It all freaking sucked.
She wholeheartedly, now, regretted opting for the direct, non-stop flight to Boston she’d chosen, wishing she’d gone with the lay-over option that would have supposedly taken a lot longer, but would have eventually taken her straight into Bangor, her final destination.
Now, it was too late for regrets.
Tabitha sighed loudly. It wasn’t as if she had anyplace to be until the following morning, but at this rate, she wouldn’t reach her hotel until well after midnight. Then she’d be running on fumes, needing to get to the dock tomorrow, early, to take her rented skiff out to meet the Atlaua.
The crew of the merchant ship would wait. Obviously. They had her sub, and as per their early afternoon text today, they were currently anchored off the lighthouse she was to inspect. She had, in turn, given them her time of arrival, and dammit, she wasn’t going to change it or be late.
Tabitha turned up the music and began singing at the top of her lungs, trying like mad to tamp down her frustrations. She never liked it when things didn’t go according to plan. She hated it when she wasn’t in total control. And she absolutely did not like screwing up, which is what she’d inadvertently done when deciding to fly into a gosh-darned city at frigging rush hour.
This was crazy.
What normally would have been under a four-hour drive north, looked to be turning into a nightmarish six-plus, road trip.
Tabitha raised her voice and belted out the chorus that had just come on instead of cursing.
Her gaze traveled sideways when she noticed some peripheral movement.
Right.
If nothing else, she was amusing the family next to her who were all pointing and laughing while she bellowed out lyrics.
When the currentJourneysong ended and traffic started moving again, she sent the car next to her a jaunty wave, then gave her vocal cords a rest, reaching for her ever-present water bottle to take a big slug. Digging one hand into her pack, she fished out the hotter-than-hell cinnamon mints to which she’d become addicted and popped two into her mouth.
Hopefully her supply would last for the duration of her trip, and the lovely burn in her mouth and throat would keep her from dozing off.
Unfortunately, she hadn’t had much sleep the night before, either.
Her sister had kept her up until the wee hours, as she often did, but it wasn’t something Tabitha regretted. Ever. Sheila was her only living relative, and she’d give her sister all the time she needed, regardless of her own agenda. Her sib was on the spectrum and living in a group home, often needing to be talked down from whatever crisis arose in her brain, no matter that it was generally nothing and manufactured out of thin air, Tabitha was going to be there for her. Always. Full stop.
It hadn’t been just the two of them forever. They’d only had to navigate their current circumstances for the last four years.Four years… It was hard to fathom that their parents had been gone that long. They’d been amazing people; warm, loving, full of life. Those had been idyllic days.
Her three family members had been living happily together when Tabitha had gone off to college, then entered the Navy as an Officer Cadet, aspiring to become a Commissioned Officer. She’d eventually entered training at the American Submarine School in Groton, Connecticut to become a “forward puke”, which meant she was being schooled in thefrontoperations of a sub as a helmsman, not in anything that resembled weapons or reactor capabilities which was a “rear” position.
Studying and apprenticing hard, she’d earned her place and had been waiting for her promotion to become an Officer of the Deck when she’d gotten word that her parents had died. To Tabitha, it seemed like she’d gotten the news only yesterday.
It had been an unusually cold night in November in Florida, and the heat in her parent’s house had kicked in. Something that rarely happened. Because of the rarity of the system being used,there had been an undetected fault in the old equipment. The house had filled with carbon monoxide, killing both her mother and father in their sleep.
If anything could have been considered lucky about the freak accident, it was that Sheila had been spending the night at a hospital to get her meds straightened out.
Life had drastically changed, then, for her and Sheila.
In Tabitha’s new role as sole caretaker for her then twenty-two-year-old sister—and in order to settle her parents’ estate—Tabitha had requested and was given an honorable discharge from the service.
She’d subsequently found herself in possession of a large amount of money, which had enabled her to purchase a small condo, as well as her own two-person submersible for work in the private sector. She’d also been able to afford for her sister a spot in a wonderful, fully staffed group home just three blocks from where she lived. It was a place where Sheila could meet other people, thrive to the extent she was able, and where Tabitha could spend a lot of her off-time hanging with her sister.
Which was why it sucked-ass that this latest job was taking her so far away from Florida. Tabitha would miss their constant, in-person contact, but it was unclear, as of yet, how her absence would affect Sheila. Luckily, the job was probably a one-off.
Normally, the vast coastline of the Sunshine State gave Tabitha plenty of work. The several companies who utilized her skills for jobs such as inspecting bridge abutments, searching out undersea cable snafus, and even reconning sites for salvage, were more than generous with what they paid, and filled out her schedule quite nicely. Sure, they’d always tried to coerce her into working the length of the East Coast for them, but she’d been able to put them off, until… One of her major employers had asked if she could travel to Maine for this single, important job. She couldn’t exactly turn them down.
She’d told Sheila that she wouldn’t be able to stop by for their every-night dinners together until she returned, and it had sent her sensitive sibling into somewhat of a tail-spin.
Luckily, they’d had time to discuss it, until finally it had embedded in Sheila’s brain and become okay.
Tabitha glanced at the clock on the dash. Seven PM.
Maybe, rather than belt herself hoarse with seventies music, she’d be better off calling Sheila and chatting for a while. Shehadpromised her a call when she got in. Luckily, the shitty little car was equipped with Bluetooth.
