“Serendipity,” I quipped. “And now, Sweetie, we have other things to think about. The moment has arrived to ferret out our cabins, stow our gear, and open the magical mystery boxes, containing highly classified information about our secret and most baffling quandary.”
Mike just made a face as we slapped on the obligatory “Let’s Get Acquainted” nametags, proclaiming first names only. A friendly place, this old boat, and right from the start we could see that the ship’s crew wanted everyone to feel like neighbors, and maybe eventually, friends. Also, they probably knew from the get-go, which names to pencil into their little notebooks as suspicious, unsavory, or downright questionable, thereby requiring a little extra surveillance. It may have been my imagination, but I swear Juanita had jotted down our names when we passed her station.
Most interesting. But I couldn’t dwell on that now. We had more important things to do. So, while the fragrant sea breezes wafted across our faces, we began our quest for Level D, Wing 3, Hall 7, Rooms 101 and 103. If we could figure out the directions, we could solve any whodunit that came our way.
TEN
For the better part of two hours, passengers streamed on board. Mike and I staked our claim on the upper deck and perched along the rail, ready to peruse the other passengers as they chattered, laughed, and gestured about the magical upcoming trip. Our colleagues in crime, of course, became our primary focus. We kept our eye on the group that veered off and entered by way of the “Mystery Cruise” entrance.
“What an eclectic bunch,” I muttered.
“Isn’t it just amazing?” Mike sighed. “These people came from all over the world for this specific cruise. Some of them will become our acquaintances, more or less, and some we won’t see again until the cruise is ended. Incredible.”
For my part, I was just delighted to be here with my favorite friend, anticipating fun and excitement and mystery and intrigue and, of course, the awesome food. Everyone who goes on a cruise absolutely raves about the food. Glancing at Mike, I noticed again her calm smile and relaxed demeanor.
“You got rid of the bra, didn’t you?” I asked with a smirk.
Mike smiled in rapturous comfort.
“That’s fine, but you know they have rules around here against middle-aged women going commando. This isn’t the sixties.”
“Huh?” Mike wrinkled her nose.
“You know, commando, as in no underwear. And sixties as in Jane Fonda, Nancy Sinatra, Marlo—”
“I get it. But please. I mean, give me a break. Jeez. The ‘girls’ need a vacation, too, you know.”
“Honey, I wouldn’t exactly call your, er, endowments, girls. They’re honest-to-goodness women…if you know what I mean.”
Mike pretended to be shocked and horrified, but I saw in her expression that the mere thought of sailing, unencumbered from binding bra straps and underpants, brought her joy and a sense of harmonious serendipity. Mike’s long-standing warfare with women’s undergarments had grown to epic proportions. The battle had raged for more than thirty years, and it appeared that it’d reached a stalemate since social norms decreed that women of a certain age keep all their flabby parts under some sort of modest restraint.
While the young cosmopolitans flaunt what they have in the boob and butt department, we with so much more to offer, refrain and demure. The fear that once you get all those body parts swinging and swaying, it might be difficult to maintain a sense of balance, curbs any inclination to let go.
“Okay.” Mike stood up straight, smoothed her floral print shirt against the newly liberated girls. “Let’s go back to our rooms and take a look at our mystery boxes and figure out what’s next.”
I nodded and was overcome with sudden dizziness. I grabbed the railing to steady myself and closed my eyes. Wait. It couldn’t be that. I mean, the ship hadn’t moved, but the tiniest twinge of something suspicious churned midway between chin and expando pant waist. Impossible! I couldn’t be seasick. We hadn’t even left the pier.
“Are you rocking the damn boat? For God’s sake, don’t rock the boat!”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Mike glared at me as I held the rail with both hands and stared back at her for full dramatic effect. My skin felt clammy, my breaths were choppy, and my face seemed to grow rigid.
“Well, it feels like you’re rocking it.” I swallowed the bile creeping up my throat.
“Bernadette Catherine North,” Mike almost shouted. “You will not get seasick. It’s all in your mind. You’re just imagining the ship rising and falling, and rocking and rolling and undulating—”
“Stop!” I shouted. “You are not helping matters. Stop talking and get out of my way. I’m going back to the room right now. Where the hell is it?”
