Chapter 18
Nolan worked the rest of the afternoon to finish fixing Isla’s wall. Now it needed a fresh coat of paint and all would be well again. He cleaned up, then locked the door behind him as he headed across the yard to his place. He needed a shower desperately and maybe something to eat.
He stripped down and was about to get into the shower when there was a knock at the door. He grabbed a towel, wrapped it around his waist, and answered the door.
Isla’s eyes widened and lingered on his chest.
“Hey,” he said.
“H… Hi. Seriously, why are you never dressed?”
“Does it bother you?” He secretly loved how she shifted from one foot to the other, trying her hardest to keep her eyes from drifting to his chest.
“What if it was someone like Mrs. Wheeler stopping by? You might give the poor woman a heart attack.”
“Considering there’s no reason for Mrs. Wheeler to stop by, I think it’ll be okay.”
“Don’t call me to come do CPR then.”
“Do you even know how to do CPR?”
“Yes, I took a class with Harper and Olivia. It wasn’t as much a class as it was sitting in Harper’s living room while Jasper taught us.”
Jasper was Harper and Milo’s roommate and one of Nolan’s childhood friends. Nolan hadn’t had a chance to see him since he’d been back. While a middle school science teacher during the school year, Jasper spent his summer as a lifeguard and the summer nights partying it up with the other lifeguards.
“It’s a good thing to know. Though, I don’t think you came over here to talk about CPR.”
“No, of course not. I wanted to say thank you. The wall looks great.”
“No problem.”
She shifted again. “I was also wondering if you’ve eaten? I thought I could buy you dinner for helping out.”
“You bought me dinner last night.”
“That was pizza. I was thinking more like take out from McConnell’s.”
“You know I can always go for one of their burgers.”
“I know.”
He hitched his finger over his shoulder. “I really need to shower.”
“Go shower. I’ll go pick the food up.”
“Or you can wait for me, I can go with you and we can take it down to the beach.” He’d been wanting and failing to get there, and he always loved going when the day crowd headed home. There was a different feel about it, a quietness that relaxed his soul and reminded him it was okay to slow down.
“Okay. Just come knock on my door when you’re ready. I can work on going through another drawer or two.”
“Decide when you’re going to have your yard sale?”
“I don’t know. It might have to wait for a month or two. I’m only just cracking the surface, and I don’t want to jump the gun.”
“You can always have two. One this summer and one in the fall.”
“I think I’d prefer to do a one-shot deal. Advertise on social media, get the word out, and make it a two-day event.”
“Sounds like you’re a woman with a plan.”
“For once I am, and it feels pretty good.” She stepped back from the door. “Go shower and put some clothes on.”
With a laugh, he shut the door and headed for the shower. He washed and dressed quickly, though for a second, he thought about going over to Isla’s with no shirt on as a joke. In the end, he pulled on a white t-shirt.
He made his way across his lawn to her place and gave a swift knock.
“It’s open!” Isla’s voice echoed through the house. He turned the knob and stepped inside. “In here.”
Nolan followed Isla’s voice to the kitchen. A small box sat on the table, and Isla was going through it, a smile spreading wide across her face.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“Old pictures.”
“Of your grandma?”
“Of us.”
“No way. Let me see.” Nolan sat across from her, and Isla handed him a photograph. He looked at the picture and couldn’t help but laugh. “This was your Hannah Montana phase.”
“And the beginning of your Justin Bieber phase.”
“Maybe we should burn these.”
She snatched the photo out of his hand. “Absolutely not. One day I’d like to show our kids.”
Nolan’s eyes darted up at Isla, who froze in place.
“I mean, not our kids together. I mean we’ll each have kids, not necessarily together, but just kids you know. Like of course one day we’ll be parents. Or at least I hope I am. Who knows what’s actually in the cards for me… At this rate I’ll probably have a lot of cats, but that’s okay, too. And I want to be able to show my cats.”
“Isla?”
“Yes.” Her gaze lifted to his and her lips parted slightly. Embarrassment shined brightly in her blue irises.
“I know what you meant.”
She slumped in the chair. “Okay good.”
“Why don’t you grab the box and bring it with us? We can continue down memory lane after we eat.”
She put the pictures in the box and placed the lid on top. “Let’s go.”
Nolan drove, and Isla went into McConnell’s to grab the order while he waited in the car. It was a risky move to be seen in public, but the town had already been talking according to Isla. Going into McConnell’s would only give the townspeople more fodder, so he stayed in the car. Not that it mattered. Once someone saw Isla get in or out of his car, the rumors would explode.
