Must Love Otters (20 page)

The quick stop at Smitty’s is fun. Cute store the owner and his wife have decorated in the spirit of a Blackbeard-era ship, complete with gas for Ryan to refuel. When I see him buying a basketful of groceries—butter, onions, garlic, fresh peppers, a bottle of wine, nutcrackers to break open the crab legs, rice, trail mix and lunch makings, fresh bread and a package of cinnamon rolls baked by Smitty’s wife—I get excited. Nervous. Twitterpated, as my father would say.

Maybe we don’t have to go back today. Maybe we get to stay out here in our own little world.

I have exactly zero problems with that.

I’m scanning their surprisingly well-stocked book aisle, looking through guidebooks about local wildlife. “Pick one. You can bird-watch while we’re out today,” Ryan says into my ear. I shiver at his closeness and pick a small Audubon field guide specifically for the Pacific Northwest.

Smitty is grateful for the crab and barters some groceries with Ryan, asking about the resort, family, when Tanner’s back in the inlet, how the baby chase goes. Despite their geographic distance—we’ve got to be at least two hours away from the resort at this point—it’s obvious this is a close-knit group of folks. I like watching Ryan in his element—relaxed, smiling, warm. He’s good with people. Not that he wasn’t relaxed and warm at the resort, but in his concierge uniform, he’s different. More professional.

I think what I’m looking at is Ryan in off mode.

I like it. A lot.

In fact, watching him causes some weird new emotion to surge in my chest. Pride? Is that pride? Am I proud of this man? I hardly know him! Or am I just excited that he’s here, with me, that he didn’t berate and scold me after I did such a stupid thing and risked both our lives but instead has swept me into this spontaneous adventure with crabs and clams and smiling and flirting and …

When he looks over his shoulder and catches me ogling him, his smile is like a hug. I want to wrap in it, feel its warmth ensconce me, explore its soft edges until the moon tells me I have to go home.

“This is my friend Hollie,” Ryan says, arm outstretched. “She’s from Portland. We’re out exploring today.”

“Hey, take her up around Rock Bay,” Smitty says, pointing. “The auklets and cormorants and pigeon guillemots are nesting. Oyster catchers too. Neat-looking bird. Gorgeous this time of year.”

“A private tour of our fair land with this gallant gentleman?” Smitty’s wife says. “You must be a
special
guest.”

Ryan blushes again and grabs the paper bags from the counter. “I’ll see you next time, Audrey,” he says. “Come on, Hollie Porter. I have some more friends for you to meet.”

I wave goodbye to Smitty and his wife and follow Ryan back to the boat, nearly forgetting about my bum ankle until a misplaced rock reminds me. I stumble.

“No more injuries,” he teases. “You okay?”

“I got this.” It hurts, but I won’t let on. Just walk slower on tiptoes and lap up Ryan’s “special guest” attention.

Ryan moves us northward again but banks east around the backside of one of the countless islands. I’m glad he knows where we are because it’s all starting to look the same to me. It’s after three o’clock, but the sun is still beating down, warming the breeze. Few things feel as freeing as wind in your hair, body stretched on the back of a boat under the bright sun. No expectation, no worries, and best of all, no Yorkies.

A quick tweak of my T-shirt sleeve reveals that I’m even getting a bit of a sunburn. In May! Unheard of. My dad won’t recognize me when I get home without my vampiric, hooded eyes and translucent skin.

The boat slows as we round a rocky outcropping, and then it shuts off completely. I sit up, waiting for Ryan to come tell me we’ve run out of gas and we’ll have to swim for it.

Instead, he drops the anchor.
Plop
.

Opens the fish box and pulls out our bucket of clams.

“What are we doing?”

He doesn’t answer but proceeds to untie my small rowboat, leash it to the cruiser’s backend, and toss a life jacket into my lap. From the bench box across from me he pulls two new oars, wiggling his eyebrows as he hands them over. “Don’t lose this set, co-captain,” he says, saluting.

He then lowers the clam bucket into the rowboat and signals for me to hand over the oars.

“Where are we going?”

“Do you trust me?” he says, arm outstretched, hand beckoning for me to come aboard. I need go no further than his eyes before I know that I trust him. Implicitly. With my life.

The one he saved last night.

I accept his chivalry wordlessly, balancing my weight into the rowboat so I don’t tip us over or add too much weight on my sore foot.

