Valentine's Day:
Maria didn’t feel like spending Valentine's Day alone again; she did last year. This time around, she was going to go on the single cruise the City of Norfolk was hosting on the Spirit of Norfolk. Vincent was spending Valentine's Day with his boyfriend.

She gets all dolled up and buys tickets for the cruise. The bus she normally catches goes all the way downtown. Maria wears a nice backless dress to show off her sea dragon tattoo. She loved the tattoo and has been covering it up a lot.

She wore her long, luxury faux fox fur coat, which she bought at the local thrift store in downtown Norfolk, when she went thrifting with her grandmother. The coat was in excellent shape, and it fit her like a glove. She was also wearing her black three-inch thigh-high boots and her baby goat handmade gloves. The gloves themselves were made from real young goat skin.

In her ears, she was wearing a set of ruby earrings her grandmother in Richmond gave her for her sweet sixteenth birthday. She had gone and had her hair styled and her fingernails done at Betty’s Salon, down the street from her apartment. She felt like a million bucks and felt warm in her long coat.

The bus ride down to downtown Norfolk was boring. She noticed a bunch of other people were giving her glances, because of how well-dressed she was. She had her clutch hidden inside her coat. She had taken her grandmother’s advice and sewn a hidden pocket inside her coat to hide her small purse and cellphone.

The bus didn’t stop exactly in front of the pier where the Spirit of Norfolk was docked, so she had to walk the rest of the way. She shivers from a cold breeze blowing off the water. Maria looks around as she follows the path from the bus station to the pier where the boat is parked.

When she arrives, she notices everyone is being checked by security. She wonders why everyone was being made to walk through the metal detectors and checked with the wands as well. She has no problem being checked, as she allows the security officers to do their job. When the wand beeps, she informs them it’s her clutch. She allows one female security officer to reach into her coat to check.

Once she is through security, she walks onto the boat and checks her coat in. She’s been given a ticket, so she can get her coat back. She tucks the ticket into her bra and mingles with the crowd. The ticket included a meal, but she wanted to dance for a while before eating.

Maria walks out onto the dance floor and starts dancing by herself, and before she knows it. She is joined by two handsome men. Each man interrupts the other as they cut in to dance with her. Maria thinks it's funny, as she agrees to dance with them.

Robert and William spotted a short, gray-haired woman wearing a backless dress that showed off a beautiful and colorful sea dragon tattoo on her back. Not only was itn’t the dragon, but a whole scene of the dragon rising out of the ocean. They wanted to meet her and see who she was.
Both men walked over to her. “Ma’am, would you mind if we dance with you?”

Maria looks at both men, “not at all.”

Maria starts dancing with Robert first and then switches to William, who asks her to dance, on the second song that plays. She dances several songs with both men before she heads back to her table to sit down to eat. Robert and William ask to join her, and she agrees.

Robert saw how blue Maria’s eyes are. “By the way, my name is Robert Norris, and this here is my younger brother William Norris. We are intrigued by the sea dragon tattoo on your back. Where did you get it done?”

“A good friend of mine did it. He works at a tattoo parlor in Virginia Beach.” Maria knew the tattoo parlor her friend worked at did a lot of work on military people and some law enforcement personnel.

“Well, it must have taken him several days to do that tattoo, because it is very detailed and beautiful on your pale complexion.” William could tell how pale the woman’s skin was.

“Well, since you gentlemen were kind enough to tell me your name. My name is Maria Ann Sheridan. It’s nice to see you two.” Maria holds her hand out to shake their hand.

Robert and William shake Maria’s hand. They noticed she had a light touch, and her hand felt soft. They also noticed the perfume she was wearing.

“Actually, it took him four days to do, and a lot of tequila on my part to overcome the pain. I have a low tolerance to pain.” Maria knew she couldn’t tolerate pain, as her other cousins and most males could. Her biology and neural pathways were more like a natural woman’s.

She underwent a full medical scan when her body started changing when she was eight years old, after being on the hormones for three years. Her body started to develop female secondary sexual characteristics at a young age. Her grandparents and the family doctor she had been seeing since she was born. They felt that the small amount of estrogen shots she had been taking since she was five years old had a lot to do with her development.

When the doctor did a neural scan of her brain, it showed that her brain activity was the same as that of women. Her brain worked just like a woman’s does. Where men use the front and back portions of their brain, she used both sides of her brain hemisphere as a woman does.
A male waiter comes over and takes their order. Maria made sure not to order anything strong to drink.

“Do you still drink?” William was curious when Maria said she had drunk tequila.

“Only once in a while. I’ve learned my lesson about drinking strong liquor.” Maria takes a sip of her sweet tea.

While they were waiting for their meal, they were passing the Navy base. A smile appears on Maria’s face when she spots several of the aircraft carriers in port.

“Do you like the Navy ships?” Robert saw how Maria smiled when they passed the ships.

“I was born on one of them.” Maria wanted to see how these two guys handled that news.

“No way.” William didn’t believe it.

“It’s true. I’m the only American child born to a Navy sailor while at sea.”

“How is that possible?” Robert was curious.

“My mother was pregnant and hadn’t realized it. When she gave birth to me, the ship was in the Indian Ocean. So, I’m the only child born so far on a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.” Maria has always wondered how her mother didn’t know she was pregnant.

“That is unique.”

Just as Robert says those words. There is a loud explosion that rocks the boat. Alarms start blaring, and people start panicking.

There are secondary explosions, and the ship cracks in half. Maria fell backward and tumbled backward in her chair before she could grab the table she was sitting at. She falls backwards straight into the icy ocean water.

Maria panics as the darkness of the ocean water surrounds her. She tries swimming back towards the surface as her body violently shivers from the icy temperatures of the ocean water. She manages to make it to the surface and start coughing. Her teeth were chattering as she looked around.

There was debris floating in the water all around her. She could hear screaming and calls for help. Pieces of the Norfolk were sinking and burning like candles on the ocean. The waves were a little rough as Maria tried to get her bearings. She spots her coat floating nearby and grabs it. She ties the arms and uses it as a float device as she spots the navy vessels and starts swimming towards them.

She knew she needed to stay moving or she was going to freeze. It was already hard for her to concentrate because of how cold she felt. The distance to the naval vessels was a way away, and she was already freezing.

She could still hear other people from the cruise screaming for help. Maria was getting tired because of the waves and the undercurrent. She was never a strong swimmer, but she wouldn’t give up. She heard several boats pass a few feet from her position.

“HELP!” She watches as the boats speed by her.

Her boots were slowing her down. Her body was freezing, and she was using every bit of energy she had left in her body to fight the current. She fights to stay conscious as she finally reaches the net that surrounds the front of the destroyer; she somehow swam to it.

“HELP! SOMEONE HELP ME!” Maria held onto the net with her cold hands. They had already turned blue.

Maria hears several splashes to her left and then spots several people swimming towards her. As soon as she felt arms wrapped around her, she passed out.