"Clara." He looked at her. "They check on you constantly. Mrs. Patterson asked me three times if you seemed happy." Jack's voice softened. “They all seem fairly concerned about your welfare and it’s…I don’t know, really sweet.”
She was quiet for a long moment, staring at the water. “They need to just leave me be. I’m fine.”
He sighed. “That’s the thing about family, they aren’t always convenient in how they show up. Back home, in Lockport, everyone knowing everyone's business, showing up uninvited with casseroles and advice." He smiled, but it hurt. “After my dad, then Joel—" His throat closed. “It was just too much. I couldn’t handle all that attention. Felt suffocating. So I get it, I really do. Now? I see it differently.”
Clara's hand found his. Warm. Steady.
"I ran away from all of that,” Jack admitted. "Because staying hurt too much. Because every street corner reminded me of them. Because the people who loved them kept asking if I was okay, and I couldn't answerwithout lying." He stared at their joined hands. "I thought I was running toward freedom. Turns out I was just running away from the only thing that mattered."
"Which was?"
"Home. Connection. The kind of people who show up at seven AM to vet the stranger staying with someone they love." Jack's laugh was rough. "The kind of place that feels like family even when your actual family is scattered or gone."
Clara squeezed his hand. "Beacon's End is like that. Annoying and invasive and impossible to escape."
“But they were here for you when you needed them. That’s golden.”
Clara pulled her hand away, wrapping both arms around herself. “Yes, they were and I appreciate it, I truly do, but one thing that they probably don’t realize is that when they’re constantly hovering around me like a bunch of mother hens, it just reminds me that at one point I was so broken, they were afraid to leave me alone. It’s hard to move on from that when no one lets you forget.”
They sat in silence as the sun sank lower, painting everything golden. Jack memorized the moment—the sound of waves, the salt air, Clara's profile against the sunset—knowing he'd need it later when this was just another place he'd left behind.
"We should head back," Clara said finally. "Before it gets dark."
"Yeah."
Neither of them moved.
Because this moment felt important. Fragile. Like something that might not exist again once they left this cove and returned to real life with its deadlines and departures and all the reasons why neither of them should be feeling a certain kind of way.
Finally, Clara stood. Brushed sand from her jeans. Offered him a hand up.
Jack took it, felt the strength in her grip, and wondered what it would be like to hold on instead of letting go.
But he didn't.
Because that's what he did. He left. He moved on. He built temporary things in temporary places for temporary reasons.
Even when a voice whispered the question he wouldn’t answer, what if he stayed?
seven
Clara stared at the blank panel on her drafting table and resisted the urge to set it on fire.
The deadline was tomorrow. Tomorrow. And she had three panels left to finish, except Marina refused to cooperate. The dialogue felt forced. The sea witch's motivations made no sense. And the lighthouse keeper character—the one Clara had based on herself, the one who was supposed to be offering sage wisdom—just stared back from the page looking as confused as Clara felt.
This was a disaster.
She'd been sitting here for two hours, pen in hand, staring at the same three lines of dialogue that refused to work no matter how many times she rewrote them. Her coffee had gone cold. Her shouldersached. And the voice in her head that sounded suspiciously like Sam kept helpfully suggesting that maybe she just wasn't talented enough for this anymore.
"Clare-bear, maybe you should consider this a sign. Not everyone's cut out for creative work long-term."
"Shut up," Clara muttered to the empty air.
From across the room, Jack looked up from the window frame he was repairing—because of course he'd found another thing to fix. "You okay over there?"
"Fine."
"That sounded convincing."
