I’d barely slept. Not from the ship’s gentle sway or the engine’s hum, and not because Pam, her hormones still buzzing from our conversation about Amir and the man by the pool, had thrown herself at Steve, finally breaking their three-year dry spell.

None of that happened.

It was shouting. All night, through the wall.

Their voices rose and fell, impossible to ignore.

At one point, I heard her crying. Not a sob—smaller, quieter, no less devastating.

There was shouting about Lily’s college fund. About the mortgage. The car payments. Harsh words thrown in every direction, too fast and too loud to take back.

This wasn’t just some random argument. When I got back to the room last night, Mike was already sitting on the edge of the bed with a drink in his hand and that look that said you’re not going to believe this.

“Steve lost over five grand at the blackjack table,” he said. “Multiple trips to the ATM. It was like watching someone spiral in slow motion.” His voice was a mix of disbelief and frustration.

Steve’s text about getting “wiped out” at the casino made a lot more sense once Mike filled me in. It was over five grand. Gone. And they weren’t wealthy people. Pam was a teacher. Steve worked maintenance for the county, mostly HVAC and patch jobs at office buildings. Even in Mississippi, that kind of money wasn’t play cash; a month’s salary, maybe more.

Somehow, by the next morning, Steve was at our door as if nothing had happened—casual, cheerful, asking if we were ready for breakfast.

We headed upstairs to the Lido Marketplace, the ship’s buffet-style breakfast spot, already alive with clattering trays, the hiss of coffee machines, and the chatter of families and couples half-awake and sunburned. We slid into a table near the window, Pam and I on one side, the guys across from us, and the silence between her and Steve was louder than anything around us.

It was worse than dinner. Whatever mask they’d worn the night before was gone. Pam didn’t even try to fake small talk. She sat rigid, poking at her scrambled eggs, eyes fixed on her plate like it was the only thing keeping her from unraveling. 

Steve, in contrast, seemed fine. He jumped right back into conversation with Mike, talking about the tables, the dealer, and what he “should’ve done differently”, like he hadn’t just lost a month's salary. Like they hadn’t argued all night with their voices echoing through the wall.

Pam tried to stay cordial, but it came off strained, obvious to everyone except maybe Steve. Her answers were tight and careful, like she was walking a line only she could see. The embarrassment wasn’t from the fight itself, but from knowing we’d heard every word. And the silence that followed only made it worse. It was the kind of thing we’d save for later, just the two of us, in a bar somewhere, halfway through our fifth drink, finally ready to say it out loud.

I looked up, caught off guard, my heartbeat kicking up a notch. Without thinking, I gave her leg a quick nudge under the table. Once, then again. Just enough to snap her out of whatever spiral she was locked in, without drawing anyone else’s attention.

She didn’t react at first, still staring down at her plate like it was safer there.

So I nudged her again, sharper this time, paired with a not-so-subtle glance past the guys.

She caught it. Followed my conspicuous look.

And there he was.

Two tables behind the guys, facing us directly, was the man from the pool. Alone again, seated with a quiet confidence that seemed to fill the space around him. A black tank hugged his chest and shoulders, the top curve of a Florida Gators logo visible near the neckline. He picked at his breakfast with one hand, a book open in the other.

His dreadlocks were down now, loose around his shoulders, framing his face with each subtle movement. There was an aura about him—like he knew the women nearby were watching, more so the ones who’d recognized him from the pool yesterday, just like we had.

Then, he looked up.

Right at us.

Not long. Not intense. Just a flicker of recognition, followed by a polite, almost effortless grin—the kind that said, I’ve seen you before, no more, no less. Then his eyes lowered back to the page, calm and unbothered, like the moment had never happened.

Pam dropped her eyes immediately, the tension in her body unmistakable. Her fork hovered, frozen. She didn’t speak. Didn’t dare look again, even though I could feel how badly she wanted to. Her face flushed without her realizing it, but her tan complexion did her the favor of hiding it. She was nervous. Not because he’d done anything, but because he was “there”. As if just being in the same room with him was dangerous. As if his presence alone made her complicit in something.

She shifted in her seat, as if even the wrong kind of glance might make Steve turn around and catch on. The same fear his poorly timed texts had sparked the day before, when our conversation drifted too far into territory that would’ve gotten her excommunicated from the life she was expected to protect back in Mississippi.

Before long, we’d finished breakfast, the tension between Pam and Steve doing more to kill our appetites than the food ever could.

As we made our way out of the dining room, Steve stepped in close behind Pam, just a pace behind Mike and me, and leaned in. His voice was low, meant for her, not for anyone else, but not low enough that I didn’t hear it.

“Looked like an NFL player,” he muttered, voice low and curling with disdain. “All brawn, no brain. Useful for football, not much else.”

Pam didn’t say a word. Didn’t look at him. But even walking behind me, I saw the way her shoulders tensed, her movements tight and controlled. He hadn’t said it loud, just low enough to keep it private, but the venom was unmistakable, tucked into that smug, casual tone he used when he wanted to hurt without drawing attention.

Maybe this was their pattern. Maybe I’d never seen the real Pam—only the version she showed me, all manners and measured smiles. But their dynamic told another story: one where Steve could say things like that, certain she wouldn’t push back. Maybe she hadn’t. Maybe she’d even laughed, played along, let the rebel flag tattoo slide more than she wanted me to believe.

But not this morning. Not after everything. Today, she walked in silence.

Perhaps our drunken conversation yesterday, about Amir, about Black men, about what she’d never let herself admit, had done something. Shifted something, even if only a little. Enough to make the same old comments feel different. Louder. Uglier. Harder to pretend away.

Mike, once again an expert at reading the room, didn’t wait for a signal. He glanced briefly at Pam, then at me, and with that easy, casual tone he was so good at slipping into, turned to Steve and said, “What do you say we hit the golf simulator?”

He didn’t ask me. He didn’t ask Pam. He already knew.

The theme of this trip was becoming painfully clear: boys do one thing, girls figure out the rest. 

