VI. Strong Enough

Dad was not exactly happy with having to pay for two lost life-jackets. We didn’t embellish anything when we explained what happened, on how we fell off of the wave runner We did leave out the part that we went into the gulf and that we weren’t moving at that time.
Skye sat quietly next to me in the back of the SUV. I took ahold of her hand and smiled. My vain attempt to relay that everything was okay and that she was welcomed to go anywhere with us, including back to Memphis if she so inclined.
That part of the non-verbal conversion was lost in translation.
We arrived back at the condo to see my sisters standing with Katie.
“Are we going to get the riot act?” I asked.
“Yes, because they’ve all been wondering where you’ve been all this time,” Dad said.
Mom only looked at me in the rearview mirror.
Skye opened the door and quickly got out.
“Hey!”
“Let me talk with Katie, okay? I’ll come to see you later.”
“Alright,” I replied as I watched her cautiously walk up to Katie, who didn’t say a word but her eyes said that she was pissed.
Mom turned back to me. “We need to talk, Spencer Miles Logan.”

The inquisition occurred after we got back to our floor.
I sat down on the couch as my parents stood a few feet to the sides. We were going to have a verbal Mexican stand-off.
“What’s her name?” Mom asked.
“Skye.”
“Last name?” Dad inquired.
“Never asked.”
“Where’s she from?”
“Georgia. Maybe Atlanta. I don’t remember is she said that.”
“And you just met this girl, take her on a jetski onto the ocean. Where you’re not supposed to go.” Dad replied as he pointed out the window.
“We forgot. I’m sure she would have mentioned it if she remembered. Just as I would have turned around and came back into the bay.”
“You couldn’t get it started?” Mom asked.
“No, it just died and we sat there for a bit and talked. I mean, what else were we to do?”
My parents looked back and forth at each other.
“We had a run-in with a Mr. and Mrs. Dorian.”
“Okay.”
“They were looking for their grandson, Stephen.”
“And?”
“His sister’s name is Katie.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “She never mentioned a brother, just an older sister.”
“Katie said he went with you.”
“What?” I asked. “Who is Stephen?”
“The better question,” dad said, “is who is Skye?”
“Someone who doesn’t care if I make me money, she likes my books. I think she likes me.”
“There it is.” Mom said and held her arm to my Dad.
“Hmm-mmm,” he mumbled in reply.
“There what is?”
“You’re dense, boy,” Mom said as she walked into the kitchen. “There is no Skye. He was pretending to be a girl and you fell for it because you’re not thinking with your brain.”
“Okay.”
“What?” Dad asked,
“I mean, I had fun with this person, no matter who they are. For the past year I’ve been living in a dark room with only a monitor looking back at me. I hadn’t see the sun in like three days as I’ve tried to work on this book. I take a break from living in my cave and come down here with everyone.” I stood up and walked past them into the kitchen. Yeah, I thought that maybe a change of scenery would do some good and I found something new in Skye.”
“Spencer,” Mom said as I opened the fridge. There was a bottle of wine on the top shelf. A part of me wanted to take it out and just start drinking it. “There’s just something strange about them.”
The other thought it could be used on some form of date night.
“Look, Katie is a bit manipulative, so maybe her grandparents are too.”
“You’re clueless, son,” Dad said.
“Maybe I am. But I’d rather be happy and clueless than depressed and omnipotent to everything. I will talk with her in the morning and we will get everything straightened out.
My parents looked at me like they were waiting to place a straitjacket on me when the door opened and my sisters and their friends came in.
“Pizza’s here,” Sia yelled.

I didn’t eat any of the pizza but instead stayed in my room and stared at my switched-off laptop.
I had material, I had a story…I’m just didn’t have the drive to write any of it. The events of the day went through my mind and I wanted to know what had happened to me? If what my parents said was true then how was I supposed to deal with it? I never had a girlfriend in my life up to that point. I could never talk to them in school and the ones who did talk to me would make either outright flippant comments or hid it behind intense snark.
To maybe they told the truth but I was so jaded by life that I couldn’t tell.
Maybe there was one out there who wanted to do more than talk with me about things.
“There was one. You met her today,” I whispered to myself as I closed the lid to the computer.
I walked out of my room and down the hall.
“I’m going to the beach.”
“It’s getting dark!”
“I know, Dad. I want to see the sunset.”
“Be back. Quickly.”
“Yes sir,” I replied as I opened the front door.
The elevator ride to the beach level took forever and during that eternity I hoped that maybe she’d be on her way to the beach as well, or at least I could find her at the lazy river or at one of the pools on the way to the beach. But I also hoped I wouldn’t find her as I wouldn’t know what to say or ask.
The elevator opened and I looked into the west to see the sun quickly sinking into the ocean. I ran to the beach, now devoid of umbrellas and the crowds of the day with only a few couples and parents with kids searching for ghost crabs.
I sat down on the beach chair that we had rented for the week. The padding had been removed but it was okay to just sit down and stare into the sun.
“I guess we need to talk,” a voice said behind me.
“I suppose so,” I replied.
“Well, here I am. Fire away.”
I turned around to look at her. Her hair was down and she was wearing the same shirt and shorts from earlier in the day.
“Who are you?” I asked.
“Skylar Aylesea Dorian. I was born with the name Stephen. Never liked it. I almost liked Stephanie, but there would always be the memory of Stephen there to haunt me, so.”
“But your grandparents?”
“They don’t understand me. Neither does Katie. She tolerates me at times but on the days she wants to be a bitch, well, I become cannon fodder to her. Everyone wants to tell me it’s a phase. It’s a mental imbalance thing or it’s just creepy. Am I creepy?”
“No.”
“I admit, I’m needy. Maybe a bit weird. I have no idea how to paint my nails or how to make my face look drop-dead gorgeous. But the one thing I am not is some confused little boy who needs to go to therapy. Something Kate says she may have arranged with my parents one day.”
“That’s, that’s pretty bad.”
She walked around the deck chair and stood between me and the sunset.
“The jetski didn’t fail. I pulled the cord. I…I wanted to spend more time with you away from everyone else because I knew as soon as we got back. Even if it was on-time or tomorrow morning. Even if it was after weeks on some zombie-infested island, that this would happen. My family would tell your family with things that, while maybe true in some warped fashion, would just cause everyone some pain. I await your wrath.”
“Skye,”
“Might as well call me by my “true” name.”
“Skye.”
“Spencer! Come on. Don’t say anything that will make me feel better because this is how it’s supposed to end. It’s how it always ends.”
“Sit with me.”
“Sit?”
“Yes,” I said as I knocked my knuckles out the deck chair.
She pulled her hair back and rubbed her left arm on her right shoulder before she walked towards me and sat down.
“It’s a beautiful sunset, isn’t it?” I asked,
“Yeah, spectacular,” she replied,
I reached for her hand and placed mine on it. She recoiled for a moment until she looked at my face.
“You’re not going to yell at me, are you?”
“No.”
“What do you want to do?”
“If I was say what I wanted to, you’d tell me that I was trying to act out a scene from a book.”
“I can think of a lot of scenes.”
“What would you like me to do?”
“I don’t know. I mean, I’m not some pretty girl with picture perfect everything.”
“Yes, you are.”