This Is What Happy Looks Like(55)
Author: Jennifer E. Smith

“It’s not funny,” she said. He tried to compose his face, but he couldn’t help himself, and a laugh escaped him. He looked like a movie star then, with eyes as blue as the water that surrounded them, his head crowned by the sun so that he seemed as wavy and indistinct as all the rest of it. She had a sudden urge to stand on her tiptoes and kiss him, and she could feel her panic melting beneath his gaze. After all, it seemed to be saying, what better excuse was there to stay out here for hours, just the two of them, at the whim of the tides?

“It’s a little funny,” he said, and she moved closer, taking his hands in hers.

“Maybe a little,” she admitted, but just as he lowered his head, just before she could rise up and kiss him, the air was split by the sound of a nearby siren, and they both turned to see a coast guard boat barreling in their direction.

Graham dropped her hands, and Ellie staggered over to lean against the side, her eyes wide as she watched its approach, the prow raised high in the air as the water churned all around it, alarming in its rush.

“What are the odds,” Graham said, “that they’ve realized we’re out of gas and are just coming over to help?”

“Slim,” Ellie said, her heart thumping hard. She’d never so much as stolen a pack of gum before, never sneaked a cigarette or cheated on a test, and now here she was, about to get caught stealing a boat. It wouldn’t matter that she wasn’t the one to have stolen it. She’d gone along with the plan. Because Graham had stolen it for her, and she could almost feel the guilt scrawled all over her face as she watched the gap between the two boats grow smaller. Theirs was more of a ship, really, huge and white and angular, with blaring red lights along the top. When they were close enough, a man in dark sunglasses and a bright orange Windbreaker raised a megaphone.

“Please remain where you are,” he said, the words crackling. “Do not move your vessel.”

“We couldn’t if we tried,” Graham mumbled.

“This is bad,” Ellie whispered. “Isn’t it?”

“It’s not good,” he admitted, but when he saw her face, he forced a cheerfulness into his voice. “It’ll be fine, though. It’s just a misunderstanding. We’ll work it out.”

When the coast guard ship drew up alongside theirs, the man lowered the megaphone. “This boat has been reported missing,” he called out. “Know anything about that?”

Graham cupped his hands around his mouth to call back. “It’s my fault, sir,” he said. “I was only borrowing it.”

The officer took off his sunglasses and squinted at Graham. “You’re that guy,” he said, looking perplexed. “From those movies.”

“Exactly,” Graham said, bobbing his head encouragingly. “I’m up here filming a new one, and we’ve been using the boat—it was a production guy who called it in, I bet, right?—and I guess I just forgot to let someone know.”

Ellie marveled at the ease of his explanation, the nonchalant way in which he chalked the whole thing up to a misunderstanding, and the reaction of the officer, who seemed to be absorbing all this with a thoughtful air. If it had been Ellie, she would have been stumbling through the story, flustered and nervous. Even if she were telling the truth, she would somehow manage to appear guilty.

“Give me a minute,” the officer said, holding up a finger. “I just need to verify this.”

He disappeared back into the cabin of the boat, and Ellie turned to Graham. Before she could say anything, he gave her shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “It’ll be fine,” he said. “It does come in handy sometimes, this whole being-recognized thing.”

Even so, they waited in tense silence. A few Jet Skiers streamed past, their yellow life jackets bright against the water, and a plane flew low overhead. Ellie wasn’t wearing a watch, and her phone was now somewhere on the bottom of the Atlantic, so she had no idea what time it was, but the sun had crossed the highest point, and she imagined it must be well after noon by now.

When the man returned, he took off his sunglasses and rubbed the back of his neck. “I spoke with the guy who called it in,” he said, then glanced at a piece of paper in his hand. “He didn’t realize you were the one who’d taken it. He said it’s no trouble at all, just to bring it back in one piece.”

Graham flashed a smile and lifted his hand in a little gesture of gratitude. “Thanks, sir,” he said. “I’m sorry to have caused any confusion.”

The officer nodded, and was about to turn around when Ellie called out to him. “Actually, we’re out of gas,” she said quickly, and he raised his eyebrows, looking weary at the prospect of another problem from the movie star on the borrowed boat. He didn’t offer any suggestions, just stood there looking at her, so she cleared her throat and tried again. “What should we do?”

Forty-five minutes later, the coast guard had towed them into a marine gas station in the small town of Hamilton. The two officers had been cordial about the whole thing—though Ellie suspected that underneath their professional veneers they were both thinking about what an idiot you’d have to be to run out of gas—and Graham even signed an autograph for one of their daughters.

They left them in the hands of a mustached man who set about filling the tank, bidding them good-bye with a smart tip of their coast guard caps. Ellie watched them go back out to sea, relieved to be on dry land, her stomach still flopping around like a beached fish.

“How far to Kennebunkport?” Graham asked while the attendant came around to examine the gauge, his wrinkled face pressed close to the dial.

“Ten minutes by bus,” he said without looking over.

“Why would we take a bus?”

“Because your gauge is busted,” the man said, straightening up. “I just filled you up and it’s still showing you’re empty. I need to fix the dial. Shouldn’t take more than an hour.”

Graham handed over his credit card, and they agreed to return later in the day. There was a local bus that arrived every half hour, stopping at each town along the coast, and the attendant crooked a finger up a tree-lined road to where they could apparently find the stop just in front of the town’s tourist center.

Their legs were rubbery after so many hours on the water, and they made their way across the street unsteadily. Ellie was relieved to see that the tourist center wasn’t far—a narrow wooden building that looked more like a tree house than any kind of office—and the bus stop was directly in front of it, nothing more than a red plastic bench and a nearly unreadable schedule tacked to the back of a stop sign.