Type of Progym: Fable
“The universal topic of discussion is ‘Why Are You Here?’ Nobody uses the word ‘pamper’ or ‘luxury.’ The word that gets used over and over is ‘relax.’ Everybody characterizes the upcoming week as either a long-put-off reward or a last-ditch effort to salvage sanity and self from some inconceivable crockpot of pressure, or both.”
“So, why are you here?” a middle-aged man asks to a couple who’s also around his same age. Both families are sitting down by the pool as the cruise ship sails away to a random island in the Caribbean from Florida.
“We’ve had a stressful couple of weeks and needed to get away from all of the chaos.”, the second man responds as they munch on some subpar burgers and sip on fruity cocktails.
“Same thing for us, we felt as if we deserved a break after working for hours on end. You can never go wrong with a cruise for getting away”, the first man says while lounging in his loud-patterned shorts and flip flops.
“Definitely, there’s nothing better than laying under the hot sun without a care in the world”, the first man’s wife responds, taking a break from reading a fashion magazine she purchased at one of the cruise ship’s gift shops.
“If we didn’t take a trip soon, we would’ve ended up going crazy and probably divorcing each other. The stress was too much” the second wife chimes in as she laughs.
“Agreed.” Her husband says and laughs along.
“Well you’re lucky, the relaxation of a cruise can fix everything. You’ll go back home a new couple” the first man tells the couple next to him.
“We can see. We haven’t felt so calm in so long and it’s only been a day. Seems like it’ll be a good week” the second husband agrees while sipping the rest of his drink before leaving.
“We might have to do this go on trips like this more often. It was good to meet you” the second wife says as she stands up and leaves with her husband to their cabin for an afternoon nap before dressing up in some fancy attire for dinner.
The couples continue to run into each other throughout the week, greeting each other every time as if they had known each other for years. However, once the week ends both couples go back to their busy lives to repeat the entire cycle all over again.