The sliding door to my and Gabriel’s bedroom is open behind us, the curtains breathing in and out with the sea air.
Even from out here, I can hear the faint rustle of papers. Gabriel is working in the library.
The sky has darkened to that deep coastal blue, the kind that makes the ocean disappear into itself. Somewhere below, waves slap against the rocks, steady and indifferent.
“I just don’t get it. If there’s even a chance she’s alive…” My voice drifts off.
Scarlett exhales through her nose. She’s holding her glass of grapefruit juice but hasn’t taken a sip in a long time. When she finally sets it down on the small table between us, her hand shakes just enough for me to notice.
“I know.” Her shoulders sag as if the words weigh more than they should. “I hate that I’m saying this, Judy. I really do. But if Gabriel’s contact is right, if the image was altered…” She trails off, lips pressing together, jaw tightening. She looks away, out toward the water, as if she can’t bear to see my face when she finishes the thought.
“Then what?” I throw my arms in the air. “We just accept it? We scatter flowers in the sea, pack up, and go home, to just accept that she’s…gone? It’s only been six months, Scarlett, not years. There’s still a possibility…” A sob stifles my words.
Scarlett doesn’t answer right away. Instead, she rubs her thumb over the glass, polishing it again and again without realizing.
“I don’t want to give up,” she admits finally. “I just don’t want you to get hurt again.”
That does it. Something sharp flares in my chest.
“Hurt? Scarlett, there’s nothing worse that could ever happen to me.”
She turns back to me then, really looks at me. Her eyes are glassy, rimmed red, and for a moment the mask slips. I see it. The fear and the grief she carries as tightly as I carry mine.
“I need you with me, Scarlett. I can’t do this alone. Not again.”
She nods, once. It’s small, but it’s decisive. “I’m not going anywhere, Judy. I promise.”
The folded sticky note burns against my thigh, hidden in the pocket of my shorts. I almost reach for it, almost tell her about the message. What it said about Gabriel.
But something holds me back. A quiet instinct. A warning I can’t quite name.
If I say it out loud, everything changes.
Later, the apartment goes quiet. Gabriel eventually comes to bed beside me. We lie next to each other but miles apart, both staring at the ceiling, neither of us sleeping.
The space between us feels crowded with everything we’re not saying.
I finally fall asleep and when I wake up at around eleven, I don’t find him next to me. When I go looking for him, I don’t find him. I just hope he hasn’t started drinking again and is at some local bar.
When I emerge from the bedroom the next morning, Scarlett is already up, standing barefoot in the kitchen, wrapped in one of the soft white robes from the bathroom. Coco is sleeping on her cushioned bed in one corner of the kitchen.
Gabriel is working in the library again. I know he came home close to one in the morning, but I didn’t ask him where he went because I didn’t have the energy. Or perhaps I was afraid of the answer.
Scarlett pours coffee with careful precision, as if concentration might keep her hands steady.
“I’ve been thinking.” Her fingers tighten around the mug. Just for a second. “I might try as well. To get into the camp, I mean. To find out if they know anything.”
“You?”
She shrugs and finally meets my eyes. “Why not? Maybe they’ll let me in, talk to me. I don’t have…history with them. Not like you.”
“What do you mean, history?”
“I mean, they might be more guarded knowing you are Sadie’s mother.”
“Yes, that’s true. Thank you.” Relief loosens something in my chest.
She lifts her mug, then pauses. “Judy, whatever happens…we don’t stop. We can talk later if you like. I’m here for you, always, like you were there for me when I lost my baby.”
