Ingrid Ch. 03

"If you look on the compass, you'll see your target direction is somewhere between two-eight-oh and three hundred, so start coming out of your turn when you get to about two-seven-oh which is due West. When she's pointed into the wind, you won't feel any weight on the helm and that will be the indicator you're where you want to be. Can you follow that?" He looked to see if she had understood his instructions.

"Don't worry, I'll be right here to make sure you're OK," he said reassuringly.

Ingrid nodded. She once again repeated what she was supposed to do. Now it was a matter of whether she could do it. Steve stepped out on deck again and stood by the mainmast. He signaled to Ingrid to begin her turn to the west and she responded. Luckily, she didn't yank the helm hard over, but started a nice, gentle turn to the right.

"Nicely done ... just what I wanted," Steve said to himself. "Her instincts are perfect. She's got the 'hands.'"

He turned back to her and gave her a big 'thumbs up' along with a big grin.

Ingrid was a picture of concentration. She looked at the compass as it was nearing two-seven-oh and she started to ease up on the helm. The turn slowed and she was briefly distracted as Steve cranked up the mainsail. The big sail ballooned out to her left, partly blocking her vision of the left forward area in front of the boat.

She looked down at the compass again and saw her heading was two-nine-oh and moving up very slowly. She heard the sail flapping before she looked up. She immediately turned the helm slowly to port until it felt slack to her hands.

She held it there as she watched Steve quickly unfurl the large foresail he called a Genoa with another crank. It was flapping noisily as Steve stood beside the main mast checking to make sure all the stays were taught and the track tying it to the mast was free.

He turned back to Ingrid and gave her a fist-pump and headed back to the wheelhouse, one hand up beside his head to ward off any chance that the boom would suddenly swing toward him. He swung around the back of the cabin and stepped in.

"Fantastic, Ingrid! I couldn't have done that any better myself. Now, I want you to slowly bring her back toward two-three-oh. As you do, you'll feel the sails fill and the boat start to lean to the left. Don't worry, that's exactly what's supposed to happen. You're going to feel a lot more weight on the helm, so don't be surprised."

She began to slowly bring the helm to port and saw the sail begin to fill and experienced that strange feeling as the boat began to heel over. Steve pulled the throttle back and cut the engine. Suddenly, it was quiet, with the sound of the wind slightly rippling the Genoa headsail.

The sails were soon taught and she could feel the boat begin to surge forward. She had several tons of fiberglass, wood and steel under her feet and she was in control. It was a rush!

Steve stood back and watched Ingrid handle the boat. He was amazed and delighted. She had the feel. He could see the excitement and joy in her face. When they boarded the boat less than an hour earlier, he had no plan to let her handle the boat. The simple act of dealing with the forward line was enough to prompt him to see what she might be able to do.

"Don't put her in danger, boy," he told himself. Still, the poise she had shown him on land with her personality and her business was carried over on the 'Matron.'

He resumed his instructions to her.

"Now, in this case, I want you to find a reference point on the horizon and set it up as your heading. The reason for that is we have both tide and current in this Strait and while you may keep your heading on two-three-oh, the boat can be slipping sideways with the current or tide and you won't be heading where you want to go. By setting your heading on a fixed object on the horizon, you can compensate if the boat slides one way or the other."

"Got it." she said, looking over at him and smiling. "This is terrific fun, way more fun than a motor boat," she enthused.

"Stinkpots!" he said, "That's what we call them, stinkpots. Sailors are terrible snobs," he admitted.

"It's the quiet I like," she said after a minute. "You can talk in a normal voice and there's always something to do. I can smell the ocean, not some engine. Where are we going, by the way?"

"Well, we're going to run out a ways into the Gulf, and then head toward Gibson's Landing. Then, we'll turn east to Keates Island. There's a lovely little bay that we can anchor in and if our timing's good, I'll serve lunch. It's a bit sheltered and I'm betting it will be quite warm in the sun.

"Usually in the afternoons on a warm day there's an outflow wind from Howe Sound, and that should give us plenty of push home. This boat doesn't go anywhere in a big hurry. The fun is getting there!"

He had been pointing to various paths and locations on a chart and she could see his plan was a sort of triangle with some zigs and zags here and there past the various islands.

After a while, Steve took over the helm, giving Ingrid a break. He recognized she had been tense with concentration when she was handling the boat. As he relieved her, he could almost see the tension drain out of her.

They sailed out into the Gulf before he came about to starboard, his heading now toward Gibson's. It was an easy-to-see target and she took the helm again while Steve managed the sails.

It only took a minute and he returned to the helm. He looked at her with admiration and put his arm around her shoulder and gave it a light squeeze. He had caught Ingrid completely by surprise. She jumped slightly when she felt arm around her and looked at him quizzically.

