style="font-size:15px;"> Keira flicked straight past the pages of important contact numbers – noting with a wry smile the empty space where a tour guide’s name and number would normally be – and skipped straight to the juicy details of the cruise. She’d hardly had time to get her head around the fact she was going on a cruise, that she’d be on a huge boat in the open sea. It would be a brand new experience for her. Her stomach leapt with anticipation. She glanced through the list of locations: Copenhagen, Denmark. Helsinki, Finland. Stockholm, Sweden.
Heather wasn’t one for adornment and there were no pictures included to further whet Keira’s appetite —too expensive to print in color, she thought in Heather’s voice – so she took her tablet from her bag and began to search online.
The images were stunning. Unlike the European cities she’d visited thus far, the buildings in the Scandinavian countries were different, peaked like alpine lodges. And there were vast swaths of countryside, beautiful evergreen trees, lakes of deep blue, and craggy mountains. She could hardly sit through the rest of the plane ride; she wanted to be there now!
Napping was always a good way to pass the time, so Keira settled into her airplane seat and let herself drift off to sleep.
She dreamed she was standing on the edge of a cliff, looking out at the ocean, deep blue and calm. Through the waves she saw a school of dolphins, jumping up before disappearing again. She watched, amazed, as they leaped in strange formations. It was almost like they were dancing, or performing synchronized routines for her. As though trying to impress her.
Keira noticed something peculiar about the dolphins then, about their faces. Even from this distance, she could make out their strangely human expressions, and the varying shades of their eyes. One had the same piercing blue eyes of Shane, and his crooked, cheeky smile to match. Another had deep chocolate eyes, a softness in its expression that reminded her of Cristiano. Yet another had a lost expression, with a look of mourning and regret behind its eyes. Zachary.
No sooner had she made these connections than their graceful acrobatics transformed into something new. Not a coordinated routine anymore, but something aggressive. A display of masculinity. The Cristiano dolphin plowed headfirst into the Zachary one, busting his nose, or snout, or whatever it was called on a dolphin. The Zachary one hit back, swishing his tail at both Cristiano and Shane. Shane just stood on the back of his tail, flapping his great flippers like this was all a huge joke. Then they piled in on one another, ripping shreds from one another as she watched on horrified, the blue ocean turning red before her eyes.
She tried to call out, “Stop! It’s not a competition!” But her voice was drowned out by the winds.
Then a new danger took her focus. Racing through the waves toward the sparring dolphins was an enormous whale. She didn’t know who this whale was, a stranger, but he moved with purpose and killer determination. Her dolphin-exes were so busy attacking one another they didn’t even notice the whale approach until it was on top of them. In one huge mouthful, the whale ate all three dolphins up. Then it disappeared beneath the waves, making a whirlpool as it went, leaving nothing behind but bloody water to show anything had ever happened there.
Keira startled awake. She was sweating, and her neck was stuck in a painful position. She rubbed it, adjusting to the brightness of the cabin, to the smells and sounds of the airplane in flight around her; rustling chip packets, the merry chatter of excited vacationers, the whirr of powerful engines. Finally coming back to herself, Keira began to chuckle.
What a strange mind she had! To turn her exes into dolphins like that. But she wondered who the whale signified. Not a new boyfriend, she assured herself. That wasn’t the plan, not at all. She decided the whale signified her career, the way she was going to put it first and forget all traces of her ex-boyfriends in order to excel. There was no rebound affair on the horizon. At least, that was the plan…
CHAPTER SEVEN
Keira landed in Berlin, Germany – where the ship would be embarking from – several hours later. Her mind hadn’t quite gotten over the hilariously strange dream it had shown her on the airplane, and it took a bit of concentration to switch focus to the real world.
She maneuvered through Berlin Tegel Airport, collecting her case and following the signs that she hoped were taking her to the exit. It felt good to be on her own this time. No guide to show her around, or take any of the responsibility off her shoulders. This time it was just her, and it made her feel powerful.
She made it out of the airport and hailed a cab. The driver was in his fifties or so, with graying hair and a stern expression. But his attitude was far friendlier than his fierce expression would have indicated.
“You’re going on the Scandinavian cruise?” he asked in perfect English and just the smallest hint of an accent.
“I am.” Keira beamed. “I’m so excited.”
“I’d love to go one day,” he said. “It’s a bit too expensive for a taxi driver though. Do you mind me asking your profession?”
“Oh, I’m a writer,” Keira told him. “This is all paid for by the company.”
“You’re very lucky,” he said. “What do you write?”
“Travel articles. Well, sort of. They’re a bit of a mixture. Travel and romance.”
From the back seat, Keira saw his reflection in the rearview mirror as he raised his eyebrows.
“Travel and romance?”
“I know, it sounds strange. But it’s more like personal accounts of the countries and my experiences within them, with dating and trying new things, meeting new men. It’s a bit of a mishmash but I’m starting to get a loyal following.”
“Weird question,” he said. “You don’t write for that Latin-sounding magazine, do you? Viaduct, or whatever?”
“Viatorum,” she told him, a little surprised he’d have heard of her New York City publication all the way over in Germany. But then again, they also e-published and anyone in the world could access the content online. “Have you heard of it?”
“My wife loves it,” he said, with an air of frustration. “You’re the one on the cover, aren’t you? I recognize your face now.”
The cover. With Cristiano. Keira groaned. She’d known at the time the image would come to haunt her one day, but she’d let Nina and Elliot have their way. She regretted it now.
“Yeah, that’s me,” she said, hunkering down defensively.
“It’s your fault I’m taking her to Paris for her birthday,” he said, jovially, in spite of the complete discord with his stern face. “Great, she’ll want a cruise next. You’re going to bankrupt me.”
“Sorry about that,” Keira mumbled.
She gazed out the window, trying to switch her focus from the somewhat awkward conversation to the sight of a new, foreign city passing her by.
Berlin was stunning. Keira had heard about the city reinventing itself and moving on from its troubled history, but she hadn’t expected it to be quite this vibrant and artsy. It seemed very youthful and cosmopolitan, like the quirkier parts of New York exemplified.
Her driver must have noticed her staring, because he said, “We’ll be passing by a part of the wall soon.”
Keira hadn’t been sure whether
