“You found it.”
Following her gaze, he lifted the small bottle of sand, inspecting it. “What is it?”
“Beach sand. Not all from here,” she clarified, nodding toward the rocky beach beyond the yard. “Half here, the other half from Tampa.”
His dark brow furrowed, and he waited for her to fill him in.
“It belonged to your dad.” She smiled sadly at the memory. “He missed you. He was alone here. Lonely, after your mom died.”
“Did he ever . . .” he paused, searching for the right word. “Date? See someone?”
She laughed, surprised that he’d wonder such a thing. “No.”
“He never had a girlfriend? A lady friend?”
“Not that I ever saw. Not that he told me about.”
“Anybody from his past ever show up?” He stood, and the conversation took a sharp left turn. “A guy maybe? A relative he never knew about?”
“I thought we were talking about sand?”
Watching him as he moved around the room, she grinned. He was a why walk when you can run kind of guy.
Always in perpetual motion, unable to sit still for long periods of time, and the trait was so familiar that tears filled her eyes.
Then, he said something that made them nearly spill over.
“He’s like me, isn’t he?”
Yes.
Yes, he’s so much like you it’s eerie. It was biology, right before her eyes.
“I hate that,” Jameson murmured, letting out a deep sigh. “He deserved to be happy.”
“He is happy,” she whispered.
“He’s dead, Chloe, I doubt he’s happy. He’s worm food.” He glanced her way mid-pace and stopped in shock. “Why are you about to cry?”
She blinked, trying to catch up on the conversation. “Are we talking about Jonah?”
He lifted a hand. “Who else?”
Right. Who else.
“So, the jar of sand,” she said, steering them back toward safer ground. “It was his way of having you close.”
“How?”
“Right after you left, I didn’t sleep well. Not for several months. Most mornings, I sat out on the beach behind the house to watch the sun rise. There’s a sturdy piece of driftwood just beyond the water line at low tide. It fits two butts nicely.”
She smiled fondly. That wood was still there, but now it only held one butt.
“He started joining me. Said he couldn’t sleep either, especially when he knew you were overseas.”
“Doug said Genevieve took you to Europe that winter.”
She shook her head.
That’s what her mother told people. That wasn’t what happened.
“We started watching the sunrise together, almost every morning. Once I left for college, we stopped, of course. But I missed that time with him, so when I came back to East Hampton after graduation and opened Something Borrowed, I drove over from my old condo twice a week, in the dark before dawn. We watched it together. We did that for years.”
Right up until his sudden death two months ago.
“That sounds nice.”
“It was. One of those mornings about three years ago, we sat there until well after the sun rose, just quietly being miserable together. Finally, he said, ‘Chloe girl, we need to stop waiting. He’s not coming back.’ And I knew it was true. He knew it was true.”
“Jesus,” he hissed, scrubbing a punishing hand down his face.
“The next time, he showed up with that empty bottle, and we watched the sunrise while he told me about the first time you had your feet in the sand. You were six months old, and he held on to you, sweeping your little baby toes through the surf. You giggled, and he knew you were hooked. The ocean didn’t scare you. Not as a baby, and never as a kid.” She circled a finger around her ear. “Cuckoo, if you ask me, ’cause sharks.”
He smiled, as she hoped.
“Most of the time, I’m more comfortable in water than on land.”
“And most of the time, I’m uncomfortable with the fact you’re more comfortable in water than on land. It’s not natural.”
He laughed, as she hoped.
“You were never happier than when your toes were in the water, Jonah said.” A memory he—and now she—cherished. “Or on cold sand. As a baby, you’d crawl all over it, and eat it, and cry when he and Lydia took you inside.”
He looked down, eyes squeezed shut. “And?”
“And the day he brought the bottle, once the sun was high in the sky, he scooped up some of that cold sand. Told me he had a visit to Florida planned. That you left the Navy and bought a place on the beach. Not our beach, he clarified. Not your beach. But another beach, in another state. In another world.”
“People move,” he reasoned, explaining himself. “Leave their hometowns. Not every Maine has to live his life within a five-mile radius of this fucking house.”
But he didn’t need to defend himself to her. Of course, that was true, and nobody faulted him chasing his dreams, including Jonah, but she knew it was guilt that made Jameson point it out.
“I know,” Chloe whispered.
Because Riverhead was twenty miles away.
Fifteen miles outside that radius.
“He came back from that trip to Tampa with a baggie of sand,” she said, hating the pain in Jameson’s eyes but needing to finish the story. “Added it the bottle and brought it to our next sunrise. He was so happy that morning because he had some of your new beach mixed in with some of his old. Now he knew what the sand his son put his toes in every day looked like. Had it in his possession should he ever want to put his toes in it with you. Like when you were a baby.”
Making a choking sound, he dug his fingers into his eyes and turned his back to her.
“Jameson.” Taking a step toward him, she reached out to lay a hand on his back.
“No.” He held out an arm and moved out of her touch. “Just . . . Just give me a minute.”
And then he was gone, his anguish filling her with regret.
She caused this.
If not for their nasty break-up, he might have come back. Come home. If not for good, at least to see his father. Instead, he stayed away to avoid seeing her.
Finding him on the back porch, sitting on the daybed with his head in his hands, she sat down beside him. Expected him to lash out.
Instead, he made a sound that was half-sob, half-laugh. And full heartbreaking.
“Until today, I’ve not allowed it to sink in. That he’s gone.”
She leaned into him, lay her head against his beefy shoulder. Wished he’d lean back. Let her carry his load for him.
She gladly would. Every pound.
“He loved you so much. He was never angry that you left. Only proud. Only ever proud of you, Jameson.”
He reached for her hand and squeezed. “I’m not handling this very well.”
“I think you are. And it’s understandable. Loss is excruciating, and it doesn’t have rules, and it doesn’t include a timeline.” She traced his hand with the pad of her thumb. “It can last forever. If it does, that’s okay. It’s not weakness. It’s love.”
Chloe had no experience in the loss of a parent. She had a loving, supportive dad, a loving, supportive stepmom, and a semi-loving, rarely supportive mother who’d probably show up should Chloe need emergency medical attention only after she applied lipstick.