You’ve been working day and night.”
Cinderalla took in a long, slow breath. “Tell me about it. I’m exhausted. How am I supposed to entertain kids, keep all those cabins clean by myself, and on top of that, learn how to snorkel while leading an excursion? Did I put ‘good swimmer’ on my résumé? No, I did not.”
Olive studied Cinderalla. Then she said, “In the movie, you don’t look so bad when you’re doin’ all the cleaning. What happened?”
“Life happened,” Cinderalla said darkly.
Charlie began to fear that they had more to worry about than Olive falling overboard. Cinderalla might throw her overboard.
“Well,” Olive said, turning her attention to her hot dog and potato chips, “at least you got a fairy godmother. It’s gonna be happily ever after for you!”
“Is it?” Cinderalla asked. “I used to believe that. Now I’m not so sure.”
Olive didn’t reply. Instead, she focused on drawing a line of ketchup across her hot dog. Her interest in another person’s existential crisis was reliably zero.
The twins began a rapid-fire conversation in Cucuchara. Claire attempted to take a photo of them, but she decided against it after they screeched at her like wild animals and tried to rip her phone from her hands.
Gunter leaned over to Cinderalla and said, “Why were those two guys in suits chasing after the captain?”
Charlie hid a smile. Just as he had predicted, Gunter would spend his entire vacation on a pointless quest, convinced that Charlie was doing the same thing and determined to beat him at it.
When he and Gunter had been friends, there had been way too many competitions. His own mom and dad couldn’t care less whether Charlie won or lost a soccer match. Mr. Pennypacker only wanted to know if they were on the hook for snacks and how much was that going to cost.
The Hwangs, on the other hand, took a dim view of losing. Nothing that could be won should ever be lost. Charlie had not cared whether he won or lost an Edge of the World tournament or a breath-holding challenge or a race to the nearest telephone pole. Though he had been bothered that the Hwangs always looked sorry for him, like he was the pathetic loser next door.
Gunter folded his arms. “Well? Why is the captain getting chased?”
Cinderalla shrugged. She either didn’t know or wasn’t going to say why the men had chased the van.
Gunter turned to Charlie. “Listening in on my interrogation? Getting me to do all the heavy lifting, as usual, Pennypacker?”
“I actually don’t care,” Charlie said.
“Right.”
“Really. I don’t.”
“We will see,” Gunter said.
“I guess so,” Charlie said.
Olive raised her hot dog in the air and shouted, “Stop talking! You’re ruining the Disney mood!”
Cinderalla rolled her eyes and went to smoke another cigarette.
“Game on,” Gunter whispered.
* * *
The next morning, Charlie opened his eyes. He had slept with the porthole cracked open and now he felt a warm, salty breeze drift in. He jumped on his knees and looked out.
He was surrounded by pale blue water. Two hundred yards ahead, a white beach ran in either direction, backed by a jungle of palm trees. There was nobody on the beach and no houses he could see. It was like the kind of tropical paradises he’d seen on TV. His only other experience with a beach was the one time he went on a day trip to Seaside Heights with his friend Kyle’s family. That beach had been a sea of umbrellas. Old men were stretched out on beach chairs doing a slow broil to well-done, mothers chased children determined to drown themselves, and two lifeguards spent the day wildly blowing their whistles. The carnival music from the rides along the boardwalk and the smells of Italian sausage and caramel corn had hung in the air.
Here, the beach was empty and silent, and the air only smelled of sea salt. It wouldn’t have surprised him to see the cast of Survivor walk out of the trees and start building a camp with their bare hands.
Charlie stuck his head out the porthole and peered down into the water below to the white, sandy bottom. Oval-shaped blue fish schooled around the hull, as if they were grateful to find some unexpected shade. Small waves made a cheerful slip-slap against the hull.
Charlie smiled. He had made it. He was at a foreign destination. It was a magical morning in the tropics.
