Dana

After dinner, Hutch and I decided it might be fun if we had a little time after Blu went to bed.  So we strolled around a bit, played a few video games with Blu, then set off to the Presidential Suite to tuck her in, then sneak out for a moonlight stroll.  Well, I reasoned, he deserves that, it’s part of the experience, and he is paying for it.  It’s just a stroll around the ship, maybe a dance, that’s all.

Yeah, another voice inside me contradicted, right.

Walking down the hall with them, I got nervous again.  I knew what was going to happen eventually if I didn’t stop it.  And I really didn’t want to, but I knew that, at the end of the night, I’d be going to bed alone, no matter what either one of us wanted or how badly we wanted it. But there was no denying the attraction, the tension, all those looks he gave me during dinner.  I had to wonder, Was I just teasing him, knowing I’d never put out?  That’s not right, that’s not the kind of person I am.  But to sleep with a man I barely know, and on our first date?  That’s just too much, too fast.  It doesn’t matter how great he is, how gorgeous, how rich.  Not on the first date, no way.  But I knew I had to make a plan and make it fast.  It was too risky to leave things up to the spontaneity of the moment.  I’ve gotta gave an out, an excuse, some way to ease out of the situation without insulting him or angering him … or keep him from trying again.  We arrived at the end of the Presidential hallway toward his suites and I did't rush to get to the end of that hall.  I’ll tell him we’ve got a lot of things planned for Blu the next day, starting early in the morning.  There's lots to do, it's not a total lie.  He'll see through it anyway, but if does and he objects then he's really not the man he's pretending to be, and I'll be a lot better off.  At least then I won't have to face Daddy with that guilty loom.  I'll bet parents can tell once you've past that line!

We arrived at the suite door and took a deep breath. 

Hutch opened the door and led us all into the central room of the suite and turned to me.  “Let me clean her up, tuck her in.”

Suddenly, I wasn’t so worried.  “Take your time,” I said with a smiling whisper of my own.

Blu turned to me.  “G’night, Dana.”

“Goodnight, Blu, I’m so glad you’re on the ship with us.”

She smiled as he led her into her private room with an attached bath.  I looked around the suite while he tended to her.  I already knew, but it was obvious what an attentive and loving father he was, and for me that was as attractive as his tall, muscular body or that amazing face, blue eyes peering out from under that black hair.  I shook my head, cautioning myself not to get carried away, swept up in his charm or charisma, all that he had and all that he represented.  You’ll get hurt, Dana, I warned myself, all three of you will.  But that nervous nausea curled in my stomach, hard to define.  Is it anxiousness?  Confusion?  Lust?

The sounds of the faucet stopped, a few unseen footprints leading to the bed.  I stepped back into the suite's common area, impossible not to hear the conversation they were having just a few yards away.

“Did you have a good time today, hon?”

“Yeah.  Daddy, you’ve still got your jacket on.  Take it off.”

“Maybe a bit later, hon.”

“Later?  Why?”  After a short silence, she asked, “Were are you going?  You're not going out?”

Her voice got louder, but his remained calm, a soothing gravel tone.  “I was going to step out for a while with Dana, yes.”

“No, Daddy no!”

“Shshshshshsh, take it easy, hon.  You like Dana, don't you?”

“Yes, but … just don’t go out, Daddy.  You two can stay in, watch a movie on the TV.”

“”Blu, you're perfectly safe. I'm going to have somebody standing outside the door -- ”

“No, Daddy!  Nobody by the door, nobody by the door!”

I stood there with my heart breaking, tears threatening to melt all that carefully applied makeup.

Hutch said, “You’ll be perfectly safe, Blu.”

“No, it’ll be like Mommy just like Mommy!”

“No it won't be, Blu,” Hutch said with a bit more sternness, a bit more authority than I’d heard him use with her before.  “Mommy wasn’t safe in her bed, like you are.  She wasn’t protected the way you are.”

“I don’t care -- “

“You sleep at home every night without a problem — ”

“We have the dogs at home, Daddy.”

“And out here we've got the whole Atlantic Ocean, surrounding us, keeping us from anybody who would do us any harm at all.”  I stood there, knowing in that long silence that poor Blu was wrenching with fear, that she'd faced terrible horror in her life and not that long before. 

