6. Stevens

SIX

Stevens

You look familiar. Do I know you?

~ Madagascar

“ S o, this movie star is pretty private,” Joel says.

I met Joel a few minutes ago at the dock where he parks his motorboat in one of the coves on the North Shore of Marbella. He climbs aboard the boat and I follow.

“I emailed the papers yesterday, including the NDA,” I say. “They got me cleared in record time.”

“Let me tell you,” Joel starts the engine and backs out of the slip. “Working with Hollywood people is sort of like being in an alternate universe. What they want, they get.”

I hum, considering what it would be like to snap my fingers and have anything I wanted or needed. I wonder if that level of instant gratification and power is actually beneficial long term. Most healthy systems in nature are interdependent, even if there is a natural hierarchy of organisms. When one species takes up more than its share of resources or dominates the ecosystem, the entire dynamic shifts to an imbalance which threatens the well-being of all the organisms.

“Whatcha thinking?” Joel asks.

“About ecological balance.”

“Of course you are.” He smiles warmly at me.

I like that about Joel. He gets me. He’ll be the first to say he doesn’t follow my train of thought at any given moment, but he never judges me for being who I am.

“So, you’re not going to tell me who I’m driving?” I ask.

“She requested that you not know in advance. There’s less chance of a leak that way, I guess. You’ll be contacted by her personal assistant when you’re needed. Like I said, this star is very private. Just call her Ms. Vargas. I never even call her by her actual name. It’s one of those things—alternate universe, I’m telling you. Besides, you won’t need to strike up a conversation. If she wants to talk, she’ll let you know. Sometimes she just wants to ride in silence. Other times she’ll ask you things.”

“What kinds of things? Like personal things?”

Joel laughs. “No. Not personal things. She’s just … I don’t know. She might ask you what you did over the weekend. Or she’ll ask about … probably nothing since she doesn’t know you. I’ve been driving her for a few years now. So, she asks me all sorts of stuff. We talk about music, her life, my life, the woman I’ve got a thing for, her movies. Don’t worry. You’ll be fine. It’s just a few trips back and forth across the channel during the coming week.”

“Can you give me a hint?”

“As to who she is?”

“Yeah.”

“No can do. That’s what I signed an NDA for. Any stipulations she places on me, I follow, unless it’s something unethical or illegal. So far she’s been neither of those things. If only she would be just a little more …” Joel trails off and a warm smile overtakes his face.

“Do you have feelings for her?”

“Nah. Not like that. She’s like a big sister, or a good friend. Only we’re not really friends. I’m just her lackey, getting her groceries, driving her around. You know, like that old movie? Driving Miss Daisy.” He chuckles. “Anyway, thanks for doing this. It’s hard on her, you know? Being in the spotlight, not trusting anyone unless they’ve been screened. It’s not all glitz and glamor.”

I nod. I imagine it’s not easy. She must be pretty big to go to these lengths to avoid being in the public eye. Her assistant told me she can’t even take the ferry— too much exposure and people can be unpredictable . Who lives like that?

“It’s no problem. I’m glad to help. And, tell your sister I said congratulations.”

“I will. I still can’t believe my baby sister is going to beat me to the altar.”

Joel has me take over driving the boat around for a bit, even though I pilot larger boats than this one all the time. We chat about a lot of nothing and spend about an hour or so tooling around on the water. At one point, we cut the engine and I free-dive off the back of the boat, intentionally submerging myself for a few minutes in the cool blue depths of our ocean. I have friends who practice this way more often than I do. They can stay under for nearly ten minutes without tanks or a snorkel. After three minutes, I emerge, refreshed, my mind clear and peaceful.

We motor back to the slip in silence. I have just enough time to finish responding to some grant emails, shower and meet my mom at Harry’s painting class after Joel and I dock.

I’m surprised to see so many people on the beach when I get there. Mom’s waving like we’re in a crowd of a thousand, and shouting my name as if we aren’t looking right at one another. At least she calls me Stevens when we’re in public.

“Stevens! Stevens! Yoo hoo! Over here!”

“Coming,” I answer in a normal volume, since there are only twenty people milling around in a relatively secluded cove. A couple is off in the distance laying on towels on the sand. A family runs in and out of the shorepound at another spot. But otherwise, the painting class has taken over the beach, four rows of five easels per row, each with their own folding stool propped in front of them, staggered so we can each have a clear view of the scenery.

I walk up to the front row and take my seat behind the easel next to Mom’s.

“Harry!” Mom shouts nearly as loudly as she called out my name. Harry walks over.

Mom beams at her. “You remember my son, Ren, er … Stevens. Well … we call him Stevens now. Anyway, he’s single. A marine biologist. He does tours out of the Alicante harbor. And he does important evaluations of marine life whenever a company wants to expand along the coast. Reh … Stevens, this is Harry. Of course you know her. You two went to Marbella High together. Isn’t that amazing? A shared history.” Mom sighs. “Harry’s an accomplished artist, and our teacher. Also single. Isn’t that a coincidence?”

Mom glances between us. I smile at her and then give Harry an apologetic smile.

“Subtlety was never her forte,” I explain.

