Page 8 of Total Dreamboat

Felix

Hope is heading straight for me, hair clinging to her neck and swim costume askew. She looks like a voluptuous, angry, wet Labradoodle.

I hope she’s not angry at me .

I didn’t mean to look at her topless. It was just that I happened to be looking in her direction, and the whole slow-motion disaster was so riveting it was impossible to turn away.

That, and her breast was magnificent.

She stops four chairs over and I realize she doesn’t have a towel. I spring up to offer her my unused one.

“Thanks,” she says, taking it. “Did you see that?”

“See what?” I ask innocently.

She rolls her eyes at me. “Uh-huh.”

“Right. Fair. I think everyone saw it,” I admit.

“Humiliating,” she says.

“Just a wobble.”

“Literally.”

She towels off and sinks down in her chair. She’s incredibly pale, in a nice milky way that contrasts with her dark hair.

“Was it at least a bit of fun?”

“Exposing myself?”

“Aquacizing.”

“Well, I learned it’s possible to sweat in a swimming pool.”

“The wonders of homeostasis.”

She rummages in her bag to pull out suncream and shades, which I take as my cue to leave her alone.

I return to my book.

“Oh my God,” she says suddenly. “Are you reading Middlemarch ?”

“Uh, yeah,” I say.

She holds up a fat, tattered paperback. It’s also Middlemarch .

“Oh shit,” I say. “You too?”

“It’s my favorite book! This is my mother’s copy from when she was in college. She almost named me Dorothea.”

“A bullet narrowly dodged.”

“Have you read it before?”

“First timer.”

“Ooh. What part are you on?”

“Casaubon’s dying. And not a moment too soon, in my opinion.”

She laughs. “Just you wait. He gets worse.”

“No spoilers, please. I’m reading it for the thrills.”

“You don’t like it?”

“I love it, actually. I’m trying to get through the classics, belatedly. Just finished Anna Karenina and was looking for something a bit more uplifting.”

“You must love a doomed bourgeois marriage.”

“Very much.”

“Not based on experience, I hope,” she says. And then she winces. “Sorry. That was rude.”

“Not at all.” I hold up my bare ring finger. “I’m as yet unwed.”

“Ah,” Hope says.

She doesn’t seem to know what to say next and I don’t want to stop talking to her so I say: “Are you?”

“Unhappily married?” she asks.

“Divorced.”

“Neither,” she says, “but I’m young yet.”

“Compared to the rest of the chaps on this boat, anyway.”

She laughs. She has a great laugh—full and earthy.

“So do you read a lot of nineteenth-century literature?” she asks, gesturing back at my book.

“I do lately. I started last year with the Brontes, then moved on to Jane Austen. Dickens will be next, when I finish the greatest hits of George Eliot.”

“Oh, you have so much to look forward to!” she says. “I’m a massive Brit Lit nerd. Studied it in college.”

I’m immediately self-conscious. As a man who did not even get through his A-levels in a family of people who all went to Cambridge and Oxford, I am, I’ll admit, insecure about my intellectual interests. It’s not that I don’t think I’m smart. It’s just that I know I’m not educated.

“Flattered on behalf of my culture,” I say.

“It’s funny we both have actual books. I usually read in audio.”

“Me too,” I say. “Gives me something to focus on while I’m cooking.”

“Same.”

“You cook?” I ask.

“Well, not professionally, but I love it. It relaxes me.”

“What do you do professionally?”

“This and that,” she says, waving away the question. “Nothing interesting. Mostly PR.” She says this apologetically, like her job is embarrassing. “I’d much rather be a chef. Sounds exciting.”

“It has its pleasures. Next time you’re in London you can come by one of my pubs and I’ll put you to work in the kitchen.”

“I wish,” she says. “I haven’t been there since grad school. Haven’t been abroad at all, actually.”

“You’re abroad now, I think. International waters.”

“Soaking up the rich culture of this cruise ship, yes,” she says, gesturing at our elderly compatriots sleeping in their lounge chairs.

“Well, don’t discount the excursions,” I say. “You can absorb the vibrant culture of luxury beach clubs. What are you planning on doing—”

I’m trying to see if she’s going on any of the scheduled outings at port, so I could perhaps conveniently join her, but her friend comes bounding toward us and plops down at Hope’s feet.

“Felix!” she says. “It is Felix, right?”

“Indeed. And you’re…” I wince. I don’t remember her name.

“Lauren,” she provides, unoffended. “I’m starving after that. Want to join us for brunch?”

I consider accepting even though I gorged myself on (very good) pastries an hour ago, but I don’t want to come on too strong.

Or maybe I’m just nervous.

It’s been years since I’ve had a crush on a girl.

“I’ll leave you to it,” I say. “I’ve already eaten.”

Hope starts gathering her things.

“Nice chatting,” I say to her.

She smiles at me. “Yeah, see you around.” She gestures with her chin at my book. “Can’t wait to hear what you think of the ending.”

I’ve never wanted to finish a novel so badly in my life.