“Where are they?” Olive shouted from the adjoining cabin. “Where are the hundred lost Dalmatians? You said they would come back in the night!”
“I said maybe they would,” Mr. Pennypacker answered. “Dogs are notoriously unreliable.”
Charlie sighed. He supposed Olive could drain the magic out of any morning.
He jumped out of bed and opened the menu that had been left in his room. It said they were going to have a “Continental Breakfast.” He assumed continental meant Europe, hopefully France. The French were the world’s bravest food adventurers. He’d seen a show where a guy had actually eaten a fried cow pancreas. Charlie didn’t know if he would be served a pancreas or a cow’s tongue or tripe or goose liver. Whatever it was, even if it looked disgusting, he was going to try it.
As it turned out, the continental breakfast was a slapped together egg sandwich and an apple. Chef Mickey Mouser staggered around the galley pulling toast from the toaster, bumping into counters and cracking eggs that sometimes ended up in a pan and sometimes didn’t. Cinderalla sat at the table sullenly drinking black coffee. She had a mug in front of her and another one lined up behind it, ready to go.
Claire lifted the top piece of toast off her limp sandwich and snapped a photo. “Hashtag: sad sandwich.”
The twins stared at their apples, shrieked at each other, and then threw them over their shoulders. Jimmy Jenkins ran after them like a dog chasing a ball.
Gunter leaned over to Cinderalla and whispered, “Why were those guys in suits chasing the van yesterday?”
Cinderalla shrugged. “How should I know?” she said, her voice raspy. “He probably owes taxes. Every year I don’t file and every year I think this is the year they’ll catch up to me. But hey, that’s what’s good about being a yachtie—you’re elusive.”
“The IRS,” Gunter said. “I should have known that was it.”
Charlie knew for a fact it wasn’t the IRS. His dad was an accountant and he liked to “sail close to the wind” on his taxes. He had told Charlie more than once that if he saw an envelope from the Internal Revenue Service, the jig was up. The IRS, he said, sent all bad news by mail.
“Why is there a new crew? What happened to Clarissa?” Gunter asked. “She used to clean the cabins and leave a snack-sized bag of M&M’s on my pillow every day.”
“She sounds like she goes the extra mile,” Cinderalla said. “Ratchet down your hopes—I don’t go any mile.”
“But where is she? And where is Brad? He used to be the cook, not that red-haired guy.”
Cinderalla looked down at her ballgown/nightgown. “Maybe they got sick of the costumes.”
“There weren’t any costumes before,” Gunter said.
“I dunno, kid,” Cinderalla said. “All I know is I’m supposed to take the guests snorkeling and I gotta go read about how the equipment works. And try to remember how swimming works. I ain’t what you’d call a natural in the water—a bathtub is the deep end as far as I’m concerned.”
/> Cinderalla downed her second cup of coffee, which Charlie assumed was enough rocket fuel to fuel an actual rocket, and then dragged herself out of the room.
“I saw you listening,” Gunter said, staring at Charlie.
“I have ears, don’t I?” Charlie said. “Not that you found out anything.”
“I did too find out. Those guys were from the IRS.”
“Wrong,” Charlie said.
“You don’t know it’s wrong,” Gunter said. “Wherever those guys are from, I will find out,” Gunter said.
“Uh-huh,” Charlie said.
“We’ll see,” Gunter said.
“We’ll see what?” Charlie asked, stymied again by how his conversations with Gunter ended with a “we will see” every single time.
“You better believe we’ll see,” Gunter said.
“We won’t see anything. I’m not interested.”
“Still sticking to that story, are you?” Gunter said, folding his arms. “Let’s just find out how not interested you really are when I get to tell everybody what’s been going on. Your poor dad will have to realize, again, that his son is a loser who can’t figure anything out.”
