BLUE
Blue watched as the water stilled, the whale slipping back into the deep like a dream quickly forgotten. Around her the mood on the boat had changed. Seagulls gathered and gossiped like old ladies, frantic with excitement over the humpback’s visit. The passengers became at once celebratory and serene, as after a birth. The boat steered toward the docks, everyone chatting about what they’d seen. Some guests disappeared below, switching from colas to cocktails at the bar, before reappearing on the deck.
“I gotta admit,” Blue said, “that was pretty spectacular. Almost worth all the puking.”
“I knew we’d see one,” Maya said. “I never lost faith.”
“Did anyone get any pictures?” Renee asked.
Blue shook her head regretfully.
“I didn’t even think to,” Hannah said.
“That sucks,” Maya said. “If only there was some genius who remembered to... Oh wait! There is.” She held up her phone, grinning.
“Oh, yay!” Hannah said.
They all gathered around Maya’s phone.
“Make sure you text me all the good ones,” Blue said.
They looked on eagerly as Maya began to scroll and scroll, picture after picture.
Their smiles faltered.
“I don’t understand,” Renee said.
Maya reached the last photo, looked up. “They’re all of Hannah’s hat. That damn thing is bigger than the whale.”
Blue looked closer and, sure enough, every picture was of Hannah’s yellow brim plus a slice of blue ocean and a tiny splash of white water beyond it.
“Wait,” Blue said. “Is that the tail?”
“Yes, I think...” Maya peered closer. “Nope, that’s her ribbon.”
Hannah made a hangdog face. “Sorry.”
They all shook their heads, returned to the bench.
“We still love you,” Maya said. “Just a tiny bit less.”
Blue leaned back, stretched out her legs. Her nausea had subsided just enough that she had resumed replaying every dumb thing she’d done the night before. Each recollection was worse than the last—the drunken spill of water, the look in his eyes, all the stupid things she said. She wanted to find a small closet in herself, safe from memory and self-recrimination, step inside it, shut the door.
In front of her a sleepy toddler eyed her warily from over his mother’s shoulder. Who are you to judge me? she thought, staring back. Things are easy now, but just you wait, it’s all downhill from here. He shoved a biscuit into his mouth with his chocolate-stained fist and glared at her. Yeah, that’s right, teethe on that, little man. She had reached a new low. She was having silent wars with two-year-olds now.
“I don’t want to go back,” Renee said. “Can we just stay on this boat forever?”
“Why not?” Maya said. “Can’t get much more adrift than I already am.”
“Try getting pregnant,” Renee said. “With a cheating fiancé.”
“You win,” Maya said.
“On the plus side, I haven’t thought of Darrin in like five hours.”
“Who?” Maya said.
“Exactly,” Renee said, and they laughed.
Blue closed her eyes for a moment, the night before looping in her brain. She thought of that moment of elation when she’d received the message from Jack last week, of the lacey underwear she’d packed so optimistically in her suitcase. Of how hope could turn so swiftly on her. A flash flood of despair. She blinked it away, thought she might be sick again. “You guys,” she said. The ocean was wrinkled with wind now. In the glint of sunlight, it looked like crumpled tinfoil. Meringue-like peaks of white water formed and scattered. A light mist was dampening her outstretched legs. “What if Jack was like that whale?” She wasn’t asking in the hopes of an answer. She didn’t know what she was hoping for.
“What does that even mean?” Maya said.
Blue examined her feet in their flip-flops. If she looked at Maya directly, she might cry. Grief gnawed at her, carnivorous, insatiable. It seemed both about Jack and utterly separate, a false corollary.
“You wait and wait and wait for good things to come along. The really big things—love, the perfect job, some great victory—but what if one of those things shows up and you just...blow it?”
“Oh, Blue,” Hannah said.
“First person who says ‘there’s more fish in the sea’ gets thrown overboard, by the way,” Blue said to cut the seriousness.
Renee sighed, twisted her engagement ring nervously. “You should text him.”
“No way,” Blue said.
“He’s not your one big thing,” Maya said. “He’s just a guy. Who you’ve attached too much meaning to.”
“What’s the saying?” Hannah said. “Don’t confuse a lesson for a soul mate.”
“So what’s the lesson, then?” Blue said. “And how do you know the difference?” She looked into their blank faces. “And why the hell doesn’t anyone ever have the answers to anything that matters?”
“Technically Hannah gets paid to have the answers,” Maya said.
Blue arched an eyebrow at Hannah. “Do I need to send you an email or do you dispense advice on the fly?”
“Please,” Hannah said. “You’re looking at a girl who sought answers from a carnival psychic.”
Blue sighed, regret weighing on every inhale. If only she could have a do-over.
“If it makes you feel better, I think every guy is my whale,” Renee said. “It doesn’t even occur to me to wonder if I actually like them. It’s just, you know, here’s somebody. I bet a lot of people miss out on the right person by thinking that way. Because, God, who has that much patience to wait? That much faith?”
“Maybe,” Blue said. But it didn’t make her feel any better.
They all got quiet.
In front of them, the woman with the toddler was now wiping his chocolate-covered hands with a napkin from her bag. Blue noticed Renee watching them.
“I’m going to raise this kid without a father,” Renee said slowly, as if that reality was only now settling in. “Just like my mother. Literally a repeat. Why can’t we ever get away from our past?”
“I don’t know,” Blue said, wondering the same.
“I’ll end up screwing this kid up for life.”