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Authors: Jolene Perry

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BOOK: Spill Over
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“But David, or Trace, or Finn, or—”
Who else do I know that lives close?

She
pushes out a breath
. “Sorry, Antony. It’s settled.
I know there are other places you’d rather stay, but I think it’s important you spend time with your dad.

Settled—
like the weight in my gut.
The only argument
left is begging
, or guilt, or a mix of the two. “Mom, we’ve always talked things through first. I think it’s worked really well.”

H
er face
begins
to soften.

“We’ve made dec
isions together for a long time. A
m I making you crazy or something? I’m a little behind in Trig, but
it won’t take long to catch up.
Phil said he’d
meet with me tomorrow if I want.

Can I sound desperate enough for this to not happen?
Because I’m feeling pretty desperate right now.

“Having you in Darfur terrifies me Antony.” Now she looks vulnerable. This is
the
face I can’t argue against.

“Then I don’t want
you
there.”
But
I
already
know how this argument goes. She’s an adult. She’s the one in the middle of cameras and
security, and
she can’t keep track of me when she’s working.
We’ve had the run-around before, and we both know how it ends.

Her face closes off.
I know before she
speaks that I’ve lost. It just
seems too horrible to think about. “Sorry. I did tell your dad that you needed to be able to keep with your home school. He was going to register you for spring semester.”


What
?” My head snaps back to Mom. “Like
public
school?” I’ve heard horrors. I’m not about to go there.

Mom laughs. “You know, I went to a
public school
, and I think I did okay for myself.”

I ca
n tell by the tease in her voice
that we’re still okay.
But how okay am I?
How will I get along with a guy who wears Costco jeans and
thinks
it’s cool to live on a
boat
?

Her hand rests on my knee. “I love you Antony, but this is a big opportunity
for me to do the kind of
journalism that
at the end of the day, really
means
something. Will hopefully bring attention to an area of the world that’s in desperate need of aid. I know you don’t want to spend the time with your dad,
and I’ve let you avoid him for way too long.
I’ve
had
guilt over that for a
lot of years
. He asks about you a lot, you know.”

I nod. Mom always tells me
when Dad’s send
s
her an email
, or when they talk
.
I
t happens often, even though Dad and I don’t talk all that much. Mom knows how uncomfortable it is for me, which makes me even more frustrated over what’s happening now.

Dread is
n’t
cr
eeping in
, it’s
taking over
.
This is insane. I belong with Mom. I belong in New York.
T
hese are my people. This is who I am.

“If it were somewhere else, I’d bring you, but this is an opportunity for
both
of us.”
Her voice has the soft seriousness that lets me know she sort of gets it, but we’re doing it anyway.

“I c
ould stay here. I’m almost eigh
teen. People leave for college when they’re eighteen. It happens all the time.” I can’t even force hope into my voice, because I can tell it’s decided.

“Love you, son.” She wraps her small arms around me. “
I’ll be back before your birthday.
It’ll go by so fast. I promise.”

I chuckle. “You can promise no such thing. Just, be safe, okay?”

“That, I can promise.”
She has to lean up to kiss my cheek.

And this is going to suck, but it is what it is. Seattle’s not a bad city. A bit cold and rainy in January, but I can deal with that. It’s my dad and the boat that I’m worried about.

 

 

 

 

 

Two

             
             

It’s raining. Of course it’s raining. I’m in Seattle. What els
e would it do here? My hair get
s all
weird and curly in this weather. I
t makes me crazy.
My friend, David, would harass me to no end over
it
, but mostly cause he’s obsessed with his.

I walk slowly through the halls of the airport, unwilling to move as quickly as the peopl
e around me. I don’t know what D
ad and I are going to talk about on the drive to his boat, mu
ch less for the next few
months.

This sucks.
Maybe we can boat up to Canada or something. I laugh. That’s probably about
as intern
ational as Dad gets. Th
ese
three
months will be
an
eternity
.

The more I think about it, the more I feel dumped here. Mom keeps telling me I’
m spoiled.
I keep insisting I’m not. She probably thinks this’ll be one of those life-changing experiences, when I’m
already
one of the nice guys. And the only good thing I c
an imagine coming from this is M
om feeling really guilty about leaving me here when she
gets
home.
Guilt can go a long way—
I still might get Paris for my birthday. She said she’d be back
in time
.

Baggage claim in the public airport is ridiculous. I can’t remember the last ti
me I flew commercial, but
Mom wasn’t with me, and I’m guessing part of her thought it would
be pretentious of me to make Dad
go to the private airport. So, apparently a half hour of his discomfort is wort
h a seven-
hour flight of my discomfort
. See? D
umped.

