Life After Dinosaurs

13 - Helicopter

When we got to theballroom, there were only a small handful of people socializing asthe onboard staff cleaned. We got a more thanfew looks as we wandered around looking for Jenny and Mary. Aliciahad made sure that everyone knew who she was by screaming at herfamily, and now that we were traveling hand and hand again, I feltthe eyes of the world following me. This time it didn't really botherme. Alicia was famous, and I was her boyfriend. Those things weregoing to happen.

After asking a fewentirely unhelpful party goers, one of the staff directed us to themain deck of the cruise ship. There was a large open area that wasvisible from the upper levels of the ship, where the ball room waslocated. Hundreds of people were gathered around Jenny and a vastarray of presents. We went down the stairs slowly. Aliciawas quiet and thoughtful.

"Are younervous?" I asked her.

"No." She squeezing my arm. "I have you with me Ian. I don't have anything tobe nervous about."

I smiled at her,but felt a sting of self conscious doubt. I wasn't sure how I couldhelp Alicia apologize to her family outside of being there for her.It hardly felt like enough.

Right before wedescended the outer stairs to Jenny's unwrapping ceremony, I spottedsome older people in business suits and formal wear. Among them was avery ecstatic looking director. He smiled and raised a glass. Ilowered my head. The last thing I wanted was to have any association with that man.

"Alicia," Isaid grabbing her attention. "The director of Jenny's birthdayparty has been filming us."

"I don't care."She let me pass her on the steps. When I looked back ather, she took my cheeks in her hands and kissed me softly. I feltmyself be drawn into her, and my hands drawn to the subtle curves of herhips in a tender embrace.

"People aregoing to watch us. I don't want that to get in between us," Shereleased my head and grabbed my hand.

Alicia led me downonto the vast open deck of the ship. The crowd gathered around Jennywas substantially smaller than it had been at the ballroom. It seemedto me that people weren't looking forward to Jenny opening an entireboat's worth of presents. I couldn't help but wonder how many of thegifts were redundancies. Some of them were probably sponsorships and endorsements. There were open boxes and racksof clothing on wheels. There was enough for a dozen different girl'sbirthday parties.

Jenny herself wassurrounded by what I assumed was her inner circle of friends --glamorously dressed girls with painfully fashionable dresses,jackets, scarves, and of course shoes. Being a straight guy, I didn'treally know much about what they were wearing, only that it lookedlike the kind of things celebrities wore at red carpet events andinterviews.

Jenny was lookingthrough the pile when she spotted Alicia and I descending thestaircase. She smiled hopefully and then gave me and her a quizzicallook. She had to investigate once she was me. Next thing I new, everyone was looking at me and Alicia. Well, mostly Alicia, but I couldn't exactly escape their gaze. I tried to spot Mary Martins and saw her on the far end of the pile of presents.She was talking to some of the party staff.

When Jennyapproached Alicia, Alicia released my hand and gave her sister a weakwave.

"Hey," Aliciasaid. "I'm sorry about what I said."

Jenny shook herhead and threw her arms around Alicia. As the sisters embraced andwhispered quiet things in their ears, Jenny's attractive, rich, andmostly age appropriate friends were looking me over like gift housewith bad teeth. They all wanted to bombard me with questions, and only my proximity to the Martins gave me any protection.

The girls endedtheir embrace with an awkward pause...and Jenny's eyes slid over to me.

"This is Ian."Alicia pushed me forward a little. "He's my boyfriend."