He rows us away from the bigger boat, a finger pressed to his lips as we round yet another island edge near a small beach, no wider than a sidewalk. With the oars pulled in, we drift in the shallower water. Waiting for something.

We sit in silence for about five minutes before he drops the oars again and pulls us along the island’s incongruous edge. I’m watching him row, searching his face for a clue about where we’re going, just as he pulls the oars in and a smile spreads wide across his face, again revealing that spectacular dental masterpiece.

He says nothing. Only points.

Near the shore, I see them.

Otters.

A momma and baby. The momma’s pulling the baby around in her mouth, dropping her in the water, dragging her back on shore, repeating the process. The gloriously fluffy fluff of a baby is squeaking.

She’s squeaking! The baby doesn’t want to swim!

I know that baby otters are born unable to swim, that their fur is so dense and fluffed out that it assures their buoyancy, but this momma … we are witnessing swimming lessons.

I don’t even know the tears are falling until Ryan’s hand stretches over my shoulder clutching a red cloth handkerchief.

We bob in our wee boat watching this real-life nature documentary unfold before us. Eventually the momma tires of the lessons and pulls the baby onto her belly and back into the water. They float, watching us cautiously, these huge intruders to their beautiful little lives. Within a few moments of momma reentering the inlet, three more otters join her. Three!

My hands are at my cheeks. “Are you seeing this?” I whisper. Ryan chuckles at me. He pulls a knife out of his pants pocket and pries open a clam, scooping its meat onto one half of the shell and gently placing the shell into the water so it floats. He prepares a handful of clams this way—but the otters disappear under the water.

“Where … where’d they go?”

I yelp when one pops up right next to us, floating on her back, a careful eye on us as she takes an hors d’oeuvre. Mere seconds later, the half-shells have disappeared, so Ryan keeps shucking clams. He hands one to me, drippy and slimy, and motions for me to reach over the edge of the boat.

“Be careful. They’re cute, but they bite hard. Just hold it out and she’ll come get it,” he says quietly.

“When they’re in big groups, they clutch onto one another—like this,” I demonstrate by lacing one of my arms into Ryan’s. “The males and females will float in separate groups called rafts. If they’re alone or with just a few other otters, they’ll wrap themselves in kelp so they can eat or sleep.”

Ryan bobs his head and smiles. “Ya learn something new every day.”

“And when they mate? The males bite the noses of their female partners. I’ve seen some gruesome pictures …”

“Glad I’m not an otter.”

“Me too.” And then I blush, thinking about mating and Ryan and biting and
stop right now Hollie
.

I’m shaking with excitement and nerves and fear and pure, unadulterated glee. My dad is going to die when he hears about this. I wish I had a picture.

“Another misconception about otters—they don’t eat starfish. Unless there’s nothing else to eat,” I say. “They love shellfish, obviously, and crab. Snails too.” I hold out my scant offering. An otter breaks the surface of the water, grabs it from my fingers, and disappears again, only to come up about five feet away chomping on the fresh clam meat, chewing and scraping at the shell to lick clean the remaining delicacy.

We feed the otters our clams until the bucket is empty and our hands are sticky from guts. The geoduck is too big and strong for us to shuck with just a pocketknife, and when Ryan plucks it from the bucket, it squirts him right in the face. I have to cover my laugh so I don’t scare the otters away. It’s one of those moments you wish you could’ve caught on video to burn up YouTube.

Ryan holds out the ginormous penis clam and waits for the biggest otter of the group to come for it. He’s a lot bigger than his comrades, but I’m still surprised to see a male with these other three and the baby. Usually the males and females don’t hang out together … unless they’re mating.

“You want to know why the otters?” I ask. Ryan nods. “I saw my first otter the only time I ever met my mother. Only I didn’t know she was my mother then. She was just my dad’s ‘friend.’ We were in Monterey. At the aquarium there. This pretty lady with my eyes had clam chowder with us and gave me a stuffed momma-and-baby otter. I still have it,” I pause, watching as the otters duck back under and float far enough away that we can still see them but where we’re not a threat. “I didn’t know she was my mother until a few years later when Dad told me. I didn’t know then, at ten, if I should cry or scream or smile.” Another tear splashes onto my wrist, bathing Oliver Otter. “I still don’t know.”

Ryan is quiet, his face sympathetic. Looking at him, it dawns on me that I’ve spent over an hour in this boat with him, sharing nothing more than a few nerdy facts about the
Enhydra lutris
, and yet, the fulfillment is like that felt after a huge meal.

