Semester at Sea 14
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This here's Nostalgic
Patience had done this to me.
I knew she was coming up with something...but this was her highlight.
Betrayal is something that always seemed so damn foreign to me. How could this happen? I found myself walking down the hall in a midst of anger and frustration. The person I cared about most in the world was with some other chick.
It just made our love...the love that we had both sworn would last forever, seem so mortal. For once it seemed so regular. For once Amir just seemed like a regular man.
I got to her Felicia's door.
It was complete silent. They were probably not there...but then again, they probably were. I stood there just looking at the door. I stood there just wondering if I should knock or just ...if...
Almost as though some kind of forced had opened the door, it opened.
Amir was standing on the other side of the door and he was just looking at me with these wondering eyes. He turned back into the room and then looked at me again. He looked uncomfortable with a slight sense of anger. What the hell could this be about?
"You leave me...in Your room, to come stay over here?" I ask him.
I'm mad. I'm so mad that I feel like I can really go off about the entire situation. Is this how it felt to be betrayed?
"Hey...I meant to tell you."
"What kind of shit is this? Huh! What the fuck are you doing in your ex's room at this time of night?"
He looked upset. He knew how I feel. He must have had an idea. He grabbed me by my hand and pulled me into the room. Her room was just as small as his was. She was standing up and peeping around the corner.
She had on the pajama shorts and a wifebeater...it was HIS wifebeater. She didn't look at me in my eyes when I walked in the room. Fucking slut. She just stood there on the side of the room, putting her head down. Why was the look of guilt written wall over her face for?
Why was I angry? I was I so pissed that I wouldn't to smash both their heads into the wall. How could he do this to me?
He told me he loved me.
"I love you, but..." he explained.
He was saying it again. I didn't get this. My heart was sunk underneath my stomach and hidden somewhere in my large intestines. My entire mouth went dry as though I hadn't drunken anything for days on end.
"God...I don't want to know."
I sat down on the floor right where I was standing. I used to sit down a lot when I was younger and Patience had ratted me out to my mother so I didn't know what else to do. I would just sit down on the floor and sway front and back.
I was swaying now...front and back...like a clock's pendulum; confused by time.
"Chauncey...I didn't lie...I really do care about you," he explained.
He wasn't looking at me either. He just kept staring at the floor. He was beating around the bush. He wasn't doing a good job about it either. He wasn't making me feel any better. Why was he telling me these things? Why was he making the inevitable seem so hard to get at?
"It's over isn't it?" I asked him, "Hello...is it? Huh...answer me."
It was no point to do that. My stomach was turning. I looked up to see only lowered eyes. Guilty son-of-a-bitches, thinking that lowering there eyes would help. Two minutes after I leave this room they'd not think another thought about it.
A minute has passed.
"I said...is it over?" I repeated.
"Yes. I can't be with you any longer," Amir finally admitted.
Bullets went flying into my heart. Amir's cold words just pierced through me. He still didn't look at me. He just kept looking at her dusty floors.
"No, this can't be happening! You promised me things!"
"Things change..."
Cold.
"What things change?" I ask, pounding on the floor as I did it.
I was loud. I was extraordinarily loud.
"Show him," Amir stated.
He was talking to Felicia.
Felicia got a box off the bed. She brought me over the box and dropped it on the floor. Out of the box spilled pregnancy tests. There were so many. All of them with positive signs on them. All of them...
"What the fuck!" I scream, "This is bullshit!"
It's pointless though. She pulls up her shirt, slowly as though meaning to tease me and drive me crazy. As she pulls up her shirt she reveals her stomach.
She is definitely pregnant. The stomach is so clear. It's so obvious.
I get up off the floor and make my way out of the room.
No point to stay...no more point to live.
Amir follows me like I think he would. He doesn't grab me though. He just follows me like we are little kids playing follow-the-leader. He follows me all the way back to our secret deck.
Didn't he remember this? We would watch the sun rise on the Atlantic...now we were watching the sunset on the Mediterranean.
"I hate boats..." I tell him, "You know I really hate boats. Patience forced me to come on here. She's controlled me my whole life. I hate her. You were more then just a boyfriend to me...you were a savior."
