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She half grumbles, half scoffs. “You’re missing the point. It was beautifully self-sacrificial. He died so she could live. It was some seriously epic romantic stuff. I can’t believe you’ve never seen it.”
“No thanks,” I grunt into the phone. “I probably feel aboutTitanicthe way you feel aboutJawsorThe Meg. Or even serial killer documentaries.”
“Actually, I really enjoy those. I live on the Oxygen channel these days.”
“See? That’s concerning.”
“And seriously—being shipwrecked in the North Atlantic Ocean is as scary to you as getting eaten alive or murdered? Because one is a quick call to AAA and an airlift rescue. The other is a gory death.”
It’s not the shipwreck that’s terrifying. It’s the mass lawsuits that would come out of a situation like that. “You can’t just call AAA from a ship.”
“How would you know? It’s still a vehicle of sorts,” she says.
“I just know,” I reply, trying not to draw attention to my expertise. “Anyway, what’s up? How are you?”
She’s quiet for a minute. I wait patiently for her to respond before she finally rushes out, “I need to cancel my spot on the Cozumel trip.”
Ah, typical. At least once before every dive trip, I have to remind Lennox she won’t be shark food. “Len, I promise you, there aren’t going to be any sharks in that region?—”
“No, it’s not that.” She clears her throat. “I can’t afford it anymore. I got fired.”
I grip the phone tighter in my hand, pressing it firmly against my cheek. “I want to say, ‘I’m sorry,’ but you hated that job.”
“I did. Don’t get me wrong, I’m relieved. But I don’t know… Everyone seems kind of disappointed in me.”
“Who’s everyone? I’m certainly not.”
She sighs. “Okay, fair enough. MaybeI’mdisappointed in me.”
“Why?”
“I think I want too much from a job.”
If only she could see my vexed expression. “Your job paid like twenty bucks an hour.”
“Excuse you. That’s good pay for someone like me.”
“Someone like you, being?” I ask.
“No college degree, has never kept a full-time job for more than a few months, hates numbers and metrics, and has the attention span of one of the little fish in your tanks…so, yeah, twenty bucks an hour is solid. But money isn’t thewantI’m talking about anyway.”
Leaning back in my chair, eyes fixed on the Miami skyline, I breathe out and feel the pressure in my chest lessen. I always feel better when my mind is on Lennox. “What are you talking about then?”
“I want to love what I do each day. You know the way you feel about scuba diving? Aren’t we supposed to feel like that all the time? Or is that childish, head-in-the-clouds thinking?”
“If I breathed through an oxygen tank under water for forty hours a week, I’d be brain dead. Not to mention, the dive shop doesn’t pay my bills. You know it’s a hobby.”
She mumbles something I can’t make out, then says, “That’s right, I forgot you have a backup big boy job back home. What’s your family business again? You guys are in cargo shipping?”
“Just ships,” I mumble, then quickly digress. “But anyway, look, there are some people who live to work and others who work for the weekends. Everyone is different. It doesn’t have to make sense to anyone but you. Just figure out what you want and go for it. You can make a great living in a more creative, less structured field. It’s hard but not impossible. If you’re miserableworking at an insurance call center, maybe getting fired is the universe’s way of telling you it’s not for you.”
She lets out a little chuckle. “You’re so wise, Grandpa. I hope I’m as astute as you when I’m your age.”
“When you’re thirty? In three years?”
“Yes. I sincerely hope I age as gracefully as you,” she teases. “Touch of gray. Bifocals. Your walking cane always adds a touch of sophistication to your outfit.”
“Hilarious.” I smile into the phone, wishing we weren’t on the phone. But it’s a little easier to talk to Lennox when there’s physical distance between us. I see her, and my mind gets hung up on all the things I tell myself I don’t want.