Shark Lover (33 page)

“I
had fun too,” She said as she got up to lead him towards the door. She felt a
little sad that he was leaving so soon. In times like this, she didn’t like to
be alone. She liked to surround herself with people who cared about her and
made her feel better. Chris was one of those people. “I’ll see you tomorrow
then, good luck with all of your classes tomorrow.” She opened the door to let
him out as she finally saw Carly emerge from out of the kitchen. Cathy wished
she would go back in and clean up. She knew nothing good could come from this.

“Bye
Chris!” Carly yelled out obnoxiously. “Cathy really likes you, I hope I get to
see you again really soon!” She ran back into the kitchen before Cathy could
give her a piece of her mind. She knew Carly was really pushing her to move on
with Chris, but they were just friends. Cathy wasn’t ready for another
commitment, she didn’t know if she ever would be again. A part of her had died
when Marc died.

Cathy’s
cheeks turned bright red as she stared at Chris who was still standing outside
of her door. “I’m so sorry about that. She has a big mouth.” She stared at the
ground self-consciously.

Chris
grinned. “It’s okay. She’s just honest. You have to appreciate that in a
person. I wish more people were like your sister. Have a great night,” He said
as he started walking away. He turned back suddenly and asked, “Cathy?”

“Yes?”

“I
like you too. It’s fun doing stuff together. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He started
walking down the stairs as Cathy just stared in wonderment. She wasn’t sure if
Chris meant that as a friend or as something more. The timing seemed off to
her. She knew he wasn’t the type of guy to make a move on someone who had just
lost someone so important in their life. She decided to just take it as a
friendly compliment. Friends could miss each other and want to spend time with
each other. She didn’t want to think of it as being something more and it
probably wasn’t. Overthinking things was what she always tended to do for some
reason.

            It
had been over two weeks and Mandy was still out on the loose. Chris and Cathy
had been going out on the boat nearly every day, searching for some sign of
her. Cathy was starting to worry that she had left the San Francisco area
completely. The thought of never capturing Mandy, bothered Cathy unto no end.
She thought that after two weeks they would have found her. Mandy wasn’t even
showing up on Marc’s mobile shark tracker anymore. Cathy knew that most shark
trackers only lasted a few months, but they had just tagged Mandy recently. It
couldn’t have been more than a month or so since they first tagged her. Cathy
was starting to lose hope completely.

            “Don’t
do that.” Chris said as he looked at her from behind the wheel.

            “Do
what? I wasn’t doing anything.” She looked off the side of the boat. Every day
she was sailing on this boat. While she loved boating and loved the ocean, but
she was getting tired of going back home with nothing to show for it. Marc had
been gone for more than a month and she still wasn’t having an easy time coping
with it. Each day just got worse. She couldn’t imagine living this way for the
rest of her life.

            “Give
up. I can tell in your eyes that you want to. It’s only been two weeks. Like I
said I’m in this with you and we’re not giving up.” Chris took hold of the
wheel and brought the ship out further into the sea.

            “Chris,
it’s just hard. I still haven’t done anything to bring justice to Marc. I
thought by now that we would have had something. I’m sure any remains that were
within Mandy will have been gone by now. I think we missed our opportunity that
day we caught the seal. She’s probably migrated by now. We may never see her
again.”

            “I
know it’s hard, but I don’t want you to give up on the fight. All of the
evidence will probably be gone from inside her, but you will still be able to
catch her to bring Marc peace. Don’t worry so much. It’s not time to give up
yet. I’m sure we will find her on the shark tracker once again.” He said
firmly.

            “Yeah
Cathy don’t give up,” Carly chimed in. Cathy had almost forgotten that she had
joined them. Carly had been so busy and overwhelmed with school, it was tough
even being able to see her these days. “We’ll find Mandy. We won’t stop until
we do.” She paused. “I have some bad news.”

            “Oh
no, Carly what happened? Is it something with school?” Cathy asked worriedly.

