“One charter season without me, and you turn to a life of crime?” a familiar voice says from behind me. 

 Ollie. I didn’t know he’d be here, but part of me had hoped. I won’t give him the satisfaction of turning to face him, though. I don’t want to seem too eager. “What are you doing here? You aren’t part of the crew,” I say. 

“Alex invited me. He’s not crew anymore either. Mitch’s is open to the public, yeah?” 

I should’ve known this was Alex’s doing. He and Ollie have become buds over the last year. They even have matching t-shirts with Gordon Ramsay’s face on it that say Where’s the lamb sauce? I don’t get the joke, and I don’t want to. All I know is Ollie talks to Alex about me, and I don’t like it.

 “How’s the form, Neen?” Ollie says. 

His breath is warm against my skin, and he smells like the mint tea he drinks obsessively. My instinct is to lean into him, but I’m not sure if being around him will make tonight better or worse, so I try not to move.

“I used to be a professional gymnast, Oliver,” I say. “My form is excellent.” I know that’s not what he means. I’ve picked up more Irish slang over the years than I let on. This is just part of the game we play. 

“You know I don’t like being called Oliver,” he says, like he often does when I use his full name.

“And you know I don’t care,” I reply, like I have hundreds of times. Thousands maybe. Same old barbs. Same old reactions. I like to think of them as the grooves of our relationship. We settle into them when we’re around each other just to remind ourselves they exist. If we stick to the lines, we can play this game for as long as we like. If we follow the rules, no one gets hurt.

Ollie wraps his arms around me and rests his chin on my shoulder. I hate how I don’t mind it. How I can’t help but rest my weight against his chest. Before Jo, it was just me and Ollie. A whole lifetime ago, it seems. He and I have more history than I care to admit. And though Jo is my best friend, my relationship with Ollie means just as much, albeit in a vastly different and infinitely more complicated way. 

Ollie’s barely-there stubble scratches my cheek when he speaks. “You good, Neen?”

I keep my eyes on the wall ahead of me. “Why wouldn't I be?” I say. Better, I think. Being around him will make tonight better.

“Heard you might’ve got some bad news,” he says.

So even Ollie found out about Jo and Alex’s plans before me? Worse, I decide. “I’m marvelous,” I say. 

Ollie’s nose nudges my neck. I ignore the way it makes me weak in the knees, and not just the bad one. “I’ve missed you,” he says, not at all the way you tell your ex-coworker you miss them.  

I want to put some space between us, but Ollie is too comfortable, and I can’t drag myself away. “Where’s your girlfriend?” I ask. Sondra? Samantha? Tall. Redhead. I like her. 

“Don’t have one anymore.” 

No surprise there. The man goes through girlfriends faster than I can snap up a pair of vintage Levi’s off the rack. “What was wrong with this one?” 

“She wasn’t you,” he says. His breath raises goosebumps on my neck. So, he wants to play that version of our game. 

I pull his arms off me with a sigh. “Not tonight,” I say. 

“It’s true.”

I turn, getting the first good look at him I’ve had since I left for charter season. He’s unchanged, everything about him as in-between as ever. His hair, between blonde and brown, between straight and curly, short on the sides and longer on top. He isn’t tall, but he isn’t short either. Even his outfit, a navy button-down, jeans, and white sneakers, falls somewhere between formal and informal. That’s not to say Ollie is plain, because he isn’t. There’s something striking about the balance of him. Beautiful, really.

The only out-of-balance feature on Oliver Dunne is his eyes. Blue, but not like the sky or the ocean. They’re an intense, impossible blue that reminds me of the blue raspberry Slurpees I shared with my father after gymnastics practice when I was a kid. We’d stop at the 7-11, and I’d stay in the truck while my father disappeared inside. He kept a lucky penny in the cupholder between our seats, and I’d warm it between my palms while I waited for him. When he returned, I’d pass him the penny for his scratch-off ticket in exchange for the Slurpee. Every now and then, the smell of quarters and scratch-off dust washes over me, making me sick. I thought my father and I were playing a game. I suppose we were. But that didn’t mean there weren’t consequences.

All this to say, I’ve encountered many attractive people in my life, ones who wanted exactly what I did—no feelings, no strings attached—but none of them drove me wild like Ollie does. At first, I thought it was the accent. But even with his mouth shut I want to kiss him. I tell Jo I don’t love him. I tell him I don’t love him. But of course I do. If soulmates exist, Oliver Dunne is the closest thing I have to one. But that doesn’t mean we’re good for each other. It doesn’t make either of us immune to the damage we can inflict on one another. It doesn’t change the rules.

