Chapter 16
“Shawn, you’re still upset, what do you think Drake was saying?”
It was later afternoon and Sally had just turned from Ben’s back road onto the main highway. Ben insisted they leave early, before dark, warning, “You’ll never get past the sugar cane, and you’ll find yourself fending off wild boars all night...”
After helping Ben straighten-up and reviewing their notes, they bid farewell and drove away, promising to keep Ben up-to-date on developments.
“That’s what I can’t get out of my head Sal, he was mouthing something to me, tried three or four times but I couldn’t make it out. Forget it for now, brain is shot. I wanna relax a bit and let it all sink in. Besides now we can both have dinner somewhere cozy!”
Sally’s expression split in two. As they left Ben’s, she’d received a text with another invite to dinner from someone she’d kept to herself. She had been dating a man named Daniel for about six months now. From his text, she gathered he flew in last minute to attend a conference in Honolulu. As his yacht was also already here on the Big Island, he decided to hop over and check in on the crew. Sally had informed him of her travel plans late yesterday, and he was delighted to be able to surprise her and suggested they meet at the harbor in Kona for the evening. Never did she expect him to come out while she was here with Shawn.
Sally had little experience in affairs of the heart, and she was struggling with how to break the news to Shawn. When she did, she would be forced to tell him her even bigger secret, one she dreaded telling him, one which somehow broke her heart. The last time she and Daniel had been together in New Orleans, he had asked her to marry him, and she had said yes. “Shawn, there is something we need to speak about; I have to tell you about changes in my life — positive changes,” she said with reservation. “There is something I have left out.”
“Let me have it Sals, be good to get my mind off Drake’s face. Whatever it is, we can talk about it over a juicy steak and some delicious oysters!” Shawn responded with his eyes closed, head back against the headrest. He lived off catnaps and was now about to doze off and grab some zzz’s.
“Ah, well, yes, we can have dinner; I would like that very much, but what I haven’t told you is, ah, hmm, I’m kind of dating someone. I’m so sorry, I should have told you sooner, but I never expected him to fly into the islands while we were here. But he did, and now he wants me to join him on his boat this evening. You are welcome of course. I’ve told him all about you many times, probably too many, but he is a great guy, and he said he would like to meet you!”
Sally was quickly glancing over to look at Shawn to see any change in his expression, but his eyes remained closed. Had he fallen asleep already? Sally thought. Now I might have to tell him all over again.
It was quiet for some time, an eternity to Sally.
Then Shawn spoke, “Sally, yeah, kind of expected you to have a boyfriend by now. Hell, I’m everywhere but near you most of my life. Sure, I’d like to meet him, cool with me. We’ve spent some good time today and we still have an hour or so to talk. Tell me about him. What’s his name? What does he do?”
Sally hated herself at that moment. After this emotionally-draining afternoon, particularly for Shawn, the last thing she wanted to do was to describe why she loved another man to Shawn, and how could she tell him they were to be married? But it was even more difficult to sit in silence.
“His name is Daniel, and Shawn, this will flip you out, he’s a television evangelist from Tucson. I was attending a Defense intelligence conference at Fort Huachuca in Arizona and when it ended, all the attendees made a mad dash to the airport, eager to get home, but all the flights were overbooked. Daniel was walking through the terminal with his entourage and realizing the situation, picked me out of the line, and offered to bump me up to first class on a spare ticket he had. I knew instantly who he was because he was on every religious channel on TV in my hotel room the last three days. It certainly didn’t seem out of place for a religious man to offer a kindness to a stranger, something you would expect, so I said yes. And Shawn, it was very comfortable; no, not like that, I mean, it was easy because God and my faith are so important to me. We sat together and never stopped sharing the entire flight. He was very interested in how a scientist could have such a deep-rooted faith which I explained to him was due to the fact that the more I came to understand the wonders of our perfect universe, it was clear some greater being must have had a hand in its creation. Before we landed, he asked me out on a date the next time he was in California, and I accepted. I wasn’t actively looking for someone, just kind of happened.”
Shawn feigned interest but wasn’t sure what bothered him most: knowing Sally was seeing someone, or that she used the word sharing. Oh, how he hated that word. Oh, share with us please! Oh, I’ll reach out to you. Oooo, Oooo, the corporate lingo that plagued society! But he got over her word choice pretty quickly and felt his heart shatter.
“Shawn, Daniel has asked if you would join us, we will be dining on his boat, what can I tell him?” Sally asked. Now they were only fifteen minutes out from Kona, not enough time to mention the engagement. If Daniel brought it up, she wouldn’t know how to respond to Shawn.
“Well, let’s see if this is the gent who I want partnered up with my Sal,” Shawn joked half-heartedly. “We’ll have to wait till after dinner to decide!”