Steve agreed without hesitation, without even looking in Pam’s direction. No check-in. No consideration. Just a quick, “Yeah, let’s do it,” like nothing from the past day had even happened.

Pam didn’t seem sad about it. If anything, she looked relieved. But still, it was a microcosm of their entire relationship. Even after losing five grand and spending the night in a full-blown shouting match, Steve couldn’t read the room. Couldn’t see her.

I owed Mike for this. We both did. He was back to babysitting Steve, not because he wanted to or had anything to prove, but because he understood. Because he knew Pam needed space from the man she was stuck with. Mike was a good sport. Always had been.

Again left on our own, it felt like déjà vu, the guys peeling off without a second thought while Pam and I lingered behind, silently figuring out what to do next. I knew she wasn’t ready to revisit the anxiety of putting on a swimsuit, so I didn’t even bring up the pool as an option. The weight of last night still hung between us. She needed something low-key. So did I.

It was a sea day: no port stops, no excursions. Just the ship and empty hours. We wandered for a bit, aimlessly drifting from one deck to another, stopping to people-watch, glancing at the shops, exchanging soft commentary like we were conserving energy.

Eventually, we found ourselves on the sixth deck, pausing in front of one of the ship’s digital event boards. Eighties Trivia – 12:00 PM at The Golden Mermaid. We smirked at each other. It felt like fate.

We were eighties babies through and through; born in ’80, raised on cassette tapes, VHS rentals, and TV theme songs that still played in the back of our minds. We didn’t just grow up in the eighties—we lived like it never ended.

We were a good thirty minutes early, but it didn’t take much. A smirk from her. A raised eyebrow from me. Before long, we were rationalizing that 11:30 wasn’t technically too early to start drinking. Not on a cruise. Not today.

We settled into the cushioned lounge area near the bar, and for a moment, it felt like we had the wrong place. The space was nearly empty, too quiet for an event that was supposed to start soon. Maybe it hadn’t been well advertised. Maybe everyone who actually grew up in the eighties was sleeping off last night’s cocktails. Or perhaps we were just the only two who thought trivia at noon sounded like a good time.

A small table sat in the center of what was clearly a dance floor by night, trivia sheets stacked neatly on top, confirming we were exactly where we were supposed to be. Just early. Just eager. Just two women looking for a distraction.

We were quickly greeted by the waiter and ordered two Dark Ships, the same drink we’d been introduced to last night on the Serenity Deck and had both agreed would be our go-to for the rest of the trip.

Honestly, it felt like we’d had a drink in our hands more often than not since stepping on the ship, and it hadn’t even been a full twenty-four hours. Not because we were chasing a buzz, but because it felt necessary for the conversations we’d already cracked open, and for the quiet, slow-burning mess Pam was still trying to hold together. The alcohol made room for the things that usually stayed buried. The off-limits stuff. The taboo.

By noon, the host stepped onto the small platform, clipboard in one hand, mic in the other, her voice bright and bouncing like she’d been waiting all morning. She introduced herself as Mae, a petite Japanese woman with the effortless charm of someone made for cruise ships, her energy filling the quiet room with ease.

The room, though, was still mostly empty.

Besides us, there were only two other tables. One had three guys in their forties, laughing way too loud at something that probably wasn’t that funny. At the other sat a man our age, squeezed between who I assumed were his parents, both already looking like trivia was a bit too rowdy for them.

She smiled widely, lifted the mic, and scanned the almost empty room with a kind of forced cheer that only cruise staff could pull off without flinching.

“Well,” she said, laughing lightly, “either the eighties aren’t as popular as I thought, or we’ve all discovered the magic of sleeping in.”

A few polite courtesy laughs drifted through the room, the kind you give a struggling comedian out of pity more than genuine amusement, to fill the silence.

And then it happened. The timing couldn’t have been more precise. So precise it felt staged, like the universe had been holding its breath, waiting for this exact moment to let it all unfold.

My heart didn’t drop from fear; it was something else. That sudden jolt you feel when the inevitable finally arrives. Like fate stepping into view.

As the host’s voice faded and the low hum of eighties music filled the quiet bar, I felt my pulse start to climb.

I glanced at Pam and gave her a sharp nudge to the knee, just like at breakfast. This time, I didn’t have to tilt my head or whisper. She already knew.

Her body stiffened slightly, breath catching in her throat.

He was here. The man from the pool. From breakfast. From Pam’s head for the past twenty hours, and, if I’m being honest, probably mine too.

He slipped into the bar quietly, scanning for a seat. The same black Gators tank clung to his chest and shoulders, flashing muscle with each move. His book was still in hand, fingers tucked between the pages like he planned to pick up right where he left off.

But it was the shorts that caught my eye—basic black workout material, mid-thigh, snug, the kind you’d find hanging on any Nike rack. Insignificant on anyone else. But on him, almost laughable—not in a show-off way, but because there was simply nowhere else for it to go. Even from across the bar, the outline was impossible to miss, the same shape that spandex had struggled to contain yesterday at the pool.

He slipped into the first open seat near the bar, flipping open his book before he’d even fully settled. Like he hadn’t planned to linger—just stumbled into the Golden Mermaid in search of a quiet corner to read.

The host noticed him instantly, her voice lifting over the soft pulse of eighties music as she jumped back on the mic.

“You here for trivia?” she called out in a charming Japanese accent, her tone chipper and teasing, the words light and playful as they carried across the bar.

He barely looked up. Even tucked off to the side, half in the shadows, he was impossible to miss.

From our table across the room, we couldn’t hear everything, but his voice carried just enough. Low and even, with the trace of a smile behind it.

“I was just looking for a quiet place to read,” he said, a soft laugh chasing the words like he already knew she wasn’t going to let that happen.

The host grinned, sensing her opening and doing precisely what she was trained to do: recruit trivia players as if she were working on commission.

“Well, we’ve got two full tables and one underdog duo,” she said, gesturing toward us with a dramatic flair that bordered on theatrical. “I think the ladies could use a little help.”

