Chapter 6

Jason had never experienced what a cruise ship feels like when it starts moving until now. It almost reminded him of being a little tipsy; everything feels just a little off. Not enough to make him fall over, just enough to make him feel slightly uneasy. But right now, that wasn’t the biggest problem that Jason was feeling.

“Shit,” said Kelly, “we’re too late.”

Jason leaned forward towards the security associate. “Can’t we just stop the boat? Like, put it in reverse or whatever?”

The security associate rolled her eyes at him.

“No,” said Kelly, “that’s not really how boat physics work. The amount of force needed to move the weight of the ship isn’t something that can be quickly undone. But we don’t have to truly leave the whole port. I’m sure we can spin around and dock somewhere else due to the severity of the situation, right?” Kelly looked at the security associate for confirmation. Unfortunately, Kelly did not receive the confirmation she was looking for. The security associate reached below to pull out a clipboard with a form on it and handed it over to Kelly.

“Here,” she said, “you’ll need to fill out this incident form and then turn over the evidence.”

Jason responded with shocked frustration, “Incident form!? That’s how you’re reacting to someone getting stabbed in the throat!?”

The security associate’s eyes narrowed as Kelly quickly snagged the clipboard. She grabbed Jason’s arm and pulled him away from the counter calmly. The frustrated Jason suddenly faded away when he realized that Kelly was holding his arm. He felt a light flutter travel from his bicep to his gut before looking over to her eyes. They were very wide as she nodded towards the chairs in the room. The security associate kept her eyes focused on the two of them while they sat down with the form. Kelly started filling it out as she spoke softly to Jason.

“This is Disney Jason, there are rules,” said Kelly. “Here, I’ll fill out everything I know, and then you can put in your personal info after.”

Jason wasn’t fully paying attention to what she said. He was instead just staring at Kelly as she sat, slightly hunched over the clipboard and writing. She’d lightly bite the end of the pen while reading the form, and at one point, she pulled some of her loose hair back behind her ear. Jason knew that he was suddenly acting like a teenager again by just staring at a girl he’d only known for a few hours now, but he didn’t care. Especially when she crossed her legs, causing him to now focus on how smooth they…

“Here you go,” said Kelly as she handed the now mostly filled-in form to Jason. He abruptly raised his gaze up from her legs and onto the form. Awkwardly, he grabbed the clipboard from her and started looking it up and down to see what he needed to fill in himself. “I’ve gotta get going, or I’ll be late to tonight’s events,” said Kelly as she stood up.

“Oh, you’re not, like, scared or anything about going to work tonight?” asked Jason.

“I mean, sure. But maybe we are just reading into it too much. I don’t know. What I do know is that I still have a job if I want money, and Goofy isn’t part of the Frozen-themed dinner.”

“I think that’s where we’re going tonight, actually. David made a joke about how it’s all frozen microwave meals or something.”

Kelly rolled her eyes, “Yep, we hear that joke every night.”

“So I’ll, like, see you tonight, I guess?”

Kelly was taken aback slightly. It felt like a question she’d hear after an awkward date.

“I mean, at the dinner, not like-”

“Yep, I’ll be there with Ella!” said Kelly, in a fake upbeat tone to try to kill the tension. “See ya.”

Jason watched Kelly walk out the door a little longer than necessary before looking back at the form. He exhaled, put his pen to the form, and started filling in the rest.

The hallways were much busier now for Kelly as she made her way to the dressing room. It must have been everyone having just finished up the safety drill out on the decks. Kelly always thought they were a waste of time since hardly anyone paid attention. Not to mention that they’d probably forget the tiny parts they heard within a few hours, let alone a few days. But Disney is strict on everything, especially proper maritime procedures.

Finally, she made it to Ella’s dressing room. Kelly was only five minutes behind, but she knew the first thing Ella was going to say would be a complaint about her being late and ruining everything.

“You’re late,” said Ella as Kelly stepped into the room, “Now my hair is going to have to be rushed.”

Not quite as bad as she anticipated. Ella didn’t complain about everything. She was at her mirror putting on makeup already and still in her underwear. Kelly went to the wardrobe area and started pulling all the costume pieces from the rack. This time, it was more than just one simple dress.

“So, did you guys catch Goofy the Ripper then?” asked Ella facetiously.

“I thought you didn’t care,” responded Kelly, forgetting in the moment that she was sorta-kinda speaking to her boss with obvious annoyance.

Ella stopped applying her eyeliner for half a second while staring down at Kelly through the mirror.

“You’re right,” she said, “I don’t.” She put the eyeliner down and stood up. “I’m ready for the dress now.”

“Just a second,” replied Kelly bluntly without looking at Ella.

“Excuse me?”

“I’m working as fast as I can here.”

“Yeah, and you were late.”

“I was late from filing a report of someone getting stabbed in the neck! You don’t think that is worth five minutes of your dress time?”

Ella rolled her eyes and stepped to the clothing rack. She quickly grabbed the blue, glittery dress quickly off the hook and pulled it away. Something from the bottom of the dress was snagged on one of the rack wheels and tore a small rip at the bottom of the dress.

“Goddamnit,” yelled Ella, “Do you see what fucking happens when you’re late!?”

Kelly stopped what she was doing and knelt down to look at the tear.

“It’s not that noticeable,” she said, “I’m sure we can get this fixed for tomorrow, no problem.”

Ella wasn’t listening. “Now the dinner show is going to be everyone taking pictures and uploading them to TikTok and saying that Elsa must be a slut now and how inept we all are and…”

“I’m sorry,” started Kelly, “I was going to get it for you in just a second, but-”

“But you were instead just going on a mystery goose hunt!”

Kelly stepped back and finally stared Ella directly in the eyes. “Why don’t you take it seriously?” she said.

“Because it is just absolutely insane to think that someone is walking around on the ship in a Goofy costume and stabbing people. That makes no sense at all. Why put on an obvious costume? How does a random person get the costume without anyone noticing? How does nobody notice and report blood everywhere? Like, have you ever seen Kill Bill? People squirt blood everywhere when they’re stabbed. We’d have had a shower of blood where we were standing when that photo was taken.”

Kelly exhaled and started rubbing her eyes before responding, “Ella… Kill Bill is not a realistic movie. Blood doesn’t spray out like that-”

“Yeah, ok, and neither is Evil Dead or Rambo,” replied Ella sarcastically.

Kelly realized that that argument had no chance, so she moved on. “I guess, I mean, I don’t know Ella. But what I know is that I saw a picture of Goofy stabbing someone. If we never reported it, how would we ever answer those questions?”

“Well, whatever. It’s past that now, and I think you need to just stay away from all of it. Even if you’re right, and you’re probably not, but even if you are, I don’t think you should be involved at all.”

“What, why not?”

“Did you want to get stabbed too, Kelly!?”

Ella started putting on the dress as Kelly took that comment in.

“I mean, I would see Goofy coming, I guess. And we’re all on a big, crowded boat, so…”

“Hey, you think Goofy,” Ella paused, putting on her dress for a second and looked at Kelly, “Goofy. You think Goofy up and stabbed someone. In the throat. Goofy. But you also think, it’s just him, alone?”

Kelly was taken off guard by how Ella said that. Her normal dumb blonde tone dropped and became a very direct, logical one that was not her normal style. Was she right? Was it Goofy and normal people? Was it Goofy and other characters? Was it Goofy and his handler?

“Hand me the outer dress,” said Ella, “We’ve got a show to put on."

Prev: Chapter 5

Next: Chapter 7