Coincidence - Alan May [29]
Most of the time the ship was on automatic pilot, but now and then it had to be steered manually. The watchers on the bridge enjoyed taking the helm and steering. Having something to do beyond endlessly scanning the horizon for the remote possibility of approaching danger helped them stay awake.
One person from each watch was assigned to galley duty each day. Six watches meant there were six people assisting the cook: two in the galley helping with food preparation, two in the mess hall serving, and two more washing dishes. All six had to help clean the galley and the mess hall after the meal.
Melissa and Pierre found they enjoyed mess duty. Partly because they would have enjoyed any activity that put them together, but partly, too, because the mess was the one place onboard where they could listen to music. The stereo pumped out a great dishwashing beat. The two discovered they could sing and dance and scrub pasta-encrusted plates all at the same time—at least until the ship made a sudden lurch. After losing a couple of plates, though, and nearly slipping in the water that slopped over the edge of the sink onto the floor, they remembered the poor Floatie who’d broken his arm sliding in the soup. They toned it down a bit, just swaying lightly to the rhythm while keeping a firm grip on the crockery.
After the dishes were dried and put away, they went out on the classroom deck, stretched out on their backs, and gazed up at the stars. This far away from the lights of any city, the sky was a deeper blue than Melissa had ever imagined possible. It looked like one of the pictures in a Christmas storybook she had loved as a little girl: her favorite picture of shepherds tending their flocks on a grassy plain, the velvet blue of the midnight sky illuminated by a single radiant star. She never would have believed that such a sky existed outside the pages of a book.
The abrupt change from the bright and noisy galley to the still darkness of the vast night made the couple feel shy with each other. Where only a few minutes before they had been laughing uproariously at the slightest provocation, each one prodding the other to greater heights of silliness, now they couldn’t find words to express what they were feeling. Melissa was surprised feelings like this existed outside of a book, too.
Pierre was surprised by his feelings for Melissa. True, he had been struck by her from the moment he had looked up from the baggage carousel at the airport and seen her standing there. But in some way he couldn’t explain, his initial animal attraction had grown, with every moment they spent together, into something much more. Much more serious, much more profound—and much more complicated.
He hadn’t wanted to get involved with anybody in the program, not really involved. Sure, he had looked forward to meeting some girls and having fun and getting some practice in how to talk to people of the opposite sex, but not a serious one-girl, one-guy relationship. Not yet. He didn’t know the first thing about that kind of relationship, and even supposing he turned out to be a quick learner, what would happen at the end of the year? They’d have to go their separate ways, never to see each other again—non, it was too terrible a thought—or else rearrange their lives to be together. He wasn’t ready to even think about any of this. Then again, he hadn’t counted on meeting someone like Melissa.
For Melissa, meeting a boyfriend onboard was practically part of the seagoing educational curriculum. And yet, in all of her imaginings about this boyfriend, there had been no face behind the idea, no real person behind the abstraction. She had pictured herself, like the girls she knew at home, blithely chattering about “my boyfriend,” or having a sure partner for the informal onboard dances Anika would arrange, or sitting beside her tall and handsome guy (for invariably