Joyce sat across from me on a bench, the water spots on her well-fitted polo slowly drying in the sun, and said, “That sounds amazing. Dan and I knew a couple like that once. We were friendly with them for a short time, but they liked fighting in public so we decided we couldn’t be friends with them anymore.” She nodded and a lock of her brown hair fell over one of her eyes.

  “Yeah. Some of our friends stopped speaking to us and inviting us to parties because we got into too many fights and they were fed up. We were together for nearly eight years. The last year was awful because the drama was more fighting than makeup sex. Even after we broke up, we’d still seek each other out, bait each other just to get that rise, you know? It was so stupid. I mention C.J. because my relationship with her made me realize that love, real love, isn’t all high drama all the time. But there were times when we were together when I was really happy.”

  Joyce seemed to understand. Some of my friends could never understand how I could say that I had been happy with C.J. As much as I had enjoyed the drama we got into, there were occasional drama-free moments of happiness. I had really loved her. There’s nothing like your first love, but I told Joyce about others, including the break up seven years ago.

  “We’d been together for twenty years. I thought we would be together forever.”

  “I thought I’d be with Dan forever. Sometimes life has other plans for you. Sometimes it’s something you would have never dared imagine.”

  Then we just sat there quietly. It wasn’t that we had run out of things to say. It’s that we didn’t have to say anything.

  On our way back to port we reconnected with Sheila and Anne Marie, who was acting weirder than usual. She seemed to be into Sheila, but something was holding her back.

  They told us about their adventure climbing the falls in the warm, rushing water, and we shared about the vibrant hues we had seen in the flowers and foliage. Then I guess I fell back into the Joyce vortex. Anne Marie and Sheila had their own conversation as Joyce and I talked about working as nurses. She had gone to work for an orthopedic surgeon, outpatient procedures only, once her kids were old enough that they didn’t depend on her for everything. She seemed impressed by my work as an ER nurse. She also filled me in on the lives of some our former classmates, women I hadn’t kept in touch with and hadn’t heard from in years.

  One, a native of Chicago’s South Side who spun wild tales about political families, sadly died of cancer in her late 20s. Another, a fellow out-of-towner from Montana who talked about wide open skies and quiet nights, had retired a few years ago and taken up triathlons. Other stories were more mundane: marriage, children, work, retirement, not always in that order.

  “I’m really enjoying our little reunion,” I said as we climbed the gangway to get back on the boat.

  “So am I. I’m enjoying it very much.” We paused at the top and found a place to lean over the railing and get one last look at Jamaica. Then she looked in my eyes, and once again we were quiet. Neither of us had to say anything.

  ***

  We went our separate ways. She had a reservation at the ship’s luxury restaurant with Kristen and Sam. I wanted to meet up with Carol and Frankie and hear more about Anne Marie’s budding relationship with Sheila. We ended up at the ship’s casual dinner restaurant. Over seared striped bass and slow cooked prime rib—the food on cruises was always so good—Anne Marie voiced her doubts about Sheila, who was from Milwaukee, just a couple of hours away from Chicago. She wasn’t sure she could handle the distance. We assured her she could, and that the distance would shrink at some point.

  “What if Sheila wasn’t a lesbian and was one of those bi chicks or randy straight girls with a husband or boyfriend at home?” Anne Marie asked.

  “There’s nothing wrong with bi chicks,” I said. “And if you want to know what she has at home, ask her. She seems to really like you, and you like her.”

  Anne Marie looked down at her hands. Maybe she was just out of dating practice. I didn’t know what was going on with her. “This is so scary,” she said.

  Frankie rolled her eyes. “What are you scared of? You know this may just be a wonderful vacation romance. Don’t get too far ahead of yourself. Enjoy it. Don’t start planning your break up yet.”

  “Maybe you’re right,” she said.

  We spent the rest of the meal trading stories about our day. Frankie and Carol had been on a beach with fruity umbrella drinks and constant requests from people passing by for them to buy some kind of trinket. I talked about Joyce and how much fun we were having.