“It’s fine. My mom isn’t much better.”

“Oh! See! You two have that in common,” Mom says in an incredibly glee-filled voice. “Meddling mothers. What a coincidence! The second thing you’ve had in common in only a few moments. That could mean something, you know.”

“I need to start the class,” Harry says, smiling an amused smile at my mom and then smiling kindly at me.

“Oh, yes,” Mom says to Harry. “You go. We’ll be right here. Me and Stevens. Painting. Admiring you as you teach. All that.”

“Mom,” I smile softly at her. “Maybe dial it back to fifty percent.”

“Okay. Okay. But she’s cute, right? I told you she was.”

“She’s an attractive woman.”

“So, you’ll ask her out?”

Thankfully, Mom’s voice has shifted to a conspiratorial level .

I lean toward her. “No. I will not ask her out. I don’t know her. And I’m busy this week with a job.”

“So? Dates are for just that. You get to know one another. You could ask her out for sometime the following week. That will build the anticipation.”

So help me, Mom wags her eyebrows suggestively.

“One day I might meet a woman. And if I do, she’ll be the one. We’ll date and fill your house with grandbabies at the holidays and on weekends and you can even babysit them when I take my wife on a date. Today is not that day. So, let nature take its course. Please.”

“That is not how it works, Ren.”

Mom’s whisper-hissing while Harry explains the history and intention of plein air painting.

“How does it work, then?” I regrettably ask.

I should keep my mouth shut in hopes that she realizes we’re here to paint. Though, it’s obvious now, we’re not really here to paint.

“How it works is that you let your mom do some of the pre-selecting. It’s faster that way. I know Harry’s family. They’re good Marbella people. Harry’s sweet and beautiful. I already screened her.” Mom looks wistfully in Harry’s direction, then back at me. “You won’t feel all that warmth and chemistry when you first meet someone. The sparks usually aren’t instantaneous. Trust me. Love grows from familiarity.”

“Love is a byproduct of chemicals,” I explain to my dreamer of a mother. “Initially, serotonin, norepinephrine and dopamine determine our reaction to someone we find remotely attractive and eligible. Then oxytocin solidifies the bonds those other chemicals initiated. We’re not talking about pheromones, though the debate rages on about the possible role of those in human attraction. We can’t force these relational chemicals, Mom. They’re either present, or they aren’t. It’s science.”

She shakes her head at me and mutters, “I’m going to be one of those old women who can’t recognize her grandchildren because her children all waited far too long to settle down and she went completely senile by the time they had any babies.”

I place my hand on her back and smile softly at her again. “Let’s enjoy an afternoon of painting together. What do you say?”

She’s pouting, but she says, “Bet,” which I’ve come to learn means yes among the high school crowd.

There’s a small disturbance in the row behind us. A woman in a ball cap and glasses takes the stool behind Mom. She’s wearing extremely dark sunglasses which block not only her eyes but half her cheeks. I’d imagine wearing those might interfere with her choice of paint colors, but I’m not an expert.

Harry glances over at the new arrival, waves as though she knows her, and says, “Hello, Layna. Let me know if you need anything.”

The new arrival nods at Harry and smiles a reserved smile. Her teeth are the whitest I’ve ever seen in person.

Mom, being Mom, turns around and starts chatting with the new student while Harry goes over how we will sketch our concept before painting with the oil paints she’s provided as a part of the lesson supplies covered by our registration fee.

“Layna, is it?” Mom asks the tardy classmate behind us.

The new student nods and then diverts her attention to the blank canvas in front of her.

I stare at her for a moment, trying to figure out if I know her from somewhere. Maybe she took a tour? I doubt it, though. I usually remember every face of every person who rides on my boats with me. She looks so familiar, which isn’t too odd for Marbella. But usually when someone looks that familiar, I can place them pretty quickly.

“Are you new to the island?” Mom asks.

The new student shakes her head lightly to indicate she’s not new, and then shrugs like she’s playing some understated and mysterious form of charades.

“We’ve lived here since I married my husband,” Mom continues. “R … Stevens here was born at the Marbella Island Medical Ce nter, as were my other children. I have two grown sons and a daughter. All single.”

No. She. Didn’t. I’m starting to think my mother’s going to try to pair me up with anything that moves. We don’t know this woman behind us, even though she looks familiar in a way that nags at me like a puzzle I need to solve. The woman obviously doesn’t want to be known. She’s out to have an uninterrupted afternoon of painting—without having the local bachelor scientist foisted on her.

“Mom. Let’s focus on what Harry’s saying, huh?”

“Sure. Sure.” Mom shoos me off.

Then she asks the woman, “Are you single, dear? I don’t see a ring.”

“Mom.” I speak more loudly this time.

“Right. Well. Nice to meet you, dear. Layna, was it?”

The stranger nods again and smiles what might be an amused grin at Mom. Thankfully, we’re instructed that we’ll have five minutes to roughly sketch the scene we’ve chosen to paint—something we’re looking at on the beach, either the whole cove, or an aspect of it. Harry’s directions temporarily distract Mom from her self-appointed role as Marbella’s own yenta.