Sated. Whole.

Happy
.

The contentment on his face says what his mouth doesn’t. I dare say he concurs.

Ryan dips the oars back into the water and gently eases us away from my new friends. I watch until we’ve rounded the corner and they’ve faded from sight.

“Thank you,” I whisper. I can’t say anything else, but the smile stretched across Ryan’s five o’clock-shadowed face tells me I don’t have to.

Even with the tiny kitchen, Ryan knows his way around the food. He uncorks wine and gives me a knife to slice garlic for the melting butter. Our crabs are boiling—I swear I hear them scream when they go into the pot, but Ryan says I’m delusional. He’s got a little barbecue on the deck with charcoals smoldering for our foil-wrapped French bread. I set the outer table with a very fancy plastic tablecloth, a roll of paper towels each, and of course, the vino.

It is a feast unseen by mine eyes before this hallowed date.

Ryan plates a crab for me and shows me where to extract the best meat. It’s been a while since I’ve done this—and last time, my dad shelled the crab for me—so it’s a fun lesson. Especially because it means he sits close enough that I can see the tiny mole just below his left ear. And he has detached earlobes. And little smile lines at the creases of his eyes. And eyelashes that almost look fake, they’re so long. He’s enough taller than me that if I were to rest my head against him, it would find its place against his upper arm, just at his shoulder.

Cozy.

When he catches me looking at him, he stops talking and glances at my lips.

I want to kiss him.

Kiss me
.

“Would you like garlic butter … or regular?” he says. But he speaks slowly, as if he’s considering my lips as carefully as I’m considering his. His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows hard, a sly smirk tugging at the corner of his lips.

Rather than kissing me, he offers a crab fork with a piece of very delectable, butter-soaked meat. I close my mouth around it without taking my eyes off his, even when he looks away and leans back in his chair.

“Who are you, Hollie Porter?”

A quiet laugh escapes my throat. “Me? I’m no one. I’m just a girl who loves otters.”

“Where do you see yourself in five years?”

“Are we going to do this? You’re going to play Dr. Phil with me?”

“I’m just trying to figure you out. Clearly you’re confident, smart, fun loving, but you show up at the Cove and it seems to me that something’s missing. Like … you’re looking for something but you don’t quite know what it is.”

“That sounds about right.”

“Tell me about you. I want to know more.”

“What’s there to know? I work for 911. I hate it. I hate listening to people die or hear how they pay my salary so I owe them some part of my soul. My coworkers are creepy assholes. I dumped my boyfriend and came up here …”

“Okay, tell me three things about you that I wouldn’t be able to figure out by reading your Facebook wall.”

“Seriously?”

“Why not?”

“I’m going to need more wine, Concierge Ryan,” I say. He tops up my glass. I again notice how nice his ass looks in jeans. “Let’s see—umm, my best friend broke up with me and I miss her terribly, even though I shouldn’t because she was a jerkface.”

“Ah, you’re better off without her, then. Number two?”

“Mmmm, I am physically incapable of saying no to anyone.”

“That could come in handy,” he says. I kick my foot at him playfully. “So give me an example of when Hollie can’t say no.”

“Like, I have this obnoxious old lady who lives downstairs—Mrs. Hubert. I swear to God she’s stalking me—every time I walk by, day or night, she shouts at me about getting her cat’s food or how she needs milk for her coffee.”

“Doesn’t she have family?”

“Yeah! She does! But her kids never come around because she’s such a crotchety witch, so she picks on me instead.”

“And you never say no to her.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I dunno … I guess I feel bad for her. Her hands are all gnarled and knobby and her cat, Mr. Boots, he’s blind and has to wear a diaper.”

Ryan busts up. I can’t help but chuckle in agreement. “I have to see this cat wearing a diaper.”

“He looks like Gollum. All his hair fell out so he doesn’t look like Mr. Boots anymore.”

“Stop! You’re making this up!”

Two fingers presented, I salute. “Scout’s honor.”

“When you get home, you’re going to have to send me pictures of this cat.”

“I could do that. Only that means I’ll have to buy Mrs. Hubert’s cat food and coffee creamer.”

“I’ll give you the money,” he laughs, reaching into his rear pocket for his wallet. “A tin of Friskies: one dollar. A pint of half-and-half: three dollars. Seeing Mr. Boots the Hairless Cat in his diaper: priceless.”