Mike didn’t budge. “You’re just doing this to annoy me, aren’t you?” Mike crossed her arms in front of her swaying bosom and tapped one Croc-clad foot. “Why do you take such delight in antagonizing me?” she railed, more annoyed than sympathetic. She grabbed my elbow and directed me toward the nearest door to the elevator, shaking her head and clucking her disbelief that a woman of my size and stature could be such a weakling.
Inside the relative darkness of gently illuminated hallways and soft, carpeted floors, the odd feelings dispersed as quickly as they’d come. I held my head high and searched in vain for my elusive cabin. “Damn, this ship is big,” I muttered. “Too big.”
Ship’s stewards trundled luggage up and down the hallways, rapping knuckles on unoccupied doors before delivering bulging suitcases and oversized rolling wardrobes to the various rooms. With a little luck, our luggage would be already stowed in our cabins, and we could get down to the business of enjoying our cruise, solving our mystery.
“This is the right level, isn’t it?” I whined. “Level D-for-Dolphin…hall 7.”
“Excuse me, ladies, may I be of assistance?”
We whirled to face a very rotund young man in the requisite immaculate white uniform. His small gold badge declared him to be Benjamin Browning. I forced a smile and said, “Thanks, we’re just on our way to our cabins.”
“Level?”
“D.”
“You’re right on track. Take this elevator down to D. When you disembark, turn right then left.” He grinned, making his cheeks look like two ripe gala apples. A chuckle rumbled somewhere in his ample mid-section and rose up into his throat. “Hope you ladies are having a good time.”
Mike jumped in. “Oh, we are, we are. Thanks.”
With a nod and a salute, Mr. Browning turned on a heel and left.
Mike teetered on tiptoes and grinned. “Nice man. Loved his smile. Wonder what he does on the ship. Anyway, the color’s back in your cheeks, so you must be feeling better. We can focus on our mystery now instead of your tummy and have some fun. Right?”
“Uh huh.”
“I know we’re going to win.”
“Uh huh. Where’s Room 103, for crying out loud?”
“After all, we have experience. I mean, we helped solve a mystery last summer, so we have an edge over all the others. Right?”
“Uh huh. Good Lord, this is Room 88! Where the hell are we? No wonder so many people sank with the Titanic. They couldn’t find their way out.”
“Benjamin said turn right then left.”
“Rats. We did just the opposite. Hurry. Turn around. Go.”
“All right already. Jeez. We’ll get there. You don’t feel like throwing up, do you?”
“I’m fine. Just want to get to my damn room.”
“So we can discuss the mystery.” Mike’s shoe scuffed the carpet and she tripped over her feet in her growing excitement. If I hadn’t grabbed her arm, she would’ve fallen to her knobby knees.
“Slow down.”
“You just told me to hurry.”
“Then watch where you’re going. You obviously can’t talk and walk at the same time,” I grumbled.
“Bernie. I’m talking about the mystery,” Mike huffed—left eye twitching to beat the b
and. “Aren’t you even a teensy-weensy bit excited and curious? Don’t you think we have the upper hand? We’ve got a chance to win this thing, right?”
“What? Oh, yeah…sure. Right,” I muttered with tepid enthusiasm. “Where’s the Dramamine?”
ELEVEN
So much for euphonious word plays. As it turned out, Level D did not stand for Dolphin Deck but was saddled with the incongruous title, Cha-Cha Deck. Then Wing 3 became the Papaya Wing, and Hall 7 was the Starfish Passage. So, while looking for our elusive rooms, ship’s lingo morphed into Cha-Cha Deck, Papaya Wing, Starfish Passage 101 & 103. I’m sure it all made perfect sense to the seasoned cruisers and the young, enthusiastic employees, but the directions and locations sure intimidated us at first.
I suggested leaving a trail of breadcrumbs, but as quickly as a speck of trash materialized anywhere, whirring vacuums sucked it up. Breadcrumbs wouldn’t work. Neither would it help to draw a map. We had a map, and had tried in desperation to establish a “You Are Here” position, but gave up after we kept arriving back at the laundry room where cheerful, Spanish-speaking matrons pointed and laughed at us, no doubt calling us “idiots” in their musical language.