  “Oh, you are?” said Carol with a raised eyebrow.

  “We’re old friends. We’re just catching up. Nothing more going on than that.”

  ***

  After dinner, Anne Marie, Carol and Frankie were headed to a show that I wasn’t that interested in, so I decided to check out something that did interest me. I headed to the clothing-optional adult deck on the ship. I had sunbathed nude at various women’s events, and I liked it. This was a little different. It was a tucked-away piece of the boat that was under the same sky as the rest of the ship but had high walls to prevent any accidental exposure. In a way, it felt like lounging inside a box, but I liked being naked. The area had also been taken over by the gay men on board.

  When I arrived the sun had set, and the area was lit by one pale bulb. There was one other woman up there and a gaggle of gay guys. The woman turned to me and smiled with a grin I was really growing to enjoy.

  “How did you find out about this?” Joyce said to me as I dropped my clothes and spread out a towel on the lounger next to her. She was wearing the same outfit from earlier and seemed curious more than anything else.

  “Frankie and Carol chatted up a couple of guys who they overheard talking about it last night in the casino. They found out all about it and then told me,” I adjusted the chaise lounge so I could recline and see the night sky while still being to see Joyce without straining my neck. The stars were twinkling brightly. The sky was a deep black, the kind of darkness that Chicago never sees.

  “I saw it on the ship map, and I was curious. This is nice.” She looked right at me, at my naked self. For a brief moment I regretted getting naked so quickly, but then I got comfortable. “We don’t have to strip, do we?” she said.

  “It’s not a requirement. Do you want to?” I looked around. There were a few gay dudes chatting softly. They were naked. They ignored me and Joyce. I briefly thought that I would like to see Joyce naked, if only to be near bare female flesh. Then I put that thought out of my mind as well.

  “No. I’m fine just the way I am,” she said.

  You certainly are, I thought but didn’t actually say. I added it to my increasingly long list of thoughts about Joyce I was not giving voice to and chasing out of my head as soon as they entered.

  “Sam asked me out,” she said in an offhanded sort of way.

  “Did he?” I really wasn’t surprised. He’d been sniffing around her since the beginning of the cruise, if not before.

  “Yep. He’d been hinting around, flirting, but I ignored him. Yesterday, he just asked me out. He wanted to take me to the French restaurant on board. I thanked him, but said I wasn’t interested. He tried to get cute and he said, ‘What? You’re not interested in eating dinner?’”

  “Yeah. I can imagine him doing something like that,” I said.

  “I said, ‘Of course I’m interested in having dinner. Just not with you.’ I didn’t like going that route, you know, slightly bitchy, but— Actually, I did like going that route.”

  I burst out laughing.

  “Are you laughing at me? Why are you laughing at me?” She sat up in the lounger and leaned her face closer to me.

  “I’m not laughing at you, Joyce. It’s just that…I don’t know. The way you tell it just made me happy.” That was partly true. I also really liked that she shot Sam down.

  She giggled. “Okay. I guess it is kind of funny.”

  “How did he take it?”

  “Rather well, actually. He sort of guffawed in the way that he does, shook my hand and told me how much he enjoyed having me as his euchre partner. I think he’ll go to the next lady on his list. He’s not the sort of man to put all his eggs in one basket. Past a certain age, we just don’t have a lot of patience for stuff like that.”

  “You’re probably right about that. There is a certain amount of freedom that comes with age.”

  She looked up at the night sky. “Do you prefer gay or lesbian when referring to yourself? Or maybe dyke? Kristen thought you might prefer dyke.”

  “You told Kristen about me?”

  “Oh no. My daughter’s gaydar is infallible. She told me our first night here. After dinner, she said, ‘Your nursing school buddy’s a dyke.’ I was horrified.”

  “Horrified that I’m a lesbian?”

  “No! Horrified that she’d use that word. Isn’t it a slur?”

  I explained to her about how dyke wasn’t necessarily a slur, that lots of lesbians have tried to reclaim that word and take the sting out of it.

