Chapter 21

Caitlin's Point Of View ;)

I wake up in Sidney's arms happy. He's not even awake yet. He's got a Penguins alarm clock sitting on his nightstand and I twist awkwardly trying to read it. 5:45? Ahhhh, how will I ever get out of school mode? I snuggle back into Sidney and it wakes him up. "huh?" He asks. I just ignore him and lay my head on his hard chest to get comfy. I quickly fall back asleep, his warmth comforting, the weight of his arms keeping me from getting up. It probably hasn't even been half an hour when the alarm clock blares.
Sidney groans and tries to roll over, then remembers that I'm there and he smiles. "How'd you sleep?" He asks, tucking a strand of my tangled hair behind my ear.
"Wonderfully." I say, smiling back.
He kisses me briefly then says, "we gotta get movin'" I go into the bathroom and pull on something cute and comfy. It's no fun when you're on a plane and you're not comfy. I pull a brush trough my hair and add just a little eyeliner to my look. I come out in like 3 minutes.
"ohhhkey dokey" I say, just happy to be with him from the minute I woke up. He grabs both of his bags and one of mine. "You don't have to carry mine." I tell him.
"No problem, you just get the other one." I grab my lightest bag and sigh. He's always making my life easier. I follow him downstairs and into the like, entrance hallway thing and he put our bags there. Then, he leads me to the kitchen, "Pop Tart or Toaster Strudel?" He asks me.
"Toaster Strudel." I say, and he throws them in, then walks over to me.
"You all ready?" He asks.
"Yep." I say. He leans down to kiss me, his arms around my waist, my arms around his neck, when Mario's daughter Stephenie walks in. "umm," we both say awkwardly, and let go. "Toaster Strudels are ready!" I desperately try to cover, running to the toaster. Sidney laughs at me and walks over.
"are they?" He asks, laughing.
"I thought I heard your toaster pop!" I say, mock glaring at him. We both laugh at each other and we both jump when the toaster does pop. Sidney grabs them out too quickly and gets burnt. The toaster strudel goes flying across the counter. All the while, Stephenie's standing in the doorway laughing at us. By now, Lauren has joined her and they're both laughing at us. Sidney retrieves the breakfast and we eat in silence, just trying to get our butts in gear so we can get out of here.
"That was swift." I say.
"Yeah," he agrees. "Mario's gonna hear all about that one." He laughs halfheartedly.
I just hug him, "It was cute." I say, smiling up at him. He finally smiles back, and this time it reaches his eyes. We throw the bags in the back of his Range Rover and get going.
"We're picking Ruthanne and Kris and Max up AND Jordy I guess," he says, looking at his phone. My heart kinda stops when he says Max. I'm always having a great time with Sidney and somehow Max gets brought up. "They don't want to go through a hassle trying to find us at the airport."
"Ok." I say, happy. "Are they together?" I ask.
"Yeah, Ruthanne went to Kris's a little bit ago and I guess that's where everyone else is right now too." I glance at the clock on his dashboard. It's like 7:00. They must have woken up really early. We pick them up and make it to the airport, all in good time. Traffic isn't bad on Saturday mornings.
Sidney leaves the Range Rover with Jordan and the rest of us grab out bags. I don't know why Max is here, but I figure he's going on the cruise with us. We go through all the normal airport proceedings and finally make it onto the plane. I traded seats with some lady (after some hassle) so that I could sit by Sidney. Ruthanne and Kris are directly in front of us and Max is somewhere here. He got on right before me, but I didn't pay attention to where he sat.

I slept for some of the plane ride with my head on Sidney's shoulder. When we land, he wakes me up. "Sorry." I say.
"It's ok. " He replies, putting the magazine he was reading back into his bag. We get all our stuff together, luggage etc. and then go outside to hail a taxi.
That takes us to where we need to be and the cruise ship is loading when we get there. "Perfect timing, eh?" Sidney says, gazing down at me and walking around to the cab's trunk. I'm still waking up, so I just nod. We grab all our bags and stand on the curb for a moment
Ruthanne and Kris are over there doing their little lovebird thing. Holding hands and swinging them back and forth, laughing and fooling around. They're great couple. I'm glad they met. Well, not as glad as I am for Sidney. "Get your bags!" Sidney says to them, nodding to our impatient cabby who obviously does not know who we are. That or he just doesn't care. But, I'd be willing to bet he doesn't know us. ;)
They check our luggage, making me pull out every tiny perfume bottle I had which, I had a few. When everything was finally deemed legit, for all of us to get on the boat, it took over an hour. I would hate this job, I decided after no more than 15 minutes of standing there and watching them do everything. Our suites are side by side with a door in between since we booked together. Ours 158 and theirs 157. Max is in his own private room somewhere on another deck. Sidney and I walk in and plop on our bed. "Finally," I sigh, rolling over to face him.
He kisses me, "it'll all be worthwhile soon." He says, kissing me again. I smile, liking what he has to say.
"It better be," I say, rolling over on top of him. There's a knock at our door. "Ughhhh," I groan, "you get it." I roll back over. He gets up to answer the door.
It's Ruthanne, of course, with Kris right beside her. "You guys wanna go find something to eat?" He asks. "I gotta get Max though," he says, pulling out his cell.
"The ship hasn't even left port." I say, looking around nervously, hoping nobody noticed my little jump at Max's name. I need to stop being so...scared of him.
"So? We can still look around!!!!" Ruthanne says, absolutely beaming. I groan and look at myself. I look hideous and scraggly after all the hub-bub and my last few happy moments in the bedroom.
"Fine.. just, let me get ready or something." I try to run a hand through my hair, getting it stuck and hurting myself. They turn around and go back to their suite to wait for us. I run back to my suitcase to get a brush and some eyeliner and something to replace my sweaty clothes. It's the least I could do to spare everyone the gastly sight. Sidney sits on the bed patiently, well, as patiently as he can. I finish and turn around, coming out of the small bathroom. "How's this?" I twirl in front of him in my new short sundress.
He nods, approving, wrapping his arms around me. "beautiful." He says, kissing my neck. He leads me out and we knock on their door.
"You coming or what!?" I shout through when they don't answer right away.
"Yep!" Ruthanne says, opening the door and surprising me.
"Let's go then." I say, hooking my arm through Sidney's.
He laughs at me, "we have all week you know." He says.
"Yes, but, they want us to go go go, then they take forever!" I say, my fast paced mind kicking in again. We laugh at me and walk around just to explore. That's what we decided to do since Ruthanne and I have no clue how this kind of thing goes. We all kind of just walk aimlessly, looking at things and pointing. There's more and more people being led to their rooms or suites, just like us, so we decide to head up a deck. I notice all sorts of things I want to hit later, after relaxing of course.
After a while, I whine into Sidney's ear. "Let's go back," because people are just walking around aimlessly like us, waiting for the stupid ship to leave port so we don't feel so weird. Ruthanne and Kris are so into their little exploration trip they continue on well after Sidney and I head back to our rooms. Max had disappeared sometime earlier, probably to pick up some alcohol.
"So," he says, "what do you want to do tonight?"He asks.
"Well, as long as I'm with you I don't care..." I trail off. He kisses me lightly.
"Let's hit the casino." He says.
I laugh, "I didn't know you were a gambler!" I say.
"I'm not. But I like to play." He says. We laugh again and lay back on the bed.
"I suppose if we're going to be here for a week, I might as well get moved in, right?" I say, getting up to do so, claiming the top half of the dresser in front of our bed.

