I didn't say that to John, because I knew I'd just get ribbed like crazy, but that was the way I felt.
It surprised me, but I was coming to realize that my fantasies of Mars had been a way of escaping my cares back on good old planet Earth. I no longer felt the need to escape. In fact, I looked forward to getting set up with Alexa at the beach house where we would spend our summers, and of course, picking out a place to live together in New York.
Or maybe, we could move to Europe and live somewhere that Alexa chose. I was game for anything. With the money I'd made off Chatter, I could do pretty much anything I wanted.
I was a lucky man, and I knew it.
That night, I got a text from Alexa, recounting how she'd spoken to Candace about what happened the day she fell off the platform at the subway station.
ALEXA: She didn't fall after all. Someone pushed her.
LUKE: What?
According to Alexa, the police came to interview Candace as soon as she regained consciousness, but all Candace could say was that she was standing at the edge of the platform, surrounded by people, a few inches behind the yellow warning strip, and that someone had deliberately pushed her so that she fell off and onto the rails below.
She didn't remember anything after that, because of her head injury. According to police, CCTV showed that a tall man wearing a dark hoodie had been standing behind her for a few moments, then came forward and shouldered her hard enough that she tripped and fell off the platform. The man walked out of the station, taking care not to look up at any of the cameras, his hands in his pockets. Police were able to see that he was Caucasian, had long dark hair and a beard, and was over six feet tall of medium build.
That was it. The mystery man who pushed Candace off the platform appeared to have done it randomly. He disappeared into the crowds on the street, and they lost him. There was even an article in the newspapers about it and a video on the local television news, asking for witnesses to provide tips to the police's tip hotline, but so far, no one had offered anything useful.
&n
bsp; Whoever did it was still at large.
I couldn't shake the sense that whoever harmed Candace was more than just a random stranger. I didn't want to say it, but my mind went immediately to Blaine. He was still in the city, according to police, having served his time and being on probation. Maybe he harmed Candace to get back at Alexa. Police had no leads, and so my guess was as good as theirs.
I hoped I was wrong because that would mean she was still in danger.
John and I left port the next day and made our way along the southern coast of South Africa to Port Elizabeth. We found a nice spot to moor off Cape St. Francis, and all I could think of was how much Alexa would love the location. It was picturesque, with an old lighthouse, and it would be the last really pleasant sailing before we hit the notorious Wild Coast, with frequent weather systems that blew through and a very powerful Agulhas current that extended from Mozambique through to Cape Town.
With frequent stops while we waited for the weather to improve, John and I made the trip and then planned our next leg of the journey -- from Cape Town to St. Helena and the Ascension Islands. After that, our next stop was Brazil. The trip took a total of twenty days, during which time we were lucky to have almost perfect weather with pretty consistent winds from the north east, which pushed us along and only moderate swells. It was almost unbelievable luck that we avoided the worst squalls, which stayed north of us, thankfully. By the time we saw land, I was ready to spend a few days anchored in some quiet spot.
Most of all, I missed Alexa's presence in my life and in my bed. Luckily, I had installed a satellite system so I could connect to her even in the middle of the ocean. Messages between us kept me centered and let me know that Candace was getting better with each passing day. By the time I arrived in Brazil, she was almost ready to come and meet me. I decided to wait in Sao Paulo so that she could fly and meet us somewhere with a major international airport.
Her flight, once she booked it, ended up being from Manhattan to Atlanta and then on to Rio, and then from Rio to Sao Paulo. All in all, it would be a good twenty hours of travel, with layover factored in. She'd be exhausted when she arrived, but then the three of us could take the next month or so to travel up the eastern coast of South America to the Bahamas and Caribbean. It would be the trip of a lifetime.
Everything seemed to be going perfectly, with all our plans in place, and then all our plans ended up amounting to nothing when Candace took a turn for the worse. She contracted a drug-resistant bacterium while in hospital and was quite sick. Sick enough that Alexa didn't feel she could leave.
Alexa had to cancel her trip and stay with Candace's mother until she was out of the woods. For a while, it was touch and go and Candace was very sick, on multiple very powerful antibiotics, the infection having got into her bones. Namely, the bone of her thigh, which had broken during her fall and required surgery. If they weren't able to stop the infection, she might lose her leg -- or worse.
"You'll have to continue on the trip up the coast without me. I'll see how she does. If she survives, I may be able to fly somewhere in the Caribbean but not until I know she's completely okay to go home."
"I understand," I said while sitting in our slip at the yacht club near Sao Paolo. "Tell her that I'm praying for her."
"I will," she said, her voice choking up.
"Do you want me to come to Manhattan?" I asked, thinking that perhaps she was worse than I thought. "I can rent a slip, leave the cat here and be with you until things improve."
There was a pause and I knew she was debating with herself whether to say yes.
"It's really okay with me if you want me to," I said firmly. "John and I can fly out tomorrow and I can be there in twenty-four hours. Give me the word and I'll be there."
"I'll speak with her internist and see what she thinks. I'll let you know."
"Okay. Don't hesitate. If things look bad, I'd rather be with you than out here, unable to do anything."
"I'll talk to you later."
I ended the call and turned to John.