“Have a good day,” I said, my voice softer than I intended.
“You too,” he replied before stepping forward and pressing a gentle kiss into my hair.
Then they were gone, the door clicking shut behind them, and the house felt too quiet all at once. I stood there, hands wrapped around my mug, staring at the space where they’dbeen. The sound of Winnie’s laughter lingered like an echo, bright and fleeting.
It was dangerous how easy it felt. How natural.
By late morning, I’d settled into the quiet hum of the carriage house. The air inside carried the faint scent of old paper and whispered secrets, a smell that clung to your clothes and hair after a few hours.
Stacks of brittle ship manifests and faded photographs covered the long wooden table in front of me, their ink smudged and edges curled with time. My laptop screen glowed with scanned documents—obituaries, registries, and handwritten letters I’d been hired to digitize for the Star Harbor Maritime Museum.
I loved this work more than I’d ever admit out loud.
There was something haunting about the human traces left behind. A half-torn love letter, ink blurred from a tear that had fallen across the page decades ago. A ledger’s faded dedication:For my dearest, wherever the sea carries you.Margins scribbled with notes in handwriting so careful it almost looked like art.
These tiny fragments of lives long past reminded me how easily people disappeared.
The photos of her had been haunting me all week.
Alma Barker, the Lady of the Dunes.
Two versions of her sat side by side on my screen. One pristine, her face serene and perfect, eyes staring straight into the camera. The other scarred—her eyes scratched out violently with something sharp, leaving behind hollow smudges where her gaze used to be.
And in the shadows behind her, a figure. Tall. Broad shouldered. Just visible enough to make my stomach knot.
I rubbed my temples and leaned back in my chair, staring at the cracked plaster ceiling.
I hadn’t told my brother yet. Not about the second photo, not about the figure who looked alarmingly like him. Hayes wouldn’t believe it anyway. He was already so weird about his supposed curse that mentioning something like this would probably put him over the edge.
Still, I couldn’t shake the unease crawling up my spine.
The Lady’s story was supposed to be romantic—tragic, yes, but soft at the edges. A woman waiting on the dunes for a lover lost at sea.
But this? The violence in that second photo? The man lurking in the background?
It didn’t feel romantic. It felt like a warning.
My phone rang, startling me.
“Hey, Selene.” It was Hannah from the museum board. “We’re meeting about the new exhibit next week. Would it be possible for you to bring any artifacts you’ve flagged?”
“Of course,” I said, forcing a smile. “I’ll have them ready.”
We said a quick goodbye, and I turned back to my screen, my eyes tracing the faint outline of the shadowy man again. Maybe my sisters would know what to do or how to tell Hayes that it was possible his silly curse wasn’t so silly and unlikely after all.
I should have been thinking about the presentation. Or the pile of documents waiting for my attention, but my mind kept wandering back to Austin in my kitchen.
The way he’d let Winnie paint his nails without hesitation. The sound of her laughter as he blew on his fingers like he was waiting for them to dry. The kiss he’d pressed to the top of my head before he left.
It scared me how much space he took up in my thoughts. How easily he’d slipped into cracks I thought were sealed tight.
This was never supposed to be forever. It couldn’t be, right?
For just a second I let myself imagine what it would feel like if it was. If the mornings started like this every day—Austin in ourkitchen, coffee brewing, Winnie giggling as she looped her arms around his waist while he stirred pancake batter.
I pictured summer evenings on the porch, his hand resting low on my back as I leaned into him, belly round with our baby.
His laughter echoing through the house. His voice reading bedtime stories. His arms around me in the quiet hush after the world had gone still.
