"Water," I said.
He glanced at me, expression unchanged. "Beach or harbor?"
"Which is closer?"
"Harbor."
"Harbor, then."
He nodded and merged onto the highway without another word, letting the silence settle between us like an agreement neither of us needed to discuss.
Charleston unfolded around us as we drove—old buildings and narrow streets, church steeples silhouetted against a sky that still held the last traces of daylight like it wasn't quite ready to let go. The sun was setting, casting everything in shades of gold and amber, softening the edges of a city that felt caught between centuries, unable or unwilling to choose which version of itself to be.
I'd been to Charleston a handful of times over the years. Guys on my team who'd served nearby, who knew the bars and the best places to eat oysters and drink beer until the sun came up and you forgot, temporarily, what you did for a living. We'd come for long weekends between deployments, blowing off steam, pretending we were normal people living normal lives.
I'd always thought it was an odd sort of place—a city better suited for the old world but trying hard to be new, like it couldn't quite decide what it wanted to be. Beautiful in a way that felt like it knew what it was and refused to apologize for being a museum that people still lived in, still loved, still couldn't quite leave.
The view hadn't changed. The feeling hadn't either.
The driver navigated with quiet efficiency, turning down streets lined with historic homes and sprawling oaks, their branches heavy with Spanish moss that swayed in the evening breeze like something alive and ancient. Gas lamps flickered to life as we passed, casting warm pools of light onto cobblestone streets that had been walked for centuries.
We pulled up near the aquarium, the harbor stretching wide and glittering beyond it, water reflecting the dying light in shades of copper and rose and deep purple.
"There you go," the driver said, nodding toward the water. "Nice night for it."
I couldn't disagree. The sky was bleeding pink and orange and deep purple, the sun slipping lower, casting the world in a hue that felt too beautiful for the weight I was carrying, too perfect for a man who'd spent the day killing coyotes and watching his mother forget his face.
"You want me to stick around?" he asked.
"No," I said. "I'll find a place to stay after."
He reached into the console and handed me a card—simple, black, a phone number embossed in silver. Nothing else. Noname. No company. No explanation. "Call anytime. Day or night. Someone will come."
I took it, turning it over in my hand, feeling the weight of the card stock, another mystery in a day full of them. "Thanks."
He pulled away smoothly, leaving me standing on the sidewalk, duffel slung over one shoulder, the harbor stretching endlessly ahead like an invitation I didn't know how to accept.
People were everywhere.
Couples walking hand in hand, leaning into each other like gravity worked differently for them. Families with kids chasing each other along the waterfront, their laughter carrying on the breeze like it was the easiest thing in the world. Groups of tourists clustered around street performers and food vendors, phones out, documenting everything because if you didn't photograph it, did it even happen. The smell of fried seafood and salt water mixed with music drifting from nearby restaurants—jazz, maybe, or something bluesy and worn.
It should've been peaceful.
It wasn't.
I walked toward the water, weaving through the crowd, trying to let the moment settle into me. Trying to be present. To notice the beauty instead of the noise. To let Charleston work whatever magic it was supposed to work on people who came here looking for something they couldn't name.
But too many things weighed me down.
My mother's vacant smile, polite and distant, a stranger wearing her face. The ranch I couldn't visit, sitting empty in the valley while strangers kept it alive. The coyotes I'd killed because it was the only thing I knew how to do anymore, the only way I could protect something I'd abandoned. The card in my pocket with an address I didn't understand and an offer I hadn't agreed to but somehow couldn't refuse.
I found a spot near the rail with a clear view of the harbor and stopped.
The sun was almost gone now, just a sliver of gold sinking below the horizon like it was being pulled under by something patient and inevitable. The water reflected the sky in shades of fire and shadow, rippling gently as boats cut through it, their wakes spreading in V-shaped patterns that disappeared almost as soon as they formed.
I stood there, hands braced on the cool metal railing, and watched it disappear.
Ignored the world around me. Ignored the laughter and the music and the life happening in every direction. The children squealing. The couples taking selfies. The street musician playing guitar behind me, his case open for tips, voice rough and honest singing about something he'd lost.
