“Said like a man with experience. What’s your romantic story, Caleb?”
“I believe,” he said with a lilt, “we’re still talking about your dad and Joanna.”
“The rest of the story is they married a year after Mom died. In November, Blakely joined the family while I was at Ohio State. I like to joke she was the whole to meld the halves. But she’s lucky. She never knew anything but Dad and Joanna as parents, and Ava and Elianna as her sisters. And me, I guess. For a while I was the mysterious one who only came home for holidays.”
Caleb stepped behind her, one hand gently on her back, to let another couple pass on the Beachwalk.
“Ava and Elianna’s father died when they were very young, so Dad was really all they knew. I, however, didn’t want a mother or a mother figure—which I made known rather rudely, I’ll admit. More than anything, Dad with another woman meant Mom was truly gone and we’d never, ever be a family again. When she died, our family died. My childhood died. It took me a long time to reckon with it.”
They arrived at the motel’s courtyard, where a couple of men sat by a winter fire, playing guitar. Delilah sat in one of the Adirondacks on the opposite side, head back, eyes closed, singing softly.
“Delilah,” Caleb said. “She has a story to tell, doesn’t she?”
“Maybe. I’m just not sure she wants to tell it.”
Emery lingered, not wanting to disturb the moment in the courtyard. Caleb waited with her, and when he shifted from his stance, his hand brushed hers. Such a simple touch. Such a warm spark.
“I should go,” Caleb said when the song ended. “Mom’s with Bentley. Who knows what he’ll talk her into. Grandma Ransom is nothing like Mom Ransom.”
“See you at the Main Street meeting.” She backed toward her cottage. “If not before.”
He waved before disappearing down the dark Beachwalk toward the center of town.
At her door, she looked into the courtyard, hoping to see him there, feeling the slight sink in her middle of missing him.
8
EMERY
Then . . .
“Pssst. Emery.” The jalousie window next to her bed rattled. “You awake?”
Pulling out of a dead sleep, she cranked open the window. Between the hum of the ceiling fan and the cha-chunk of the old A/C unit, Emery’s room sounded like an old Cessna airplane. The digital clock on the nightstand blinked eleven thirty.
“Caleb? What are you doing?”
“The carnival is in town. Want to go?”
“Maybe. Who wants to know?”
“Me,” he whispered, his lips pressing against the screen. “I’m off work tomorrow.”
“Stop kissing the screen. If my dad sees a sloppy lip print . . .” Since their breakfast at the diner—where he’d stuck her with the bill—she’d seen Caleb every day. He’d stopped by a few times. Then she ran into him at the Starlight when Dad “rallied” the troops for an evening skate.
Caleb was becoming a good friend. He was cool. And cute—really,reallycute. She’d filled her journal with descriptions of hiscuteness. This evening, she’d sent him a Facebook friend request. So far, he’d not accepted.
“So, the carnival?” Caleb wiped the screen with the hem of his T-shirt, showing off his taut, tanned belly. “You want to go?”
“Gee, I don’t know if I can hang with a guy who disses me on Facebook.”
“Disses you on Facebook? What are you talking about?”
“You haven’t accepted my friend request.” She tried to sound somewhat irritated, but sounded flirty instead.
“I hardly look at Facebook. Too much drama. Especially since you-know-who went all crazy on us.” Over the last week, Emery learned that his sister continued to cause tension in the family. “But you, I’ll Friend. As soon as I get home. So, are we going?”
“Em?” Dad knocked on her door. “Everything okay?”