Pam didn’t budge. Her fingers tightened around her drink, knuckles pale against the glass, but her expression didn’t shift. Only I could catch it, the subtle bounce of her knee under the table, that nervous rhythm she’d had since grade school, showing through just enough.

“Come on,” the host pressed, her smile widening. “Help us even the teams out. Unless you’re scared of a little eighties pop culture?”

I expected him to be annoyed, perhaps brush it off with a polite "no," or ignore her altogether. But instead, he laughed. Quiet, low, and genuine.

Then, to everyone’s surprise, he gave a small nod and a faint grin—the look of a man who knew he wasn’t getting out of this. “Why not?”

He stood smoothly, using nothing but the strength of his legs to rise from the chair, no push from the armrests, no effort wasted.

He closed his book with one hand, fingers still holding his place like he had every intention of returning to it as soon as he sat back down.

And with that, he started walking toward us, calm and unhurried, passing the other two tables and the host still perched on the stage with her clipboard in hand.

I glanced at Pam and didn’t need to ask. Her pulse had quickened; it showed in the way her shoulders tightened, lips slightly parted like her breath had caught between nerves and anticipation. She stared straight ahead, as if any movement might shatter whatever spell was holding her together. Disbelief flickered in her eyes—part of her still stunned that he was actually walking our way, the other part already bracing for what it might mean.

As he approached, the same look from breakfast crossed his face, a flicker of recognition. Nothing dramatic, nothing lingering. Just a quiet acknowledgment that we’d seen each other before. Strangers, technically, but not entirely.

We weren’t dressed for attention. I wore a breezy sundress; simple, comfortable. Pam had on cutoff jean shorts and a plain white tank top. Both of us still carried signs of yesterday’s poolside lounging: bare shoulders and a hint of sun-kissed color. My dress pulled slightly across the chest, still snug from the early Christmas gift Mike had given me—just four weeks old, something I was still getting used to. Pam’s tank hugged her naturally full figure, the kind of soft, curvy frame she’d spent years trying to downplay.

He stopped just short of our table, and I stood to greet him, suddenly hyper-aware of just how small I was next to him. Nearly a foot and a half separated us, my head level with his chest. He reached out his hand to mine, and I took it, but not before my eyes dropped, just for a second.

The bulge in his shorts was right there, thick and obscene, straining against the fabric like it had nowhere else to go. It hit me instantly: Amir. The size, the weight, the way the material barely contained him. It all came rushing back like muscle memory, and I had to force my eyes back up before it showed on my face.

His hand closed around mine. Firm, but careful. Intentional. As if he knew exactly how strong he was and how to dial it back for the sake of a lady.

“I’m Jamal,” he said, flashing a grin so complete and easy it caught me off guard. His teeth were flawless, bright against his skin, perfect in a way that matched the rest of him.

Then he turned to Pam. She hadn’t stood. Still seated, she was eye level with the outline in his shorts, impossible to ignore. She hesitated, just for a breath. Not enough to seem rude, barely long enough for anyone else to notice. But I saw it. That flicker of hesitation. That split-second war inside her as years of conditioning surged up all at once, everything Steve had drilled into her, everything Mississippi had whispered in her ear. 

She wasn’t scared of Jamal. Just what it meant to want him. And even as she extended her hand with that sweet Southern politeness she couldn’t turn off, I could see it in her eyes, she was fighting every instinct not to stare.

Still, she reached out. Their hands met briefly, and Pam’s eyes dropped for just a second, her gaze catching on the contrast, her soft white hand against his pitch-black skin. It was subtle, but the moment clung to her like something she wasn’t sure she’d ever be allowed to see again.

Jamal pulled out the empty chair beside us and sat down at the small circular table, settling in with the kind of easy comfort that made it feel like he’d been there all along. The way the table was positioned, we both ended up sitting beside him, Pam on his left, me on his right. He set his book gently on the edge, keeping his finger between the pages, then looked between us with a smile.

“Just a heads up,” he said, his voice low and warm, “the eighties were way before my time. I probably won’t be much help.”

He laughed as he said it, and I waved him off with a grin.

“Don’t worry,” I replied, “we’ve got enough useless eighties' knowledge for the three of us.”

He nodded, still smiling. “Eighties babies, huh? That’s great. My parents always said it was the best decade.”

There was a brief beat, just long enough for Pam and me to do the math, a quiet reminder that we were easily twice his age.

He didn’t look a day over twenty-one.

I glanced at the book resting on the table. “What are you reading?”

He held it up casually, thumb still marking his place, and we both glanced at the cover. Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future.

Pam perked up the second she saw the book in his hand, her eyes locking onto the title like it had been placed there just for her. She’d been obsessed with Elon Musk for years: rockets, Mars, the whole thing, so spotting that book hit her like a shot of caffeine.

I didn’t even have to look at her to know she was stunned. Just one glimpse at Jamal’s reading material, and he’d already started unraveling so many of the quiet lies Steve had spent years planting in her. And he had barely said a word.

Before we knew it, the host was firing off the first trivia question, her voice animated and just a little too loud through the mic. Pam and I didn’t even need to look at each other; we just started writing. The answers came fast, automatic. TV jingles, movie titles, and theme songs tucked deep in our brains since childhood. It was effortless, almost mechanical, our pens moving across the paper before the host even finished her sentence.

He looked impressed, his eyebrows lifting as he watched us move through the trivia sheet like we’d written it ourselves.

A few minutes in, the server came back with another round, two more Dark Ships, bold and punchy, the same drink we’d fallen in love with on the Serenity Deck. As he set them down, he turned to Jamal with a polite nod.

“Anything for you, sir?” the waiter asked, his tone polite and easy.

He gave a small, wry smile. “I’m good, thanks.”

“Wait, seriously?” I asked, catching the server before he could walk off. I turned to Jamal with a playful nudge. “Not even just one?”

He laughed, leaning back a little. “I still have to work out later.”