"I was?"
"Yeah, I should have known. You played everyone else. Why not me?"
"Don't say that!" he said and walked up to me, he shook me hard, "You know you were different. You know you were different from everyone else."
Why flatter me?
I held back tears, but they silent stole out of my eyes.
"Not from her," I explain.
He crossed his arms, "I am going to take on responsibility. I always wanted to...to be a father. She doesn't want this child. She can't take care of it by herself."
"She doesn't have the brain to do that, Patience brought her here."
Patience had to have known. Somehow she figured it out. She figured out Felicia was pregnant and she brought Felicia here. This was her plan and God...this was the greatest horror she'd ever done.
He still couldn't look at me as he shrugged, his broad shoulders seeming older, stiffer now, "Regardless of how it happened. She's here. She told me she was pregnant."
"How do you know it's your child?"
He shook his head, "I took her virginity. I am sure about that one. The dates match. She's 3 months pregnant. She only agreed to come out here because I was going to be here. I want to help her."
3 months. No wonder she was always so covered up.
"They all knew didn't they?"
"Yes."
"God...I must look like some kind of idiot."
How could Kim, Pony and Jr. all know about this before I did. God...what about Patience?
"Don't say that."
"Vince told me...he told me to be careful with you. I should have listened."
"STOP IT!"
I was making Amir feel guilty. It was the first time he was making eye contact with me since I had opened the door. I could tell by even mentioning Vince I had hit a nerve.
I walked over to him. I gave him a hug...he didn't resist, but his breathing was so damn heavy. The hug got longer, I didn't want to let go. I began to touch him, all over his body. He was still letting me, but he wasn't doing it back like he usually did. He wasn't touching me back.
I opened my mouth and started to suck on his neck.
"Please don't leave," I had said.
It seemed like my voice had suddenly woken him out of the trance of my touch. He grappled onto my hands and even though it was a light touch, I had the idea. He took my hands off of him and they dropped to the side.
"I can't do this...not anymore. I can't bring my kids around that lifestyle. It's wrong. I don't want my kids to think being gay is natural. It's not."
"You are saying that being gay is wrong?"
He stopped for a while. He was thinking. His slanted eyes closed and he bit his bubbly lower lip as though he was on a commercial.
"You know what I mean..."
"You think when you and I have sex that it is unnatural?"
"Not with us. With you everything feels natural," he explained.
He kept looking at me and he gave me this warm look. God, he was so fucking sexy. In the moonlight, reflections hit his body making his muscular arms look like diamonds of light caramel creations.
"So what is wrong with being gay?" I ask him.
As I do it I make my way up to him once again. I want those muscular arms to just console me like they always do. I want them to grab me and keep me close to his chiseled chest. I want to feel like the luckiest person in the world again.
No...he puts his hand up...denying me.
"I am going to be with her," he explained to me, "I am going to be with her for the sake of the child. I was raised by my mother and it was tough. I don't want that to happen to my son or daughter.'
He was serious. There was not a mention of me in the entire sentence.
I didn't know how to react. I didn't like this boy. It was love. It was real love.
How the hell could this happen to me?
"Please..." I said.
I was begging. I realized it. Damn, I still had pride but at this moment this was the worst feeling in the world. His eyes were no longer the warm eyes I'd seen before. They were empty almost like nothing was behind them.
"I don't know what else to say. There's nothing else I can say. I really do care about you, but I have a responsibility to this child. I am going to try to work out a relationship with Felicia. I know...I know it hurts..."
"Don't do this to me?"
I was crying. I'd gotten on my damn knees crying.
How could the most perfect man in the world just up and leave me like that? Destiny had pulled us together and responsibility was now tearing us apart. I wanted to crash. I felt like I was going to any minute now. I couldn't deal...
He saw me crying but his eyes were dry, "Please stop crying. I care about you..."
"Stop saying that!"
He did stop saying it. Hell, he stopped talking. He just kept looking out at the water over the deck as though searching for something.
God, I remembered how I felt when I found out that the crazy attraction I had to him wasn't just in my mind. I remembered how fate felt.