Ruthanne's Point Of View ,<3>

Kris and I are having so much fun just walking around, I hardly notice the time til Caitlin texts me. Hey, Let's go eat... why aren't you back by now!?
Kris laughs, looking over my shoulder. I text her back. Ok... just having fun with Kris. Enjoying the ALONE TIME. Kris laughs again and we head back down the 3 levels we had climbed. I glance at the time on my phone. 3:30 almost. Wow, what a long day already.
They're standing at the rail, looking out over the water when we get back. The ship has left by now and they're enjoying watching the land slowly get farther away. And the way they're standing makes them look so cute. I pull my camera out and snap a picture before they can notice us. Kris laughs at me. "Paparazzi much?" He asks, making them look up. Caitlin I think, hear him and gives me a funny look. Sidney just seems to hear Kris's voice. I tuck the camera back into my pocket and walk up to them.
"Ready?" I ask happily.
"Yeah," Caitlin says, "I'm starving."
I know how she gets when she's hungry so I say, "let's go then." And we start walking back towards the dining area Kris and I found. I guess on this particular ship, there's several. A waitress immediately sees us and comes over to get us a drink. Sidney and Caitlin get coke and Kris and I both get iced tea. We chat quietly while we wait for that.
The special today I guess is prime rib, so Kris orders it, Caitlin and I don't like our meat still bloody, so we decide on some nice-- cooked --chicken breast. Sidney, gets some sort of weird soup that he says is really delicious and makes Caitlin try. Judging by her face I don't think she really liked it, but she doesn't tell him that. Max shows up late and gets himself some chocolate milk and roast beef. We all laugh at him for his order even though it's something we'd all love to eat.
Dinner was good and fun, and we ended up with some great pictures of the water and of us. Kind of tired, we all head back to our suites for a little break. Caitlin had filled me in on their plans to hit the casino. I have no clue if I'm even old enough to gamble so I turn to Kris. "You want to go to the casino with Sid and Caitlin tonight?" I ask him slowly, just in case I'm not even allowed in.
"Sure." He says. We sit on the couch in front of our flat screen TV for a little bit, just hanging out for a while. We don't really watch the weird romance movie that's on, instead, talking and kissing and whatnot.
Come 8:00, Caitlin has texted me. Let's go!
I laugh. She's always kind of been a gambler.
Okey dokey! <3 I type back and we meet outside. Sidney leads us up to the casino he somehow noticed. It's supposedly a big attraction, except it has this teeny tiny little sign, and only 2 big doors.
I find out gambling is fun and I beat Kris like a zillion times at Texas Hold 'Em since he insists on spending all his money. I walk out with a few hundred dollars more than I had, which was absolutely none. I'm happy to be a winner. Kris comes out with a pitiful win of $47.
Caitlin and Max won some, not much, and Sidney lost. Everyone makes fun of me for being the big winner.
Exhausted, Kris and I head back to our suite. I look at the time again, 12:30 AM. "We spent that much time there!?" I ask him, surprised.
He looks at the clock himself and laughs, "wow. now I know how so many people lose themselves gambling." I nod and walk over to my suitcase, something I didn't bother to unpack since I got here. I get a cute old pair of sleep pants that I love and a t-shirt which just happens to be a Pittsburgh Penguins one. Kris winks at me as I walk into the bathroom to get ready for bed.
I come out feeling less tired than before, having gotten my shower blow dried my hair and brushed my teeth. Kris pulls back the covers on my side and then takes his turn in the bathroom.
His beautiful thick hair, is still wet when he comes out and I smile at him mischievously. He laughs and climbs into bed beside me. "goodnight, love." He says as we pull our lamp switches simultaneously.