Laurie almost laughed.
“No,” she said gently. “It’s just you and me, baby girl.”
“Oh.” After a moment’s disappointment, Mia brightened.That’s OK too. I don’t have to share you. I can just visit my baby cousin, and I don’t have to share my mom.
Right.She kissed Mia’s forehead.We already have everything we need.
27
Anne
Tourist traffic slowed down as summer mellowed into fall.
Pualena was even more gorgeous in the autumn than it was during the hot summer months – more rain, more rainbows – but it seemed that most tourists were hemmed in by school schedules.
Anne had hoped to escape that same fate when she quit the mainland rat race, but things hadn’t worked out that way. She supposed it was for the best. Pete was having a blast at Pualena Playschool, and Claire seemed happy at Kea?au High – or at least happy enough to stay the course.
Noah’s foster daughter, Jasmine, had taken the ninth grader under her wing. Having a local sophomore to look after her had paved the way for an easier start, and Anne was grateful for that.
With both kids occupied all day, she suddenly had plenty of spare time.
Less tourists meant less work. The spare rooms were still mostly booked, but now she had rest days where she only had to make breakfast – something that she would have done for her family anyhow – and didn’t have to worry about check-ins or check-outs. That left her free to explore with her kids in the afternoons. And when they were in school, she was able to spend time with the rest of her family.
She loved slow mornings on the back porch with Akemi and in the bookshop with Laurie, just doing life together with her sisters. She loved rocking her little nephew to sleep, and she loved cataloging books with her little sister.
Whatever restlessness had driven her away from the island as a teen was gone now, and in its place was a grounded contentment. It felt easy to enjoy the simple rhythm of island life with her loved ones.
Even Zoe accepted her company every now and then. Sometimes Anne tagged along with her eldest daughter to help with a harvest or trim trees. Oakley came down most weekends, and their mom came down to breakfast every morning.
Dawn was herself again, nothing like the sad shell of a woman Anne had found when she came home just a few months before. She was still grieving – they all would, for the rest of their lives – but she had grown strong enough to carry her grief and still find the joy in life. She made time for solo days with each of her grandchildren, and she doted daily on little Kaleo.
Akemi was glowing with happiness. She and Lorenzo were in a strange sort of orbit around their new baby. Anne couldn’t quite understand it, but it seemed to work for them. They were still in separate rooms; each parent took the baby into their room for half of the night and slept uninterrupted for the other half.
It was unconventional, to say the least, and sometimes Anne worried about the long-term outlook for their strangerelationship – but for now, her baby sister was thriving, and that was all that mattered.
Meanwhile, Anne and her eldest were nurturing a fragile sort of peace. Zoe hadn’t gone from spouting vitriol to acting warm and fuzzy overnight, but shehadstopped being actively unpleasant, and that was major progress. Anne was walking a fine line of interacting with Zoe as much as she would allow without pulling away, earning her trust one millimeter at a time. Eventually, Zoe would realize that she wasn’t going anywhere.
Anne was alone in the kitchen washing the breakfast dishes when her eldest daughter walked in. She blinked in surprise and stared for a moment before fully registering who it was.
Zoe’s long hair – always some outlandish color, most recently purple – was gone. She had shaved it nearly down to her scalp, leaving only about an inch of unbleached hair behind. Her natural hair color was a deep auburn; without any sunshine to lighten it, the short pixie cut was the near-black of dark chocolate.
“You cut your hair,” Anne said before she could stop herself.
Zoe nodded, her expression guarded. Her silver eyes were bright, and her striking features were all the more beautiful without the mess of faded dye that always used to drag the eye away from her face.
“It suits you.”
“Yeah, well… I bleached it so many times that it was all breaking off.” She ran a hand over her spiky hair, and a smile ghosted across her face. “It feels good.”
“It looks good.” Anne gestured to the stove. “There’s still porridge left, if you’re hungry.”
“Sure.” She glanced out the front window and frowned. “Oakley’s here.”
“On a weekday?” Anne walked across the kitchen and the living room to meet her sister at the front door. She was shocked to see tears on Oakley’s face.
Oakley didn’t cry. Anne had never seen her sister cry for anything short of a death in the family – at least, not since they were little kids.
Miscarriages and the death of their father. Those were the only times that she had seen Oakley cry as an adult. So seeing her tears now struck a deep and immediate fear into Anne’s heart.