  “Loads of lesbians call themselves dyke with pride. Is your daughter gay?”

  “No. She says she’s bisexual, hence the gaydar. She says that straight people can’t have gaydar. Apparently, straight people can only pick gay people out when they’re the most obvious examples of gay people, like drag queens. That’s what she said anyway.”

  I laughed. “I’m not a drag queen.”

  “Of course you’re not. I think she said it because I looked confused. Kristen says that gay people, and bisexuals, too, just know each other somehow. It’s all so mysterious.”

  I didn’t offer a response at this point because I figured she had more to say. I sat up, so I was eye to eye with her. I draped the towel over my crotch. I didn’t know why I was all of a sudden feeling modest.

  “When I thought about it, though, about what she said about you, I mean, it made sense. You always went around with Marty, but I’d always suspected you were different.” She lowered her voice as if to protect a secret I was no longer keeping. “When I looked back on it, it made sense that you were gay. You always treated him more like a brother than a boyfriend. It seemed like you had lots of secrets.”

  I shook my head. “No. Just the one. Joyce?”

  “Yes?”

  It had started to get a little chilly on the deck. “Are you straight?” I had to know, and, as she had said, one of the blessings of aging is a need for now, no patience to wait. I wasn’t about to let another woman slip through my fingers. Too many had because I had hesitated, and it was only a week-long cruise. I wanted to know if there was a chance for something more.

  She didn’t say anything for several moments. I mean nothing. I swore she was holding her breath.

  Finally, she said, “I always thought I was.”

  So much in just a few words. What does she mean? I wondered.

  Suddenly, a male voice—deep with a bit of humor in it—sliced through the awkward silence that had developed between me and Joyce.

  “Jesus! Will you two stop talking and just kiss already?”

  At first, I thought he was talking to one of the other guys on the deck, but when I looked around, I saw this guy with brown hair and a trim figure looking right at me.

  “Excuse me?” I said.

  He grinned. “You heard me.”

  I stood up. “I don’t think you should be listening to—”

  “I wasn’t listening to anything. Not really. I didn’t hear anything specific.” He gestured as he spoke, moving closer to us. “But I sensed what’s going on underneath the words.”

  I looked at Joyce, who had what I would describe as a neutral look on her face. I wondered what she was thinking. She’d probably noticed what I’d noticed. The guy was drunk off his ass.

  “There is nothing going on,” I said. I broadened my shoulders and straightened my back as if I was going to have to defend myself soon, although I doubted that would be necessary.

  “Everything will be better, for me anyway, if you would just kiss her and get it over with. It’s the only thing you can do right now, darling.” He wore a white terry cloth robe. He hadn’t bothered to tie the sash to close it, so it was easy to see that he was naked underneath it.

  “We were having a nice conversation here.” I looked down. He was letting his junk hang out. I didn’t need to see that up close. “Why don’t you go back to your friends?”

  He looked over his shoulder. “Oh, I suppose they’re friends, but of the temporary kind. I only met them yesterday, darling. You and your friend here are much more interesting, such a spark between the two of you. Oh! You’re shy. We’ll leave you to it. C’mon, fellas! The ladies want to be alone. Besides, I think the piano bar needs us.”

  The “fellas” chuckled and giggled as they dressed. One of them tripped over the leg of a chaise lounge as they started to leave the deck and swore. They laughed some more and made kissing noises as they left. The guy who had interrupted me and Joyce winked at me and gave me the thumbs up sign.

  It became eerily quiet after the door closed behind them. I looked down at Joyce.

  “Well, that was interesting,” I said. “I’ve known a few guys like him. Nosy busybodies.”

  Joyce got up from the chaise lounge. She took a tentative step toward me and stopped. I was about to tell her how lovely she looked just then. A prelude to a kiss? She had another idea, as it turned out.

  “It is chilly up here. I want some tea.” She moved toward the door and opened it. “Will you join me?”