If there was a wrong turn, a missed direction, a choice of left or right, we seemed doomed to choose poorly. Girl Scouts, we were not.
“How are we ever going to solve a mystery,” I moaned, “when we can’t find our way in or out of the cabin area. And we have a damn map.”
“Oh, pooh,” Mike retorted. “The problem is that I’ve been letting you do the leading, even though I’m the one with the logical mind, the nose for mystery, and the ear for familiar sounds.”
“Okay, fine. And while we’re on the subject of body parts, what are you going to do when we finally get out on the deck, and a gust of wind flings your blouse up over your head, causing you to flash the entire population of the ship? Hmmm?” With that mental image in place, I couldn’t help but laugh. Mike, on the other hand, was less than amused.
“Oh, Bernie. Really. Stop being so hyperbolic.”
“Hyper-what?” A snort escaped before I could stop it.
“Hyperbolic…you know, exaggerating all the time. Oh, no.” Mike skidded to a stop and threw up her hands. “Jeez Louise.”
We found ourselves in front of the laundry room for maybe the fourth time in twenty minutes. Mike, eyebrows in a knot, released a whoosh of air. “Okay. That does it. I think we need help. Obviously we are directionally challenged.”
A cute little gal in a crisp, white uniform was strolling down the passageway, clipboard in hand, peering at door numbers and checking them off. She flashed an enormous toothy smile at us as we flagged her down.
“Well, hello there, Mike and Bernie,” she gushed. “Already working on the mystery, are we?”
She not only knew our names but also that we were mystery cruisers. It was an impressive gesture. Mike stabbed me in the rib cage with her pointy elbow, and her face puckered up a bit as she confronted the junior cheerleader—Harmony, according to her shiny turquoise nametag. Hands on hips, Mike cocked her head in her very best inquisition attitude and started firing questions. Mike excelled in the inquisition mode. More than twenty years of mind-wrestling with hormonal junior high kids had taught her how to interrogate anyone about anything. I’d witnessed many triumphs as cocky teens burst into tears and admitted everything—even things they hadn’t done.
Harmony held on to a smile as Mike launched her verbal barrage. “Okay, where are we?”
“You are in front of the ship’s laundry,” Harmony replied, a bit perplexed by the obvious question. But the smile endured.
Mike wasn’t through yet. “There are thousands of passengers on board. Correct?”
“Yes! Fourteen hundred and ninety-seven, to be exact.”
“Okay. Then tell me. How did you know our names?” Mike demanded.
Harmony batted her thick mascara-laden eyelashes. “Well…you are wearing name tags.”
Mike glanced down at her unshackled bosom. She glanced at me, and saw that my nametag was just as obvious. Mike, however, would not let details distract from her purposeful line of questioning. “Fine. But how did you know we were part of the mystery tour?” Mike continued, tossing me a smug little smirky smile.
“Oh.” Harmony erupted in giggles. “Your name tags have those cute little question marks across the top. See?”
We both glanced at our chests as Harmony continued. “You know, like when you attend a wedding reception and your nametag might have a little chicken or a little pig or a little cow on the top so the waiter knows what to serve you at the dinner. Understand, honey?”
Harmony brought new meaning and significance to the word perky, and although I tried hard to dislike her the way I dislike all cute, perky little charmers, I couldn’t help but like her anyway. Her calling Mike “honey” did the trick.
Mike slumped a bit but conjured up a game smile. “Okay, okay…I get it. However, back to the point, we—Bernie and I—find we’re a little turned around. Can you help us find our way through this impossible maze? I mean, I have an idea where we are, confusing though it may be, but…well, we don’t want to waste time thinking about where we are and just want to be able to know where we are and find our rooms without any trouble…if that makes any sense… So. Can you tell us where our rooms are?”
Harmony had listened politely, nodded her pert little head several times, and then decided it was probably a hell of a lot easier to escort us back to our rooms than explain. I’m sure she prayed we’d get our bearings, or our sea legs, or whatever the nautical term is for finding one’s way around without making a complete ass of oneself.