I finally stood up and said, "Amir...I can't do it without you."
I didn't tell him exactly what I meant, but I had a feeling that he knew. I couldn't live without him. I couldn't go on this journey to some unknown without him. He had always been my rock. I needed him.
"I'm sorry."
He walked away leading me there...no he ran away. For a moment I felt like I saw him breaking down into tears, but I couldn't be certain through my own.
My tears dried on their own.
Amir said I could stay in his room as long as I needed. He didn't tell me to my face. He sent Kim to tell me. Then he sent Kim and Jr. back the next day to collect his clothes and shit.
How could he do this to me? How could he leave me here?
His familiar scent came all around me. It flooded me with memories of how we used to make love. The feeling of having Amir all around me.
His slanted eyes...
His sexy masculine voice...
His hard body but soft skin had kept me always wanting to wrap up in him. He never minded the fact that I seemed to always want to touch him either...not until now.
Days had passed. We were sailing on the Mediterranean Sea. I'd skipped school for the most part unless we had a test. I ended up doing well on the test anyway, so I figured what was the point of going?
I just stayed in his room.
Kim had come back to the room to get more of his things. I was quiet when she came. It was almost like she was the bringer of death. This was really happening. I couldn't believe it.
"Did he want to say anything to me?" I asked her.
I was lying in his bed. I hadn't moved out of it for exactly 12 hours. Jr. had stopped over and brought me some lunch.
"Sweetie, maybe you should just worry about you for right now," Kim explained, "Look at you, you're not looking so good."
They all said that. I'd asked everyone from Kim, to Jr., to Pony and even Desmond. They all seemed to not want to give me any news at all about him.
She was digging through his chest.
She pulled out a box. It was a little box that I'd never seen that was painted gold. When she opened it she pulled out the rock. It was the same exact rock that I'd given him. It was on the same string.
It was in such perfect condition.
I walked over to her and looked in the box. There was a note in it. Kim tried to pull the note away, but I grabbed it from her just in time.
I read it aloud, "It says...from the love of my life...I'll always treasure it."
"Let me get that," she explained.
"Why! He doesn't even want to be with me."
"Amir specifically asked for this."
She was serious. I couldn't take this. I started to cry once again. Why would he want this? What would it mean to him?
"I can't deal with this."
I'd said it so many times. This all felt like a nightmare that I couldn't wake up from and I wasn't making up from it.
"Let me tell you something," she said walking over to me and holding my hand, "You drown when you fall into water, you drown when you stay in it."
"Uh! This is killing me..."
I didn't have time for words of wisdom. I didn't have time for any of that. I needed my baby back. I needed the man who had been my support system and changed my life.
"It's killing him too," she defended him, "You have to think, that boy loves you. He let you know that before you even told him. He's always loved you. He just has this whole mating call whenever he's around you...I thought it was for me, but obviously it wasn't."
She laughed. I guess she was trying to make a joke...but I didn't laugh.
Amir was dead to me.
"Is this how it felt when he left you too."
"It's not the same, he didn't leave me. We were never together," she explained, "I'm trying to make you feel better here. Damn it. I'm trying."
She gave up. I could tell she had given up when she walked out of the room and took the box with her. It was one of the only things that she ended up taking with her period.
Damn this couldn't be happening.
Days had turned into weeks. After 3 weeks, my down had just kept getting lower. I stopped speaking to people as much. I stopped believing in love and happiness. The only person I really did talk to was Jr. He seemed to be the only one that really understood where I was coming from.
We'd taken port in Tunisia to restock the boat with materials. It didn't matter to me. I didn't even go out to see how Tunisia looked like. I didn't care. They'd come to my room multiple times trying to get me to go out with them, but I couldn't.
Then more weeks passed.
An entire month and a half had gone by since I'd seen Amir.
It was October.
I'd gone to class like usual. In the past month, I almost been something like a ghost, dodging my own shadow. I truly felt so alone in the world. I didn't know a breakup could be taken so hard. I didn't know what was going on with me.
