Page 44 of Until I Have You

It feels good, though.To be regarded with kind smiles like this.Lately, I have been walking around like a bear who needs hibernation and can’t find a place to settle.People regard me with some amount of distance and at times wariness.

With a kid as charming as Bonnie at my side, that’s all changed.

She finds a spot right at the back, grabbing onto spindles of the railing and stepping up onto the bottom rung so she can peek over and watch.

I have to push my way in between two people to be close to her.“Sorry about that.”

To my right, a man with fair skin and white hair peeking out from under his ballcap smiles and nods at me.

The ferry starts to draw away from the dock.

“What part of the boat are we on, Bonnie?”

Bonnie glances up at me, eyes wide as she seems to be thinking.“The…um…the stern.”

“Bingo!”I exclaim.

I told her as much about boats as I could in the short ferry ride to Liberty Island.I’ve spent plenty of time on boats of all kinds throughout my education.I even considered applying for a long-term fellowship on a boat in the South Pacific, but even I get freaked out by the idea of miles of endless ocean and no land in sight.

From beside us, the husband in the older couple grins.“Very good!You’re a smart young lady, aren’t you?”

Bonnie flushes and presses her back against me like I’m a security blanket.

“We were talking all about the parts of a boat on the way here, weren’t we?”I ask Bonnie.

She nods and allows the man a shy smile.

“That’s good.You must be the smartest girl in the twelfth grade,” the man says.

Bonnie gasps with laughter.“I’m not in twelfth grade!”

His eyes bug out.“What?But you’re so intelligent, you must be–”

“First grade,” Bonnie says with a curt nod.

“Wow, that’s something!”

I watch the wake of the boat as we pull farther and farther away from the island.

On a normal Sunday, I’d be trying to relax and allow myself a day off from all the worry of finding a job which never really works.For the first time in a long time, the worry in my brain is quiet.

“I’m detecting an accent in your voice,” the man says, furrowing his unruly brows.“Where are you from?”

“London,” Bonnie says.

The man looks to me.“London, hm?”

“Her father is from there.”

“And we moved here a month ago!”Bonnie offers.

The man nods his head like a performance.

“Ah…so where are you from, then?”he asks me.

I realize he must think I’m her mother.We haven’t said anything to the contrary, and I’m not sure this deep in I want to do the bumbling, “Oops, sorry!”

So, I play along.“I’m from here.Grew up on Manhattan.”

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