It Started With A Kiss by Lindy Dale

had dragged up memories, ones she had tried for so
long to forget. If she were Kate Winslet in Titanic, and her Leo was here with his arms outstretched and his body
leaning into hers, everything would be perfect. As long as they
didn’t hit an iceberg, of course. Georgie had always hated the end
of that movie. Jack should have lived to run away with Rose. Just
like she should have run away with Nate when she had the
opportunity. But it was no use thinking about the past. What was
done was done; she may as well get over it. Nate had a girlfriend,
and even though Perth was a very small place, she’d probably never
see him again.
    As the crew tied up the boat, Georgie went
below to gather her things and prepare to disembark. It had been a
fun night despite her melancholy mood now and she was keen to move
on to the next stage of the evening, a dinner at a restaurant
overlooking the river. She wanted to shake the blues away, to get
back to being fun Georgie, not this stick in the mud no-fun
one.
    “ Coming, Georgie?” one of
the other guests asked, as he headed down the gangplank and back to
shore.
    “ Yep.” She took the offered
hand and stepped lightly onto the walkway at the very moment a
cargo vessel decided to blast its hooter.
    Startled, Georgie squealed, jumping higher
than she’d ever jumped in high jump competitions at school and
hitting her head on some ship paraphernalia.
    “ Ouch!”
    She raised her hand from the rail to rub at
her head, which of course was the completely wrong thing to do. In
front of her, the large wake from the passing boat was causing the
walkway to wobble and her eager helper was making it worse by
clutching at anything and everything in sight, including the
plastic sword at Georgie’s hip. Georgie, despite having the balance
of a seasoned board rider, found herself teetering with him until,
finally, they toppled over the unprotected side of the gangplank
and straight into the water. Her only thought as she spluttered her
way to the surface — other than hoping nobody had emptied bilge
water in the near vicinity — was ‘not again.’
    “ You’re supposed to
hold on to the
rail,” Tara tutted, as one of the crew used the boat hook to fish
Georgie out of the river. “What the hell were you
thinking?”
    “ Nice night for a dip?”
Georgie laughed, wringing out her wet pirate dress and smoothing
her bedraggled hair. In the kerfuffle she’d managed to lose one of
her boots and her hairclips. Her dilly bag — because a clutch was
not appropriate pirate attire — had sprung open in the fall,
revealing its intimate contents to the other partygoers. They were
currently being retrieved with a net. Georgie didn’t care about the
bag or the lipstick. She just hoped her keys were still inside and
that her phone was in working order. The last time she’d seen it,
it had been floating down the river right side up and she had a
feeling she may need it to call a taxi any minute. Tara looked
extremely peeved.
    “ This isn’t a laughing
matter, Georgie. You can’t come to the restaurant looking like
that. You’ll have to go home and get changed.”
    Georgie was well aware that she couldn’t go
looking like a fish left out of water too long but seriously, Tara
was going overboard. It wasn’t as if she’d purposely gone for a
dive. And it wasn’t her fault. The man standing next to her, who
looked like he’d been put through the heavy-duty cycle on a washing
machine, was more to blame. He’d grabbed her sword and pulled her
into the water. If anyone should be getting a tongue lashing, it
should be him.
    Georgie sighed. “It’ll take at least an hour
to get home, changed and back. And I’ll never get another taxi. Not
on a Saturday night. I’ll just go home and stay there. You go
without me.”
    Tara gave a low, cross grumble and stomped
towards the minivan that was taking them to the restaurant. “God,
you’re hopeless. Get in the taxi. And sit up the back. I don’t want
you