Since Isla called the order ahead, she was in and out within minutes. She got in the car, and once her seatbelt was on, Nolan put the car in drive.
“That smells amazing,” Nolan said.
“Connor said to tell you hi.”
“Guess we aren’t as slick as we thought.”
She shrugged. “I never order two meals. It’s either one or three plus.”
They drove in mutual silence the rest of the way to the beach. When they crossed the bridge, Isla rolled her window down. She inhaled deeply. “I love that.”
“What’s that?”
“The smell of the ocean. The closer we get, the stronger it is. I don’t care where I am, if I smell the ocean, I feel like I’m home.”
“I want to show you something,” he said. “Unless you’ve already seen it.”
She took her head from the window and looked at him. “What’s that?”
He lifted his shorts, and her eyes drifted down to the tattoo he got shortly after he’d left Morgan’s Bay.
“You have a tattoo!” she exclaimed.
“I thought you might’ve seen it the night I was sleepwalking.”
“It was dark, and I was more concerned with getting you in the house. What is it?”
“The coordinates to Morgan’s Bay.” He pointed at the anchor that sat beside it, a rope tied to the top and trailing beneath the numbers. “This is to remind myself that no matter where I am in the world, a part of me will always be here. Morgan’s Bay, the beach… they’re my anchor.”
“You did come back because of the town then.”
Confusion tugged at his eyebrows. “Why else would I come back?”
“I’m not sure. It’s just that your parents are gone, so I thought you’d go stay with them.”
“I love my parents, you know that, but in small doses.” He laughed. “Especially since my mom is on a healthy lifestyle kick and is feeding my dad beet juice every morning.”
“I bet he loves that.” Isla laughed.
“Last time I talked to him, he snuck out of the house to get a fast-food burger. While I love my parents, I do not love beet juice.”
“Understood.”
“Besides, Morgan’s Bay will always be home to me. There’s too many memories here for it not to be.”
“That’s why I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.”
He glanced at her. “And that’s exactly why your grandma left you her house.”
A smile spread across her face. “You’re probably right.”
He pulled into the parking lot and turned the car off. He grabbed the bag of food, and Isla carried the box of pictures and a sheet she insisted on bringing. He was curious what other gems they’d find in there. They may have only started dating in high school, but they’d grown up together. So much of their lives were intertwined.
The air was thick with salt, the cool breeze from the ocean breaking through the early summer heat. Nolan followed Isla across the sand and toward the water’s edge. She stopped before the sand turned hard from water and glanced around. This seems like a good spot.
He placed the bag of food down and helped her with the sheet. They sat down, and she handed him a burger. He took a bite and closed his eyes. “Doesn’t get better than this. Summer, beach, burger.”
“The trifecta.”
“It certainly is.”
Isla put her burger down and grabbed the box of pictures. She took the lid off and picked up a stack. Every now and again she’d laugh and pass one to him. One was of Nolan and Milo from when Milo created his own Olympics after too many days of rain. It was a fun day. Another was them at the beach in front of a sandcastle they had built, and another of a six-year-old Nolan chasing Isla with a fake snake.
“You were so mean to me,” she said.
“That’s because I liked you.”
She stopped flipping through pictures and swung her gaze to him. “When we were six?”
“I always had a crush on you.”
Her cheeks turned a pretty shade of red, and she took a bite of her burger before going back to the photographs.
“Oh,” Isla said and dropped the picture in her hand into the box.
“What is it?” He reached into the box and grabbed the photo before she could stop him. “Oh.” His eyes lingered on one of their many prom pictures. He in his tux with a green tie and matching cummerbund and Isla in the gorgeous gold beaded halter top that stopped at a green satin skirt and flared out. It made her look like a princess. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, and their eyes were locked. He remembered the exact moment of this picture. No one else existed. It was only Isla.
He’d been so na?ve then, thinking what they had would last forever. A part of him wanted to climb into the photo and go back to that time. Relish in the innocent way he thought he had it all figured out.
What would his eighteen-year-old self think of him now? He lost the girl, he lost the dream job, and all he had left was a car payment.
“We were so happy,” she said. “Then I had to go and mess it all up.” She looked down at the box of pictures, and he continued to stare at the one in his hand.
She had messed it up, and that had been why he’d been so angry at her. Why he had left. When they were together, nothing else mattered. But for whatever reason, what they had wasn’t enough. If it was, she wouldn’t have created the drama that she had.
“We were,” he finally said, his voice gruffer than he intended. He should have assured her that it wasn’t her fault, but he never lied to her, and he wasn’t going to start.