“That’s great news. You can stay here as long as you need. Shoot, stay here for good. You don’t have to move out.”
“Daddy, I’m almost thirty. I need my own place.”
He wraps an arm around my shoulders and kisses my cheek. “You’ll always be welcome here.”
“I know.” I return his warm smile. “Now, all I need to do is find a job to support my new career and I’ll be on my way.” I laugh.
My mom reaches for the tongs in my hand and prompts, “Show him your website.” She minds the chicken for me, so I lead my father over to the kitchen table and take a seat in front of my laptop.
He peers over my shoulder as I show him the various menus and pages I created to showcase my freelance editing skills.
“You did all this?”
“Yeah.”
“You might need to come work for Southern Coastal. Our website could use a new look.”
“It’s really not that hard, once you get the hang of it. Besides, you have a whole marketing team that can do this.”
“It looks great, baby. I bet you’ll start lining up clients in no time.”
“It still needs a lot of work, but thanks. I hope so.”
“Have you given anymore thought to what you want to do in the meantime?” my mom asks.
“Not yet. I think I’m going to use the next few weeks as an overdue vacation, but I’ll start looking soon.”
“Some downtime would probably be good for you,” she agrees, “before you start your next adventure.” She smiles encouragingly.
I close my laptop and return to the stove, where I watch my mother flip the chicken over with ease, barely making a ripple in the hot oil.
“So, have you made any plans for this vacation?” she asks.
“No. I just want to take some time to...reconnect, I guess.”
“With?” She gives me a knowing look.
“Everything,” I answer honestly. “The Island, the beach, you.” I smile at her.
She smiles back, then pushes her lips together and adds, “Gabe?”
“Yes, Gabe too.”
She hands me the tongs and, after a quick assessment of the chicken, I begin pulling the crispy pieces from the pan and placing them on a paper towel.
“I know he’s not the same. And I know things will never go back to the way they were—I don’t expect them to. But I’ll always care about Gabe. And right now, I think we could both use a friend.”
“Gabe could certainly use one,” my dad says, and it makes my heart ache when I think of the way people treated him after the accident, either like he was to blame for what happened or like he was a fragile piece of glass. He became so introverted, he basically cut his remaining friends out of his life, and by the sound of it, he hasn’t made any new ones.
My mom makes herself a cup of tea. “I just don’t want to see you getting hurt again, that’s all.”
“I won’t,” I assure her. “Things are different now, I realize that. But I think we could be friends again. And”—I look into her worried eyes, imploring for her support—“I’d really like that.”
“Friends,” she says cautiously, wrapping her long fingers around her warm cup of tea.
I shrug one shoulder and nod. “Friends.”
* * *
When I get to Gabe’s apartment, I park my car next to his truck and grab the picnic basket off the seat, which I filled with fried chicken, biscuits, and chocolate chip cookies. I carry it into his garage where I hear him working, glancing down at my outfit—a tank top, linen shorts, and sandals. The warm, humid day also necessitated a ponytail.
I find Gabe in the back of the garage bent over a giant piece of unfinished wood, rubbing it down with a block of sand paper. He’s wearing a pair of worn-out jeans, work boots, and nothing else, besides a golden tan. The muscles in his shoulders and back flex each time he runs the sand paper over the wood, and I stare shamelessly for several long seconds before I finally call his name, “Gabe.”
He glances over his shoulder and turns his music down. “Hey,” he says, wiping his forehead. He pulls his gloves off and tosses them on his workbench.
“I brought you lunch,” I say, holding up the picnic basket. “I hope that’s okay. I just thought that maybe...”
“Lunch sounds good.” The corners of his mouth turn up into a soft smile that touches his eyes just a little and I have to remind myself to breathe, especially when I take in the view of his chest and—sweet baby Jesus—his abs. I’ve never seen an eight pack before, but there it is, right in front of me, rippling away in all of its tanned, sweaty glory.
I force my eyes up to his face again. “O-Okay.”
He reaches for his shirt and pulls it on over his head, and I take the opportunity to appreciate his new muscles once more before they’re hidden from view. “Gabe, you’re kind of ripped,” I blurt out, unable to contain my astonishment.
He drops his head bashfully.
“Seriously,” I laugh softly, “what have you been doing?”
He rubs his hand over the back of his neck and shrugs. “I don’t know, I just got so skinny after the accident. I felt weak all the time and didn’t have any energy. You remember?”
I press my lips together and nod over the difficult memory.
“I didn’t want to look or feel like that ever again. So, I decided to do something about it.”
I nod with understanding and hold up the picnic basket. “I made chocolate chip cookies. And fried chicken, some biscuits, and iced tea.”
He gifts me with a smile that warms me like an old, familiar blanket.
“I thought we could both use some comfort food.” I smile softly, but then I wonder if he even eats the high caloric food we grew up on anymore. By the looks of him, maybe he doesn’t. “Is that okay? I mean, do you still like that?”
He gazes at me just long enough for my heart to slow down to a leisurely pace. “Contrary to popular belief, I haven’t changed that much, Liv.”
I press my lips together over a tight smile as my heart stirs and stammers in my chest.
“We can eat around back, if you want.”
“Okay.”
“Come on, I know a good spot.” The glint in his eyes tells me exactly which spot. Behind the barn, under the old oak tree that he carved our initials in. We used to sneak off there to fool around when we were kids. We also used to sit there and talk for hours.
I nod, unable to find my voice, and follow him out of the garage.
“Gabe”—I pause as he weaves through the stacks of furniture—“did you make all this?”
He stops and looks around. “Yeah.”
I wrap my hand around the post of an ornately carved headboard. “This is incredible.”
He watches me trace the intricate grooves in the wood with my fingers.
“How did you learn to do this?”
“I’ve had a lot of time on my hands.”
“Yeah”—I raise my eyebrows—“I guess so.”
“I don’t know...it started out as something to keep my mind off everything. My therapist thought it would be a good idea,” he admits. “But over the years I grew to love it.” He rubs his hand over the headboard thoughtfully.