Olson is staring at the rope like it contains the secrets of the universe. Mitch is watching a cormorant dry its wings on the nearest piling. Aidan is trying to tie a bowline around Steve the crab's bucket, which is ambitious.
“Rabbit comes out of the hole,” Harold demonstrates. “Goes around the tree. Back down the hole.”
“What if the rabbit gets lost?” Mitch asks.
“Then you start over. Rabbits always find their way.”
My father is in his element—teaching practical things to kids who are too young to realize they should be bored. He did the same with me, and with Dawson after. Line handling and weather reading and the right way to fillet a fish. The kind of knowledge that belongs to a specific place and the people who stay in it.
The houseboat door opens and Emma steps out onto the deck. She's changed out of the pajamas—shorts and a tank top now, hair pulled back, camera bag over one shoulder. She pauses at the railing and watches Harold with the boys. I can't see her expression from here, but I can read her posture—the slight tip of her head, the way her weight shifts to one hip. Stillness.
Then she looks toward the office.
I step back from the window. Which is absurd. I'm a forty-two-year-old man in my own office. I am allowed to look out my own window. I am not hiding.
I am also not going back to the window until she's walked past.
The phone rings. Mrs. Kimball, wanting to know if her husband left his reading glasses on the rental boat again. (He did. They're in the cup holder.) Two college kids wanting to book a kayak. A vendor confirming the fuel delivery for Thursday.
Normal. Routine.
The door opens.
“Knock knock.” Lottie is standing in the doorway holding two cups of coffee. Her red hair is in a ponytail today, and she's wearing what appears to be one of Emma's sweatshirts—too big through the shoulders, sleeves rolled at the wrists. “I brought a peace offering.”
“For what?”
“For the breaker trip this morning. And for what's about to happen.”
She sets one of the cups on my desk.
“What's about to happen?”
“Mitch just asked your father if they can practice knots on the boats. The actual boats. With actual ropes that are attached to actual things.”
I'm on my feet before she finishes the sentence.
“Relax.” She holds up a hand. “Harold said no. He redirected them to the practice cleats. I just wanted to see your face.”
She smiles. It's a smile that saysI understandmore about this situation than you'd like,and I don't know how to respond to that, so I sit back down and pick up the coffee.
It's good. Better than the gas station coffee I've been drinking for the past decade, which means Emma made it, which means it came from the possessed coffee maker on the twenty-amp circuit.
“Thanks,” I say.
“Emma made it. She said to tell you she used the staggered appliance system and the breaker held.”
“It's been three hours. That's not a trend.”
“She also said to tell you she's color-coded the schedule.”
“Is she serious?”
“She laminated it.” Lottie leans against the doorframe. “She's like that. Commits to the bit. When her ex told her the houseboat was a terrible idea, she made a PowerPoint with charts about waterfront property values and the psychological benefits of coastal living.”
“Did it convince him?”
“No. She did it anyway.” Lottie takes a sip of her own coffee. “Emma doesn't wait for permission. She just figures out the best way forward and goes.”