I’m not even looking for Dad. Part of me hopes he doesn’t show. Then I could grab my bag and my passport and head to Paris. Mom and Arnaud may have had another falling out, but Arnaud and I haven’t. We get along great. He’s younger than Mom, I’m younger than him, and I think he likes dragging me around. Makes
him
feel younger. So, all I nee
d to wish for is that Dad won’t—

“A
ntony?” Dad’s
gravelly
voice booms out behind me.

I cringe, and almost wish I could disappear, because r
eally? Do we have to yell?

I turn to face him. My dad. His
light
brown beard now has a few grey hairs
.
It’s not a nice, neat trim, beard. It’s the kind of beard I’d expect to see on a guy who lives on a boat, grows his own tomatoes
at a community
garden
,
and drinks organic beer.
His black-rimmed glasses look like something from 1968.
He’s wearing a rain jacket, worn jeans and his
dirty, white canvas
boat shoes. Of course. Because w
hy would you wear anything else?

“Hey, Dad.” I keep my voice low. Appropriate.

He walks through the edges of people hovering around the carousel. But when he stops in front of me, I’m not sure what to do. Do we hug? Shake? I thin
k it’s b
een more than two years—
he’s a stranger.

I don’t have any more time to think about it. He grabs me in a tight hug
.
I pat his back, holding my backpack
with my laptop, iPad, iPod, phone
,
and camera off to the side. No need to smash those things together.
The reality that I’m actually going to be stuck here for a wh
ile, works its way through me.
I hate feeling betrayed by Mom
like this
.

“You look exactly
like your mom.” He’s stari
ng at me as he pulls away. Dad and I are
the same height now

an even six feet
. I’m kinda proud of that.
Dad’s a bit
broader than me, but he looks trim, healthy, as always.

“Yeah,” I say. “W
e get that a lot.”

“So, you must be like, seven
teen now?” he asks
, adjusting his dark glasses
.

He’s my dad. Sh
ouldn’t he know stuff like this?
My birthday is one of the for-sure call days from him.
“Yep. S
eventeen
.

And I’m
so
close to the magic eighteen.

“You have a
driver’s
license, right?”
His hands rest comfortably in his dirty jeans.

“Yeah
.”
Of course.
Who gets to seventeen without bothering to get a license?

“I only asked because I know you’ll want to have some freedom, and you live in New York and a lot of pe
ople don’t bother with cars and


“Mom can afford a car.” I let out a breath. My life is completely foreign to him. He doesn’t get it at all. Or me. “There’s one of my bags.” I step forward and heft the case to the floor.


One
of your bags? How much did you bring?” He chuckles.

“I’m a
pparently here for three
months, D
ad.
I need my stuff.” My textbooks are in there, my clothes, some shoes. I couldn’t bring nearly what I wanted to
. Shipping wasn’t an issue.
Mom informed me that space would be the issue. Because I’ll be living on a boat.
And not a
Jay-Z/
Tiger Woods
kind of boat. A sailboat.
“There’s only two.”

“And the one on your back.”
He points.

Obviously. But I
keep my mouth shut and stare at the carousel to
wait for my other bag to come down.
I’m still sort of in disbelief that this is actually happening.

- - -

Dad no longer keeps his boat on the Seattle side of Puget Sound.
Too busy
, he says
. The drive takes us an excruciating hour and a half of awkward questions and silences.

We pull up in a small…
town
? If I can call it that. A grocery store, lots of trees, a few houses, a couple of gas stations
,
and restaurants where I’d be more worried about the cleanliness of the table than the quality of food.
The quality of the food would be pretty obvious by the exterior.
Oh, and a Starbucks, I fo
rget how this spot of the world
needs Starbucks everywhere.

If I’m being honest with myself, I’m feeling a bit lost here, but the survival part kicks in, and wonders why on earth I need to be stuck.

“Here we are.” He pulls his Prius into a parking space and the dim light
of evening,
and the rain
,
all
add to the dreariness of the place. It’s a boat harbor. Nothing special or exciting. Blue metal roofs and thick wooden pilings surround row after row of average looking boats. Nothing here’s even close to Matt Lauer’s boat. In my opinion no one should even attempt to live on something smaller than his.

I’m stunned into silence
, and going sort of numb
. H
ere’s where part of me wants to run at the mouth, like Mom would say, but I don’t.
I’m smarter than that.
The insanity of living on a boat, in this
p
odunk
little town, somewhere that’
s always raining…
If you’re going to live on a boat, why wouldn’t you do it somewhere like the Virgin Islands?
That
I could see.
Three months of warm water and sand would be something to look forward to.

A steep wall of rocks leads to the ocean on the other side of the
chain-link
fence
we’re following
, and up the hill is a smattering of homes and the restaurants we passed on the drive down.

BOOK: Spill Over
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ads

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