Something Special -Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

Josie’s Tale

Even as the little group dined in the cabin on Coco’s Latin American style lunch, Josie was sitting pertly in the sport fishing boat with her bag of tools.

Although they both lived in the same city all of their lives, she had not seen Roger Sewell in seventeen years, five months and twenty seven days, not that she had been counting. So when Skipper Lambert pulled up at the dock at her workplace, she assumed that something else had gone wrong with his engine and bellowed out to him.

“Lambert, I jus’ fix you engine. What you do with it?”

Then she saw Roger beside him and stopped.

The men docked the boat and Lambert shouted across the yard.

“Granville — o need you out at sea.”

“Why you couldn’t tow them in?” she called back.

“My little boat not big enough. You can come now?”

She looked around the yard. The boss was not there, and there was nobody else who would be able to handle a big engine.

“What is it?”

“50 foot single hull with two 600 horsepower diesel engines.”

Josie caught her breath. It was a long time since she had worked on such large engines. At the moment she was repairing a jet ski, something that she could practically do with her eyes closed now. The thought of working on an engine of such class attracted her professional desires, but could she pay it serious attention with Roger there?

She decided to take a risk and took out her phone to dial the boatyard owner while she spoke with her apprentice.

“Marlon, pack me kit, we going to look at something out at sea.”

It would take them half-an-hour to reach the marooned yacht and despite the noise of Lambert’s outboard motor and the slap of waves on the boat, Roger signalled to Marlon to leave his supervisor’s side and he sat beside her.

“Strange way to meet again.”

“It was inevitable. The two of us live in MoBay.”

“So, how are you Josie?”

“How am I now, or how have I been over the past 17 years?”

“Well, both.”

“Just fine thank you very much.”

She gave him a slight glance taking in, in one split second, how he had aged over the years. His forehead was always broad, but his thin body had thickened to the point where he now had a little paunch. Like most people who worked in the tourist trade he was clean-shaven with a low haircut. Her heart noticed that his eyes still twinkled even behind spectacles she never knew he now wore.

“I guess you are doing well. Driving a taxi and everything.”

“I can’t complain. You are famous Josie. When Lambert said he was going for the best boat engine mechanic, I never thought it would be you.”

“Why not?”

“Well true, that’s my fault. You were always something special Josie.” She looked away but he continued speaking.

“So, have you found somebody as yet?”

“What is that to you?”

“Because nobody else ever made the butterflies sing for me.”

Josie breathed heavily and her voice came out softly but with a harsh undertone.

“Shut up! After all these years what makes you think that you can speak to me like that again. I am not 25 and listening to your nonsense any more. Don’t treat me like I am stupid.”

“I am not...”

“Yes you are. You haven’t grown up at all, have you? Still think that sweet talk will get you what you want. Well, this woman is secure in Christ Jesus and needs no other man, so you can don’t bother to waste your time.”

“Josie, if I ever thought that an easy talk to you was going to bring out all of this hate, I would have stayed on the boat with my client.”

“I am a Christian woman, I don’t hate anybody. I just want you to keep your lying,

silver tongue away from me.”

“So you have me off as a liar. Why?”

‘We are going to go over that again?”

“Go over what? I came to look for you one day and your sister told me you said that you never wanted to see me again. Then you started spreading all those stories about me

being a liar to your friends, I just gave up.”

“Have you lost your memory Roger? Stop acting like your behaviour never happened, like you never fool me up!”

Roger leaned towards Josie and looked at her straight in the face.

“OK, let us talk straight. You are talking about when my son was going to be born, right. My son is 17 this year.”

She stiffened but said nothing so he continued speaking.

“Yes, you and I were close...as a matter of fact more than close, we were the best of friends and I was courting you for marriage. And yes... I strayed. I got a girl pregnant and did not know how to tell you so I kept it a secret. God knows that I came close plenty times, but got cold feet. How could I? Your church brethren did not support our friendship in the first place. There was this nonsense talk about being ‘unequally yoked’ remember? So how could I imagine that any of them would help you to see beyond my mistake?”

“You should have told me.”

“Yes I should.”

“Do you know how bad I felt when I heard some idle talk in the market one day that this girl was pregnant for you, and that you were trying to duck out of it. A part of me died that morning. Then I thought that it could not be true, but my sister checked it out and every word was true. You told me that I was the only woman in your life. You lied, Roger Sewell! And that is why to me you were a liar then, and a liar now.”

Embarrassed at the tears that were burning behind her eyes, she turned away. Roger did not move but she heard when he took a deep breath in then let it out.

“I cannot say that I regret the birth of my son. He is a blessing in my life. But I now know how easy it is to hurt the one that you love the most. Josie, believe me when I say that I am sorry that I hurt you. I am a foolish man and did not know how to approach you. And I did not have the guts to fight through the condemnation from your sister and the church people. But even as we stand here, and even though it has been 17 years and you are still angry with me; my heart is full for you.”

“I don’t need to hear this”, sniffled Josie and moved away from him.

She joined Lambert at the wheel and watched as they slowed to a stop alongside the Easy Skanking.