"Look at him, will you? I mean, not too hard, but just look at him, for Christ's sake!"
Juri looked at Selene instead, her cheeks burning. The Solstice of the Seas had been sailing for almost two weeks now, and she was happier than she ever would have believed possible.
For the first time in her life, she didn't feel like an outsider. She didn't feel in the least odd or part of the outside of things. Even when her little peculiarities popped up, as was inevitable, nobody seemed to mind much. And Juri wasn't stupid, either.
Far from it, actually. She understood that much of her easy acceptance was thanks to Selene Beecher. Selene had terrified Juri almost as much as she had entranced her upon their first meeting. She was as peppy as Juri was at being reserved.
Finding out that the two of them were going to be living together for the foreseeable future had given Juri immense amounts of anxiety and had almost been enough to keep Juri from taking the job.
She had almost passed on starting on the only adventure that might get her out of her current not-so-happy situation. Thinking about it now, she could hardly believe that version of herself and who she was now was the same person.
Currently, she didn't think comparing Selene to her savior was completely out of line. Still, conversations like the one Selene was trying to have now were very far from comfortable.
"Selene," she hissed, her fair face filling with blood as if on cue, "stop it! He's going to hear you!"
"Yeah? Do you think so?" Selene asked, who Juri was coming to realize had little to no propensity towards personal shame.
"Of course, I do! You aren't exactly quiet, are you?" Juri muttered out of the side of her mouth.
"No, ma'am, I'm not," Selene was laughing, "and I have no intention of being quiet. I'll tell you the truth, baby child. I'm hoping he hears me. It'll save me some of the work."
"You're disgusting, Selene," Juri mumbled. She couldn't look at her new friend.
It was nothing personal, though. She couldn't look at anything but her own slender feet, with the nails painted a bright pink that screamed Selene's influence. It was terrifying enough that she was in a bikini out where everyone and his mother could see her.
Objectively speaking, she had a pretty good body; a pretty great body, actually, but that didn't mean she was used to showing it off. The bikini was just another thing in a long line of things Selene was getting her to try on for size.
The girl talk, though, was a whole new animal. Never in her life had she had a conversation like the one she was having now, and she wasn't clear on what part she was supposed to play.
Especially because, truth be told, she was enjoying the friendship and comradery she shared with Selene. She was fun and wholesome and you couldn't help but gravitate towards her naturally, best thing of all despite Juri's quirks Selene seemed to understand her without being told anything about her past.
"Oh no I'm not, and you know it," Selene laughed, "tell me he isn't the foxiest thing you've ever seen."
Juri didn't want to look; honestly, she didn't, but who was she fooling? He was just too tempting a man to ignore. Adam Haynes was the kind of magnet who practically begged to be worshiped even from a distance.
He was unconcerned about how he affected women and the chaos of broken hearts he was putting out into the universe. Besides sharing a cabin, Selene and Juri had pretty much the same taste in men.
Juri didn't think she would trust any woman who didn't think Adam was the hottest man walking around outside of the movies, but that was neither here nor there. Besides, as far as she could tell, everyone on the massive boat agreed, at least on this subject.
The captain of the Solstice of the Seas was a fixture on his ship's decks, always ready with a smile and a handshake. To Juri, he looked like a living, life-size Ken doll, only better looking because he didn't have that whole vacant, plastic thing going for him.
For starters, he was tall and rugged, which Juri had always liked. If she had to venture a guess, she would have put him right around six foot four, which was almost an entire foot taller than her rather petite frame. His hips were slim, but his shoulders were nice and broad.
On the few occasions when Juri had been lucky enough to see him with his shirt off by the pool, she had seen that he was perfectly tan. He probably basked naked in the sun and the tan extended across the entire length of his body.
His eyes were blue-green, the color of the perfect ocean the ship was cruising over, and his hair was thick and sandy blonde. In other words, he was your basic Greek god. She watched him saying hello to a couple of women cruise-goers, they leered appreciatively. All kinds of half-formed fantasies threatening to rob her of her tentative cool.
"Well," Selene purred, stretching her legs out luxuriously in a way that Juri couldn't help envying, "will you look at that? Maybe his ears were burning, what do you think?"
"Wha -?" Juri started, then clammed up tight. Selene was right.
Almost as if he had a superhuman hearing, Adam was looking right at them. Not only that, he was walking towards them, that megawatt smile pointed in their direction. Juri inhaled sharply and wondered if she might pass out.