            “Yes.
I didn’t maintain the 4.0 that I promised you at the beginning of the semester.
It looks like I will be cleaning your apartment every weekend.” She sighed
looking down at the floor of the boat.

            “Oh,
that’s all. I forgot we even made that bet. You don’t have to clean. We’ll just
forget that the bet ever happened.” Cathy stated in an empathetic tone.

            “It’s
a lot more than just that. I didn’t do too well. So I am switching schools. I
hate to tell you this now, but I am probably going to move back in with Mom. I
can’t afford to pay rent for an apartment and go to this new school. The school
I am transferring to is more expensive and Mom’s house is closer to it. Plus I
want to be able to save for a new car.” She looked up at her sister searching
for more empathy.

            “You
don’t have to pay rent. I didn’t even have a roommate before you moved in. I
don’t mind paying for the both of us. I’ll even pay for your expenses if you
need me to. I really don’t want to go back to living alone. Not after
everything that has happened,” Cathy said as she ran a hand through her hair
stressed. “I know it’s not a big space. Maybe we can get a bigger apartment
somewhere else that would give us more room.”

            “No,
no Cathy. I don’t want you to pay my bills. I do love living with you though.
Why don’t you move back home with me? Mom would love it. It’s great when all
three of us are living together.”

            “I
don’t think I can right now. I have the apartment leased for another year. Ugh,
I just remembered that. What am I going to do? I cut back on my hours at the
aquarium so I could use more of my time to help find Mandy. I don’t know if I
can even afford the apartment by myself anymore.” She stressed by pacing back
and forth on the boat. The rocking motion of the waves were making her dizzy.
She already felt confused and uneasy by all of this commotion that Carly was
causing in her life.

            “I’ll
be your roommate,” Chris jumped in the conversation as Cathy and Carly turned
away from each other and looked at him in shock. “My lease to my apartment is
up anyways. Plus the buddy I was living with is getting married, so I assume he
will be moving in with his wife.”

            “I
only have a one bedroom. Are you sure that will work for you? Thanks so much
for the offer Chris. You have no idea how much that will help me. It would work
out great too. We’re best friends and we practically spend all of our time
together anyways, so it’s like why not live together.” Cathy said excitedly.

It
had been a while since she had been this excited over something. Usually her
days were filled with the monotonous pain of missing Marc every moment. Carly
was constantly gone and she wasn’t able to spend much time with her. She had
planned on moving back home a month ago, but the lease hadn’t been up and it
just seemed as if she never found the time to move. The constant battle of trying
to find Mandy, dealing with school and working at the aquarium were too much
for her to handle. She couldn’t imagine planning a move on top of all of that.
When she moved, she would be forced to pack up Marc’s stuff and put it away.
She wasn’t in the mood for that just yet. She wasn’t ready to let go.

            “I
don’t mind crashing on the couch. Believe me I have seen worse.” He chuckled.
“I’ll even help Carly move out. I know a strong guy comes in handy when moving.
I can probably even get some other members of Shark Savors to help us move.” He
said as he parked the boat at the dock. Another day had gone by without a trace
of Mandy. Even Cathy could tell that Chris was exhausted, but he still didn’t
show any trace of wanting to quit the chase.

            “That’s
great! We can all move this weekend. I’m looking forward to it,” She said as
she got off the boat. Carly followed her and they started to go back towards
the headquarters. “Chris are you coming up with us?”

            “I’ll
be there in a minute. I’m going to give the boat a quick wash. It’s starting to
smell like dead fish, which isn’t appealing. I don’t want the Shark Savors team
to come out next Saturday and have to smell this.” He picked up a large brush
and started scrubbing the sides of the boat.

            “Okay,
we’ll be up here.” Cathy started walking back up the steps as Carly jogged
faster in order to keep up with her.

