— Ken and Vesta —
Wedding and Portrait Photography
541 773-3373
If you would like to download any of the photos below, just click on it and you’ll be taken to a gallery, where you can do that, because each photo will have a download button under it. Or you can just drag it off. But you’ll get a larger, better quality image if you go to the gallery and download it.
As for how they’re arranged, the first photo or photos of anyone or group of people would have been taken with an iPhone 14 and the the last photo or photos would have been taken with a Canon R6. For example, if we photographed a few photos of somebody, the 1st two or three would have been taken with the iPhone and the 2nd two or three, would’ve been taken with the Canon.
Oh yes, please click on the Instagram link in the menu bar above and follow us. We’ll love you forever if you do and we’ll follow you back.
__________
This is our seventeenth day of this project, January 27th, 2023 and yesterday I mentioned that my little toe was turning in, well that’s because my feet swelled up, which happens on occasion, because of my blood pressure meds. So I wore sandals when we walked the two miles to the Shore, but since I kind of turned my foot in, to avoid pressure on that toe, I got a giant, big as a planet blister on the bottom of my big one and it hurts when I walk. So it’s a good thing we have our three day vacation from this project till Monday next. I should be right as rain by then. Fingers crossed, or should I saw, toes crossed.
Best,
Ken and Vesta
__________
PS. Just incase you don’t know, and you probably don’t, I’m a writer and I finished my last book, a sort of thriller, when we were locked down in Reno. It’s about a hundred thousand words, which is way too long and I haven’t gone over it or proof read it. Actually, I just sort of forgot about it.
So, at the very end of these posts, I’m going to post around 1500 words of the story everyday. It’s called CLEAN SLATE. And today’s post is the 8th installment of that. If you wanna read it from the beginning, you can just go to www.kenandvesta.com/Photography/PROJECTiPHONE14 and click on the PROJECTiPHONE14-3 post below. It’s the one with the photo of the girl in the cowboy hat on the large thumb nail.
And if you do decide to read it and you think something sucks or I made a horrible grammatical mistake, please text me at 541 773-3373 and let me know. I'd be forever in your debt if you did that.
As for how they’re arranged, the first photo or photos of anyone or group of people would have been taken with an iPhone 14 and the the last photo or photos would have been taken with a Canon R6. For example, if we photographed a few photos of somebody, the 1st two or three would have been taken with the iPhone and the 2nd two or three, would’ve been taken with the Canon.
Oh yes, please click on the Instagram link in the menu bar above and follow us. We’ll love you forever if you do and we’ll follow you back.
__________
This is our seventeenth day of this project, January 27th, 2023 and yesterday I mentioned that my little toe was turning in, well that’s because my feet swelled up, which happens on occasion, because of my blood pressure meds. So I wore sandals when we walked the two miles to the Shore, but since I kind of turned my foot in, to avoid pressure on that toe, I got a giant, big as a planet blister on the bottom of my big one and it hurts when I walk. So it’s a good thing we have our three day vacation from this project till Monday next. I should be right as rain by then. Fingers crossed, or should I saw, toes crossed.
Best,
Ken and Vesta
__________
PS. Just incase you don’t know, and you probably don’t, I’m a writer and I finished my last book, a sort of thriller, when we were locked down in Reno. It’s about a hundred thousand words, which is way too long and I haven’t gone over it or proof read it. Actually, I just sort of forgot about it.
So, at the very end of these posts, I’m going to post around 1500 words of the story everyday. It’s called CLEAN SLATE. And today’s post is the 8th installment of that. If you wanna read it from the beginning, you can just go to www.kenandvesta.com/Photography/PROJECTiPHONE14 and click on the PROJECTiPHONE14-3 post below. It’s the one with the photo of the girl in the cowboy hat on the large thumb nail.
And if you do decide to read it and you think something sucks or I made a horrible grammatical mistake, please text me at 541 773-3373 and let me know. I'd be forever in your debt if you did that.
Here we have, in no particular order, Ricky and Dave and Bruce and Sheila, who we met on the west end of the Shore on the shady side of Second Street. And they were four people at once, which was a pretty darn good start on our photographic journey of the day.
Here we have mom and daughter. Mom is Meegan and daughter is Jadan.
