Page 58 of The Vacation Mix-Up
“Hey! Don’t downplay it. I’m being sincere. You did good. Phobias are silent stranglers. An invisible noose.”
I scoff. “I rode an elevator up six floors, Riles. That’s hardly good.”
“Nonsense. You’re facing your fear, which is more than I can say for myself.”
Curious about what she’s afraid of, apart from the ship setting sail and leaving her behind, I ask, “How so?”
“I might not be equinophobic, but I am chronomentrophic.”
Chrono-whatever-she-just-said isn’t something I’ve heard of before, so I scratch my head.
“Fear of clocks,” she explains.
Clocks? What’s so scary about clocks?
We enter The Grill, and Riles scans the menu on the board as if she didn’t just admit a timepiece terrifies her.
“Clocks?” I probe, trying not to laugh, because she didn’t laugh at me.
“Yeah. But not all clocks. Just the ones that tick loudly. It’s as if they’re a bomb ready to detonate. It scares the bejesus out of me.”
My favorite childhood book springs to mind. “Perhaps I should call you Captain Hook, then?”
Her head slowly turns in my direction, exorcist style, her eyes narrowing menacingly. “Please don’t.”
I raise my hands. “I’m joking. I wouldn’t.”
“Good. Because if you do, next time we’re in an elevator together, I’ll hit the Stop button.”
Every nerve ending in my body sparkswith dread, mostly because of the don’t-fucking-mess-with-me look on her face. But the thought of being in an elevator with Riles again, provided it’s moving and made of glass, doesn’t petrify me as much as it should. In fact, I can think of a few things to do as a distraction.
“Riley!”
Blinking, I meet her eyes. “What?”
“I said, what are you having?” She gestures to the waiting server behind the counter.
“Uh…” I rub my beard. “Double beef, double cheese, L-T-M, fried onions, and barbeque sauce. Fries on the side. And a Bud.”
“Ooh, me too.” She spins back to face the guy. “Sorry, can I have that instead? But no Bud. I’ll stick with my Pepsi.”
“Certainly. Coming right up.”
We wait a few minutes before our burgers are ready, and then we head outside to the deck, finding a free table in the corner by a window.
“This is a great spot,” she says, setting down her plate and soda. “No wind. No kids.”
I take a seat opposite her. “You don’t like kids?”
“No, I do. I just prefer to eat my dinner away from their splashing. I think I drank chlorine with my Cosmo yesterday.” She takes a sip of her drink. “How ’bout you? Do you like kids… when you’re not drugging them?”
A passing passenger almost trips and performs a double-take at me.
Riles smirks.
I smirk back. “Yeah, I do.”
She awkwardly lifts her burger—which is almost as big as her head—and assesses it, ready for a bite. “Do you and your partner have any?”