            “So,
I have a confession.” Carly looked down blushing. Her blond hair was getting so
long now. All of her curls were tangled. Cathy wondered how long it had been
since she last had it cut. When their hair was the same length, the often
looked like twins. Now that Carly’s was longer, she took on her own identity.
Cathy could tell from the way that she was blushing that she had done
something. She didn’t know what Carly did, but she knew that she was up to
something.

            “What
did you do now Carly? Please don’t tell me that it’s something worse than not
getting good grades at school. I told you that you need to put more time into
studying. School is supposed to be the most important thing in your life right
now, not boys. Just promise me you will at least devote some time to your
schoolwork.” Cathy said in a harsh tone. She knew she was being hard on Carly,
but her sister needed it. She needed to focus on school and find her path in
life. She was focusing too much on the wrong things.

            “Sheesh,
I didn’t ask for pep talk 101. My confession was actually going to be about
school,” She said rolling her eyes at Cathy. “You always think I am so boy
crazy. I don’t even know where you get that idea from.” She stared off looking
at a guy without his shirt on heading towards the beach.

            “See
that’s what I am talking about. You were totally checking out that guy. Now if
only you could be that into your schoolwork, you would be a top notch student.
So what were you going to say?” Cathy still sounded harsh and she knew it.

Sometimes
she felt as if she was like a second mother to her sister. She wanted to just
be her sister, but ever since their dad died she felt as if she needed to be
Carly’s other guardian. Carly needed it to stay productive and motivated. Cathy
constantly worried about her. She figured that it was just an older sister
thing, but there was more to it than that. Carly was one of the most important
people in her life and she wanted to make sure that she was taken care of. Even
though Carly was an adult, Cathy still felt protective over her.

“You
have to promise that you won’t be mad, okay?” She blushed again looking at the
ground.

“Just
tell me what you did,” Cathy said dryly. “I can’t make any promises yet until
you tell me what you did.”

“Alright…alright.
I actually did really well in school. I’m not transferring schools, but I will
be taking more classes at a satellite location. I didn’t get a 4.0, but I did pretty
well. It was my first semester of college and I got a 3.8.” She said with
honesty.

“Wait…why
would you tell me that you did horrible? I honestly thought you weren’t trying.
Carly, you don’t have to move out then. Do you not like living with me? Am I
that unbearable? I try not to be messy but…”

“Cathy,
stop you need to calm down. That’s not at all what I am saying,” Carly said
interrupting quickly. “I am moving out for you. So you can start your life
again. You need to move on and with me there, it’s hindering you from doing
that. I know you are still going through the grieving process, but I want you
to be happy again. I miss the old Cathy. You used to be so carefree and full of
life. All of that is gone now. Whenever you are with Chris, I see that girl
come out again. The one who was always laughing and smiling. The last few
months, you haven’t been living up to your potential. Marc wouldn’t want you to
live this way. You’re doing the exact same thing that you did when Dad died.”
Carly put her arm on Cathy’s as she opened the door to the headquarters and let
her in. Cathy pushed her hand away and hurriedly went into the door.

“Carly,
I don’t need you to look out for me. I know you’re worried, but I am fine. It’s
just been a rough time for me. The guy that I thought I was going to spend the
rest of my life with died so suddenly, without a goodbye. At least I got to say
goodbye to Daddy. Marc didn’t even give me a chance to do that. He was just
taken away from me. I can’t believe you are still trying to push Chris on me.
We’re just friends Carly. I don’t know why you think it is more than that. It
never has been and it never will be. I’m still the same person, maybe you just
haven’t been looking hard enough.” She sat down at one of the tables in the
lobby and covered her hands over her face.

She
didn’t know when she got so stressed and unable to handle her life. She was
tired of constantly having breakdowns in front of her friends and family.
Everyone said it was normal behavior for someone who was grieving. She was
starting to wonder if Carly was right. Every day she didn’t feel like the same
person that she used to be. She used to be happy and full of life. Now every
day was filled with crying and feeling unsettled.