Sailor Proof by Annabeth Albert
Chapter Ten
Arthur
“Introduce me to your new man,” Aunt Sandy demanded as she passed our table on her way back from the dessert buffet. Fork in hand, she settled into an open chair at our table. She shared my mom’s habit of circulating throughout a meal, collecting all the best gossip. It was a wonder it had taken her this long to make it to us.
“Aunt Sandy, this is Derrick.” I’d made so many introductions that I doubted even Derrick’s impressive brain was keeping track of names. The dining hall was full of relatives and friends, a lively group, and I too was struggling to keep up with all the newcomers and changed hairstyles and kids who had grown half a foot since I saw them last.
“You look familiar.” Her eyes narrowed, revealing the same shrewdness that had made her an excellent flight nurse. She was a double relative as she was my mother’s sister who had also married a Euler cousin.
Derrick extended a hand across the table. “I’m also Calder’s friend.”
“That’s where I saw you before.” Like my mom, she had short, fading red hair laced with gray and white. She had a firm handshake for Derrick before returning to her pie. “And of course that video that Maureen sent around.”
“That did make the rounds, didn’t it?” I was getting tired of hearing about the video. Now that it had served its purpose and made Derrick’s ex jealous, I was way more concerned with the prospect of getting some real, private kisses than with the idea of going viral again.
We could just have sex. For the millionth time during dinner, I mentally slapped myself. Smooth. So smooth. There were a ton of ways that I could have seduced Derrick and probably had better results than making it sound like a choice between a movie and a video game as after-dinner entertainment. But instead I’d blurted that out, and he’d predictably shot me down, and now we’d spent the whole meal weirdly tense and formal, that one bed undoing all the fun and easiness we’d found on the drive over.
And what was worse was that I’d wanted him to say yes, bad idea though it inevitably was. If we were going to practice good-boyfriend behavior, hooking up this week made a certain amount of sense. Lord knew I could sure use that sort of practice too. Moreover, I simply couldn’t get that kiss out of my brain.
“You’re aiming high, Arthur.” Aunt Sandy shook a long finger at me. “I like it. Calder must be having kittens though.”
From across the table, Calder winked at me. He was clearly enjoying the attention being on me a bit too much. The family opinion seemed to be unanimous that Derrick was too good for me. All the approval was unsettling, as was the implication that someone like me would need to work extra hard to keep Derrick.
“That’s one way to put it,” I said mildly, giving the man in question a hard question. “Did Kelly come?”
It was a deliberate change in subject, but I did like Sandy’s daughter, who was married to a woman who worked as a social worker for a veterans support organization. They had two little girls who were a nice change of pace from the seemingly endless stream of boy babies in the family.
“Kelly’s family will be late.” Sandy frowned. “She got called in to work an emergency shift, so they’re leaving Olympia first thing in the morning.”
I made a sympathetic noise. “That’s too bad.”
“Eh. That’s the life of a nurse. We’re so proud of Kelly’s acceptance into a master’s degree program too. She’ll do so much good as a nurse practitioner.”
“I bet.” I nodded, but my spine still stiffened. Do good. It might as well be the family mantra. I swept my gaze around the room. Soldiers. Firefighters. Nurses. Paramedics. And, of course, a huge contingent of sailors. And every last one of them served the greater good.
And then there was me.
“You should think about going back to school as well.” Aunt Sandy had clearly been talking to Mom.
“I already have a master’s.” I worked to keep my tone level. No sense pissing off one of the aunts on the first night.
“Yes, but not in education. You’d be such a good music teacher.” She patted my hand encouragingly. The family was obsessed with finding me my “calling.” Too bad I’d already done exactly that.
“I’m pretty happy doing what I’m doing. Just landed a big job for later in the month.”
“That’s excellent.” Derrick played the part of the supportive boyfriend to perfection, leaning forward, eyes all eager. “Tell us about it.”
“My friends are doing an expansion pack for their award-winning game, and I’ll be doing the score for the new level. It introduces a fun new mechanic, and I’m looking forward to the work. Hopefully, it leads to more jobs for other games.”
“I’m sure it will.” Derrick threw an arm around me, easy as if we did that all the time, easy like the tension in our cabin never happened, easy like he truly was that supportive. If only.
“Aw. You’re so cute together.” My mom arrived at our table, wearing a visor from our last reunion and toting her clipboard and a pen.
“Thanks.” I forced a smile. We were cute. I might as well try to enjoy it. “You’ve got a clipboard. Should I be worried?”
Mom didn’t laugh at my tease. “Did you check your messages?”