I lean too far back in my fold-up chair and almost kiss the deck. This is the best kind of laughter.

“Okay, okay … back on track here, Porter.” He wipes the corner of his eye. “Who else have you not said no to?”

“Are we really going to have this conversation?”

“We don’t have to. But you owe me one more Porter-ism.”

“Nuh-uh.”

“One more super-secret secret about Hollie Porter. Give it up. No cheating.”

“Gah, this is hard. I dunno …” I sip. “Oh! I spent my tuition money on a private investigator only to learn that my mother is a criminal.”

“Oooh. Dude. Buzzkill.”

“Yeah, little bit. Oh, and don’t tell my dad. If you ever talk to him. Or whatever. He thinks that I didn’t get approved for the student loan and that’s why I dropped out.”

“Earlier, with the otters … you said you only met her once.”

“Yeah. She left when I was a baby.”

“I’m sorry … I didn’t mean to …”

“No, no, God, Ryan, don’t worry. It’s not like we bonded and she broke my heart. I just had this dumb fantasy that I’d find her and we’d have this crazy reunion and she’d feel terrible for abandoning her newborn and we’d ride off on our sparkly unicorns into the rainbow sunset.”

“I think that’s normal.”

“Which part?”

“The part about the sparkly unicorns … What? You don’t have one?”

“Of course I do. My dad got one for me. Brat.” I drain my wine glass. “He’d sell his soul to the devil for me, and that’s enough.”

“Sounds like a good guy.”

“He is … He sent me here.”

Ryan reaches out and places a long finger on the arm of my fold-up chair. “I’m glad he did that.”

“Me too …”

Flame flares out of the corner of my eye. “Shit! The bread!”

Ryan jumps up and douses the barbecue with a glass of water. “All good! We’re safe.” With tongs, he pulls the bread off the rack and drags it onto the boat’s floor. Gingerly, he pries apart the foil. “And some of the bread survived!”

“Victory!” I say, raising my empty glass. Some equals three pieces survived. The rest is going into the water.

“Fishes like burnt French bread, right?” he teases.

After the barbecue has been quieted and Ryan’s sure we’re not going to catch on fire, he sits again, cracking more crab to share with me. “Tell me about the best and worst calls you ever had at 911.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’ve always been curious what goes on behind the scenes in a place like that.”

“It’s not nearly as exciting as you might think.”

“You guys are the hub of the excitement! Police chases, big fires, rescues of damsels-in-distress …”

“I wish. More like a lot of snarky mean people in polyester pants who look way too forward to staff potlucks and make fun of the people who call in for our help.”

“Really?”

“Well, not all of them. Some of the dispatchers are cool. I just happen to be in a section with some real winners.” An image of Troll Lady and Les pops into my head, them sneaking out of the handicapped bathroom, wrongfully thinking none of us know what’s going on. Eww.

“But what about the calls? Give me some insider info.”

“The worst call I ever had? Hmmm … there have been a few. I don’t like it when people die on me. Right before my little impromptu holiday up here, I had a guy dressed as Batman who had a heart attack after he took Viagra and drank too much whisky. That was pretty sucky because his wife was really upset—she couldn’t do the chest compressions properly because she was afraid he’d be pissed at her for cutting through his costume.”

“And he bit it?”

“Mm-hmm,” I say, lifting my wine in a toast. “Rest in peace, Batman Jerry.”

Ryan clinks my glass and we drink to the masked crusader.

“I think the very worst calls I get, other than the rude people who scream at me when I tell them their neighbor’s barking dog is not an emergency, are the kids. When the kids are sick or hurt or even dead. I had a little girl die once.”

“Oh my God …”

“Yeah … she’d gotten into some medicine while her parents were asleep, and when they found her, she was already gone. That was a really shitty night.”

“Damn. That sucks. I don’t think I could handle it if a kid died.”

“I had to do some aftercare counseling for that one. A few of us did.”

“So what about the best calls?”

I smile, thinking about Mona and Herb. “The best ones end up happy—no one dies and the patient ends up being okay. The ambulance will arrive and take care of everything. Sometimes I get lucky and the caller will tell me a story while we wait for EMS.”

“Really? Like what?”

“Just the other day, ironically, a sweet old woman, Mona, called—her husband was having a diabetic reaction. The whole time as I talked her through the call, she was worried but calm. When we got Herb some insulin and he started to come around, Mona told me how they met, how long they’d been together, which is like sixty years or something. She tried to set me up with one of her sons …”

Ryan laughs. “Seriously? That is awesome!”

