Emerson stared at his now-messy daughter for a long second.
And then he gave in to laughter.
“Daisy,” he said, holding his head in his hands, “when did you get so wise?”
Daisy leaned back, a satisfied look on her face.
“Always been,” she said as Luca leaned over with a napkin to attempt to clean the eggs from her shirt.
“Okay,” Emerson said, laughter still fluttering helplessly around his chest. “Let’s go.”
“BEACH!” Daisy screeched, clapping her hands.
“Really?” Luca looked over at him, gross napkin still in hand.
“Yeah,” Emerson said. “You should come with us.”
“Loo-kah!” Daisy yelled, more jazzed by the second. “Loo-kah come to BEACH!”
“What’s this about the beach?” Jansel asked as he stepped through the door.
“We’re taking a beach day,” Emerson said, still staring at Luca, who was still staring back. “Luca’s coming with us. You’re on your own today, Jansel. Sorry to leave you high and dry.”
“Please,” Jansel scoffed. “Not that I won’t miss you or anything. But me and this old farm’ll be just fine.”
“Leave any time you want,” Emerson added. “Take the day off. Go wild.”
“Oookay, Mr. King.” Jansel raised his eyebrows and tapped a dry-erase marker against the whiteboard and all of the day’s tasks listed there. “I didn’t realize this was a my-boss-has-lost-his-mind situation.”
“Kind of,” Emerson replied. “Might be.”
Luca still hadn’t said a thing. He finally broke his and Emerson’s stare to turn to Daisy and say, “Gotta finish your breakfast before beach day.”
“Ho-kay!” Daisy declared happily, and picked up her fork.
They drove down togetherin Emerson’s truck.
Emerson had chosen this farm on the coast for a few reasons. Being close to the sea meant he hardly ever had to deal with deep frosts. The land carried more moisture all year round than those in the valley and beyond, even if more moisture carried its own risks, too: more rot, more pests, more oversaturated soils. Perhaps, being from arid Eastern Oregon, something inside him wanted to be as far as possible in the opposite direction as he could get. Perhaps it was simply the first attainable listing in the state that he and Jay stumbled upon.
Whatever the reason, he couldn’t imagine, now, being anywhere else.
He could do, almost all year, with more sun. He could do, all the time, with less wind.
But getting to have his farm, while also being a ten minutedrive from the ocean, sometimes felt like more luck than a single person had any right to have.
It was a Thursday morning, so the beach he and Daisy most liked to go to was still relatively quiet. The summer tourists were back at school and at work; the weekend tourists would drive down tomorrow. Those would include, this weekend, Ben and Alexei and a hundred of their loved ones.
While the wedding wasn’t until Saturday, the flurry of activity started tomorrow: rehearsal in the wildflower field in the afternoon; setup of tables and decorations in the barn; delivery of the fancy portable toilets Ben and Lex had rented. And then, at night, a rehearsal dinner that both Emerson and Luca had been invited to. Which was a completely unnecessary invitation; Ben and Lex shouldn’t have been wasting more money on them.
But with a bit of encouragement from Luca, Emerson had decided they would go. Jayden was picking up Daisy early, so he would be free. And despite the chaos that was about to ensue on his farm, despite all the million ways his farm still wasn’t one hundred percent ready for the biggest event it had ever seen?—
Emerson suddenly only felt a bit excited.
There was still stress, yes, lurking in every bone in his body. But he wasn’t the wedding coordinator. He wasn’t Ben and Lex. He was just the farmer. He didn’t need to have every piece of the puzzle perfected. Maybe it would all work out. Maybe Daisy was right.
Maybe it was okay to have fun.
She ran ahead of them as soon as they navigated the haphazard stairs that led from the dunes to the beach. Emerson picked up the sandals she had thrown behind her. Her bare feet raced across the sand, her squeals meeting the roar of the wind and the surf.