"Sorry," he said apologetically. "I didn't mean to surprise you."

"No, it's OK," she quickly responded. "You just caught me off guard. To tell the truth, I wasn't sure if you were ever going to touch me. You seem a bit nervous around me."

"Well then, I guess I'm making progress," he said, not quite seriously. "Now that we're alone on the boat and lots of time to talk, I thought it was a good opportunity ... uh, to say what I wanted to say."

Ingrid looked at him with a wrinkled brow.

"You look so nervous, Ingrid. Relax, it's not bad news. At least I don't think so. I just wanted to tell you how much you've come to mean to me. We don't just have a business relationship, but that's not a surprise to you I'm sure. I haven't had this much enjoyment in being with someone in a long time. I guess I want to know how you feel."

He paused briefly and then continued. "I'm not asking for a commitment. I think its way too early for that. But I was hoping you'd enjoy my company as well as my cooking ... and the boat."

Ingrid was unsure of what she wanted to say.

"Uh, yeah ... I mean, yes I like being with you. I'm not sure where this is going to take us either, but if you're inviting me along for the ride, I'll go with you."

Was this an invitation, or some strange kind of stop sign?

"I'm attracted to you," she continued, "and to be honest, I've been why you hadn't made a pass at me. This arms-length, no-touch relationship can be very frustrating, and I'm having a hard time understanding it."

She was gaining back some of her composure and self-confidence. "I'm not used to having a guy keep me away. They usually want to bed me in the first ten minutes. I'm not bragging, it's just that the world seems to be filled with horny men, and you don't fit the pattern."

"No, I guess I don't," he said quietly. "But then, that's not what you want or what you need ... in my opinion. You are the most dynamic, intimidating, voluptuous, sexy, smart women I've ever met. You don't fit any profile. The closest I can come to describing you is a Viking Goddess and that doesn't tell half the story.

"You had me hooked the minute you walked by my front window last Tuesday. I knew it, you knew it, and now, less than a week later, we're having a conversation that sounds like we've known each other for six months. Does that make any sense to you?"

"No, I guess not," she said quietly. She looked up at him, took the two steps needed to stand in front of him, put her arms around his neck and kissed him. It was a full blooded heavy kiss and within a few seconds their mouths were open and the kiss had turned into something a great deal more passionate. When the kiss ended they looked into each other's eyes. Steve put his arm around her again.

He looked out the windshield and noticed that they had fallen badly off course. "I think the Captain should get us back on course," he said with a wry smile.

He looked back at her and kissed her briefly, finally returning to the task at hand.

"That's the one trouble with a sailboat," he said quietly. "It makes you pay attention to it all the time. No time off."

He looked at his watch. He was roughly on the schedule that he had mapped out in his mind. Now he knew that the rest of the day was going to be very interesting. The kiss had guaranteed that. He wondered if he'd really screwed this all up. He'd kick himself forever if he lost this girl, and yet he was determined he was going to stay balanced and equally determined he was going to be sure about her and himself.

"I kissed you because I was trying to understand you," she said, unexpectedly.

"I needed to know that there was some passion in you, that you aren't all clinical analysis. Thank god you have some spark in you."

She stopped to catch her breath. She had raised her voice and she was aware she had been irritated with him for almost spoiling her day. She looked at him, her eyes demanding a response.

"Boy, are you going to be a handful," he said. "If you think you're going to scare me off though, you're wrong," he said emphatically.

"I don't give up easily on important things either," she said quietly.

"Time to change course again," he said looking into her eyes. His arm was still around her shoulders and he kissed her softly once more.

"The helm is yours, Ingrid. Come about to starboard and head toward the group of houses near the south center of the island."

He walked out of the wheelhouse and slowly made his way forward on the starboard side. Ingrid watched him carefully. The boat slowly swung around to its new heading the boom swinging from starboard to port in response to the change in wind direction. Steve pulled the line attached to the bottom of the big Genoa and the sail crossed over the mainmast and filled out on the port side. He tied it off to a deck cleat.

They weren't far from the island and Steve estimated they would arrive in the little bay within thirty or forty minutes. He looked at his watch and smiled. With a few minutes to find a nice spot to anchor, he had time to prepare the lunch for about one o'clock.

He was counting on the lunch to restore the day. He had badly miscalculated and her kiss had been the only thing that was good about the awkward ten minutes or so that ensued. He hadn't reckoned on her temper and her obvious disdain for his "style." He should have known better, but he didn't. She was a volatile mixture of passion and talent. He had no idea how to handle her. Maybe that was what he should tell her.

"I've got to save this relationship," he thought. "I've got to and that's all there is to it!"

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This is a re-posting of my original story, Quartet Ingrid. It has been corrected for punctuation, grammar, and I hope, readability.