Passionate Choice

Chapter 2.5

   Perhaps it was because they had both known they were not going to be together for ever that they had lived in harmony for those nine months, sharing everything, and yet, now Selena came to think of it, it was only when their time together was coming to an end that she had begun to feel a strain as she had realized she hadn't wanted to leave Keith, that she had wanted commitment to him and from him.

   They had returned to Nassau as he had planned in the last week of September, just before the first hurricane of the season had blown up. Even now she could recall how hot and sultry the weather had been when Nightingale had been steered into its berth at the Nassau Harbour Club marina and the lines had been made fast. Leaving Keith on the dock talking to the dock master, she had gone below decks to fix a cold drink for him and for herself and she had been approaching the steps up to the cockpit, a glass in each hand when she had heard a high-pitched, excited female voice calling, "Keith, Keith. Oh, Keith, darling you're back at last. Tin heard you calling harbour control on the radio and told me you were on your way in so I can't straight down to welcome you."

   Standing on the ladder, the glasses still in her hand, her head just above the hatchway, Selena had been able to see without being seen and she had watched a young woman with blonde-streaked hair tied back in a pony-tail, dressed in brief blue shorts revealing long tanned legs fling herself at Keith, wind her arms around his neck and kiss him very thoroughly.

   "Oh, Keith," the young woman had continued in that high voice so that anyone who had wanted to hear could have heard every word winging out. "I'm glad you're back. Now we can get married. Now we can set the date. Oh, it's wonderful to see you."

   Selena had had time to see Keith take the young woman's arms from around his neck and push her away from him all the time laughing.

   "It's good to see you too, Sora," he had said. He had put an arm about the young woman's shoulders and turning her, had guided her long the dock towards the club buildings, away from the Nightingale and away from Selena.

   Stunned by what she had just seen and heard, Selena had retreated down the ladder to the cabin. Placing one of the glasses on the galley counter, she had sat down in the saloon and had slipped her drink slowly, trying to deal with the feeling of intense disappointment and disillusion that had swept over her and all the time the voice of the woman called Sora had been ringing through her mind: Now we can get married. Now we can set the date.

   When they had embarked on their cruise, Keith had told her he would return to Nassau before the end of September because there was something else he wanted to do and that had suited her because she had planned to return to university when the nine months were over. Never once had she thought that the something Keith wanted to do was get married to another woman. Strictly single, he had always described himself, and intending to stay that way for as light as he could, and for a while, having been strictly single herself, she had understood and accepted his views.

   But then, at the end of nine months of loving him and living with him, she had longed for him to ask her to marry him. Instead, she had heard a woman called Sora say to him: Now we can get married. She had seen the woman kiss him, and the way he had put his arms around Sora'e shoulders affectionately and realized he had come back to get married.