Adrian felt something settle inside him as he sat beside Logan, the warmth of his presence washing over him like sunlight after a storm. Logan gazed at him, his grin effortless and luminous, radiating a glow that made Adrian’s heart flutter. With each glimpse of that beautiful smile, Adrian found himself smiling back, feeling a little piece of his heart melt.
“It’s the best feeling,” he agreed, looking out at the water still rolling, restless, against the shore. “I could stay out there forever.”
“Yeah,” Logan nodded, voice softer now, almost a murmur. “Out there, everything feels clearer. Like I can actually hear myself think. The water, the rush…” he stopped, wiping some water from his face. “It’s like all the noise just fades.”
Adrian’s gaze lingered on the horizon, feeling the words settle deep within him. “It’s heaven,” he said, a quiet reverence in his tone.
They sat like that for a while, letting the silence pool between them, comfortable, natural.
Adrian inhaled deeply, sensing the rush of his pulse in his neck as he pondered his next move. He wished for the day to stretch endlessly, craving the precious moments spent in Logan’s magnetic orbit, paired with a flutter of anxiety. They had shared the entire day together, and yet a worry lingered—had Logan had his fill?
Just then, their eyes locked as Adrian turned toward him, and in that instant, Adrian felt a surprising conviction that Logan shared his unsaid thoughts. Words tumbled from his lips before he could rein them in, unguarded and raw, like a melody begging to be sung. “You hungry? You want to grab dinner?” He asked, his voice laced with quiet hope, desperate not to let the moment slip through his fingers like sand. Eager and painfully aching to steal more time, to stretch the breaths they shared into something endless. To hold onto the man beside him for just a little longer, to carve out a space where the world didn’t reach them, where time could bend and soften around their touch. Where leaving didn’t exist, and neither did goodbye.
Logan’s eyes lit up, and his lips parted into a smile so exquisite, so radiant, Adrian felt that smile enflaming him. It surged through his veins and settled in his bones, causing his knees to tremble and his chest to jolt with a sudden warmth. “Starving,” he said.
Adrian pushed himself up, reaching out instinctively to offer Logan a hand. Logan took it, his grip warm and steady, and Adrian felt a spark run up his spine, subtle yet electrifying. Logan rose, grabbed his boardand hoodie, and they started walking back along the shore, shoulder to shoulder, the soft hush of the ocean following them.
“What do you have in mind?” Logan asked, glancing sideways at him. For a moment, Adrian wanted to reach out, brush back the loose strand of hair falling across Logan’s forehead, and wipe away some of the sand clinging to his neck.
Adrian shrugged, trying to ignore the heat in his chest. “Not sure. Meet you outside your cabin in an hour?”
Logan nodded, smiling. Adrian caught him looking back, his gaze lingering, something unreadable and bright in his eyes. Logan took a deep breath, and Adrian could feel that same flicker, that unspoken current, winding through him, like a wave gathering strength just before it broke.
Chapter 3
The Altar Meant for Someone Else
Waves crashed, one after another, like the heartbeat of the sea itself, steady and unyielding. Each one rose, towering over the rippling expanse, a graceful yet merciless dance. One, two, three… they kept coming, unstoppable and hypnotic, their rhythm as ancient as time. The ocean moved with a beauty so raw, it was almost dangerous, a siren’s call, luring any soul who dared to get too close. The water curled and swayed, an endless pulse, each wave sculpted with deadly allure, pulling hearts toward its depths with promises whispered in salt and foam.
I sat there for hours, or maybe it was only minutes, or maybe it was lifetimes, watching the tide pull at the edges of the world. But if I’m honest, I don’t know if I truly saw any of it. My eyes were open, but my soul had already drifted far, far away past the edge of this ocean, past this continent, past this version of myself that pretends to breathe without you.
Somewhere else, on another shore only I can see, you are laughing. Your voice is the breaking of a wave in my memory, bright and wild and alive. I feel your hands on my skin still, your breath against my throat, the sacred weight of your body pressed against mine, a thousand phantom touches stitched into the fabric of my being, refusing to fade.
Your smile, that rarest of miracles, lives behind my closed eyes. The way you looked at me, like I was something holy, something worth saving, haunts the marrow of my bones.
There are whole worlds built inside the little moments we shared, moments I inhabited more fully than any life I pretend to live now.
And so, with the remnants of my pride scattered like ash at my feet, because it means nothing in the absence of you, I bought a ticket. Shoved everything I was into a shaking fist. And I left behind everything I ever knew in search of the only thing that ever truly knew me.
You.
Always you.
December 13, 2018—Seattle, Washington—Five Months Later
Logangrippedthewheelas if holding on to the last remnants of himself, though he felt like a shadow, an empty vessel going through the motions. The Thursday traffic crawled along, red taillights blinking in sync with the ache pulsing in his chest. His father sat beside him, absorbed in a phone call, oblivious to Logan’s turmoil, his voice a faint hum against the chaos Logan carried inside.
Four days ago, he had proposed to Sandy. Four days, but it already felt like a lifetime, a weight pressing on his spirit, suffocating him. He remembered the night with a detached clarity, as if watching it all from a distance. There was no ceremony, no momentous kneeling, no grand declaration. Just a small box, containing a ring of his father’s choosing, was placed on a restaurant table in a room where the colors had already faded to dull grays. The world around him had blurred; faces lost definition, voices melted into static. All he could hear was the beat of his own heart, trembling with dread, with regret he couldn’t name but felt in every bone.
When Sandy said yes, he forced a smile that fit his face like a mask, rigid and unnatural. Her joy should have been infectious, a spark to ignite his own, but instead, it smothered every unspoken hope he’d harbored, slamming shut a door he had never been brave enough to walk through.
He dropped her off with practiced ease, exchanging a soft, hollow “goodnight” as she lingered by the car, her invitation hanging in the air. “Come inside,” she had said, her voice warm, hopeful. But he deflectedwith a careful lie—something about wanting to take things slow—words that felt foreign in his mouth.
He drove home in suffocating silence, the hum of the engine his only company. His face remained still, betraying nothing to the world outside, but inside, he was crumbling, breaking piece by piece. The weight of his own duplicity pressed down on him, and he wondered how long he could keep pretending, how long before the mask cracked and the truth he had buried so deeply finally came spilling out.
Once alone in his room, Logan let the mask slip, feeling it fall like shattered glass around him. He sank to the floor, and a flood broke free, unstoppable, a relentless tide of sorrow he’d tried so hard to hold back. It was a grief without edges, boundless, like an endless sea, and it rolled through him in waves that left him breathless, aching. His hand trembled as he reached for his phone, the familiar ritual too strong to resist. Adrian’s Facebook page glowed faintly in the darkness, a pale lighthouse guiding him toward a shore he could never reach.
It had become a ritual now, this quiet haunting. Each day, he found himself drifting back to Adrian’s page, drawn there like a sailor to the rocks, knowing the hurt it would bring but helpless to stay away. His fingers moved slowly, tracing through photos like he was sifting through sand, holding each memory up to the light. There were no new posts, no updates, only the same familiar fragments: Adrian laughing beside him on a beach or in the water, eyes bright with that spark that seemed to catch every ray of sun. Logan’s heart clenched painfully, his chest tightening as he scrolled, his screen a window into a world that had slipped through his hands.
