She didn't take it. She rose from the sea, Venus-Scarlett- Anadyomene, and gave him a curious look, reminiscent of young wolves eyeing a prey or a foe. She waded into the water, swam back to the boat and pulled herself up on the deck. A splash told her he had followed.
Half an hour later they set for home, this time sailing against the wind. Rhett kept the boat on a complicated criss-cross pattern that for the time being seemed to absorb all of his attention.
They passed three dolphins on starboard. She did not see them. He did not point them out.
On the horizon, towards the middle of the Bay, was a yacht. She put her chin on her hands and remembered.
~~oo~~
The wild strange year immediately after they were married. She had been twenty-three. Rhett, whether from a desire to impress or to amuse his new bride, had taken her to the clubs and the ski resorts and the exotic vacation spots – Gstaad, Monte Carlo. Dubai and South Africa. And on a luxury yacht. Owned by a friend of the prominent Butler family in Charleston, heir to a real estate empire. A trip around the Mediterranean.
She remembered the surprise at being asked to take off her high-heeled shoes before even stepping off the gangway, and being handed a pair of slippers. To protect the wood floors, the liveried servant had told her in response to her questioning expression.
A ship full of people wearing haute couture and slippers. And that was only the beginning of the oddness.
"Everyone with a credit line can buy a Bentley or a Maserati these days," Rhett had told her. "A yacht however …. you can back a yacht into a pier in Monaco during the racing season and invite people to stay with you who were unable to find hotel space, and thus incur long-lasting obligations." He'd given her a searching look, and had smiled. "Feel free to amuse yourself. Just stay on the good side of the chef."
"Why the chef," she had asked, diffidently.
He'd raised a sardonic eyebrow. "The chef is the one person that can get you removed from the boat, as many a yacht captain has found to his detriment. Yacht captains, and minor passengers like us, are worth a dime a dozen. However, a good cook that can reliably serve good fare to his guests is someone every boat owner will want to keep in good spirits."
She had tossed her head, not comprehending that he had just told her both hard things and kind things about life.
She had submerged in the glitter of those days. They were amusing people, and her status as a medical student gave her minor curiosity value, but mostly they treated her as Rhett's attractive toy. The men were charming and attentive but she couldn't follow their conversation. The women, for the most part, were openly disdainful. The private Greek islands that they visited were glorious.
The pulse and the crest of the activities separated her from Rhett much more than she'd envisioned, and she discovered that she was lonely. She had too much to drink. She told herself she was having fun.
It had ended one night when she had stumbled onto their hostess in a compromising position with what looked like a fitness trainer. Worse than the shock was that the lady in question had seen her, and Scarlett could foresee her immanent destruction reflected in the slow narrowing of those painted eyes.
She had run back to Rhett demanding to be taken home.
He had laughed uproariously, and told her to watch out for the grimy sex-video that would probably be circulating the internet within the week. She had punched him. But he had arranged for transportation back to Charleston, and allowed her to decompress in the relative serenity of his mother's house before flying them back home.
When she returned the pace picked up considerably at school and she couldn't have gone back to that life even had she wanted to. She now remembered those days only rarely, but understood in some vague way that they had caused her damage, that their fangs still lay coiled underneath her solar plexus, nipping at vital nerve roots like Nidhoeggr gnawing at the roots of Yggdrasill. She had lost, not just innocence, but a dream.
The fluorescent light of the hospital wards had been an antiseptic, and a sanctuary. She had collected Wade and Ella from her father's house, vowing to be a real presence in their lives, her newfound maternal instincts aided by Rhett's love of children and ability to finance a nanny and a housekeeper.
And they had settled into their new existence.
~~oo~~
Rhett didn't use the motor until the very last moment, bringing the Bonnie Blue against the pier.
At almost the exact same moment, both of their pagers had beeped. Scarlett dug the chief pager out of her beach bag, Rhett unclasped his from his belt. They pulled out their identical phones and listened with almost identical expressions to the information. MVA on the interstate, multiple victims. They were calling in all available backup. Within ten minutes, they were back on the street to the hospital. Scarlett wore jeans and t-shirt under her lab coat, her dark hair heavy with salt water. She hadn't taken the time to put on make-up. She didn't care.
They gave the car to the valet in front of the ER, and checked in with the attending on call to make themselves useful. Multi-car-crash, 10 victims. They were shown the neurology cases: Three teenagers, all drunk, all unrestrained. One had been DOA. An older couple. All with closed head injuries. The sorting hat had already sorted one of the boys into surgery to decompress his active bleed, while Scarlett and Rhett looked at the others. The night shift, composed of Maybelle and the 2nd year resident, stood by, looking slightly helpless.
Three hours later they were back home in Rhett's kitchen with a box of Chinese and a bottle of ginger ale in front of them. The boys had been stabilized. One of them was still in critical condition after surgery. They debriefed over peanuts and then merely listened to the silence drifting between them, the vast hallowing silence that death and blood cast over our smaller struggles like the full moon moving over twinkling stars. They didn't dare drink alcohol in case they would be called back in, although the wine bottle looked tempting to both.
Scarlett thought how much like the last year of their marriage this was, before he'd left, when they had had nothing but this. Grief, helpless guilt, and their work.
He was wrong, she thought, if we hadn't worked together it would have broken much sooner.
They showed the salt water off their skin and hair. Then they went to bed, both with phones and pagers on their night table. He slept, his right arm slung loosely over her waist, while her cat-like eyes burned on for hours in the darkness before they finally extinguished.