Chapter 17
First Officer Carol Carter had been born at a very early age, but she hadn’t been a First Officer then, in fact it could have been safely said that it would have been over her mother’s dead body, but then that may have had something to do with her (the mother) having had a thing for a sailor in her formative years - only to be dumped at the altar for a parrot (but that’s another story). As Carol grew up she showed absolutely no interest in the family’s Garden Centre business, all she ever wanted to do was mess about on boats, and this worried her mother greatly as the dastardly sailor (minus his parrot this time) had turned up again just before her second wedding day (this time it was to her current husband), and tried for a reconciliation (i.e. he had his wicked way with her again), then he dumped her again; and Carol had been born just nine months into the marriage. Her husband had green fingers and got sea sick on the Gosport Ferry (on a calm day), so she was very keen to keep her headstrong daughter away from all things nautical, but she wasn’t very successful.
For her tenth birthday, after she had ceremonially burned her dolls and all things ‘girly’ a week before, she finally beat her parents (father) into submission and got her first dinghy.
For her eleventh birthday, after sending her ‘tiny’ dinghy to Valhalla (setting it on fire and then casting it off into the river) a week earlier, she got an even bigger and faster dinghy.
For her twelfth birthday she got a fire extinguisher, not really, she got an RYA sailing course on the Isle of Wight; and a racing dinghy as her passing out present.
Her thirteenth birthday was spent at the helm of a brand new Olympic class racing dinghy, fortunately provided by her sponsors, she was getting that good.
Her fourteenth birthday was spent at the European Youth Olympic Festival picking up a gold medal.
Her fifteenth birthday was spent tuning up her new ocean going racing yacht, provided by even more sponsors - which was rigged for ‘solo’ sailing.
Her sixteenth birthday was spent in bed with her new boyfriend, she had found out that she didn’t like the ‘solo’ bit very much.
Her seventeenth birthday was spent looking after her three month old baby son, alone, and by her eighteenth birthday her mother had stepped in, taking over the looking after of her grandson full time, and sent Carol off to College, but it was six months into her courses that her mother finally found out that she was studying all things nautical.
Her nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first birthdays were spent studying, but on her twenty-second birthday she set sail on a very small cruise liner, as a Deck Cadet, to learn the ropes (literally as well as figuratively) and to start building up her mandatory sea time, her aim was to achieve her Officer of the Watch Certificate in record time, which she did. Finally after four and a half years of training she became the Third Officer on a medium sized cruise liner, and then as time progressed she was promoted to Second Officer on the lines new liner. After distinguishing herself during a fire on board her ship she was offered the position of First Officer on one of the company’s smaller vessels, it may have been smaller, but it was still a welcome promotion, or so she thought. After two years a new Captain developed a ‘thing’ for her and when she rejected him, firmly, her life became a misery. Fortunately her previous Chief Officer had obtained a position with the Borne Line as Chief Officer on the brand new Sea Sprite, and when the Captain suddenly became ill and had to take early retirement, her mentor was made up to Master. The First Officer was made up to Chief Officer, and Captain Hill was aware of Carol’s predicament. After one surreptitious phone call she applied for, and was accepted as First Officer of Sea Sprite, but then her previous Captain carried out a very effective smear campaign against her. She was a First Officer in a small Line, and fully qualified for command, but with a long wait for promotion, and no other Line would now touch her, so she was stuck there with nowhere to go, career wise, but despite her predicament she enjoyed life on the Sea Sprite, although she was starting to miss her son Scott more and more as the years progressed. Of course she had him to herself on her leaves, and he came and stayed with her on his holidays, but now that he had left College, and was into I.T. in a big way, the holidays were getting further and further apart. She wasn’t involved with a man, in fact for the past five years she had only had ‘friendships’ with a few female passengers, as early on in her career she had made it a strict rule never to get involved with any of the crew; that really was a death wish, but life suddenly took a turn for the better as she stood in the sunshine at the bottom of the steps that were leading up to a very shiny Airbus A318 Elite. As she watched Maria glide down from the aircrafts plush interior her heart skipped a beat, but when she found out that Maria was P.A. to one of the World’s richest men she assumed that she would be untouchable, until they were sat in the back of the Riva, with Maria hanging on to her arm for dear life, and they hadn’t even cast off yet, and within a few days Carol and Maria became inseparable, helped along immensely when Maria’s boss took off for Bermuda and the States without her.
As she chatted to Mr Michaels on the stern, and watched the party on the Destroyer get into full swing she realised that she didn’t want to spend the next umpteen years trapped in this luxurious existence. She wanted a life closer to her son (and perhaps with someone like Maria) and so after making her excuses she continued on with her rounds, whimsically mulling over what Mr Michaels had just said, and then it hit her (an idea); what if Mr Michaels had been just be a teensy weensy bit serious about the second-hand Destroyer, well it wasn’t really second hand.
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