Ollie looks me up and down. “Nice dress,” he says. It is nice. A knee-length color block dress with matching buttons down the front. Vintage Liz Claiborne. One-hundred percent silk. He catches the hem between his fingers, and his knuckles brush against my thigh. “Where’d you get it?” 

“Do you really care?” I should step back, but my muscles are frozen. I blame the bad knee.

“Maybe I do,” Ollie says, his eyes on the fabric between his fingers.

 “Butch, of course.” Butch, the owner of my favorite thrift store, knows exactly what I like.

“The one and only Butch. You make me jealous when you talk about him.”

When he lifts his gaze to mine, I force myself not to look away. I hate when he does that—makes me feel stark naked when I’m obviously overdressed.

“You should be jealous. Butch is the man of my heart.”

“And Jo is the woman, I know.”

“Not anymore.” I look beyond Ollie. Amir, RJ, and some of the other deckhands have joined Jo, Alex, and Britt at the table. Amir says something that makes everyone but RJ laugh. The look RJ gives him could filet him alive. At least I’m not the only one who’s miserable tonight. 

Ollie doesn’t say anything else. When I look up at him again, I catch the soft smile he saves only for me. Being near him is like sighing into my couch when I first get home from charter season. We haven’t spent much time together since he moved to Miami. The restaurant keeps him busy, and I’ve avoided driving down to see him ever since the last time I ended up in his bed. 

For the last year, my friendship with Ollie has consisted of phone calls on his drive home from work. Most nights, unless I’m working lates on the boat, he calls just as I’ve gotten into bed. I always put the phone on speaker and close my eyes as we talk, mostly about nothing. The restaurant, the yacht, weird Craigslist listings. By the time I hear Ollie unlock his apartment door, I’m half-asleep, lulled there by the sound of his voice.

It sounds like a capital “R” Relationship, but it’s not. I don’t know what to call it. The phone calls and occasional hook-ups are all I can give. They’re enough for me. But this phase, the one in which we can be friends, only lasts so long before Ollie is itching for more, something with a label. And when I refuse, he’ll pull away from me again. We won’t talk for months, maybe a year. He always says he’s done, and sometimes he finds someone else, someone he really likes. But it’s no use. We always find ourselves back here, walking this in-between place like a balance beam. 

“Did you miss me?” he asks.

“We spoke yesterday. Though you failed to mention you’d be here.”

“Wasn’t sure I’d come. But I like to see the faces you make when you tease me.” 

“Teasing? Me? Never.” I rest my hands on his shoulders. “You’re built like a hunky fridge,” I say. My hands slide down his arms to give his biceps a squeeze. He laughs, and I shoot him a glare. “What? You’re frigid, and bulky, and occasionally provide food.” I’m making quite the spectacle of myself tonight. Maybe it’s time to give up the tequila.

“That face. Right there,” Ollie says. He presses his thumb to my mouth. “And you say you don’t tease me.”

My heart is doing moves now that would be physically impossible for anyone but Simone Biles. I take Ollie’s hand in mine, and squint at his palm like a fortune teller. I know the callus at the base of his forefinger. I can map out the small scars and discolored burns that run up his hands and arms. Even when I don’t want to, I think of them whenever someone else touches me. It’s a real mood killer.

“No new injuries I see.”

“Not on this hand.”

“And the other?”

He puts his other hand in mine, and I spot a new burn right away, just behind the knuckle of his pinky finger. “New line cook doesn’t look where he's fecking going,” he says.

“I wish you’d be more careful,” I say, but I regret it as soon as Ollie’s smile becomes a smirk.

“So, you did miss me.”

“I didn’t say that.” And really, what does he care if I missed him or not? What would it change about anything? 

“I’m seventy-percent sure you did,” Ollie says. 

Ollie’s hands feel so good in mine after months apart that I don’t care what I’m about to suggest will only make the situation between us murkier. “Do you want to play a game?” I ask.

“What game?”

“Truth or dare.”

He raises his eyebrows. “Oh. Sure.” He squints at me. “Truth or dare, Nina Lejeune?”

“No,” I say. “I go first.”

Ollie rolls his eyes. “Why do you always get to make the rules?”

“Because I suggested the game.” 

“All right, all right. You go.”

“Truth or dare?” I ask.

Ollie’s eyes are bright with mischief. “Dare,” he says.