“Oh, please,” I said with a grin. “You can’t win trivia without a drink, it’s practically part of the uniform.”

That made him laugh again, and just like that, he caved.

“Alright, alright,” he said finally, turning to the server. “Just one. Make it an Old Fashioned, please.”

For a second, I caught myself wondering how it might’ve looked. Two middle-aged women coaxing a guy barely old enough to drink into sharing a cocktail. From the outside, it probably read like predatory flirting. But it wasn’t that. Not really. It was light, unforced. Just banter, tinged with rum and the kind of thrill we both felt but weren’t quite ready to admit.

The drinks went down too smooth. Each sip tasted like vacation, vanishing faster than we noticed. It had the same slow-burn energy as yesterday: first at the pool, then later on the Serenity deck. That quiet slide into ease. Not enough to blur vision, just enough to soften the edges.

Before long, the server set a second Old Fashioned in front of Jamal without even asking. He gave a slight nod of thanks and lifted the glass without hesitation, taking a slow sip, already past the point of pretending it would be just one.

Pam hadn’t said a word to him since their introduction. She sat statue-still beside me, fingers resting lightly on her glass, not drinking, not speaking, still clearly terrified Steve might walk in at any moment, even though he was nowhere in sight. It fell to me to keep the small talk alive, to give the moment some kind of rhythm so the silence didn’t swallow us whole.

“So,” I said, my voice casual but deliberate, “who are you here with?”

Jamal glanced between us, taking in the energy, but kept his delivery steady. “Just me,” he said, lifting his glass again with a small shrug. “I actually just moved to Port Canaveral. Start a new job next week. Thought I’d squeeze in one last trip before entering the real world.”

He gave a soft smile, then nodded toward us. “What about you two?”

“We’re with our husbands,” I said, glancing toward the exit. “They’re off playing golf.”

He laughed, raising an eyebrow. “On a cruise ship?”

“On a cruise ship,” Pam and I said in unison—hers edged with annoyance, just sharp enough to cut through the quiet. It was the first thing she’d said to Jamal since that nervous introduction, like irritation had finally done what curiosity and cocktails hadn’t: made her speak.

The twentieth and final trivia question came, and we scribbled our answer. I caught myself glancing at Pam’s phone, half-expecting it to buzz with a message from Steve. Some perfectly timed interruption to pull her back into his orbit. But nothing came. No demands. No guilt. Just silence.

When the host began rattling off the trivia answers, I felt it. The shift. That easy rhythm we’d fallen into, the way the three of us just seemed to click without effort, was starting to slip. Something about the moment was loosening, fading before I was ready to let it go.

I caught Jamal shifting in his seat, a quiet signal that he might stand, and leaned in before he could.

The last thirty minutes had been the best part of the trip. No question. I wasn’t ready to let it go.

And Pam, she hadn’t said much, but I could feel it radiating off her.

She wasn’t ready either.

We finished third, dead last, missing just one obscure Cagney & Lacey question neither of us could fake our way through. The other two teams handed in perfect scores, clearly checking their phones between questions, but we let it slide without a word. Winning had become insignificant the moment Jamal stepped into the bar.

“You’re not bailing now, are you?” I asked, shooting him a grin. “You at least owe us a celebratory drink for dragging you straight to last place.” I laughed and added, “Guess we’re not the eighties experts we thought we were.”

He smiled, easy and warm. “I figured nineteen out of twenty would be enough to win,” he said, rising from his seat. “I’ll hang around a bit, just need to hit the bathroom first.”

He stood, hesitating only a moment before moving toward the exit. He didn’t rush; if anything, he lingered, giving us time to take in what we couldn’t ignore. We stared, shameless, the alcohol stripping away our pretense. That same kielbasa-sized cock, just feet from our faces, looked almost fake in the way it filled his shorts.

He left his book next to his glass, a quiet sign he wasn’t bailing, just stepping away. For the first time in what felt like hours, Pam exhaled, not from nerves, but from the rush finally fading. The last thirty minutes had been a blur, and now, with him just out of sight, she finally let herself breathe.

She shot me a look across the table, disbelief flickering in her eyes. There was a trace of fabricated annoyance there, like she wanted to blame me for keeping him at the table, like I’d pushed too far just for my own amusement.

But it couldn’t hide the truth. She was glad I had, even if she’d never admit it.

"Okay," I said under my breath, letting out a slow exhale. "He’s... something."

I took another sip of my drink, then shook my head with a half-smile. "And did you see that fucking thing?"

Pam let out a quiet laugh and shook her head, like she didn’t want to agree out loud but couldn’t lie to herself either.

“He really is,” she said, her voice low, still laced with disbelief. It was as if she were still trying to process that someone like Jamal had been sitting beside her, dismantling nearly every stereotype Steve had spent years planting in her head.

After a beat, she let out a shaky laugh and muttered, “Of course I saw it. How could I not? It’s like a third leg.”

Her body shifted before her mind could catch up.

The waiter returned with two Dark Ships and Jamal’s Old Fashioned, grinning like he’d seen this play out a thousand times before.

By the time Jamal returned, the exuberant trivia announcer had vanished along with the rest of the setup: mic stand, speaker, clipboard, all gone like it had never happened. The other tables had cleared out too, leaving the bar quiet and nearly empty.

Just the three of us remained, the lounge suddenly smaller, only an occasional bartender drifting by.

“You ladies are dangerous,” he said playfully as he made his way back, spotting the third Old Fashioned waiting for him like a challenge. His dreadlocks shifted with each step, brushing his shoulders as he gave his head a slow shake, that same amused grin on his face. Then he dropped into the chair with the kind of ease that said he wasn’t going anywhere.

“So,” I asked, tilting my glass toward him, “what’s this big job you’ve got waiting?”

"SpaceX," he said, taking a sip, a slight smile on his face like he'd been waiting for someone to ask. He said it casually, as if it were nothing, as if landing a job at one of the most competitive companies in the world was just another Tuesday.