“Please, Daddy, please?  Pleeeeeeezzzzzzzzze?”

I thought I heard her cry a little, but it didn't last before Hutch said, very tenderly, “Okay, Blu, okay.  I’ll stay right here, get a little work done.  I've always got a little work to get done.”

“Thank you, Daddy,” was all she said, and all she needed to say, except a pouting, “I love you, Daddy … so much.”

“I love you too, my daughter, more than anything or anyone in the world.”

Another tender moment later, Hutch stepped out of Blu’s room and closed the cabin door behind himself.  Without giving him the chance, I said, “Y’know, I really don't feel that well, I ... I think I over did it on the waterslides.”  Hutch glanced at me, then back at the room, then at me again.  I added, “I hope you don't mind if I just … retire a bit early?”

He knew what I was up to, and he knew why.  He smiled, but not because this was the way either one of us wanted the evening to go.  But we both knew this was the way it was going to be.  He took my hands, and they felt so slight in his, almost trembling.  He said, “Thank you for a lovely afternoon.”  I tried to answer, but the words got caught up in my bashful smile.  “I hope we can take it up again tomorrow?”

“Of course, I … I don’t want to monopolize your time with Blu.”

Hutch raised his finger to my chin, raising my face to his.  “No, Dana, no.  I want to spend more time with you, and I want so spend some of that time alone.”  The way he stressed the word alone send a chill up my spine, and a wave of heat down my front.  He went on, “You’re a very special young woman, Dana Ballard, and I very much look forward to discovering just how special you are.  And I look forward even more to watching discover that for yourself.” 

*

My knees were wobbly walking down that empty, quiet Presidential Hall to the elevator.  I wasn’t sure what to do next.  I knew the whole ship was probably gossiping about me and Hutch by that time, my father was probably especially concerned.  So it seemed like a good idea to go down alone, show somebody that I wasn’t just holed up in Hutch’s room, doing something nasty in the next room over from his traumatized young daughter.

But I was also concerned that Caroline would see it the same way she saw Hutch riding the SkyRide alone earlier that day; as my failure, as his rejection of me, as an invitation for her to move in.

Well, she’s free to do what she wants, I told myself, heading toward the Cove, a little bar where Hector was tending.  It was a quiet little nook, but with the only two passengers upstairs in their cabin, every spot on that huge, magnificent ship was pretty quiet.  Though the place was by no means a ghost ship.  The bands were instructed to play, all the shops and restaurants remained open, a full buffet had been spread out as if the ship had been full.  But the crew was also invited to eat what the Hutchinsons didn't, and it was one of the rare times the crew would be able to dine like kings, practically without end, and they'd be doing it for another six days straight, as long as I could keep Hutch and Blu happy.  Seeing me alone ordering a daiquiri from Hector wouldn't exactly convey that message, but I was never really one for appearances anyway.

Hector asked, “How’s it going?” 

“Good, Hector, they’re really quite charming, she’s such a cute kid.”

“Not to mention her father, eh?”

“Hector!”  But a knowing silence passed before I glanced around and leaned over the bar to whisper. “Of course, her father, I mean, honestly … ”  We shared a little chuckle.  “He’s a great guy, Hector.”

“And you’re a great girl, I always said, always said.”  After a nervous pause, Hector leaned forward too.  “But I don’t know if that’s what he wants, a great girl … or a good woman?”

“Hector, really, that’s enough.”  Hector shrugged and backed away, palms up and flat to calm me. “Look, Hector, I’d really much rather if people around here didn’t make too many assumptions.”  Hector looked me over, my slinky dress, my makeup and hair, and he didn’t need to say anything about them.  We both knew.  But I said, “We had dinner at my father’s table.  He wanted to stroll around in the moonlight, I couldn’t wear a cocoanut sack!”

“No, of course not.”

“I’m representing the ship, my father, the whole cruise line.”

“Yes, yes, of course.”  After a terse moment, I took a sip of my virgin daiquiri and said, “Well, it’s been a long day.  I’m going to my cabin, take a shower and go bed.”

“Yes, Miss Dana, of course.”

“Alone,” I added, without any of the lusty suggestiveness Hutch had employed.

“Yes,” Hector repeated, “of course.”