I needed food. Jr. still usually brought me some groceries from the ship kitchen or some local food from the ports, but he was studying for his midterm exams.
That was when I saw them.
I saw Amir and Felicia. They were sitting around in the lounge that was near the cafeteria. There was something on tv. The doors of the lounge were glass, so I kept my distance as I watched them.
Her stomach was really starting to show. He sat there beside her, just watching tv. God...he was still beautiful, even after a month of avoiding him.
I looked worse. I know I looked worse.
"Hey...you!"
I turned around to see a face that I wasn't sure I wanted to see. It was Vince. He was walking with Mia, who didn't pay me any attention. She walked away at that moment and I could tell she wanted him to do the same, but he didn't. He was standing there with his hands in his pockets.
"Vince?"
I hadn't seen him and Patience or the others for such a long time. It was kind of refreshing to see Vince for whatever reason. Maybe it was the fact that he seemed happy to see me. It felt like no one would ever be happy to see me ever again.
Maybe it was the fact that once upon a time, Vince was attracted to me. Maybe I wasn't as ugly as I felt.
"Where have you been?" he asked and gave me a quick, yet meaningful hug, "You haven't been in class or anything Chauncey. I thought you dropped out."
I shook my head, "I'm doing fine. I study in my room."
Vince smiled at me. He was still attractive too. God, everyone was the same except for me. I hadn't shaved in forever. I hadn't gotten a haircut. I was an unkempt piece of crap.
"Can you walk with me?"
He asked it in such a way that my heart seemed to sink. Vince had on an expensive looking pea coat. I understood it actually. It was no longer summer. It was kind of getting chilly especially around the boat.
I walked away from Amir and his...girlfriend with this anger in my heart and I prayed Vince didn't look at me different because of it.
"How have you been?" I asked him.
"I been cool...you know...I mean, considering that my best friend completely fell of the face of the map and doesn't talk to me anymore."
He was upset about it. I hadn't even noticed it till now that I hadn't spoken to him for so long. It seemed like nothing else mattered really except Amir for so long. I'd lost the perfect man. How could anyone just...get over it?
"I bet you heard about Amir."
"Yeah...I didn't want to say I told you so but..."
I rolled my eyes. How did I know he was going to pull that? I kept looking around where we were walking. This was getting uncomfortable. Vince always seemed to drag around his feelings like some sort of weight. They weren't supposed to be like that.
"Patience is to blame for all of this?"
"Is she?" Vince asked and stopped me from walking, "She didn't put Amir's dick in that girl and make him fuck her. He did it himself. He's a low down piece of shit...I've been the one here for you...not him!"
Vince grabbed me by my hand and pulled me into a closet.
The closet was a janitor's closet. It was obvious. They had them all over the boat in case there was a spill and someone didn't have the time to be traveling half way across the ship just to get a mop.
"Vince what is this?"
His body was close to mine. We were here in this tight place and I could see his lips floating...no...hovering right above mine. He looked down at my lips, full of hunger and need.
"You know how I feel about you," he explained, "You know what this is. Don't deny it. I love you Chauncey. I'll do anything...anything to be with you."
"Not anything. You know you wouldn't."
He wouldn't give up the Dollhouse to be with me. He wouldn't let go of their rules. Amir would and maybe that's why my attraction, the drive I had to kiss beautiful Vince was stopped. It was holding me back. I still loved Amir...more then anything.
"I'll show you."
His lips pressed against mine. His wet tongue licked up and down on my lips trying their best to part them, but I kept refusing...I couldn't...
After all this time I still loved Amir.
"Please stop," I stated.
I couldn't do it.
He punched hard at the wall, "What the hell? That boy isn't even thinking about you! I am here! Look at me. What the fuck does he have that I don't?"
He was right to a point. Vince was far from ugly and he had a body of an Olympian God. He had money, he had brains and he had focus.
"I love him."
Vince backed up away from me. He was pissed. He was steaming actually.
"You'll learn."
He walked away just then. I didn't know if it was a threat or just a warning. It confused me how he had said it. It was almost like he was plotting...just like Patience was.
"You need some time to yourself," Jr. had told me.