Pam perked up so fast I felt it before I saw it. She straightened in her seat, eyes sharp with interest, lips parting slightly; not the flirty kind of intrigued, but something deeper. Real fascination.

Space, and especially SpaceX, was her thing. A full-blown obsession with Elon Musk. The one texting me during launches, gushing over footage, jealous that we could see them so clearly from Orlando.

She called herself a nerd, but it was more than that. It was something she connected to on a level most people didn’t understand, something she didn’t often get to share.

“Wait, seriously?” she asked, a little too quickly. “SpaceX? Like... the SpaceX?” As if she needed to hear it twice to believe she’d heard him right.

Whether she meant to or not, the comparison had begun. Jamal: calm, brilliant, hung like a horse, built like a god, and going places. Steve: short-tempered, out of shape, balding, stuck in a thankless HVAC job in Mississippi. The contrast was brutal. And with each passing second, the reality Steve had spent years forcing on her was quietly coming undone.

He grinned. “Yeah. First job out of school,” he said, glancing down at the Gator on his shirt, a quiet nod to UF. “I’ll be working on propulsion systems.” He motioned toward the book beside his glass and let out a short laugh. “Figured it was a good time to learn more about the guy who’ll be signing my checks.”

We were impressed. Not polite or surface-level, but the kind that hits deep. First job, his age, a body carved from stone with the brains to match; it felt like the universe was over-delivering just to make a point.

Just like by the pool, and again at the bar last night, the moment things began to loosen, to feel light and full of possibility, Pam’s phone vibrated. The buzz was quiet, but the effect was immediate.

There it was. I didn’t have to ask; it was Steve. Right on cue. Done with golf, or whatever had kept him busy, and now ready to reassert himself. To remind her who she answered to.

Just like yesterday, Pam held her phone up so I could read what Steve had sent. "Done with the sim. Gonna hit the tables again, see if I can win anything back. The dealer last night was a joke. Should’ve been cleaning the place, not running a game."

She kept the screen angled so Jamal wouldn’t see it, but the expression on my face said everything. I didn’t bother to hide the annoyance.

He caught it right away. “Everything good?” he asked, eyes flicking between the two of us.

“Yeah,” we both said, almost in unison.

The only upside was that, unlike yesterday, Pam didn’t retreat. She didn’t shrink or weigh her words. For now, the message hadn’t changed her. If anything, it bought us time. Steve was still distracted, convinced he could win back the five grand he’d lost, too buzzed to see he was about to lose more.

She was pissed. Her jaw was tight; her eyes fixed on the table, as if it might help her hold it together. Her drink sat untouched, slowly sweating in front of her. 

I could almost hear the thoughts circling in her head: how much more Steve might blow, what kind of scene she'd be dragged into later, how they’d scrape together the mortgage once they got home to Mississippi.

Beneath it all was relief. She didn’t have to leave or explain. Sitting with Jamal, tangled in complication and a shared love of space, still felt better than anything waiting outside the Golden Mermaid.

No matter how much she pretended otherwise, she wanted to stay.

But my thoughts were elsewhere.

I’d had enough. This wasn’t about fun anymore. It wasn’t just a couple's cruise that had turned into a girls’ trip, or a breather from the kids, or a few drinks in the sun. This was the breaking point.

I hadn’t boarded this ship with revenge in my heart. That wasn’t who I was. But Steve had dragged it out of me.

He’d belittled, embarrassed, controlled, and quietly erased her for years. And now, here she was, sitting beside someone who shattered every stereotype Steve had ever planted in her head. He’d judged me too, never outright, but with looks that said more than words ever could, shaming me for who I’d been with before Mike, like it somehow made me less.

I had one goal now.

Pam might go home ten thousand dollars in the hole, dipping into savings to cover their expenses for the next year, but it wouldn’t all be for nothing.

That massive bulge stretching the front of Jamal’s gym shorts, just feet away? I wanted it inside her. Balls deep. Covered in her. I wanted her taken so completely she couldn’t walk straight the next morning. Wrecked. Drenched. Spent in a way she had never experienced.

Three years without being touched. Without being kissed. Ignored, dismissed, and shelved; like her body had expired the moment she gave birth.

And now, all of that could come to an end.

She deserved her own Amir story; a secret between us.

And I was going to make sure she got it.

I was tipsy, Pam had a solid buzz, and Jamal, three drinks in, still looked like he could run laps around the ship. I tapped the cover of his book beside his untouched fourth Old Fashioned, ready to stir the air and break the ice, just enough to make things interestingly uncomfortable.

“So,” I said, tilting my head slightly, letting the words hang like bait, “since you’re doing all this prep, maybe you can help me out. SpaceX has a few different rockets, right? I know about the Falcon 9, but isn’t there a bigger one?”

Jamal glanced at the book, then back at me, catching the shift in my tone, the game beneath the words. He knew. He just chose to play along. His smile widened, the excitement of talking rockets lighting his eyes just as much as the awareness flickering beneath it.

“Yeah,” he said easily, sliding into the rhythm we’d created. “Falcon 9’s the workhorse. They use it for most launches. But Falcon Heavy…” He gave a slight shake of his head, the kind of reverence reserved for things that deserved it. “That one's built for the larger payloads.”

“Larger payloads?” I repeated, glancing down at his shorts without even pretending to be discreet. I drew the words out, slow and shameless. Pam caught it immediately, her body tightening, the breath hitching softly in her throat.

Jamal noticed too. His smile twitched, barely controlled, but he kept rolling, clearly energized by the attention and the topic alike. 

“Yeah. Three boosters instead of one. Way more power. It can carry heavier loads and reach deeper into space. Stuff the Falcon 9 just isn’t built for.”

I sipped my drink, guilt sparking through me. Mike was upstairs babysitting Steve, giving Pam her vacation, and here I was flirting, fueling a fire I should’ve left alone. But I convinced myself it wasn’t for me, it was for her. And maybe, deep down, I just wanted someone to share the quiet truth I’d carried alone for years. Even if that someone was Pam.

