DOUBLE KNOT by Gretchen Archer Read Free Book Online

upset. She’ll be fine. Won’t you, Jessica?”
    “I am so not fine.”
    “Yes, you are,” I said. “We’re all fine.”
    A fine silence settled over the salon of 704.
    Mother, who just couldn’t stop herself, broke it. “Are there not regular wall telephones
     here?” she asked. “Why isn’t there a phone on the kitchen wall? Has anyone checked
     the kitchen for a regular phone? Like a house phone?” Her head whipped around. “Where is the kitchen, anyway? Why can’t we pick up a good old-fashioned telephone and call
     the front desk? You young people and your portable phones.” She slapped at thin air.
     “It’s ridiculous. Look at every one of you, lost without your playthings. Davis, get
     your regular portable phone and call someone. Tell them we’re locked in here.”
    “Mother.” This would be the fourth time I explained the same thing to her. “The minute
     we stepped on the ship, our personal devices stopped working. It’s part of the security
     system. The broadband on the ship doesn’t recognize any digital signal that isn’t
     directly connected to Probability ’s system.”
    “Which is SO DOWN!”
    I took a deep breath of fortitude. “We know that, Jess.” Like talking to a six-year-old.
     “And you need to settle down.”
    “Well, my portable phone works just fine.”
    All heads whipped Mother’s way.
    “ What ?” Fantasy asked.
    “Mother! Where’s your phone?”
    She’d had the same phone for twenty years, an old-school flip phone, nothing smart
     about it. It was the dinosaur of mobile communication, with no Wi-Fi, camera, or texting
     capabilities, which hardly mattered because Mother would text a message exactly never.
     The Probability system hadn’t recognized her old analog phone, so there’d been nothing to disable.
    “It’s in my room,” Mother said. “I called your father and told him you brought a cat
     on this boat.”
    Six months ago I would have been up and had the phone in my hand in under a minute.
     Today, I needed a crane. Before I could even think about getting myself and the babies
     off the sofa, Fantasy flew past me in a blur. “I’ve got it!”
    “It’s on the nightstand,” Mother called after her. “And I’d appreciate it if you’d
     leave my bed alone.”
    Short of breath, Fantasy returned. She dropped Mother’s Casio flip phone into my waiting
     open hands. I stared at the relic, as dense as a rock, and was overwhelmed with unexpected
     emotion at the thought of just how much communication had passed between Mother and
     me on this one prehistoric device. My eyes found hers.
    “What, Davis? What are you waiting for? World peace?”
    Moment over. I flipped open the phone and for the life of me had no idea what to do.
     Whatever directions had been on the raised black buttons were long gone, and I’d had
     a phone similar to the Casio four hundred phones ago.
    “Well, Davis,” Mother said, “turn it on .”
    I depressed the black circle in the middle, which was clearly the wrong choice, because
     it triggered a long and loud horn blast that reverberated through the open terrace
     and scared the living daylights out of everyone. I yelped, tossing the phone through
     the air, and like a bolt from the blue, Jess dove for it, screaming, “No! So, no!”
     She landed on the glass table; tulips, V2s, and water went everywhere. Mother, Fantasy,
     and I were plastered against our cushion backs, staring at Jessica, who was facedown
     and spread eagle across the glass table, her shoulders heaving, her head hanging off
     one end, long dark hair pooled on the silver rug. Her hand rose as she displayed the
     phone she caught midair and my mother broke the shocked silence when she said, “There
     was no need for that. You can’t hurt that phone, young lady. I’ve run over it with
     my Chevrolet twice.”
    Fantasy and I exchanged wide-eyed looks of wonderment. Before we had a chance to (get
     Jess off the table) recover, three staccato horn