“Uh...”
“I’m betting they had better things to do before dinner.” Aunt Sandy laughed a little too loud.
“Indeed.” Mom had the grace to blush. And honestly, I wished they were right. Making out would have been a far better use of our time than debating who was going to sleep in the tub. Mom dragged a chair over next to me. “I had an idea for awards night on the last night of camp.”
“Yeah.” My face scrunched up. I wasn’t a fan of the annual awards, which celebrated both recent accomplishments outside of camp like promotions, but also silly stuff like fastest canoe time, best hiker, and other awards I’d been destined to never win as a kid.
“I want to add a talent show for the children. With prizes, and I brought some cheap trophies.”
I couldn’t hold back my groan. “Of course it would have to be a competition.”
“Well, prizes make it fun.” She beamed, clearly in love with her big brainstorm. “And you could get them to do some sort of group musical number too. Something cute.”
“But with a winner. Everything needs a winner.” I tried to hide my bitterness behind a tease, but judging by Derrick’s frown I hadn’t entirely succeeded.
“Winning is—” My mom continued earnestly before her eyes narrowed. “Wait. You’re joking.”
“Yup. Sarcasm, Mom. But I’ll do it.” If I didn’t, someone else would, someone who shared the family obsession with crowning winners. Better to go along with the idea, try to subvert it from the inside, and if I was lucky, rehearsals might keep me from horrors like volleyball and horseshoes.
“You will?” Sitting up straighter, she tilted her head like she’d expected a lot more resistance from me.
“If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s picking songs and scripting award shows.” I made my voice all cheerful. It wouldn’t do to let on that I had my own agenda behind agreeing. “All that RA experience should be good for something.”
“Excellent.” She reached between Sandy and me to squeeze my shoulder.
“I can help,” Derrick volunteered, clearly making a bid for more good-boyfriend bonus points. At this rate, no one I brought around in future years would ever measure up. As it was, finding something to top that kiss was going to be a challenge and a half. I should have thought this through more.
I nodded, though, because that was what a besotted boyfriend would do. “Thanks.”
“Even better.” Mom beamed at both of us before standing. “Now, I better catch Maureen before we transition to the fire circle.”
“I’ll help with rounding people up,” Aunt Sandy said as she too left the table.
“You don’t actually have to help,” I whispered to Derrick after they were both gone.
“I don’t mind.” He shrugged, expression hard to decipher. Probably he was simply doing what we’d talked about in the car, practicing being an attentive partner. Which meant I should probably release him from the obligation, but before I could, Calder came around the table to stand at Derrick’s other side.
“Hey, man, come grab a beer with us before the campfire.” Calder knew perfectly well that I wasn’t a drinker and that I’d rather be roasted like a marshmallow than hear more military talk, so it wasn’t surprising when he didn’t even glance at me. Derrick did, however, darting his eyes toward me as his mouth quirked.
“Is—”
“Go ahead.” I made a dismissive gesture. He’d racked up enough good-boyfriend karma for one evening. “It’s okay. I should probably come up with some sort of sign-up sheet for the show, see which kids are interested. You go enjoy your drink.”
I didn’t see Derrick again for about an hour as I found some paper and a pen in the resort office and set about talking to different families, signing up eager kids and persuading those more reluctant or shy to give it a try. Meanwhile, snippets of songs kept parading through my head, possibilities for a musical number that might have meaning beyond another opportunity to crown a winner.
At the fire circle, which was located in a clearing between some of the larger buildings, Calder’s crew was already there, Derrick included, beer in hand. Shoulders loose and relaxed, he looked content. No sense in me dragging him away from his friends, so instead I assisted in handing out the ingredients for s’mores and settled for catching glimpses of him in the flickering firelight.
“Your guy seems nice.” Ingrid, a cousin around my age, smiled at me as she helped one of the kids load marshmallows onto a stick.
“He is.” I looked over at him again, chest going warm and tight at the same time. He was nice. So nice. But he wasn’t mine.
“You’re not fighting, are you?” Ingrid asked.
“No, of course not.” I managed a return grin. The last thing I needed was that rumor. “He’s hanging out with his friends.”
“And you get him all to yourself later anyway.”
“There is that.” Damn it. I’d managed to avoid thinking about the one-bed situation for an hour or so, but now those thoughts swarmed my brain. I kept replaying my clumsy come-on, including the brief second when I’d thought Derrick might be about to agree. Hell, sleeping in the tub might be good for me, let me cool off this obsession with him. After all, no matter what, we were not going to share that bed.