I let my gaze drift down to his shorts again; slow, lazy, unashamed now.

Lifting my glass, I let the rim hide the smile tugging at my lips. “Sounds... intense.”

Beside me, Pam reached for her drink with both hands; a small, deliberate motion that failed to mask the nervous energy radiating off her. She stayed rigid, posture composed, but her skin gave her away, the faintest pink rising up her throat. She shifted in her seat, a subtle, involuntary movement, her body responding to questions her mind wasn’t ready to ask.

Jamal took a slow sip of his drink, eyes on us both with the calm, measured patience of a man who already knew exactly how this kind of game ended.

His drink had all but vanished during our SpaceX conversation, and the bartender appeared from nowhere with a fresh one. That workout he was worried about seemed to have faded from memory. The only thing that could ruin this was Steve blowing through more money even faster than he had the night before. For the first time, I was rooting for him to win it back, just slowly enough to keep him occupied.

He paused for a beat.

The SpaceX puns, the teasing about heavy payloads and going deeper, had all given him the perfect opening. The kind of setup no man in his position could pass up, especially not one being openly lured by two women twice his age. He read the room, caught the cues, and knew exactly when to make his move.

“So,” he said, glancing between us with that same smooth, unbothered confidence; a slow smile tugging at his lips, like he was already savoring the tension he was about to drop. “Which one of you has been riding out the three-year dry spell?”

It was rhetorical. His eyes never left Pam.

She froze, her body tensing the moment the words landed. Even through her tan, a deep flush rose in her cheeks, impossible to miss. Her drink stalled halfway to her lips, eyes widening just enough for me to catch it before she dropped her gaze. Her legs crossed in a quick, automatic motion, and her free hand slipped to her lap, fingers tightening around the hem of her tank top like she needed something to hold on to.

I let out a chuckle before I could stop it, sharp and sudden, like it had slipped straight from my chest without permission. I was shocked, honestly, at how blunt Jamal was. But after what I’d just done, it was completely warranted. He was reading the room and returning the favor.

He raised his eyebrows slightly, watching her shift in her seat, then gave a slow, knowing nod.

“I guess that answers my question.”

He grinned and let the comment hang, tapping a single finger against the cover of his book like a gavel. “Let’s just say precision will be part of my new job,” he said casually. “Especially when it comes to hearing.

Pam froze. Her hands stayed clasped in her lap, knees drawn tightly together like instinct alone was trying to hold her body in check. She didn’t smile. Didn’t speak. Just stared down at the table, her breath catching slightly. 

She glanced at me for only a second, panic flickering behind her eyes, not because she’d been caught doing something wrong, but from the sudden realization that Jamal had heard our entire conversation by the pool yesterday.

I could see it hitting her all at once. She was replaying everything we’d said. Her half-whispered confession about the three-year dry spell. My reaction. The not-so-casual questions about Amir. All the things she’d let slip, thinking no one else had been listening.

He didn’t flinch—just watched with the calm of someone who’d seen this play out a hundred times before. That quiet shift in energy, the moment a married woman’s guard slipped, giving way to something deeper. Hungrier. He recognized the look Pam wore now: equal parts hesitation and heat. And he knew exactly what it meant… and exactly where it led.

I took a slow sip from my drink, feeling the pause stretch out just a little too long.

“Poor Pam,” I said with a half-laugh, glancing at him. “Girl’s been neglected,” I added, twisting the knife just a little deeper to make her squirm.

She didn’t look up. Just exhaled quietly through her nose, eyes locked on the table, like she was trying to will herself invisible.

Jamal hadn’t taken his eyes off her. Not when the conversation shifted. Not when the silence stretched. He watched her like she was the only person in the room, the kind of undivided attention she hadn’t felt since Steve had first chased her.

His gaze was steady, hungry, clearly turned on by the way I had practically offered her up; nervous, aching, and wide open for her first real taste of something she’d been taught to hate. And the fact that he was still sitting there, drink in hand, said everything: he was more than ready to deliver.

Finally, he smiled; subtle and measured, a clean break from the nerdy SpaceX charm he’d led with. The easygoing rocket talk gave way to something heavier, more deliberate. His eyes swept over Pam from head to toe, slow and intentional. Not leering, just confident.

“Hard to believe a guy could have his own Hollywood bombshell and still not know what to do with her.”

He was clearly talking about her resemblance to Amy Schumer, the one we always joked about, the one she’d been hearing for years.

But he might’ve been the boldest to say it out loud.

Jamal rose with quiet purpose, moving with the kind of calm that suggested he always knew the right moment to leave. He picked up his book with one hand, lifted his glass with the other, and finished the last of his Old Fashioned in a single, clean pull before setting it down with a soft, deliberate clink.

He glanced at the cover, then lowered his eyes, first to Pam, then briefly to me.

“It was nice meeting you,” he said. “Pam. Amy.”

He met each of our eyes as he spoke, but the difference was clear.

I’d seen that look before. Felt it. Lived it.

His gaze barely lingered on me, just a quiet nod toward someone who’d already taken the ride. I wasn’t a mystery. He’d heard it all from his pool chair: me, a few drinks deep, gloating about Amir like he was a trophy.

He knew I’d already joined the club, and he wasn’t here for reruns.

But there was something in his look. A silent note of appreciation for what I was doing. For Pam.

Because he wasn’t here for me.

He was here for her.

The untouched. The overlooked. Still waiting to be broken open. Another neglected married woman, poised to join the club.

Then that half-smile slid into place, slow and sure, his eyes still locked on her.

"Room 4222," he said. “Fourth floor. Thirty minutes."

No mind to the fact her husband was a few decks up, playing imaginary golf.

It wasn’t a question. It was a directive.

He glanced once more at the book in his hand, the cover, the name, then back at her.

"If you're ready for something a little more Falcon Heavy," he said with a grin, closing the loop on the SpaceX sexual puns, knowing precisely what he was doing.

