He tells me the address. I know exactly where it is because it’s only four short blocks from my place. I like the idea of him being so close. After he explains a little about how he found it, and how small it is but the views make it worth it, he pauses. “Tell me another silly sea fact like you used to do when we were kids.”
I smile, eyes back on my sand dollars. “Ninety-four percent of the earth’s living species exist within the oceans you call silly. And the world’s oceans contain more artifacts, thanks to shipwrecks and such, than the world’s museums.”
“I’ve missed you in all your nerdy glory,” he flops back on the sand after letting out that beyond-sexy grunt.
I smile and my heart swells more than it should. My brain yells ‘Take that, Tom!’ I rearrange the sand dollars in order from smallest to biggest the way my mom used to line us up for family photos.
“Did you miss me?”
My breath catches. That’s a loaded question because I don’t know how to answer. Things definitely feel different between us. I know it’s only been twenty-four hours—not even, technically—but he feels less… walled off. I’m no longer filled with teenage humiliation over that shun way back when or the fact that he dated my best friend instead of me… okay well maybe that one still irks me a little. But not enough to keep me from being happy he’s back.
“The pregnant pause isn’t doing anything for my ego, Tink,” Jake warns me.
I turn and glance over my shoulder at him, lying in the sand, a careless smile on his pretty mouth, a glimmer of something mischievous in his coal colored eyes, sand granules peppered into his inky, still damp hair. “I missed you. I’m glad you’re back but I also wish you never left.”
The smile deepens, but not in a cocky way. “I needed to go, but I also needed to come back.”
“Why?” I whisper. I don’t mean to but I don’t seem to be able to find my voice.
He sits back up. Sand is everywhere – the shoulders of his wetsuit, his hair, his cheek. “I needed to prove something to myself, and to others. I wanted to prove I wasn’t just the town charity case.”
“You were never that to my family or me and you know that,” I can’t help but gently chastise him. “We helped you out because you were a kid. All kids in your situation need help, but you especially deserved it. It wasn’t charity, or pity.”
“Yeah but… I was leaning too hard on your brothers and parents. I expected too much.” He looks suddenly uncomfortable like there’s a deeper issue he doesn’t want to disclose. There must be.
“Children who grew up with the lack of stability you did, tend to have fight or flight reactions to situations,” I explain, my schooling kicking into high gear. “So what exactly triggered your flight three years ago, Jake? There is something more concrete than just a vague idea of proving yourself. Which, by the way, you never needed to do.”
His eyes shift from the ocean in front of us to me. We’re shoulder to shoulder. If I wasn’t wearing a cardigan I would be able to feel the neoprene of his wetsuit. I can almost feel his breath on my cheek. Oh how I wish we were just a little inch closer. “I see you finished you’re therapy degree, huh?”
“Close. One semester left, but I’m taking a break,” I reply without elaboration. He’s trying to change the subject and I want to force him to open up but I’m distracted by the sand on his cheekbone. It’s the perfect excuse to touch him and that’s what I want more than anything right now. So I reach up and softly brush my fingertips across it from just under his eyes to his hairline. The sand tumbles off. His skin is warm from the sun and slightly sticky from the salt water.
He reaches up and circles my wrist with his hand, freezing my movement, keeping the tips of my fingers against his cheek. His own fingers curl around the edge of my sleeve. “What’s with another long sleeved shirt, Tink? It’s already high seventies out here.”
“Long story,” I whisper back.
“Don’t feel like talking?” He questions, his voice also a whisper, but a rough one that makes a tingle start to spread inside me. I shake my head. “Yeah, me either.”
His head moves a fraction of an inch closer to mine. And just when he gets close enough that he blurs and my stomach clenches in anticipation … his cell phone alarm goes off a few feet away, by his surfboard. It might as well be a cannon going off. We both jump apart and he leaps to his feet. “Fuck. I have to leave like right now or I will be late for my first shift.”
“Seven a.m. to seven a.m.,” I mumbled. “Just like the paramedics.”
“Yeah, I’m actually working with Logan this shift which will be great,” Jake says and walks over to his stuff. I follow. I don’t know why. I feel like I’m not ready to walk away. I’m clinging to whatever the hell that almost was and am not ready to let it go. He grabs his phone off his towel and I watch as he turns off the alarm.
“Man, timing is everything, and I don’t seem to have it,” His smile disappears. “I wish I could stay longer and talk more.”
It doesn’t feel like talking is what we were going to do, but I don’t say that to him because I’m never sure of anything with Jake. And right now, that’s a can of emotional worms I’m not ready to open. So instead I nod and smile back at him. “No worries. We have all the time in the world to catch up now that you’re back for good.”
“I hope so,” Jake says and reaches for his board. “Okay. Well, I’m gonna go.”
“Knock ‘em dead on your shift!” I say cheerily but then realize how stupid that expression is for a firefighter. “I mean, don’t actually knock anyone dead. Keep ‘em all alive. And yourself too.”
Everything is suddenly and completely awkward. My head clears instantly. I walk back over to my sand dollars and pick them up. “Have a good shift!” I call over my shoulder and without looking back, I walk down the beach away from Jake.
5
Jake
Of course Logancatches me upchucking in the bathroom at work on my very first damn shift. When I heard about the opening in Ocean Pines, one of the pros for applying on my pros and cons list was getting to work with Logan. He’s on the paramedic team, which is also based out of the fire station, so I would be spending a lot of time with him. I figured it would give us a chance to get close again. We never had a genuine falling out but, well, we’ve had some issues most of which, like stereotypical manly men, we’ve never discussed. He was one of the main reasons I decided to leave Ocean Pines in the first place. The one I didn’t want to discuss with Terra this morning. He doesn’t know that though.
