Jane’s mouth hung open loosely, they’d had their arguments in the past, but even in the midst of the most vicious, Maura had never been this cruel. She watched as the honey blonde walked neatly up the boardwalk and joined the end of the queue.

As Maura got to the head of the queue, she smiled sweetly at the young man who greeted her.

“Good afternoon, welcome aboard the Galaxy, may I see your ticket and boarding pass please?” he asked.

“Certainly.” Maura said, handing him the appropriate documents.

“Ahh, a wonderful cabin.” the young man smiled. “If you’d like to follow me?”

Maura glanced behind her briefly, before following the young man into the heart of the ship.

-/-

“Wow!”

Since the crew boy, who had introduced himself to Maura as Chris and graciously accepted his tip and left, wow was all Maura could find to say. He had given her a quick tour around her luxury cabin and handed her a rather large book which explained all the facilities the Galaxy had to offer. It’s not that she was unaccustomed to the luxury, but she’d never anticipated seeing something so grand on a boat.

The cabin itself, the Grand Suite, was something from a Victorian fairytale. At almost 1500 square feet, Maura knew why this trip had cost so much; their cabin had two bedrooms, both with Queen sized beds, two living rooms, two bathrooms, and the one off of the bedroom she had chosen as the main bedroom had a full sized Jacuzzi tub as well as a shower room and two sinks. It was like the designers knew she and Jane were having difficulties and had deliberately made the cabin in case they fell out. They had two of everything which Maura could only hope would mean there was less to argue about.

She stepped out onto the private balcony and sat at the dining area laid out there. Part of her felt bad for leaving Jane behind on the dock but she’d given her her ticket and boarding pass, she was meant to be her partner, not her mother, nor emotional punching bag
Pushing aside the momentary guilt pang, Maura sat back and read through the brochure that Chris had kindly left for her to browse.