We were out together swimming laps around the pool. He had promised to help me swim. Amir had once promised to be the one to help me swim, but now it was just Jr. here.
Before I knew it Desmond had come out of the showers as well. He walked over. He seemed to be carrying around all his weight too while he was at it. It was like he sucked out the little happiness out of the room.
"Hey," he said.
He was probably speaking to both of us, but I made sure I didn't reply.
"What's up?" Jr. asked.
Desmond was staring at me. He was staring at me hard. I could see his eyes piercing me even as I dove under the water, pretending to swim.
As soon as I got up from underneath the water he was over me.
"You really are going through it aren't you?" he asked.
Damn...even he knew.
"Is it that obvious?"
It had been a month and nobody was over it. We didn't hang out "together" anymore. Jr. really stopped speaking to Amir. They had fallen out over me. Desmond, I was sure still talked to him...often actually.
Jr. turned back around, "Look, Chauncey has gone through enough. Amir is acting stupid right now. His heart is in the right place, but he needs to start thinking about what he wants and not living his life on what he thinks he's supposed to do."
"Maybe you should find a girlfriend," Desmond stated
Jr. sighed and I just stopped talking.
I'd really thought for a moment that he'd come here to help cheer me up or something.
"He's gay. Get it through your head."
"Well obviously Amir isn't. What's the point of having him sitting around drooping over something that is meant to be? This is how God wanted it."
Wow.
He walked away just like that.
He walked away leaving me sitting there thinking about how Amir had reacted those weeks ago. He said that it was a problem...the whole being gay thing.
God was it really such a problem to them?
"I need to try again. I need to get Amir back."
"He isn't going to listen," Jr. explained to me with this sad look outlined all over his face, "I tried. You know the type of guy Amir is. He puts others before himself. All he can think about is this child. He wants to be with you though, I know it...but he can't think of himself right now."
"I need him!" I shouted.
He didn't understand. I needed Amir like I needed air.
"I want to help you."
"Then tell him I want to talk to him," I say.
Jr. shook his head, "He's scared to do it. You know how emotional Amir is. We argued about this. He won't talk to you at all. He's been trying his hardest to avoid even seeing you."
"You can't do anything...at all?"
He stood there thinking. I knew Jr. felt bad for me. I was milking it for all it was worth. I was there for Jr. Hell, I was there for all of them. I'd been their friend when Patience was at her hardest.
"Ok...Captain Laperla is having his little annual dinner. We are all supposed to have a table tonight. He is going to be there...you can talk to him there."
"Ok...ok. I'll be there."
Jr. and I spent the rest of the day preparing for this damn dinner. I had to look good. I got my hair cut by the boat barber, I shaved, took two showers, cleaned every part of my body. Thank god, the life I'd been living hadn't caused any acne on my face.
I had a nice white linen suit on. Jr. smiled when he saw me finally walk into his room with a brush in one hand.
"Look at you, trying to get your man back," he said, "You look fresh as hell. If I was gay, I'd date you."
I laughed at the comment. It would have sounded gay if it didn't come from Jr.
"You think it's enough?"
Jr. shrugged his arms, "He'd be stupid to turn you down, but I am a completely different person from Amir. Who knows what will happen?"
"What are you going to say to him?"
"I don't know."
"Think of something...seriously."
Jr. was very serious when he told me to think of something. I wondered why. Everyone who knew Amir even a little bit was telling me to give up. Why were they so positive that Amir wouldn't change his mind?
The ballroom was crowded when we went there. We had arrived fashionably late or whatever the case was.
"Fuck, the table's full," Jr. whispered to me.
I looked over at what he was talking about. Amir's table was crowded with a whole lot of people that I didn't know. Kim was on the other side of the room sitting with Pony, Desmond and a few other familiar faces that I never really learned their names. Her table was full as well.
"Over here," I suggested.
We spotted two chairs a table across from Kim's. However right before I sat, I walked over to Amir. He was sitting with Felicia. She looked beautiful...she looked flawless. Jealousy flooded over me. Why would he ever want a guy over something so soft and so feminine?
I could never give him a child.
"Hey Amir..."
