“I guess I should get ready to go home,” Clare said finally, her eyes downcast. It was a stark contrast to her usual eye contact, and that hurt. Last night, she’d told Alicia she didn’t plan to leave until lunchtime, which meant she was leaving early now because of Alicia. Story of her life.
“Okay,” she said, feeling pathetic and miserable. She slid out of bed and found her shirt on the floor where Clare had tossed it last night. She pulled it over her head and crossed the hall to her bedroom, closing the door behind her.
She sat in the middle of her bed, browsing job listings on her phone while she listened to Clare move around the apartment. She heard the shower run and waited until it stopped before she got dressed and made her way to the living room.
Clare came out of the bathroom a few minutes later, dressed in a pink top and black shorts, her hair damp and curly around her face. She went into her bedroom and returned with her suitcase. Rue trotted at her heels. She paused in the living room. “Do you want my number, at least?”
It felt rude to say no, and…maybe she did want Clare’s number. What could it hurt? “Sure.”
She pulled her phone out of her back pocket, unlocked it, and handed it to Clare, who entered herself into Alicia’s contacts and handed it back. Alicia pressed the number, and Clare’s phone began to ring with the cheery tune Alicia had heard so often over the weekend. “Now you have my number too.”
Clare gave her a smile that was a little dimmer than usual. “Goodbye, Alicia. It’s been a weekend I won’t forget, that’s for sure.”
Alicia looked at her feet, not sure how to take that.
“In a good way,” Clare clarified. “I had awonderfulweekend with you.”
She looked up then. “Yeah, me too.”
Clare leaned in and kissed her, just a quick kiss, a goodbye kiss, but it sent heat and longing coursing through Alicia’s veins all the same. “Bye.”
Alicia resisted the urge to reach out and grab her hand, to stop her from leaving. “Bye.”
8
The beach house was too quiet. Now that Alicia finally had the place to herself, it felt empty. Lonely. She missed Clare. She missed Rue. She missed the tap-tap of little paws on the hardwoods and the melodic sound of Clare’s laughter.
Alicia had smiled and laughed more this weekend than she could remember doing…maybe ever. How had that happened? How had she and Clare seemed to fit so well together when they had nothing in common?
Pushing aside that train of thought, Alicia went out the back door and descended the steps to the beach. A walk was just what she needed to clear her head. A reset. She shoved her hands into her pockets as she set out. Her sneakers crunched over the sand, and the salty air filled her lungs on each breath.
It had been twenty-four hours now since Clare had left, and she’d spent most of that time searching for new job listings. The rest of the week loomed ahead of her with nothing to do but apply for jobs and relax on the beach. This was what she’d come to the island looking for, exactly what she’d wanted.
And now…she didn’t want to be here any longer, not without Clare. Alicia had been a coward to turn her down yesterday. She’d been so afraid of what might happen in the future, she’d denied herself even the chance of happiness with Clare.
This was the woman she’d been secretly fantasizing about for years!
Maybe they’d crash and burn if they gave it a shot. They hadn’t spent nearly enough time together to have any real idea of what a relationship between them would look like, after all. But the time they’d spent together had been wonderful. Clare had drawn Alicia out of her shell, made her feel comfortable in a way she rarely did. They’d clicked.
And wasn’t that worth something?
Her phone dinged, and she grabbed it from her back pocket, hope fluttering in her heart at the possibility that it might be Clare. It wasn’t. She exhaled harshly as she clicked on the email, a response from one of the jobs she’d applied for. And then hope rose inside her again, this time for an entirely different reason.
She’d been invited to interview! The position suited her qualifications perfectly, and it was remote. She could work from home, which was her dream. Four days ago, she’d fled to the beach, feeling like her life had fallen apart, and now the pieces were reassembling themselves, maybe into something better than she’d had before.
Distracted, Alicia had wandered farther down the beach than she’d intended. Now she could see the metal cage that had been placed over the turtle nest she and Clare had observed on Saturday night. The cage would protect the eggs from predators until they hatched. Then it would be removed, and the baby turtles would crawl into the surf to take their chances in the big, bad ocean.
Most of them wouldn’t make it. That was nature. But despite the odds, those brave little turtles would plunge into an ocean full of predators, hoping for the best.
Shouldn’t Alicia at least try to be as brave as those turtles? If she kept living inside her emotional cage, the cage she’d built to protect herself from disappointment, she’d never know what was out there. Who knew what amazing things might await her if she took a chance?
Maybe she and Clare would be amazing together. Maybe Alicia had finally found the person who embraced her eccentricities, who didn’t find her annoying. The person who wanted to be with her.
Her person.
Suddenly, she was walking in the opposite direction, hurrying back to the beach house. She had places to be and people to see. One person. She had one very important person to see, and she couldn’t get off this island fast enough.
* * *