When we approach people I usually say, Hello, then I launch into something like, “We’re walking these streets everyday for a year, looking for fourteen people to photograph for our iPhone 14 project.
But I guess I fumbled the words, because Meegan said, “What? you’re photographing fourteen year olds for a year?”
That really didn’t come out the way I had intended and I put her straight super fast, so we all had a little laugh and Vesta admonished me to speeeeeeeeek slooooooly, from now on and so I’ve slooooowed my speech down, because we don’t need anymore misunderstandings like that.
When we approach people I usually say, Hello, then I launch into something like, “We’re walking these streets everyday for a year, looking for fourteen people to photograph for our iPhone 14 project.
But I guess I fumbled the words, because Meegan said, “What? you’re photographing fourteen year olds for a year?”
That really didn’t come out the way I had intended and I put her straight super fast, so we all had a little laugh and Vesta admonished me to speeeeeeeeek slooooooly, from now on and so I’ve slooooowed my speech down, because we don’t need anymore misunderstandings like that.
We saw John just before we got to the eastern most part of the Shore. He’d just rounded the corner from Bay Shore, where the library is, with an armload of books. And he looked interesting as all heck.
So, of course, I had to stop him and we learned that he has no TV, no computer, no phone, no internet at all. And he’s pretty happy not to have any of it. He reads, he said.
“And good on you,” I said to him.
We don’t have a TV either, but we do have computers and internet and phones, but sometimes I wish I could go back in time before all of that, when people read and when they talked when passed each other on the block.
Ah well, change is good they say. But not all change. I don’t think so anyway. We could do without atom bombs, for example.
So, of course, I had to stop him and we learned that he has no TV, no computer, no phone, no internet at all. And he’s pretty happy not to have any of it. He reads, he said.
“And good on you,” I said to him.
We don’t have a TV either, but we do have computers and internet and phones, but sometimes I wish I could go back in time before all of that, when people read and when they talked when passed each other on the block.
Ah well, change is good they say. But not all change. I don’t think so anyway. We could do without atom bombs, for example.
Here are Carlo and Spencer, who said yes to this project, without thinking. It’s great for us when that happens.
We’d decided to head on home, because we figured we could go up Broadway and find a few more people to round out this day of faces for our project and Vesta had just pushed the button to cross Second, when I spotted Kristen and Justin.
And so with photos of them, now safely locked away in both phone and camera, we only needed a couple more faces to make our fourteen for our iPhone 14 Project and then I saw Trish with new granddaughter Maddie, sitting in front of a coffeeshop, who you can see below.
And so with photos of them, now safely locked away in both phone and camera, we only needed a couple more faces to make our fourteen for our iPhone 14 Project and then I saw Trish with new granddaughter Maddie, sitting in front of a coffeeshop, who you can see below.
The trick to photographing babies with parents or grandparents, is to have the big person look at me and not the baby, and then I make stupid noises and when the baby looks I take the picture. Usually, I do a burst of shots, to make sure I get the one where they’re both looking.
But this time, after I traded the phone for the camera with Vesta, Maddie stopped looking at me. So, both photos here are phone photos, because it’s true what they say, “You can’t win them all.”
But this time, after I traded the phone for the camera with Vesta, Maddie stopped looking at me. So, both photos here are phone photos, because it’s true what they say, “You can’t win them all.”
So with only one more person needed to finish this project, Vesta again pushed the button at the traffic light, so we could cross the street. We’d only been on Second for like half an hour and we’d photograph thirteen people, if you count baby Maddie and I for sure counted her.
Getting the last person on Broadway would be too easy. But again I spied somebody, two somebodies actually, before the light changed and here are Noah and Sara. So counting Maddie, that made fifteen people.
And was a good thing, because now I realized that I had that blister I talked about above and walking home was out of the question. So we took the bus.
Getting the last person on Broadway would be too easy. But again I spied somebody, two somebodies actually, before the light changed and here are Noah and Sara. So counting Maddie, that made fifteen people.
And was a good thing, because now I realized that I had that blister I talked about above and walking home was out of the question. So we took the bus.
__________
CLEAN SLATE - Chapter 7, 1st Part.
New Year’s Eve and Menopause had packed them in. Kennedy had just finished her ‘Bullshit Blues’ encore, was bowing to the shouts of, “More, more, when saw Dick beaming behind the bar. Arty played a riff, then the stage was silent, the only sound now, the ringing applause.