Success. After we arrived at our cabins, we thanked Harmony for her kindness and ducked into our rooms with flaming faces. As I closed the door, I could have sworn I saw Harmony flip open her little notebook and jot something down. Names? Numbers? Morons? I had a feeling we hadn’t seen the last of Harmony or her silly little notebook.
I was heading for the bathroom to wash my face when a sharp rap sounded on my cabin door. It’d be Mike, wanting to open those ridiculous boxes. Of course my pal would want to jump right into the “crime” or whatever it was. I yanked open the door and sure enough, Mike teetered on tiptoes, clutching her precious black box.
“Okay, Mike, we’ll open the—”
At that exact moment, a tremor rocked the universe. We were moving. You could sense it—feel it. We’d cast off from the pier, and here we were, holed up in our staterooms and missing the pageantry of departure. “No time for boxes now,” I snatched the box from her hands, set it on a table, and then shoved her aside so I could close my door. “We have to be topside to see this. Leaving port is something we don’t want to miss.”
We dashed—well, maybe dashed is too strong a word—down the hallway, er, Starfish Passage in search of the elevator. It had moved. We trotted down another long hall, around a corner, up another even longer hallway, turned left then right. We then clambered up a flight of eighteen steps to the Sting Ray Deck, reversed our path and headed in a totally different direction down the Guava Passage, down several steps until we finally arrived. Elevator? Hell, no. We’d found the laundry room.
TWELVE
Tropical music filled the air, and since unfamiliar surroundings and immeasurable stress had compromised our keen senses of direction, we followed the cacophony of noisy farewells heard over the bellow of ship’s horn. The marimba music grew louder until, at last, we stepped out into the sunshine, just in time to wave to the strangers at the pier who waved and blew kisses. The enormous vessel slid among the waves in a graceful arc, headed out to sea.
Seagulls flapped in frenzy above us, seeking some last-minute morsels from the passengers who thought it exhilarating fun to toss bits of doughnut in the air—only to have the wind throw it back down at them. Bright-colored nautical flags flapped and snapped in the brisk breeze; a sea of colors and sounds and smells that overwhelmed the senses engulfed us i
n a most delightful and captivating way. Movement everywhere, as men and women, not to mention more than a few children, crisscrossed the deck, desperate to absorb it all. Lighthearted music and the sounds of summer at sea filled the air.
Mike’s expression said it all. I nudged her shoulder and chuckled. “You’ll be dreaming about this for years to come.”
Mike inhaled and exhaled then beamed. “Oh, yes. It’s beyond my wildest expectations. I never knew a cruise could be…so fantabulous.”
“Fantabulous. Right.”
We flopped into pristine white deck chairs, determined to take it all in and be done with the wonder and the confusion of newness. Almost immediately, a handsome young waiter in an impeccable white uniform, complete with Bermuda shorts and white deck shoes, appeared at our side.
“Sea breeze?” he inquired, smiling his most winning smile.
“Yes, of course, the sea breeze is delightful,” I answered.
“Sea breeze is a drink, you ninny,” Mike hissed, smiling and winking at the waiter as if to say her traveling companion was a totally green rookie from the Midwest and a bit of an embarrassment to world-travelers like herself. “Didn’t you read the brochures I sent you?” she whispered, all the while continuing to smile at the engaging waiter. “Yes, I’ll have a sea breeze,” Mike replied with nauseating nonchalance, then leaned forward, squinted at his nametag and added, “Ramón. My friend here will have a…what would you like, dear?” Condescension oozed out of every pore.
I smiled at Ramón. “Oh, just bring me an iced tea. Thank you, Ramón.”
Mike glanced at me, eyes narrowed. We’d been friends for ages, so she always knew when something was up. “Okay, I’ve seen that look before. What’re you up to, Bernadette Catherine North? You’re sporting that smartass grin again.”
“Me?” I feigned innocence. “Oh, nothing much. But if you had read the brochures my dear, poor old thing, you would’ve read that my iced tea was complimentary, while that sea breeze you ordered just set you back $12.”
Don't Rock the Boat Page 5