I spend a few hours reading and pounding back iced teas. Hope is correct that Casaubon gets worse—the bloke is even a controlling asshole from the grave. Why is everyone in nineteenth-century novels so miserable?

By midday it’s grown intolerably hot, even in the shade. I’m about to pack up and retreat to my room when my entire family comes down the staircase from the Recreation Deck, dressed in tennis whites.

“We just bollocksed the girls at doubles,” Dad reports to me cheerfully.

Prue and Pear both scowl at him.

“Unfair victory,” Pear says.

“The wind was against us,” Prue adds.

Prue and Pear hate losing at anything.

“No whinging, girls. We handed you your arses,” Mum says.

“I believe I saw beginner lessons offered with the pro on the activities schedule,” I say to my sisters. “Maybe a refresher course on the fundamentals will help you beat our elderly parents?”

“No time,” Pear says, her demeanor transforming from sullen to puckish. “We’re taking our brother to cha-cha lessons, remember?”

“I remember informing you that won’t be happening.”

I, emphatically, do not dance.

“Let’s all go!” my mother exclaims. “Cha-cha! How fun. When’s the class?”

“Two o’clock,” Pear says. “Just enough time for us to have lunch first.”

Pear leads us to Picante, the “Latin fusion” bistro. It has surprisingly authentic tapas.

“Don’t eat too much,” Prue says as I reach for a third ham croquette. “You’ll be too bloated to move and embarrass yourself in front of the gentlemen ambassadors.”

“Gentlemen ambassadors?” I ask.

“You know! The men they pay to entertain single ladies on the cruise.”

“Saucy,” my father observes. “Behave yourself, Mary.”

“Don’t worry about me, darling,” Mum says mildly. “You’re the only man I want to fraternize with.”

My sisters and I exchange long-suffering looks. Our parents love to traumatize us by alluding to their sexual chemistry.

“Anyway, let’s get going or we’ll be late for our lessons,” Prue says.

“Fine,” I concede. “I want to see the moment you decide to leave Matty for a gentleman cruise ambassador.”

“I would only leave Matty for the captain. Did you see him at the welcome reception? So handsome in his epaulets.”

“You do love seamen,” I say, because the joke writes itself.

“Yes, Felix, I do,” she says. “Would you like me to tell you just how much—”

“No, I rescind the comment. Let’s go.”

We take the lift to an expansive lounge with a panoramic view of the sea.

In the middle of the room is a grand piano and a gleaming parquet dance floor.

Two of the glossy, impossibly fit dancers from last night’s musical performance are standing at the center, in salsa outfits, chatting with a group of mostly older women, with a few men mixed in.

Another group, a passel of attractive elderly gentlemen in blazers with name tags, stands by the piano.

“Those must be the ambassadors,” Prue whispers to me. “Go see if one of them will be your date.”

“Hello, everyone!” the female dancer says into a wireless microphone. “I am Svetlana, and this is my colleague, Sergio. Please, gather round.”

We walk to the dance floor and listen attentively as Svetlana and Sergio explain the origins of the dance and the basic steps.

“It’s a Cuban dance similar to salsa, so if you already know salsa, you’re in luck,” Svetlana says.

I guess I’m not in luck.

“The dance gets its name from the sound of our steps— cha cha cha —when we do the core triple step,” Sergio says. He and Svetlana demonstrate a back-and-forth shuffle.

“Just like this,” Svetlana says, doing it again. “Easy!”

It does not look easy. My mother forced us all to take dance lessons as kids. As with most structured education, I failed miserably and dropped out.

I’m about to leave when a familiar Texas drawl calls, “Oh no, are we too late?” I look away from the dancers to see Lauren and Hope rushing in.

Hope is wearing a short, red polka-dot sundress that looks right out of a 1950s pinup calendar, with her curly hair piled on top of her head. It’s all I can do not to stare.

“You’re just in time,” Sergio says to the girls. “Please, come join us.”

They make us practice the steps, all of us calling out “cha cha cha” as we move on the balls of our feet.

Most everyone picks it up quickly. Hope, I notice, takes to it naturally.

I, however, am baffled.

“Beautiful! Well done!” Svetlana exclaims, like we’re toddlers she’s very proud of. “Now everyone pair off, and we will practice.”

I skulk off behind the piano, alone. We’re an odd number, so I’m hoping this is my excuse not to embarrass myself. But Svetlana comes over and offers to partner up with me.

Maybe this will be less disastrous under the direct tutelage of the instructor.

Sergio calls out time as we all practice the moves to music.

“Forward one, two, three, cha cha cha , forward six, seven, eight, cha cha cha . Left side, one, two, three, cha cha cha . Repeat right, two, three, cha cha cha .”

Combining these movements makes absolutely no sense to me. Sergio may as well be demonstrating how to perform knee replacement surgery for all I am able to replicate the process.

Svetlana’s Slavic stoicism is impressive, but she’s beginning to look as miserable as I feel.

I decide to leave, if only to spare her.

But I feel a tap on my shoulder.

“May I cut in?” Hope asks Svetlana.

No woman has ever dropped my hand so fast.