If only her sons had been here to see this. Then they’d understand. But they’d taken their father’s side, which, of course, she knew they would. Oh, why did there always have to be sides? She pulled the guitar over her head. There was always a choice and for longer than she cared to think about, she’d been making the wrong ones. Now, at last, she’d given up the house and a yard, was back where she belonged.
“Come on, time to go.” Chloe took her hand, led her from the stage.
“Saw your husband in the crowd,” Dick said when they each took a stool at the bar.
“Where?” Kennedy said.
“He left right after the encore.”
“Really?” So he came. The boys, no. They’d left for Penn State the day after Christmas. How sad.
She wondered what Christmas must have been like on Henry Lee, the three of them sitting around the table for dinner. Did they have a turkey? If so, who’d cooked it? Did they exchange gifts? She’d spent Christmas Eve on stage with Menopause and Christmas Day alone on the boat, turning down Chloe’s invitation to spend it with her and her father. That was a little too close to home.
“He actually seemed to enjoy it,” Dick said.
“What’d he say?”
“Do I look crazy? I didn’t talk to him. The last time we were close enough to converse, he tried to strangle me. I could be dead right now, rotting in a cold coffin, probably would be, if I hadn’t a got in that lucky punch.”
But Kennedy wasn’t listening to him anymore. Norris had come. He’d seen her on stage. She wondered what he thought.
* * *
She’d looked damned good up there. Norris hated to admit it, but if anybody had what it takes to be a star, Kennedy did. New Year’s Eve, an audience of revelers out to drink, party and maybe get lucky and she had them hanging on every note. How could he compete with that?
Maybe he shouldn’t.
He’d been thinking about divorce, had even mentioned the possibility of it to Eric. It wasn’t that he didn’t love her. He did. But if ever two people weren’t suited for each other, he and Kennedy were those two people. He laughed to himself as he piloted the Volvo toward Henry Lee, turned off Second Street. Christ, not only was she not a Republican, she was named after a Kennedy. The Kennedy.
She opposed gun control, favored abortion and national health, thought kids and crooks should be molly coddled. Imagine, educating a murderer and turning him back into society. Unthinkable. He was better off with her gone. He’d do like Eric said and campaign as a bachelor Republican. Maybe his old friend was right, single he’d bring out all the old widows, their money, too.
He pulled into his drive. Still, the house was awful empty with her gone. Was he being stupid? He’d gone to the bar to try and talk her into coming home. And not just to be by his side during the campaign, he missed her. Gone less than two weeks and he missed her. How could he ever have thought about divorce? He got out of the car, started toward the empty house. He’d call his lawyer in the morning, tell him to give her what she wanted. Hell, he could make more money, buy another sports car and he hardly ever used the boat. He wasn’t really a sailor anymore.
In the house, he went to the kitchen without turning on the light, poured himself a neat scotch, sat at the breakfast table without drinking it, put his head in his hands and cried.
* * *
Kennedy and Chloe didn’t get back to the boat till three in the morning. It was a cool night, the weather was finally changing. A cold front was forecast, tomorrow was going to be sweater weather, but Kennedy didn’t care, because she was going to spend the day at rest with the small screen television, the Rose Parade and the Rose Bowl.
She thought about Norris. That seemed to be the only time of the year they spent together. Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter had always been for family. The boys, the parents, assorted in-laws and relatives, friends, dogs, even though Norris didn’t like dogs, sometimes a cat and one Easter, baby chicks and a rabbit. New Year’s day had always been their time together. Not tomorrow.
For a second, she thought about calling him. He’d come to see her tonight, after all. But then she banished the thought. He was probably going to spend the day with his girlfriend. God, she wished she knew who it was. Probably someone a lot younger than her. Probably someone closer to Chloe’s age.
No, Kennedy, put it out of your mind. You’ve got your own life now.
But she fell asleep thinking about him and he was on her mind when she woke with a slight headache. She almost called him, but Chloe rapping at her door changed her mind.
“Kennedy, you decent?”
“Got a T-shirt on, come on in.”
“Arty just dropped the tape off, you wanna hear it?”
“That would be great, just what the doctor ordered, maybe an aspirin too.”
“Too much of the bubbly last night?”
