She nodded.
They were quiet for a while, just breathing, standing close enough that their shoulders touched. Another wave broke against the rocks, bathing them in white noise and a fine salt mist.
“I’m worried about Laurie,” Anne said after a while.
Oakley hummed an acknowledgement. “I feel bad.”
“What do you mean?”
“I live closer to her than anyone, but I haven’t seen her in… oh man, it’s been like two months. She never comes to Waimea,and between work and the kids, I hardly ever get away. But still. Two months is a crazy long time. I’m the worst.”
“You’re not the worst.”
Another wave exploded upward against the rocks, and light splintered into rainbow colors through the water that misted back down.
They walked on, following the undulating waves of black lava rock and walking around tide pools. Small fish circled restlessly, stranded three stories above the ocean. When Laurie was little, she used to spend hours catching them in her pink plastic bucket and throwing them back into the sea.
Another wave of guilt crashed into Oakley alongside the memory.
How had she gone so many weeks without checking on her little sister?
The summer heat was fierce, and neither of them had thought to grab a hat. When Anne’s nose and cheeks started to turn pink, they headed home. The sun beat down on them as they walked back across the hot black surface of the cliffs.
They crossed the patchy lawn in the backyard, rounded the corner of the house – and nearly ran into Noah Kapono.
His jaw dropped. Anne froze.
The air between them was electric.
“Annie Oakley!” Noah grinned, recovering from his surprise. “The dynamic duo together again.”
“Hey Noah,” Oakley greeted him.
He opened his arms, and she went in for a hug. He was a big man, tall and broad shouldered, and the easy comfort that she found in his arms made her miss her father with a sudden violence that made her hang on longer and tighter than she would have otherwise.
“It’s good to see you,” she said when she let go. Her voice cracked with emotion, and she saw a perceptive sort ofcompassion in Noah’s eyes. He missed Kimo every bit as much as she did.
Kimo had been a father figure to Noah, and they had worked together often on construction jobs. As an adult, Noah had probably spent even more time with Kimo than any of his daughters had.
Noah had lived with them for weeks and months at a time when they were young. He was never in the foster system, just a boy being raised by his grandma, who leaned on the community for help from time to time.
He’d always been just like a brother to Oakley. To Anne, though…
Noah turned to Anne, looking like he might offer her a hug too – but he saw her guarded posture and closed expression, and he dropped his arms.
“How’s it going?” he asked.
Whenever Noah spoke to Anne, there was a low gentleness to his voice that Oakley had never heard him use with anyone else.
“Hey Dad!” Zoe shouted from the lanai.
He looked up in surprise. “Hey there, Zo.”
“You gonna fix this leak or what?”
“I’m comin!” He smiled at Oakley and rolled his eyes, then gave Anne a rueful smile. “It’s good to see you. How long you here this time?”
Anne opened her mouth, but no sound came out.