Charlie’s head snapped up. What did his dad have to do with it? Why would Gunter need to tell his dad anything? He’d known Gunter would be like a dog with a bone about those men. He hadn’t anticipated Gunter wanting to tell his dad about whatever he found out. Mr. Pennypacker would jump on any kind of information Gunter came up with and start dreaming up lawsuits. Hadn’t his dad thought there might be a case against the people who took newspapers out of his recycle bin? He’d claimed a litter of puppies was no legal defense and only gave it up when Charlie’s mom pointed out exactly how low a judgment for old newspapers would be. Mr. Pennypacker would have the whole family off the boat and headed to court at the next port. The vacation would be over.
He had to put a stop to Gunter’s investigation. He had to figure out who those men were before Gunter did. If there was one thing Charlie knew about Gunter Hwang, it was that if Charlie beat him to the answer, Gunter wouldn’t want anybody to know he lost the competition, including Mr. Pennypacker.
But Gunter had a real advantage. He’d been on the boat a bunch of times before. He might have some guesses already. Charlie would have to move fast to get ahead of him.
He paused. What was his first move? He’d go ask the captain. It might be as simple as that. Captain Wisner might be able to put this whole stupid mystery to bed in five minutes with Mr. Pennypacker none the wiser.
Charlie got up and walked toward the door, leaving Gunter behind. He passed Olive, who was lecturing Mickey Mouser because the egg in her sandwich was runny and that was the same as eating a raw baby bird and Olive Pennypacker did not eat baby birds because she loved all the babies in the world.
Mickey Mouser stuck his hand out and muttered, “Give me your plate, you little dictator.”
Charlie ran down the long corridor and up the winding stairs to the deck. The boat rocked gently on the sea, the sun warmed the top of his head, and, standing there alone with the sea to his back and the shoreline ahead, he could almost imagine he was a pirate considering where to bury his treasure. There was no way he would let Gunter ruin this trip.
Chapter Five
Charlie made his way to the metal staircase that led up to the bridge and jogged to the top. Ignatius Wisner sat in his captain’s chair with his feet up, balancing a cup of coffee on his belly.
Charlie cleared his throat.
The captain slid down on his chair, just catching his cup of coffee before it tipped over. He sat up and swung around to Charlie.
“Ah-ha!” he cried. “I spy a young man who could not keep himself away from the bridge. I suppose you have dreams of captaining your own vessel someday? Most natural thing in the world.”
“Uh, no,” Charlie said. “I just wanted to ask you a question.”
“Of course you do,” the captain said in a hearty voice. “What boy doesn’t have questions? Why, a young man your age is practically a question factory. Now, do I know what those questions are? You bet, son. One, how deep is the water below the boat? Two, how far are we from Miami? Three, are there sharks and, if so, are they dangerous? Four, is a knot how far or how fast? And, of course, five, how much will you get paid if you join the Coast Guard?”
The Coast Guard? It had never occurred to Charlie to join the Coast Guard. “No, Captain, I just wanted to know—”
“Thirty-six feet deep, 186 miles from Miami, sharks all over the place—tiger sharks, hammerheads, blacktip reef sharks, bull sharks, and lemon sharks. Yes, they’re dangerous—they are sharks after all. But rest assured, my good fellow, your chances of being attacked by a shark are one in eleven and a half million.”
The captain laid his finger along the side of his nose as if he were about to tell Charlie a secret. “Naturally,” he said, “that statistic about shark attacks is rather cold comfort for the unlucky one in that eleven and a half million.”
Charlie supposed that was true. If you were attacked by a shark, it really wouldn’t help to know how slim the chances had been.
“Now,” the captain continued, “a knot is all about speed. It’s equal to one nautical mile, which is about one point one five miles per hour. Why not just use miles per hour? Who knows; probably because it would be too easy. Thinking about joining the Coast Guard, are you? Many young men do. Sadly, it’s not a get-rich-quick scheme. You’ll make about twenty thousand your first year, which seems low, considering you’ll be risking your life. But what can you do when you’re called to adventure? You’ve got to answer the call!”