“Ummm, just a little.”
“I’ll get the aspirin, you get up,” Chloe said. “Want coffee?”
“Hot and strong.” Kennedy pushed herself out of her berth, stripped off the T-shirt she’d been sleeping in, sniffed under her arms, then shouted out to Chloe, “I’m gonna take a quick shower.” She pulled on her robe, went to the head, grabbed her shower kit and a towel.
In the salon, she saw Chloe on the settee with headphones on, hand tapping her thigh with the music. Kennedy wanted to hear, but she should shower first. Chloe looked up, pointed to the galley where Kennedy saw a glass of water and three aspirin. She mouth a thanks to Chloe, swallowed down the pills, chased them with the water.
On the dock, Kennedy started toward the shower, when someone called out, “Hey, can you get our lines?” She turned to the voice, saw a forty foot sailboat motoring into the slip two down from hers.
“No, problem.” She dropped her shower kit on the dock, started down the finger pier on the boat’s starboard side, when she noticed a good looking man in shorts on the finger pier opposite, waiting to get the port line. He was wearing a bathing suit with a towel around his neck and nothing else. He had dark, wavy hair, dark chest hair, too. Norris didn’t have any of that. But it was his sparkling green eyes that captured her attention. If ever a guy was a candidate to play in a James Bond film, this was the guy. Suave was the word that popped into Kennedy’s mind.
Apparently, he’d been on his way to shower, too. All of a sudden she felt stupid. The guy on the boat was probably shouting to him, not her. But then she saw two young people on deck, a girl on the starboard side of the bow, a boy on the port. They looked about fifteen or sixteen.
“Slow it down!” James Bond shouted out. Were they coming in too fast? Kennedy couldn’t tell.
“What?” The boy shouted back.
“Slow down! Hard reverse! Hard reverse!” Bond shouted.
Kennedy watched as the boy ran back to the cockpit. There wasn’t anyone behind the wheel. That wasn’t too smart.
“Can you catch it?” the girl said to Kennedy as the boy grabbed the wheel.
“Throw the line!” Bond shouted and the girl tossed.
“Got it.” Kennedy grabbed onto the rope, pulled, but she needn’t have as the kid hadn’t got to the throttle in time. The boat was coming right at her.
“Get back!” Bond yelled and Kennedy jumped back as the boat slammed into the finger pier, the bowsprit missing Kennedy’s head by inches.
“Throw me the other line,” Bond said, voice quiet now, probably to calm the girl on deck. She tossed him the port line and Bond secured it on a dock cleat.
“Neutral!” Bond shouted to the boy at the wheel as he ran back to the dock, then all of a sudden he was at Kennedy’s side. He took the line from her hand before the boat, tugging in reverse now, could rip it out and secured it at the cleat by her feet and he pulled it in snug, securing the boat between the two finger piers.
“Neutral!” Bond shouted again and the boy complied.
“Spring lines,” he said to the frightened girl at the bow.
“What are those?” she said.
“The ropes at the back of the boat!” Bond said in non nautical speak.
“Oh, those, all right,” the girl said and a couple minutes later the boat was secure in her slip.
“My dad’s gonna be pissed.” The boy, now on the dock, was surveying the six inch gash in the fiberglass hull, where the boat had hit the pier.
“And he should be,” Bond said.
“Oh, man.” He hopped back on deck. “I don’t know what I’m going to do?” Kennedy heard him say as he joined the girl in the cockpit.
“Sounds like he’s got a problem,” Kennedy said.
“Yeah.” Bond held out his hand. “I’m Conner Morgan.”
“Kennedy Shea,” Kennedy took his hand.
“You just moved onto the Beneteau with your daughter.”
“Ah, yeah.” For the briefest instant Kennedy was miffed that he thought Chloe was her daughter. Did she look that old? Then it flashed on her. She was that old, both her boys were older that Chloe.
“I’m staying on your boat’s twin over there. He pointed to a blue and white Beneteau moored three slips down from So Sue Me and on the opposite side of the dock. “My mate and I just delivered her out of charter from the Caribbean.”
“It looks nice.” Now Kennedy was miffed that he didn’t recognize her name and say something. It was stupid, but she couldn’t help herself.
“Something wrong?” Conner Morgan said.