Pam’s eyes were already locked on his crotch against her control, the playful flirting landing right where he aimed it.

And just like that, he walked away. No second look—just his words, smoldering.

We leaned back, stunned, the scent of him still hanging in the air. Proof it hadn’t been a dream.

He was gone, but his words remained.

It was 1:00 PM, and the bar remained nearly empty, the air heavy with a stillness that didn’t quite belong on a vacation. Most normal people were probably poolside by now, sipping something fruity in the sun, not tucked away in a dim, quiet bar buried in the ship’s belly. 

A couple of crew members wandered through, casually setting up for whatever event came next. Faint '80s music still floated from the speakers, leftover from trivia, cutting through the silence just enough to remind us the world hadn’t stopped; only paused.

We were still processing what had just happened when the waiter returned, breaking the silence like he’d been waiting for the cue. He said nothing, just set down two fresh Dark Ships, our fifth in under thirty minutes, and offered a subtle, knowing grin. He’d seen it all and seemed to understand these drinks weren’t for relaxing anymore. They were for the conversation to follow.

I let out a soft laugh, trying to break the thick tension that had settled between us.

“Wow, that escalated quickly!” I said, doing my best Ron Burgundy impression.

I leaned back in my chair with a grin, hoping to ease some of the weight hanging in the air, but I could feel Pam’s tension still swirling around us.

She stared at her phone on the table, face up, screen dark. Part of her, I could tell, was hoping for a text from Steve. One more perfectly timed interruption to pull her back from the edge, to make the decision for her. But I knew a bigger part of her was praying it stayed silent.

The elephant in the room was impossible to ignore; we were already five minutes into the thirty-minute countdown, ticking steadily toward a knock on Jamal’s door. And that knowledge sat heavy between us, unspoken but undeniable.

I recognized the look on her face. I’d worn it myself the first time I caught the outline in Amir’s shorts. That wasn’t curiosity, it was hunger. The kind that no toy could satisfy, no cold shower could wash away. It was raw, unapologetic, and once it hit, it didn’t let go. Whether you acted on it or not, it changed something in you.

I couldn’t help myself. I leaned in, a grin spreading across my face. “See? I told you that you looked good, Amy Schumer. I mean, Pam,” I said with a soft laugh, letting the joke hang just long enough to crack the tension.

Pam rolled her eyes, but the smirk tugging at her lips gave her away. “Please. They just like the big girls,” she said with a snort, voice thick with sarcasm, trying to play it cool. “Isn’t that what they call girls like me? PAWGs? Phat Ass White Girls?”

I laughed, shaking my head. “Girl, I don’t care if you had a second head growing out of your shoulders. You did something right to catch the attention of a man like Jamal.”

She huffed a laugh, rattling off any excuse that came to her mind like a nervous reflex. “It’s stupid. It’s probably a game to him. He just wants another white girl trophy for the case. Another married woman to brag to his friends about.”

But her body told a different story.

Her legs shifted. Shoulders loosened, but not from comfort. Her fingers trembled as she reached for her drink. Then her eyes flicked to her watch—quick, fleeting, but revealing.

She tried to play it off, but the glance was anything but casual.

That countdown Jamal had set in motion wasn’t just ticking in her head; it echoed through her entire body. Each passing minute pulled her closer to a decision she hadn’t dared say out loud. It wasn’t just a timer. It was a quiet warning. A reminder that if she waited too long, Jamal might move on to the next neglected housewife who had gawked at him from the pool deck. One without Pam’s conscience. One willing to step in and steal the opportunity that had been handed to her like fate itself. A once-in-a-lifetime event, seconds from slipping through her fingers.

It had started a reckoning.

I leaned in with a grin. “You wouldn’t be his trophy, Pam. He’d be yours. A big one,” I said, spreading my hands about a foot apart.

She didn’t argue, couldn’t, not with the way her thighs subtly pressed together beneath the table or the flicker of heat behind her eyes.

The fact was, a stranger had shown her more attention in the last thirty minutes than Steve had in the past three years, and no matter what excuses her mouth tossed out, her body had already decided.

Reality had settled back in, and the minutes were ticking by. The countdown Jamal had started was still alive, but fading with every second Pam stayed in that chair. I had done everything in my power to coax her toward the edge: light teasing, heartfelt honesty, even the kind of encouragement only a best friend could give. But it wasn’t enough. Not yet.

I wanted this for her so badly I could taste it.

So I reached for my phone.

This wasn’t impulse; it was the nuclear option. A last-ditch move, born of equal parts frustration and desire. Not for me, but for her. My thumb hovered over the Secure Folder, Android’s quiet little gift to married women who hadn’t quite let go. A past I’d worked tirelessly to suppress, now on the verge of coming out. The kind locked behind passwords and encryption, buried beneath innocent photos of beach trips and birthday parties.

Inside were pictures of Amir. All of him. My own private trophy case, hidden deep in the digital dark. Revisited more often than I cared to admit.

Opening that folder would expose me. Strip away the glossy, curated version of my life I’d spent years selling—to Pam, to the world, maybe even to myself.

It would be raw. Messy. Honest. But it would be enough. More than enough to sway her. A truth too vivid to deny. A visual promise of what waited just two decks below. The kind of proof even Pam’s most rehearsed excuses wouldn’t stand a chance against.

I was a second away from tapping it.

Then her phone buzzed against the table, loud in the quiet.

Her eyes snapped to the screen.

And just like that, fate intervened. Jarring. Timely. And maybe… merciful.

An assist I hadn’t expected, but one that might let me keep my wrongdoings buried, my squeaky-clean image intact.

She snatched the phone off the table, her grip tightening as her eyes scanned the screen. It was immediately clear it hadn’t been the message she’d silently hoped for, the kind that might have coaxed her back from the path she was on. Her jaw locked, lips pressed into a thin, trembling line as her brows pulled tight with a mix of disbelief and rising fury.

Without a word, she turned the screen toward me.

"The good news: I got back to even. The bad news: Now down 7K."