Charlie was overwhelmed by the information erupting from the captain like a volcano. “No,” he stuttered. “I mean, that’s all interesting, but not what I wanted to ask. What I wanted to know was—”
“Whoa, look at the time!” Captain Wisner exclaimed, pointing at his watch. “Nine twenty-two and a half already. My morning announcement is scheduled for twenty-two and a half minutes after nine on the dot. Marine living is all about schedules, my boy. Throw away the schedule and what have you got? A schedule-less vessel, which is no good to anybody. Now hustle yourself down to your cabin, jump into some swimming trunks, and prepare yourself for an unparalleled underwater safari.”
Charlie staggered down the stairs. He hardly knew how the captain had managed to get him off the bridge before he could ask a single question about the men in suits.
The captain’s voice boomed over the loudspeaker. “Good morning, good morning, good morning, folks! I hope you have enjoyed our spectacular continental breakfast prepared by our own Chef Mickey and are ready for a day filled with incredible sights and sounds. You find yourself this beautiful morning on a remote beach in the Bahamas. Can your larger cruise ships take you to such a paradise? No, folks. No, they cannot. The water’s too shallow for those oversized contraptions. But here we are! If you will meet Cinderalla on the aft deck at precisely ten o’clock, she will lead you to the dinghy and you will be on your way to discovering the attractions of our undersea world. This is not to be missed, people! Bahamian fish are world famous for being interesting. As always, safety first—if you’re afraid of the water, have a tendency to drown, or have had any near-drowning experiences in the past, including falling through lake ice or falling in your shower, inform Cinderalla so that she and Mickey Mouser can be prepared to execute any emergency measures that might be required.”
Charlie stood on the deck listening to the captain’s speech. How was Cinderalla supposed to save anybody when she was trying to remember how to swim and was just now reading a book on how to snorkel?
“Beauty and adventure and magical Disney-like characters,” the captain continued. “That’s what Wisney Cruises is all about. Over and out.”
* * *
A half hour later, Charlie was back on deck in his swim trunks. Olive had just been informed that she was not old enough to snorkel and did not have the water skills to attempt it
.
“If I’m not going, nobody is going!” she shrieked.
Everyone froze. Satisfied that she had everybody’s attention, Olive dramatically wailed at the sky, clutched her hair in her fists, and then delivered the finale by lying on the deck while holding her breath. It was a first-class performance and plans were hastily made for Mrs. Pennypacker to take Olive to the beach to play in the shallow water.
Charlie’s dad said he was going to stay on board and use the opportunity to take the nap he had been trying to take for the past ten years. Charlie didn’t buy it, though. His dad was not a napper. He assumed what Mr. Pennypacker would really be doing was calculating his losses. Paying for cable nobody was watching = lost money. Paying for car insurance when nobody was driving = lost money. Charlie assumed that by the time they got back from snorkeling, there would be a whole lecture prepared about how much food was going bad in their refrigerator.
Getting everybody to shore had taken two trips on the rubber dinghy, with Mickey Mouser quietly cursing at the tiller and Cinderalla sitting at the bow smoking. She did not seem to care that once the dinghy started moving, the wind blew the smoke from bow to stern and so really, everybody was smoking.
After they had all made it to the beach, Charlie wrestled himself into his swim fins and staggered toward the water. He fell on the sand twice before he got the hang of lifting his feet high enough to avoid tripping. Then he watched Gunter walk into the water and put his fins on once he was waist deep.
“I know I could’ve done it that way,” Charlie said. “But it exercises my muscles to do it my way.”
“What muscles?” Gunter asked.
Cinderalla stood in the water and held up a mask. “This here,” she said, “you put on your face. And this thing,” she said, pointing at the snorkel, “is what you breathe from. Put it in your mouth. Now, once you’re swimmin’ around, you’re gonna see fish. Tropical type of fish. The kind of fish that … live around here. Great! Nobody has any questions so go ahead and get snorkeling.”