“No. I’m just a little chilly. I was on my way to the shower.”
“Me too.” He laughed and it lit up his eyes. They twinkled.
“Okay.” She picked up her shower kit. “Maybe I’ll see you after.”
“Maybe.” He walked her to the woman’s restroom and shower, then went around to the other side, to the men’s.
Inside the restroom, Kennedy looked at herself in the mirror above the sink. Did she look her age? She had bags under her eyes. Shit. No more late night drinking for her. In fact, no more drinking at all. She didn’t like the way she felt the morning after. It was enough getting high off the audience, she didn’t need anything else. She ran some cold water, rubbed it under her eyes. No joy. She put fingers on the bags, stretched them away. There, that’s the way she was supposed to look. She was somebody’s mom, but she didn’t want to look it.
She took off the robe, studied her breasts in the mirror, something she hadn’t done in years. She cupped them, pushed them up, gave them a good look before she dropped them. Definitely not a twenty-year-old’s tits. Definitely sagging. Definitely not centerfold quality, but not bad. Really, she told herself as she stepped into the toilet and peed.
Leaving the restroom, she went next door to the shower, still thinking, not bad, good, they were good.
She turned on the cold water, let it perk her awake, kept it freezing till goosebumps peppered her body. Shivering now, she added the hot, a little at a time, till she warmed up. Something else she hadn’t done in years, a cold wake up shower, not since before she was married and living on the road.
She heard whistling. She looked around. The men’s shower was just the other side of the wall. The wall was about eight feet high. The ceiling was ten. There was a two foot gap between the top of the wall and the slanted ceiling. She saw steam rising from the other side. It was him, Conner Morgan. He was over there, showering. Naked, just like her. Someone strong enough could grab onto the top of that wall, pull himself up and peer down on the person showering on the other side.
She shivered and this time not from the cold. It wasn’t that she was a prude, but no man had seen her without clothes since she’d gotten married. Not even her boys, not since they were three or four. Even her doctor was a woman. Then she leaned back against the wall opposite from the spray, smiled and started to sing along.
CLEAN SLATE - Chapter 7, 1st Part.
New Year’s Eve and Menopause had packed them in. Kennedy had just finished her ‘Bullshit Blues’ encore, was bowing to the shouts of, “More, more, when saw Dick beaming behind the bar. Arty played a riff, then the stage was silent, the only sound now, the ringing applause.
If only her sons had been here to see this. Then they’d understand. But they’d taken their father’s side, which, of course, she knew they would. Oh, why did there always have to be sides? She pulled the guitar over her head. There was always a choice and for longer than she cared to think about, she’d been making the wrong ones. Now, at last, she’d given up the house and a yard, was back where she belonged.
“Come on, time to go.” Chloe took her hand, led her from the stage.
“Saw your husband in the crowd,” Dick said when they each took a stool at the bar.
“Where?” Kennedy said.
“He left right after the encore.”
“Really?” So he came. The boys, no. They’d left for Penn State the day after Christmas. How sad.
She wondered what Christmas must have been like on Henry Lee, the three of them sitting around the table for dinner. Did they have a turkey? If so, who’d cooked it? Did they exchange gifts? She’d spent Christmas Eve on stage with Menopause and Christmas Day alone on the boat, turning down Chloe’s invitation to spend it with her and her father. That was a little too close to home.
“He actually seemed to enjoy it,” Dick said.
“What’d he say?”
“Do I look crazy? I didn’t talk to him. The last time we were close enough to converse, he tried to strangle me. I could be dead right now, rotting in a cold coffin, probably would be, if I hadn’t a got in that lucky punch.”
But Kennedy wasn’t listening to him anymore. Norris had come. He’d seen her on stage. She wondered what he thought.
* * *
She’d looked damned good up there. Norris hated to admit it, but if anybody had what it takes to be a star, Kennedy did. New Year’s Eve, an audience of revelers out to drink, party and maybe get lucky and she had them hanging on every note. How could he compete with that?
Maybe he shouldn’t.
He’d been thinking about divorce, had even mentioned the possibility of it to Eric. It wasn’t that he didn’t love her. He did. But if ever two people weren’t suited for each other, he and Kennedy were those two people. He laughed to himself as he piloted the Volvo toward Henry Lee, turned off Second Street. Christ, not only was she not a Republican, she was named after a Kennedy. The Kennedy.
