Page 26 of Windlass

“Lil?” she asked instead.

“Sure. Just a moment.” Lilian was busy applying sunscreen on herself and fussing over Ivy, who did look slightly peaked, now that Angie studied her. MS flare? Ivy smiled, catching Angie in the act of staring.

“You okay?” Angie mouthed.

Ivy nodded and shooed Lilian away.

Lilian turned to Angie. “You can do your front; I’ll get your back and shoulders. Turn.”

She missed Lilian bossing her around. Stevie did glance up, perhaps thinking the same thing, and grinned. Angie felt the smile like cool water. She relaxed into it, relief slackening her muscles.

Lilian squeezed a healthy dollop of sunscreen into Angie’s hands, and then squirted some onto her shoulders. The relief vanished as she jumped.

“Ah! That’s cold!”

“It will warm up. Your skin’s already flushed.”

“It was the boat deck.”

“Make sure you get beneath the straps.”

“Yes, Mom.”

Lilian flicked her and rubbed the lotion across her shoulders and down her arms, forcing Angie to catch the straps of her suit before she was stripped. Lilian worked efficiently, and squeezed Angie’s shoulders when she was done.

Angie focused on her front. She distributed the dollop in little daubs across her body before rubbing them in slowly, starting with her stomach. Her skin absorbed the lotion thirstily. She was careful to keep her eyes cast down and focused on her work, leaving room for Stevie to watch unobserved, if she so chose. But Stevie remained fixated on the horizon even when Angie took care to shield her breasts from the sun’s rays in slow, even strokes.

“Lotion?” she asked. Stevie turned, eyes hidden behind her aviator-style glasses.

“I put some on at the house.”

“Oh.” She held the tube in her hands, unsure of what to do with it. Lilian eventually took it back. She reclined on the bow and stared at the wisps of clouds above, the churning in her chest an ugly, roiling thing. She did not want to examine it and yet it filled her up to her throat, forcing her to taste its bitter fumes.

Nothing had happened. Nothing had happened, and yet she felt as if someone had let the wind out from the sails of the tall ships they’d observed from the beach several days before.

The swells rolled gently beneath them, and Angie rested a hand outside the boat’s railing to cool off. The others chatted around her, mostly about the clinic, which excluded her anyway. Her earlier feeling that Stormy’s absence had a silver lining faded.

“Porpoise,” Morgan called out over the hum of the engine. Angie didn’t look. She’d seen porpoises before.

“Ange!”

Stevie’s voice got her attention. She was pointing, and Angie sat up, grabbing the railing for balance. A pod of porpoises leapt alongside them, keeping pace with the boat. There had to be at least seven, the joy in their movements easing the ache in her chest. Stevie stood beside her, now, leaning over the edge of the boat a little too far for Angie’s comfort. Angie grabbed her wrist for support instead of the rail, communicating her excitement with a squeeze, and also ensuring she would not topple overboard. Stevie smiled, and from this angle Angie could see her eyes, soft as they watched the animals in the water. The void inside her calmed.

Unable to help herself, she leaned her head against Stevie’s shoulder, heedless of the periodic jolts as the boat hit uneven swells. Sunlight flashed off the sleek hides and lit the waves like blown glass. The urge to reach out to them was overwhelming. What did it feel like to move like that?

“We should go swimming soon,” she murmured, half to Stevie, half to herself. The wind carried the words away.

They all let out a collective sigh when the porpoises dove and resurfaced farther off, done with their game.

“That was incredible.” She tugged on Stevie’s wrist to gain her attention. Stevie’s skin was hot from the sunlight where it wasn’t damp with spray.

“Right?” Stevie’s glasses obscured her eyes once more. All Angie could see of her expression was her mouth, which curved in a smile she suddenly found inscrutable. Where were Stevie’s eyes? On her, or still on the water? She knew how she looked, positioned on the bow, barely clothed, the motion of the boat traveling through her body, breasts rising with each passing wave.

Christ, she wanted Stevie to touch her. Was it the glasses? The edge to her smile that might have been mocking on someone else, or knowing, or simply Stevie’s impish grin seen in another light? Why had Angie taken off her own sunglasses, her shield, when she knew—could feel—her eyelids lowering like sails as heat pooled between her thighs?

Stevie extracted herself without a word.

Fuck.

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