Outside, the air is warm and scented with flowering vines spilling over neighboring terraces. Gulls cry overhead, sharp and insistent. I take my suitcase from the trunk, Coco’s leash looped around my wrist.
From here, if I turn just slightly, I can see it. Saltspray Cove Youth Camp.
Pastel buildings tucked neatly between dunes and sea, shimmering faintly in the afternoon light.
From a distance, it looks idyllic. Safe. I believed it was safe. I believed that with all my heart.
But it’s the last place my daughter was seen alive.
Six months ago, instead of staying in our apartment with us, Sadie went to the camp for a week. We planned to have our usual vacation together afterwards, joined by Sadie’s unofficial godmother Scarlett, my best friend.
It was Sadie’s first time away from me. But we were close enough that I told myself I could relax. Scarlett was there as an accompanying adult and I completely trusted her with our daughter.
And I trusted the camp. It has an excellent reputation, a place where wealthy parents like us send their children when things start to go wrong. When anger turns inward, when home no longer feels like enough. I know this world well. I belong to it. I didn’t always, but nowadays, I can afford places like that.
Before Sadie went there, we’d been circling each other for months, every conversation a potential argument. Our worst was the night before she left.
I thought the camp would help me reconnect with my daughter. I didn’t know that painful hug would be the last time I held her. That Saltspray would swallow her whole and never give her back.
I stayed in Saltspray Cove for weeks after she vanished. Slept badly. Ate almost nothing. Walked the beach with Coco until my feet blistered. With no body and no proof, I couldn’t accept what they were telling me.
As the months passed, something in me hardened. It began to sink into my bones: Sadie isn’t coming home.
But I still want to know why she went into the water that night. Why a strong swimmer would disappear in the ocean she swam many times before. Was she alone in her final hours? I have to know the truth, all of it.
And now I’m back, for the first time since those awful weeks.
I open the door slowly. I’m the first one to arrive, but I’m here to meet Gabriel and Scarlett. The time has come for us to do what we never did.
There was no funeral six months ago. Without a body, it felt wrong. But Scarlett is right, we can’t wait any longer.
Inside, the apartment is exactly as our housekeeper, Alice, left it. Bright and tidy, but still full of Sadie. Her pink flip-flops right here by the door.
Coco goes to them, sniffs. Then sits beside them. Her tail is stiff as she waits.
Watching her, my throat tightens.
“I’m sorry, girl,” I tell her gently, scratching her ears before leaving my suitcase by the door and heading for the open kitchen.
Coffee first. I move automatically—filter, grounds, water—while sunlight flashes on the sea beyond the balcony doors, catching on the crocheted dolphin on the windowsill. The one my mom made for Sadie before she was born.
I miss Mom so much, but I’m grateful she died before Sadie left us. She doted on her granddaughter; it would have destroyed her, just like it did me.
Six months. That’s all it’s been since Sadie vanished. Some days it feels like six years. Others, like yesterday.
I rinse the mug before using it, watching the water bead and slide away. The dish towel catches on my nail as I reach for it to wipe the mug.
I wince at the snag, looking down to see a jagged crack in the pale-rose polish I’d applied only three days ago in the hopes it might make me feel a little more like myself again. Of course it didn’t. I barely even noticed it wearing away.
I finish making my coffee, and when I turn, I notice the mail Alice has left fanned out neatly on the counter. Bills. Flyers. A glossy brochure advertising sailing lessons for teens.
One envelope stands out. Plain, white, thick paper. No name or return address.
Curious, I sit on a bar stool and pick it up, sipping my coffee. Coco settles at my feet with a sigh.
The clock on the wall clicks over, 6p.m. Gabriel and Scarlett should be here soon.
I open the envelope. When the paper slides out, for a moment, my mind refuses to understand what my eyes are seeing.