  The moment, if there had been a moment, had passed. “I’d like to do a bit of stargazing. I’ll see you later,” I said.

  She smiled and said goodnight. Once the door had closed behind her, I went over to the railing and looked out over the water. I just wanted to wait a few minutes before going back to my room. I assumed that Joyce had been freaked out by the drunk guy’s suggestion that we kiss. I hoped she wasn’t so freaked out that she wouldn’t want to hang out with me alone again. I thought about dropping by her room, but, if her daughter were there, it would just be awkward. Still, I had a feeling that the drunk guy wasn’t wrong. I didn’t want to admit it, but I had felt a spark between me and Joyce.

  ***

  Wednesday: Port of call, Cayman Islands

  I hadn’t signed up for any of the excursions because several of them sounded fantastic. Should I go snorkeling with the stingrays with Carol and some other friends? Horseback riding looked like so much fun, but so did parasailing. I decided to wait until the day we were at the Cayman Islands before I picked. Well, now we were at the Caymans, and I still couldn’t decide which excursion to go on or even if I wanted to go on any excursion. The only thing I knew I really wanted to do was talk to Joyce.

  I knew we were reunited friends. I had realized yesterday that I wanted more. I had always wanted more from her. I hoped she did, too.

  I got a quick bagel and cream cheese for breakfast and wasted no time going to Joyce’s room. If her daughter was there, I could invite them both to have coffee with me. I hoped Joyce hadn’t gone on an excursion. I knocked on Joyce’s door and heard her say that she’d be there in a minute. It probably took her less than a minute to open the door, but it felt longer.

  “Hannah?” She stood there in a robe with her hair tousled and unbrushed. She was beautiful.

  “Yes, it’s me. I know you weren’t expecting me.” Now I started to feel nervous, like that time I had shown up on C.J.’s doorstep two days after our first date. I didn’t know if C.J. liked me or wanted to see me again. I didn’t know if Joyce wanted to see me again either.

  “I thought Kristen had come back because she had forgotten something. Come in. Come in. It’s nice to see you.” She opened the door wide and stood back to let me in.

  I knew Joyce was staying in a suite, but I hadn’t realized it was one of the luxury suites. She had two rooms and space to stroll. She must have heard me gasp.

  “It is nice, isn’t it?” She gestured to one of the chairs. “Please, sit.” I sat on the plush and soft easy chair she pointed to. I could have sat there for hours and stared out to the balcony, a large expanse with four chairs and a table. Past the balcony was the turquoise blue water that surrounded the Cayman Islands and lapped gently at the side of the ship. Farther out still were the Cayman Islands, with white sand beaches and palm trees swaying in the breeze.

  “Anne Marie and I splurged on a suite, but ours is nowhere near as big as this,” I said. “You have a great view. We’ve got a balcony, but it’s the size of a postage stamp.” I stood up and gestured to the balcony. “May I?”

  “Please do.” She grabbed a half-drunk cup of coffee from a side table and brought it to her lips.

  I went out onto the balcony, and the air was warm, so different from the harsh Chicago winter I had left. Joyce joined me on the balcony. A gentle breeze blew. It carried with it shouts and other muted noise from the pier. Two other ships were also in port, and Joyce was standing very close to me on the balcony. I took a deep breath.

  “I hope you weren’t freaked out by what that drunk guy said last night,” I said.

  She looked puzzled. She was close enough that I could feel her breath on my neck. “Oh no. I wasn’t freaked out. I really was chilly. And I needed to think about something.”

  “Think about what?”

  “About doing this.” I turned to face her. She leaned in close, pulled my face to hers and kissed me. She tasted of coffee and orange juice. Her lips were soft. I had been dating since my last break up, but it had been awhile since a woman just kissed me. I placed my hand on her arm, feeling her soft flesh. She placed her hand on my hip.

  It was not quite a peck on the lips, but not a lingering kiss either. I was stunned but pleasantly so. She looked stunned, too. I stared into her eyes and traced her lips with my fingertips.

 

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