“Yeah. She was a hoot. And the thing is? I wanted to stay on the phone with her all day. Even when I could hear that our guys had arrived and the call was almost finished, I didn’t want her to hang up. I wanted to hear more about her life with Herb, about their ducks at this great big park in Portland—they got married there—and about how they still go there every day and feed the birds and sit on their special bench and talk about their grandbabies and great grandbabies. That call … that was the best.”

“And Herb was okay?”

I pause for a moment, thinking about that day, how everything spiraled after that phone call. “Yeah. I think so. I don’t usually follow up with callers because there are so many, but I think he was going to be fine.”

“You seem really touched by her story.”

I nod yes. “I was. I am. Thing is … her parting words to me were,
you only get to live this life once, Hollie
. She told me to not waste a second.”

“Are you still wasting seconds?”

“Well, that night, I called your fabulous resort …”

“Drunk.”

“Yes, drunk. But I’d just kicked out my lame boyfriend, so I earned that drunk.”

“Touché,” he says, refilling our glasses. “It appears that maybe Mona’s advice sunk in.”

“Maybe. A little.”

“Next question—”

“More questions?”

“I told you—I want to know Hollie Porter.”

“Beyond my mad skills in watersports?”

“When we get back, I’m calling the Olympic rowing team to see if they need a new bowman. Only you can’t lose the oars.”

“Shut up! Geeze!” I throw a crab claw at him. “
Their
boats will have anchor locks.”

“Next question.”

“Right, okay, fine. But if that bottle is starting to feel light, we may have to raid that whisky in there.”

Ryan throws his head back. “You’re a lush, Porter.”

“Get on with it, Concierge Ryan, before these mosquitoes start to take blood I can’t get back.”

“Okay. If you could do any job in the whole wide world—considering you hate being a dispatcher—what would it be?” he asks.

“Anything?”

“Yup.”

“Work with sea life. Without a doubt.”

“Like at Sea World or …”

“No, like, at an aquarium. Or at the beach. Maybe with Greenpeace or something. I’d love to be an educator. You know, teach people about the critters and where they live, how they eat, all that stuff. I’d love to work in animal rehab, but I faint when I see blood, so that’s always held me back from getting into veterinary medicine.”

“Why not study to become a biologist?”

“Because I didn’t really think that was a possibility when I started college. My dad is all about the medical field. He’s a nurse, our extended family is dotted with doctors and nurses dating back a million generations, so it’s kind of expected. Plus my dad wanted me to get a good union job. When the 911 thing came up, I figured I could make my dad happy and keep him from nagging too much until I figured out what to do with my life.”

“Did he want you to go into nursing?”

“Probably. But the whole blood thing … My dad wanted to be a doctor, actually.”

“Why isn’t he one? Although it’s not as unusual nowadays for men to be nurses, I suppose.”

“It’s definitely more accepted now than when he started twenty-odd years ago, but he was a year from finishing medical school when I came along. Then my mother left abruptly when I was a month old and he had to drop out of med school because he knew he’d never be able to do a residency with a new baby and he didn’t want me raised by strangers, you know, in daycare or whatever.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah. My dad’s an incredible man.”

“Well, if it means anything, I think he did a great job with his daughter,” Ryan says, wiping his hands on a damp towel.

“You don’t have to say that.”

He leans forward and brushes a finger across my cheek. Shivers erupt. Everywhere. “I wouldn’t if I didn’t mean it.”

“I’ll be sure to tell him …” I don’t finish the sentence because Ryan’s lips brush across mine. He tastes buttery, and the recent sip of wine lingers on his tongue. He kisses me, his fingers soft against my face, on my neck. The kiss deepens, and he rubs a hand down the side of my head, atop my hair, before pulling back. Smiling.

We’re both smiling. Like cats with canaries. Big, fat canaries with bellies full of crab and wine and lust.

Our foreheads touch, and a subtle laugh passes between us before he sits back in his chair. I don’t give him time to catch his breath. I’m up and on his lap, straddling him, my fingers buried in his thick hair, my thumbs trailing along his bristled jawline, his hands on my ass, pulling me toward him. My ankle screams in protest, but I couldn’t give a flying shit at this point. Let it break and fall off because right now, I have this man’s face to mark as my own.