Chapter 6

Kimber sipped her coffee and watched her daughters and their friends cavorting fifty feet away in the shallows on the inland side of Pea Island. She turned to watch her brother pour another cup of coffee, and asked, "I think this trip has been good for the girls so far. How are the kids doing as shipmates Paul?"

Paul tried to suppress his grin, he really did, but he ended grinning like the Cheshire Cat anyways. "Well there's been a lot of teasing, pretty rough when there's one small head for six of you to get enough privacy. I can't decide who's got it worse, the boys or the girls. The girls are driving the boys crazy since they decided the uniform of the day was their swimsuits. With the three of them, I'm afraid both of my sons are going to end up with a bad case of whiplash!"

"Good girls! It is the solemn duty of all women to drive all men crazy! But, do you think the kids really enjoyed visiting that old lighthouse?"

Paul took a sip of his coffee, grimaced and added a bit more sugar. He answered with a lop sided grin as he sat down, "They wouldn't give us the satisfaction of telling us if they did. Still, nobody just sat down and cried, so I'd consider it another successful mission under fire. By the way sis, what's a man's job, if a woman's job is to drive him crazy?"

She beamed at him, and replied, "Why to enjoy the trip I suppose, and to protect us along the way."

Paul laughed, turned to Evan and asked, "So Evan, do you agree to your wife's definition of gender roles?"

"Most certainly! The girls even talked about some of the old whaling artifacts they'd seen after they went to bed last night. I swear it was just to boggle my mind! Seriously though, we need to keep their interest piqued at some more historical sites. We definitely don't want them to get bored! What's on the agenda for today?" Evan asked.

"Well after the girls' morning swim and the boys' morning spear-fishing expedition, we make them a big breakfast and head up to Roanoke Island. There we'll go to the Fort Raleigh National Memorial, and later the girls can do some shopping while we go fishing or golfing. Tomorrow we'll go on up to Kitty Hawk, and see the Wright Brother's Monument," Paul answered.

"Now wait just a minute here! You two are not dumping me off to take seven teenaged girls shopping while you go golfing!" Kimber said with some heat. Her eyes narrowed and she gave Evan a cool smile, and said with a calculating smile, "In fact, I believe it's time for some Father-Daughter bonding time. You should come shopping with us!"

Evan rolled his eyes, and sighed. Then he turned to Paul and said, "This is part of the trip I suppose, according to Kim I'm just supposed to enjoy it and protect her from overzealous salesmen! Never have daughters Paul. They are more trouble then you can know."

Laughing, Kimber slapped his shoulder and squealed with delight as he turned on her to counter attack with tickles. Paul smiled with a bit of melancholy. He was glad to see his sister so happy, but yearned for the same love and closeness she had. Trying to break his mood, his eyes sought out his sons as they drifted face down in the placid waters near the island. He smiled when he saw that they were in far too shallow water to find any fish for breakfast, but might have a fine vantage point to see their cousins' and friends' swimsuit clad bodies though the clear water.

Paul grabbed the cord on the bell next to the hatchway, and began ringing it loudly. When he saw even his boys stick their heads up out of the water to look at him, he cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed, "Breakfast time! Come eat!"

Clark couldn't believe his dad's timing. Lewis and he had finally, nonchalantly moved close enough to the girl's to see them clearly. His first impression of Pam had been based upon her round face and baggy clothes. He had been so sure that she was a bit overweight. Then, he saw her in her bathing suit for the first time! Man! There might have been two pounds of fat on her, but if so, he liked it just where it was!

Lewis entertained similar thoughts, but with a different target. Tammy had seemed sort of skinny and shapeless, but now that he'd seen her in a bathing suit, he knew it was more because she slouched a bit. She actually had a terrific body, she was just a bit too tall for most boys her age, so she had started slouching to compensate. True, she did have a nose that was a bit too long and bony, but she also had a terrific smile, and what an ass!

The boys lagged behind the girls, even though they had diving fins on and could easily have been back to the boats and aboard before the girls could have made it halfway. Clark was even so bold as to take a deep breath, dive underwater, and turn upside down to pace them from below. None of the girls commented, so as he enjoyed the view of the last one climbing up the diving ladder, Clark couldn't resist. He pinched Sarah's thigh, just below the edge of her suit. She froze, and he started to panic, but then she sashayed rest of the way up the ladder with an exaggerated wiggle.

Clark spit out the mouthpiece of his snorkel, and just stared, until he got a mouthful of seawater and choked. Lewis chuckled at him and scrabbled up the ladder as quickly as he could, just so his eyes would be at the level of Sarah's ass before she had a chance to move too far away. Clark coughed and sputtered, trying the clear his throat. Eyes watering, he reached blindly for the ladder, missed and sank underwater.

Clark floundered just under the water, blind and panicky. Then a large hand grasped him by the forearm and pulled his whole upper body out of the water against the ladder. He coughed and heard a cheerful admonishment from his dad; "Don't drown yourself before breakfast son! Especially not within arm's reach of the boat!"

Clark finally pulled his diving mask up and wiped his eyes clear with one hand. He coughed a couple more times to get rid of the tickle in the back of his throat, and pulled himself up to face the music. Sure enough, every girl took one look at his bedraggled appearance, and started giggling! Clark's face burned in shame and he felt sure that he must look like his hair was about to catch on fire! He scrambled though the crowd to get over to the Dragon Lady and below to stow his gear, glad for a ready-made excuse to make himself scarce.

Beth watched Clark bounce off of nearly everybody in his haste to get across to the Dragon Lady, and frowned after him. "Now what was that all about?" she asked, under her breathe.

Sarah leaned close, and whispered in her ear, "I'll tell ya later!"

Beth turned quickly to catch Sarah's eyes, and they both broke into giggles.

Kimber shooed the two oldest girls toward the galley, and admonished them, saying, "Settle down you two! Now that you've almost killed the poor boy before breakfast, you can fry the bacon and eggs!"

Kimber ignored their protests, and turned to the younger girls. They looked back nervously, knowing that there was no place to hide on the crowded deck of the Topaz Fire. "Beth, take Pam and Tammy below and get the salt rinsed off. Bell you and Jenny, too. Get changed into some real clothes. We listened to the weather while you were all swimming and there's a squall line due through this afternoon, with small craft advisories."