Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 98345 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 492(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98345 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 492(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 328(@300wpm)
She turns, her smile shifting into a sympathetic frown once she gets a good look at me.
“Oh no. Casey. What’s wrong?”
Chapter Sixteen
CASEY
I feel sedated by the calm blue water surrounding us. There’s not a wave as far as I can see. Just deep ocean and sky that stretches on forever. It’s late afternoon, and Sienna and I are lounging by the pool on board Aurelia. I’m lying on my stomach with my chin in my hands, staring at nothing, really.
“Are you thinking about it again?” Sienna asks me.
I’ve gone quiet on her, but I can’t help it.
This morning, after a long discussion in my suite where I filled her in as best as I could on my job and why I’ve hit a wall, she convinced me to join her and a few others for a tour of Saint Thomas, culminating in a cocktail tasting on the beach. Apparently, the Virgin Islands are known for four cocktails in particular: the painkiller, the bushwhacker, the banana daiquiri, and the rum punch. The painkiller was my favorite and not just because the name was so fitting for my horrible day. It was a delicious blend of pineapple juice, orange juice, coconut cream, and dark rum that immediately slipped me right back into vacation mode. Well . . . at least for the length of time it took me to finish the fruity drink.
Then my pit of despair returned in full force.
It’s helpful to have Sienna by my side, though, acting like a Band-Aid. I feel like I have to keep it together for her sake. I don’t want to break down again here, poolside, while everyone else is having the time of their lives. There’s a DJ playing fun dance music and waiters passing around drinks and complimentary snacks, trying to ensure everyone is well taken care of. The atmosphere is really fun, but I can’t help but feel wholly apart from it all.
“I hate that you’re not enjoying yourself,” Sienna adds when I don’t answer her.
“I am,” I insist, rolling over to face her.
She sees right through my canned response.
With a shake of her head, she pushes up her sunglasses so they perch atop her blonde hair. I always think Sienna is stunning, but right now beside the pool, sun kissed in a bikini, she’s something else. Javier had better be somewhere nearby, eating his heart out, I think.
“What did you think of the tour this morning?” she asks, smartly steering us back toward a safer topic than my impending doom. Talk of our tour won’t bring tears to my eyes.
“It was really fun. I’m glad we’ll be in Saint Thomas for another day. I want to go out and explore a bit more. I feel like we only got a taste of things this morning. And they mentioned that snorkeling excursion. That sounded really fun.”
“Oh, I’ll definitely join you for that. Swear you’ll do it with me.”
I nod in confirmation. “We can go off on our own afterward. I did that while we were in Puerto Plata.”
She groans. “I’m jealous. I got talked into this walking tour, and it was okay—don’t get me wrong—but the guide was just such a snooze! Sometimes they think they’re really going to bowl us over with facts about bricks and mortar. Sir, unless Brad Pitt laid those bricks, I could give two shites.”
I laugh. “Here, let me show you what I did. I actually made it to the top of the mountain there.”
“Stop! You did? Oh, now I feel even worse. Let me see.”
She sits up as I dig in my bag for my phone. I’ve been avoiding it all day—not wanting to stumble across another work email that would send me spiraling again. I haven’t even begun to look at those assignments Gwen gave me. They can damn well wait. I worked my butt off getting her that story yesterday. I’m not going to hole up inside my suite for another day, toiling away at my computer.
“Here.” I pass Sienna my phone and watch her scroll through the few photos I took when I was inside the cable car on the way up the mountain. As gorgeous as it looks, truly, the images hardly do the view justice.
I spent a few hours writing about my day in Puerto Plata as well. It’s nothing to brag about, though, just a short piece highlighting my favorite parts of the city, with the most convenient route to get to and from the cable cars. It was a writing exercise more than anything, a pretend assignment, and I’m too shy to tell her about it.
“These are good, Casey.” She looks up at me, eyes wide with excitement. “You should post them.”
I laugh. “No social media, remember?”
She groans again as she hands me back my phone. “Right, ugh, how could I forget you’re living in the Stone Age?”