#regatta threads.

The first hour was always the worst. Trying to find her sea legs, trying not to lose her breakfast over the side of the boat, trying to remember if she’d packed everything and hadn’t, in fact, left anything important behind at her cousin’s home. It all melded together and swirled up into a veritable storm of anxiety and nauseousness, and Delilah was ready for it all to be over. Once she’d had time to settle in, her nerves and her stomach would surely calm down –– they had to, or else this journey would feel a lot longer than eight hours. She tried taking a seat, hoping that remaining steady would help, but it seemed to make things worse, so she stood, pacing and rocking slightly with the movement of the water with each step. That was even worse than sitting, if possible, and she was sure it made her look rather ridiculous, so she headed for the edge and began to walk alongside the railing, taking deep and steady inhales of the fresh air as she did. That helped, at least. She knew she could flag down her gracious hosts for a ginger candy if needs be, but Delilah was...stubborn, to say the least, and was certain she could conquer this with her own wits and fortitude. 

Another few steps, then another, and yes, there, she was definitely starting to feel a little better. In fact, she was actually starting to feel excitement again, colored slightly blue with the slightest bit of regret that her charges could not attend. Not that she wanted to work, of course not, but still –– Emma loved the water, always had. Delilah was half convinced her young cousin was part fish, sometimes, and Emma and Adam loved to play little games where Adam was Odysseus on a ship home and Emma was one of the sirens trying to lure him astray. Granted, the effect was rather lost when they were playing in a bathtub, and it did complicate bath time a bit, but still. Thinking of them made her smile, and she was so caught up in the thought and still trying to find her sea legs that she was entirely unprepared for when a particularly sizable wave knocked against the side of the barge. Delilah pitched forward suddenly, the deck seeming to drop out from beneath her, leaving her floating for a moment before hurtling down, only to –– whump! 

She landed rather solidly against a gentleman with one arm full of flowers, and the other arm full of –– well, her. His arm wrapped around her waist instantly, his grip strong and his stance steady, and she reached up instinctively to steady his hat, which looked perilously close to flying off into the water below after having been knocked against her own. Delilah blinked once, twice, startled, and then said, without thinking: “Good catch.” 

She was in the middle of trying to decide if anyone would care –– or notice, really –– if she dug her flask out of her reticule and spiked her little glass of lemonade with it, when suddenly, she heard a sharp gasp from somewhere on her left. Startled, Delilah whipped her head towards the noise, keeping a firm hand on her drink as she did (she worked with children; she was very used to loud, unexpected noises). There! A lady called, and Delilah crossed to the railing in three long strides, nearly jogging in her haste, her midsection pressing hard against the railing as she stopped. Her drink sloshed slightly in its glass, a single drop falling into the water near where the woman indicated, and Delilah studied it, puzzled. “Wha––” she started to ask, and then, suddenly, there! There it was! A quick flash of something thin and dark, like a long ribbon that had been discarded and lost beneath the water. Then it moved, startlingly fast, wavering and weaving in the wave, getting larger with each second. 

“Does that look like––” Delilah began, only to cry out and leap back as the thing jumped up from the water, arcing through the air, and then landed back in the water with only the smallest of ripples. “Christ!” She gasped, pressing her free hand to her chest, and then turned to the other woman, shocked laughter erupting from her throat as she did. “Are you alright? It didn’t get you, did it?” Fucking eels –– Delilah hated the things, and the Thames seemed to be crawling with them these days. “Just an eel –– utterly harmless,” she reassured, though she wasn’t actually quite sure of that herself. She’d never been quite as good at natural sciences as she led on.