He seemed a little panicked to see me walk up to him. Felicia noticed me as well. She looked at me and then looked at Amir. Her eyes fell in between us as though she would obviously be listening to what I was going to tell him.
"Can I talk to you?" I ask him.
His new friends seem to notice as well. They had on the same nosy glare that Felicia had. It was like they all intentionally got quiet.
"Chauncey, that's not the best thing for us, right now," he explained.
He wasn't talking about us...meaning him and I. He was saying "us" as far as his new family. His girlfriend and the child she had in her.
"Amir..."
"Everyone please take a seat!" The announcer had said, "Introducing your captain, your chancellor, Adrian Laperla!"
I walked away at that moment and did go find a seat. I walked long enough to see Mia walking her father up to the stage. What was the point, everyone already knew she was the lucky daughter of the captain.
I saw the rest of them too. Patience was there, with Vince, Ethan and Wednesday. It had been a long time since I'd seen them too. They were all dressed in white like they were all standing in a line like they were about to get baptized.
Captain LaPerla got up on the stage.
I looked over at Amir...ignoring everything Laperla was saying. Amir had this nervous look on his face. He kept playing with his hand. I had a feeling he knew I was staring at him. Why was he nervous?
Why wouldn't he listen to me?
Why wouldn't he listen to me!
"Here is Patience Crane, I am going to bring her to stage to sing the star spangled banner as we get set to sail into the foreign lands and new adventures," Laperla had said.
Patience was getting up on stage.
She looked across the room until her eyes met me. I could see a snicker on her face. Damn...this bitch had caused all of this! She'd done all of this.
I walked up and grabbed the mic from her, pushing her so hard she fell into Ethan's arms on the other end of the stage.
60 eyes stared at me. I knew it was 60 because there were 10 people at each table and there were six tables. I'd counted on my way in. I didn't care how many. I only cared that Amir was one of them.
"My name is Chauncey Crane," I say, holding the mic up.
"Son get down or we'll take you down," Laperla had explained, "That was very rude of you to snatch the mic from your sister."
"Shut up! I just have to say something," I shouted back, picking up the microphone stand in case one of them made an attempt at my mic.
"Chauncey," Vince had said, "Come on. Let's go talk about this."
No...this was my shot.
"I am in love," I stated, grabbing onto the mic and looking at Amir, "I've been in love this whole time and it hurts. I've cried until my head hurts. You know who you are...please don't break my heart. There are options. You don't need to be with someone to help them raise a child."
"Son, what are you talking about?" Laperla asked.
I shook my head. I'd have to make this clear.
Amir had been looking at me just like everyone else. It wasn't clear that I was talking about him.
"Amir," I finally said, causing a couple of people to start whispering, "I need you in my life. A song reminds me of you..."
I don't know why I started to sing just then. It was accapella. Kim had been working on my voice but I didn't think I was a good singer that I should be singing in front of all these people...but I loved this man... I really did.
"He walks away the sun goes down
He takes the day but I'm grown
And in this grey,
In this blue shade
My tears dry on their own
I wish I could say no regrets
And no emotional debts
And as we kiss goodbye the sun sets
So we are history
A shadow covers me
The sky above a blaze
That only lovers see
He walks away the sun goes down
He takes the day but I am grown
And in your way
My deep shade
My tears dry on their own."
I'd sung it with everything I had. I didn't know the song very well...it was some Amy Winehouse song. Why would I sing the words of a crack cocaine artist? It meant the more to me then anything right now.
"He walks away...the sun goes down."
It was everything I felt. People were clapping...but then Amir got up and the room went quiet. Amir looked at me. God...there they were...there were those loving eyes.
"Chauncey..."
A tear was definitely in his eye now. It wasn't an imagination. Beautiful. He still cared. After all this time he still cared.
He took a few steps forward and I took a few steps forward as well.
Amir...my life...
Then he stopped.
He put his head down and he ran the other way, disappearing through the crowd. Leaving there, with my heart suddenly breaking in half.
Yes...I'd be listening to Ms. Winehouse tonight.
Amir walked away.
The sun went down.
He took the day...