She opposed gun control, favored abortion and national health, thought kids and crooks should be molly coddled. Imagine, educating a murderer and turning him back into society. Unthinkable. He was better off with her gone. He’d do like Eric said and campaign as a bachelor Republican. Maybe his old friend was right, single he’d bring out all the old widows, their money, too.
He pulled into his drive. Still, the house was awful empty with her gone. Was he being stupid? He’d gone to the bar to try and talk her into coming home. And not just to be by his side during the campaign, he missed her. Gone less than two weeks and he missed her. How could he ever have thought about divorce? He got out of the car, started toward the empty house. He’d call his lawyer in the morning, tell him to give her what she wanted. Hell, he could make more money, buy another sports car and he hardly ever used the boat. He wasn’t really a sailor anymore.
In the house, he went to the kitchen without turning on the light, poured himself a neat scotch, sat at the breakfast table without drinking it, put his head in his hands and cried.
* * *
Kennedy and Chloe didn’t get back to the boat till three in the morning. It was a cool night, the weather was finally changing. A cold front was forecast, tomorrow was going to be sweater weather, but Kennedy didn’t care, because she was going to spend the day at rest with the small screen television, the Rose Parade and the Rose Bowl.
She thought about Norris. That seemed to be the only time of the year they spent together. Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter had always been for family. The boys, the parents, assorted in-laws and relatives, friends, dogs, even though Norris didn’t like dogs, sometimes a cat and one Easter, baby chicks and a rabbit. New Year’s day had always been their time together. Not tomorrow.
For a second, she thought about calling him. He’d come to see her tonight, after all. But then she banished the thought. He was probably going to spend the day with his girlfriend. God, she wished she knew who it was. Probably someone a lot younger than her. Probably someone closer to Chloe’s age.
No, Kennedy, put it out of your mind. You’ve got your own life now.
But she fell asleep thinking about him and he was on her mind when she woke with a slight headache. She almost called him, but Chloe rapping at her door changed her mind.
“Kennedy, you decent?”
“Got a T-shirt on, come on in.”
“Arty just dropped the tape off, you wanna hear it?”
“That would be great, just what the doctor ordered, maybe an aspirin too.”
“Too much of the bubbly last night?”
“Ummm, just a little.”
“I’ll get the aspirin, you get up,” Chloe said. “Want coffee?”
“Hot and strong.” Kennedy pushed herself out of her berth, stripped off the T-shirt she’d been sleeping in, sniffed under her arms, then shouted out to Chloe, “I’m gonna take a quick shower.” She pulled on her robe, went to the head, grabbed her shower kit and a towel.
In the salon, she saw Chloe on the settee with headphones on, hand tapping her thigh with the music. Kennedy wanted to hear, but she should shower first. Chloe looked up, pointed to the galley where Kennedy saw a glass of water and three aspirin. She mouth a thanks to Chloe, swallowed down the pills, chased them with the water.
On the dock, Kennedy started toward the shower, when someone called out, “Hey, can you get our lines?” She turned to the voice, saw a forty foot sailboat motoring into the slip two down from hers.
“No, problem.” She dropped her shower kit on the dock, started down the finger pier on the boat’s starboard side, when she noticed a good looking man in shorts on the finger pier opposite, waiting to get the port line. He was wearing a bathing suit with a towel around his neck and nothing else. He had dark, wavy hair, dark chest hair, too. Norris didn’t have any of that. But it was his sparkling green eyes that captured her attention. If ever a guy was a candidate to play in a James Bond film, this was the guy. Suave was the word that popped into Kennedy’s mind.
Apparently, he’d been on his way to shower, too. All of a sudden she felt stupid. The guy on the boat was probably shouting to him, not her. But then she saw two young people on deck, a girl on the starboard side of the bow, a boy on the port. They looked about fifteen or sixteen.
“Slow it down!” James Bond shouted out. Were they coming in too fast? Kennedy couldn’t tell.
“What?” The boy shouted back.
“Slow down! Hard reverse! Hard reverse!” Bond shouted.
Kennedy watched as the boy ran back to the cockpit. There wasn’t anyone behind the wheel. That wasn’t too smart.
“Can you catch it?” the girl said to Kennedy as the boy grabbed the wheel.
