“Let me take it, hon. I'll carry it for Lloyd, his hands are full with the umbrella.”
Ivy lifted the coat out of my hands.
One of the crewmen called for them to board, and Lloyd took Ivy by the hand, the two of them hurrying off.
My fingers closed around the ring in my pocket, the one he'd forgotten.
I didn't want to remind him anymore.
I pulled it out and dropped it into the trash can beside me without a second thought.
He'd never forgotten it before. Even if he left it at home, he'd rush back in time to grab it.
Once he'd nearly missed setting sail because of it.
“It's just a ring, it's not that important. You can leave it.”
“No way. I want everyone to know I'm taken.”
Now, it seemed, he didn't need the ring anymore.
He didn't need me anymore, either.
Once I got home, I set about clearing out the apartment.
Every corner of the place carried the traces of the life we'd built together.
His worn-out old sailor's uniforms, his fishing gear, I piled it all in a corner, ready to throw out.
My phone kept buzzing, but I didn't stop.
I only looked once everything was packed away.
A few photos. Lloyd's usual way of checking in.
One of them caught my eye.
He was standing in the lounge, and behind him a pair of pale, slender bare feet stood out sharply. I didn't need to think twice about whose they were.
Below it was the explanation he'd sent.
“Don't read into it. Ivy had never seen the crew lounge, so I showed her around.”
Back on the ship he'd been rigid about the rules. When I brought him fresh clothes, I could only leave them outside the door.
He said it wouldn't look good if his coworkers saw.
Yet now he could bend the rules for Ivy.
I typed and deleted, typed and deleted.
In the end all I sent was one line. “So making captain means the rules don't apply to you anymore?”
His reply came back almost instantly, every word dripping with impatience.
“Can you stop fixating on every little thing? Ivy was the one who asked me to explain myself to you. Clearly I wasted my breath.”
I didn't answer. I just locked the screen.
For the next few days there was nothing from him.
Until a call came through.
The noise of a foreign street filled the receiver, threaded with Ivy's sweet, soft voice, coming through clear against my ear.
“Lloyd, just talk to her nicely. Tell her we came out today just to pick a gift for her. She'll come around, I promise.”
The two of them were so close together their breaths tangled.
“Lloyd, we've been together this long. You really need someone to teach you how to smooth things over with me?”
“I'm sorry, hon. It's my fault for dragging Lloyd out shopping. He said it isn't safe for a girl to walk around alone in a foreign country.”
“Ivy, it's a small thing. There's nothing to apologize for. Rosamund won't mind.”
With one airy sentence, Lloyd had cast me in the role of the gracious, understanding one.
I hung up the phone.
The fish in the tank were the ones Lloyd hated most. Back then I'd wheedled and pleaded for ages before he finally agreed to keep them.
That same day I arranged for an aquarium to come take them away.
Just as I'd finished packing up the tank, the lock at the door rattled.
Lloyd was home.
But he wasn't alone. Ivy had come back with him.
“So you finally got rid of those stinking fish? Here, brought you a gift.”
Lloyd held out a cheap, mass-produced necklace, the kind you saw everywhere.
“This isn't the necklace I wanted.”
“Hon, I picked this out just for you. Here, let me put it on you.”
Ivy took the necklace and stepped toward me.
It was only then that I noticed the one around her own neck, a custom piece from Barcelona.
She must have caught me looking.
Ivy unclasped it at once. “Lloyd bought this for me. He said it suited me. But if you like it, hon, you can have it.”
“That style's too delicate. Something like this suits Rosamund better. Easier to work in.”
