I lay on my side and rested my head on my elbow. Joel did the same, mirroring my position.
“You okay?” he asked, changing his tone from playful to one of concern.
“I am more than okay,” I admitted. “I’ve had a great time over the past few days, and I don’t want it to end.”
“Me either, but we don’t have to stop seeing each other when we go back, do we?” His voice rose from concern to panic.
I put a hand on his face and let my thumb trace his cheek, his jaw, his lips. “No, we don’t,” I whispered. He relaxed under my touch and smiled. I leaned over and kissed him. His lips were smooth and warm and so fucking delicious.
“Mmm... shall we go play in the water to cool down?” I asked.
“Give me a sec.”
“Why? Oh!” I smirked at his predicament and turned to sit up, facing the ocean.
Even though it was a weekday, there were still a lot of people on the beach. No doubt many were tourists from other countries coming to Portugal to enjoy the warm weather and sunshine.
I’d never been outside of Portugal. With losing my mom and then dedicating my time to the business, I’d never had the chance to go abroad.
I remembered a time when going abroad was all mom and I talked about. She encouraged me to practice my craft and apply for scholarships that would allow us to afford my studying in Paris or London. She’d worked so hard to save the money to help in case I didn’t get one.
In the early days after she died, I felt guilty that she worked so hard for me and didn’t even get to enjoy her life. After a while, my energy had shifted toward making the café a success.
Lost in my own thoughts, I didn’t even notice Joel sitting up next to me until he had his arm around my waist and leaned his head on my shoulder. I turned my head and kissed him.
“You were somewhere else just now,” he said.
“Yeah, I was thinking about mom. How she’d worked so hard and didn’t have enough time to enjoy it all before she died.”
Joel was quiet for a bit and then he asked, “Do you ever wonder about your dad?”
That was an unexpected question, and I could only reply honestly.
“Yes.” I got up and held my hand to Joel to pull him up.
We walked toward the water, and I put an arm around his waist, making the most of our small height difference.
“When I was ten, I think, I asked her about my dad. She told me that he was a very nice man.”
“That’s it?” he asked.
“Yeah, that’s all she said at the time. A few years later, I decided to ask for more information. I’d been watching these shows on TV about DNA and genealogy, and I was curious about where I came from. I was happy with my mom and wouldn’t change our life for the world, but I was curious, you know?”
“Yeah, I get that. So what happened? Did you ask?”
“No. I never got the chance. The day I was going to ask, she came home, sat me down, and told me she had cancer. Suddenly, I didn’t care about anything else. All I wanted was to help my mom get better.”
“But she never did.” It was a statement rather than a question.
“No.”
We walked along the beach for a while with our feet occasionally catching the waves.
“What about now?” Joel asked.
“I don’t know. I’d like to know who he is, where he is, and if he’s alive. But I don’t know where to start looking.”
Thinking about my mom was always both good and sad in equal measure. I liked talking about her because it kept her memory alive, but it also made me miss her.