I stared at the screen, the words landing like a slap. Steve’s ability to turn something so deadly serious into a joke made my stomach turn. It was careless, cruel in that casual way he’d mastered, like he didn’t even realize the damage he caused, or worse, didn’t care.

She let out a dry, humorless laugh, the kind that came more from shock than amusement. “Unbelievable,” she muttered under her breath.

I shook my head, speechless for a beat. “Did it occur to him to maybe… stop when he broke even?”

Neither of us spoke at first, but everything was written across her face. Pam pulled the phone back in front of her, hands trembling slightly. 

As her thumbs hovered over the screen, she began to type: slowly, deliberately, saying each word under her breath like a curse she couldn’t hold in.

“Did… it… ever… occur… to… you… to… stop… when… you… broke… even?”

She set the phone down again with a shaky sigh, the message glowing on the screen, her frustration bleeding into the quiet air between us.

She stared at the phone like it might answer for him. Her jaw worked slightly, tension humming off her in waves.

The phone buzzed again. Pam snatched it up, eyes scanning the screen. Then she froze.

Her breath hitched as she read it aloud, voice low.

“This is your fault.”

She turned the screen toward me, stunned, like she needed confirmation she hadn’t imagined it.

Her expression was a mix of disbelief and rising anger, and before I could say anything, her fingers were already flying across the screen, typing out a reply with sharp, deliberate taps.

I didn’t have to ask what she was typing; I could see her hitting the question mark button repeatedly, the little jabs of her thumb sharp and fast. Her expression said everything.

The phone buzzed again. She read the screen, that same helpless flush rising as when Jamal exposed her three-year drought. Her jaw tightened, and she silently turned it toward me.

“You and Amy wanted Carnival. Should’ve gone Royal like I said. This ghetto-ass ship cost us seven grand.”

As I read, the bubbles continued to move; he was still typing.

She held it steady as the following message popped up.

“Amy just wanted to be around her people. Now we’re broke. Congrats.”

My eyes widened, but before I could speak, Pam pulled the phone back toward her.

“Wow,” she muttered, voice low and tight.

You’d think I’d be upset. Maybe even furious. But I wasn’t. Steve’s message: a blatantly racist cheap shot at me, the kind of venom he’d been holding in for years, finally slipped out, loosened by seven thousand dollars in gambling losses.

And somehow, instead of rage, I felt a thrill. Happy doesn’t even begin to cover it.

I was giddy.

Even five drinks in, with Jamal still living rent-free in her head, the moment was slipping.

The opportunity had been fading.

Steve’s message, clumsy, cruel, and unapologetically racist, was a gift I didn’t see coming.

That thirty-minute clock Jamal had set was running out. Pam was cracking, yes, but too slowly. There was still too much of the South in her, buried deep and fighting its hardest to hold the line. Too much guilt. Too much quiet obedience she didn’t even know she’d learned.

She was standing at the edge, and I had thrown everything I could to push her over.

The SpaceX puns. The bold flirting. The image of Jamal from the pool, stretching his shorts like they were painted on, seared into her brain.

All of it paled next to Steve’s unexpected assist.

Divine intervention, courtesy of a bigot with a gambling problem.

Her legs uncrossed beneath the table, slow and smooth, like something inside her had finally unknotted. No hesitation this time. No nervous twitch. Just release.

She grabbed her glass and downed the last of her Dark Ship in a single, savage swallow, ice clattering against her teeth, throat working fast like it was the only thing keeping her steady.

And when she set it down, it wasn’t delicate.

It landed hard. A clean, sharp clack against the table, crisp enough to catch the waiter’s attention at the bar.

That wasn’t just a sip. It was a decision.

She didn’t look at me when she said it. Didn’t have to.

“Fuck it,” she said. And the dam broke.

Three years without being touched. Without being kissed. Without being seen. It had built something in her, slow and quiet at first, like pressure gathering behind a sealed valve. A reservoir of lust and resentment, now bubbling over.

Steve’s racism, once tucked neatly behind charm and small-town manners, had been simmering too. Two months’ salary lost at the tables, and he didn’t even flinch. No apology. No shame. Just blame. Blame on Pam, on me, on the cruise line, on "my people."

Two decks below us waited the perfect specimen: brilliant, massive, poised, and built like he’d been engineered to end her drought. It was the perfect storm, and Steve had written the forecast himself.

The woman too self-conscious to change into her one-piece swimsuit yesterday was gone. In her place was someone new. It wasn’t gradual; it was sudden. Lust, liquor, and long resentment had stripped her to something raw and ready.

Steve’s text didn’t just push her. It ignited something. Years of silence, of swallowing her needs, of pretending everything was fine, all coming undone at once.

When she said “fuck it,” I didn’t hesitate. I rose like a lion catching the scent of blood, grabbing my bag, and forcing her to her feet before doubt could follow. There was no room left for second thoughts.

The next seconds blurred. I’d already mapped it out the moment Jamal made the offer: walk her down with no room for doubt. Be the whisper in her ear, the devil on her shoulder, guilt-proof because she wanted this too. I’d take her phone, block any half-assed apology Steve might send. He was finished, irrelevant. Maybe I’d linger just long enough to hear the shift, then slip away, wander the shops, maybe down another Dark Ship, while Jamal rewrote her.

I led the way, slipping between the empty tables without looking back. Pam followed, close enough that I could hear the hesitation in her breath, feel the slight drag in her steps. 

That sharp, defiant “fuck it” was already softening at the edges, the buzz still there but giving way to the weight of what we were walking toward. 

I didn’t give her time to second-guess. Movement was momentum, and we needed all of it.

We didn’t say a word as we headed for the exit, Jamal’s scent still lingering—clean, warm, impossible to ignore. But we both glanced at the chair. The one he’d taken, thinking he was just killing time, flipping through pages about his future boss. Before the trivia host pulled him into our orbit, like she’d sensed Pam’s neglect and chose to intervene. Before either of us realized what was being set in motion.