Below Deck

“Are you boys going to stand around gossiping all day? The captain is waiting for us,” Ashley Padgett, Chief Stew and the stage five clinger in question, huffs out irritably from behind me in the small hallway.

Ben snorts and I punch him in the arm before turning around to face her, refusing to return the seductive smile she tries to give me when our eyes meet.

As the Chief Stewardess, Ashley is in charge of the two other stewardesses that work beneath her—Jessica the new girl, and Zoe Ledford, a pretty cool chick I’ve worked with a few times on different charters. Ashley’s job entails everything that has to do with the interior of the ship from cleaning the guest quarters, to serving their food and drinks and waiting on them hand and foot. Me being the Bosun on the ship, and in charge of the deckhands and everything to do with the exterior, I’m forced to work closely with Ashley to make sure nothing falls through the cracks and the charter guests have nothing but a perfect experience when they’re on the Helios. A job that has become much more difficult ever since I slept with her one night four years ago during my first charter season after a few too many rum and cokes on our night off. And then I proceeded to make that same mistake a handful of times since then. I had been so busy learning my way around a boat that I didn’t have time to go off to the mainland and find a local to hook up with. My dick was about to explode from non-use, and Ashley was more than willing to ease my pain. One night of drunk fucking led to a few more nights of drunk fucking, which always led to me waking up the next morning, swearing I’d never do it again, which has resulted in several years of hell.

I finally told her at the end of last season’s charter that there would be no more hooking up between us. I didn’t need the hassle and I didn’t need the baggage, working with someone who thought me getting drunk and horny meant I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her. To say she didn’t take it well would be putting it mildly. Three weeks and three different sets of charter guests into this season and I’ve almost jumped ship a few times.

“Let’s go, Decky,” Ashley practically purrs. The childish and stupid fucking nickname she won’t stop using makes me break out in a cold sweat, as does the way she closes the distance between us in the narrow hallway, wrapping her hand around my bicep and pressing her fake tits against me.

I hear another snort from Ben before I untangle my arm from her hold and move away from her, grinding my teeth together to stop myself from telling her to cut this shit out and stop calling me fucking Decky. I cannot afford to start an argument with this woman twenty-one-days into the charter season. Not just because we still have to work together day and night for seventeen more weeks, but because Captain Michael sees all and hears all. A screaming match between two of his chief crew members will not earn me any brownie points and will definitely make him change his mind about possibly mentoring me to become a captain. The one and only thing I give a shit about right now.

“Ben, radio Eddie and have him help you do a final check on all the water toys. Make sure everything is accounted for, clean, and in the right spot,” I tell him as we both turn sideways so I can squeeze past him and get to captain before he has a shit fit because I’m late.

“I radioed him four times a little bit ago and he didn’t answer. Dipshit probably left it on a counter somewhere again.”

I stop in my tracks, causing Ashley to run into the back of me and giving her yet another excuse to put her hands on me to stop herself from falling. I ignore her giggles and the patting of her hands as she smooths down the parts of my shirt she grabbed ahold of when I stopped suddenly, and look back over my shoulder at Ben.

Just like Jessica, Eddie Merrill is new to our crew this season and he, too, just graduated from college and wanted to see the world before he got a job on land. Unlike Jessica, Eddie is dumber than a box of rocks and you have to tell him something fifteen times before it finally sinks in. Like the fact that you never, ever go anywhere on this ship without your radio. You eat with it, you sleep with it, you fuck with it, and you shit with it.

“Don’t worry about it, get to your meeting,” Ben tells me with a wave of his hand. “I’ll find Eddie’s radio, find him, and then shove it up his ass so he doesn’t have a choice but to keep it with him at all times.”

Ben gives me a thumb’s up, I give him a nod, and then turn back around and move as quickly away from Ashley as possible.

Ben and I met four years ago when we were both hired to work on the Helios. It was my first time working on a boat this size, but Ben had been working on luxury yachts ever since he graduated high school and, like me, couldn’t afford college and couldn’t figure out what the fuck he wanted to do with his life. It took me ten years of bouncing between factory jobs and constructions jobs, each one more miserable than the last, before I finally figured out what my passion was. We’ve worked together on the Helios every charter season, and since we both live in Florida, we hang out when we’re not at sea as well. When I was promoted to Bosun two seasons ago, I was worried it would royally fuck up our friendship since Ben would be forced to take orders from me. Luckily, Ben is the most laid back guy you’d ever meet. He loves his job, does what he’s told, and gives zero fucks that I’m the one telling him what to do. He’s always been content as a deckhand and has no desire to move up the ranks or do anything else with his life. He’s known since day one that I want more and I’ll do whatever it takes to get there, and he was genuinely happy for me when I got the promotion.