“Throw the line!” Bond shouted and the girl tossed.
“Got it.” Kennedy grabbed onto the rope, pulled, but she needn’t have as the kid hadn’t got to the throttle in time. The boat was coming right at her.
“Get back!” Bond yelled and Kennedy jumped back as the boat slammed into the finger pier, the bowsprit missing Kennedy’s head by inches.
“Throw me the other line,” Bond said, voice quiet now, probably to calm the girl on deck. She tossed him the port line and Bond secured it on a dock cleat.
“Neutral!” Bond shouted to the boy at the wheel as he ran back to the dock, then all of a sudden he was at Kennedy’s side. He took the line from her hand before the boat, tugging in reverse now, could rip it out and secured it at the cleat by her feet and he pulled it in snug, securing the boat between the two finger piers.
“Neutral!” Bond shouted again and the boy complied.
“Spring lines,” he said to the frightened girl at the bow.
“What are those?” she said.
“The ropes at the back of the boat!” Bond said in non nautical speak.
“Oh, those, all right,” the girl said and a couple minutes later the boat was secure in her slip.
“My dad’s gonna be pissed.” The boy, now on the dock, was surveying the six inch gash in the fiberglass hull, where the boat had hit the pier.
“And he should be,” Bond said.
“Oh, man.” He hopped back on deck. “I don’t know what I’m going to do?” Kennedy heard him say as he joined the girl in the cockpit.
“Sounds like he’s got a problem,” Kennedy said.
“Yeah.” Bond held out his hand. “I’m Conner Morgan.”
“Kennedy Shea,” Kennedy took his hand.
“You just moved onto the Beneteau with your daughter.”
“Ah, yeah.” For the briefest instant Kennedy was miffed that he thought Chloe was her daughter. Did she look that old? Then it flashed on her. She was that old, both her boys were older that Chloe.
“I’m staying on your boat’s twin over there. He pointed to a blue and white Beneteau moored three slips down from So Sue Me and on the opposite side of the dock. “My mate and I just delivered her out of charter from the Caribbean.”
“It looks nice.” Now Kennedy was miffed that he didn’t recognize her name and say something. It was stupid, but she couldn’t help herself.
“Something wrong?” Conner Morgan said.
“No. I’m just a little chilly. I was on my way to the shower.”
“Me too.” He laughed and it lit up his eyes. They twinkled.
“Okay.” She picked up her shower kit. “Maybe I’ll see you after.”
“Maybe.” He walked her to the woman’s restroom and shower, then went around to the other side, to the men’s.
Inside the restroom, Kennedy looked at herself in the mirror above the sink. Did she look her age? She had bags under her eyes. Shit. No more late night drinking for her. In fact, no more drinking at all. She didn’t like the way she felt the morning after. It was enough getting high off the audience, she didn’t need anything else. She ran some cold water, rubbed it under her eyes. No joy. She put fingers on the bags, stretched them away. There, that’s the way she was supposed to look. She was somebody’s mom, but she didn’t want to look it.
She took off the robe, studied her breasts in the mirror, something she hadn’t done in years. She cupped them, pushed them up, gave them a good look before she dropped them. Definitely not a twenty-year-old’s tits. Definitely sagging. Definitely not centerfold quality, but not bad. Really, she told herself as she stepped into the toilet and peed.
Leaving the restroom, she went next door to the shower, still thinking, not bad, good, they were good.
She turned on the cold water, let it perk her awake, kept it freezing till goosebumps peppered her body. Shivering now, she added the hot, a little at a time, till she warmed up. Something else she hadn’t done in years, a cold wake up shower, not since before she was married and living on the road.
She heard whistling. She looked around. The men’s shower was just the other side of the wall. The wall was about eight feet high. The ceiling was ten. There was a two foot gap between the top of the wall and the slanted ceiling. She saw steam rising from the other side. It was him, Conner Morgan. He was over there, showering. Naked, just like her. Someone strong enough could grab onto the top of that wall, pull himself up and peer down on the person showering on the other side.
She shivered and this time not from the cold. It wasn’t that she was a prude, but no man had seen her without clothes since she’d gotten married. Not even her boys, not since they were three or four. Even her doctor was a woman. Then she leaned back against the wall opposite from the spray, smiled and started to sing along.