Chapter 14 Vince
Vince
The resort café sits perched on a terrace overlooking the water, all weathered wood and potted palms that rustle in the morning breeze.
The morning sun catches the water just right, turning it into a sheet of hammered silver.
A few early joggers move along the beach path below us, and somewhere in the distance I can hear the rhythmic pop of tennis balls.
It’s peaceful in a way that makes my shoulders relax.
I nurse my cup of coffee while Holly picks at a croissant and Lance scrolls through his phone, muttering about his ER workmates messaging him about extra shifts when he returns to the hospital.
“Where’s Adrian this morning?” I ask, trying to keep my voice even.
“Still sleeping, last I checked,” Holly says. “He was up late working on something. I heard him moving around the room until like two a.m.”
Lance glances up from his phone. “Working on what?”
“Art stuff. He gets into these phases where he can’t stop drawing.” Holly tears off a piece of croissant and pops it in her mouth. “He’s been sketching constantly since we got here.”
“Must be all the inspiration,” Lance says. “New faces, scenery, that whole artist thing.”
Holly laughs. “Something like that. Though I think he’s got a particular muse these days.”
She gives me a pointed look that makes heat creep up my neck. I take a long sip of coffee to cover my reaction. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Oh, come on,” Holly says, grinning. “Half of his sketches here so far have been of you. It’s nice to see him excited about his art again.”
My stomach does something complicated. “He’s been drawing me?”
“Constantly. And before you get all weird about it, they’re really good. Like, he’s brilliant. You should feel flattered. Adrian doesn’t usually…” She trails off, something shifting in her expression.
“Doesn’t usually what?”
Holly shrugs, but there’s something careful about it now. “Nothing. Just that he’s picky about his subjects.”
Lance sets down his phone, suddenly interested. “How long has he been into art? I mean, professionally?”
“Since college, I think. He’s done some work in the community where he’s from, something to do with boosting local art in the city.
” Holly fidgets with her napkin. “He’s always been talented, but he went through this rough patch a few years back where he barely drew anything.
It kind of broke my heart, honestly. He shifted into other forms of art.
Digital art books for kids and adults, murals for local businesses, and some freelance illustration work.
But not his usual thing, which is drawing people. ”
“But he’s back to it now?” Lance asks.
“Oh yeah. Like I said, he’s been sketching nonstop since we got here.” Holly grins at me again. “I wonder what changed.”
I feel my face heat up again. “It’s probably the vibe of this place.”
“Maybe,” Holly says, but there’s something knowing in her tone that makes me uncomfortable.
I find myself only half-listening to the rest of the conversation when it shifts away from Adrian. I think about the careful way he holds his pencil, the confident strokes when he draws. The quiet pride in his expression when people praise his work.
After breakfast, Holly declares her intention to go to the resort spa, and Lance heads off to call a colleague at the hospital. I’m left alone with my thoughts and the urge to walk off the restless energy that’s been building in my chest all morning.
The beachfront path winds along the water’s edge, connecting the resort to a small fishing village about a mile down the coast. I’ve walked it twice since we got here, usually when I need to clear my head.
The rhythm of my footsteps on the weathered boardwalk is meditative, and the sound of waves against the rocks below provides a steady backdrop.
I’m about halfway to the village when I hear footsteps behind me. I turn, expecting to see another resort guest or maybe one of the local vendors who sometimes work this stretch of beach.
Instead, it’s Holly, jogging to catch up with me.
“Mind if I join you?” she asks, slightly out of breath. “The spa doesn’t open for another hour.”
“Sure.” I slow my pace to match hers. “It’s a nice walk.”
We move in comfortable silence for a few minutes, watching seabirds dive for fish in the shallows. Holly seems content to just walk, but there’s something in her posture that suggests she has something on her mind.
“Can I ask you something?” she says finally. “It’s a bit personal, so you can choose not to answer, okay? I swear, I just know enough, not all. Adrian isn’t exactly vocal about… things.”
My pulse quickens slightly. “Sure. Shoot.”
“How are you dealing with seeing him again?”
The question catches me off guard. I hesitate, weighing how much to say. “It’s been…both nice and complicated.”
“And the others don’t know you went to the same school?”
I shake my head. “Why?”
Holly shrugs, her tone measured. “Just curious. He’s been…guarded lately. I like knowing enough to help him, that’s all.”
I glance at her. “Help him?”
She nods, stepping around a piece of driftwood washed up on the path.
“Yeah. He’s one of those people who carries a lot with him, even if he doesn’t show it.
I just try to be aware of what’s going on so I can make things easier for him when I can.
I hope you understand. I don’t mean to overstep into your business. ”
I think about the way Adrian looked at me that first night in Trevor’s suite. The flicker of recognition, quickly shuttered. The careful distance he keeps, except when his guard drops and something else shines through.
“Some people can be hard to reach,” Holly says softly, almost to herself. “But he’s worth the effort. It’s just nice to see him creating again, you know?”
“What do you mean?” I ask, something cold settling in my stomach.
Holly considers this. “He was brilliant through most of college, graduated as one of the top art students in his class. Everyone told him he still had it, growing up as a child prodigy and all. But toward the end of art school, something shifted. Creative block, he called it. He said he’d lost his inspiration and couldn’t draw in his usual style anymore.
When he moved to L.A. after graduation, it got worse.
He threw himself into other work, like party planning, event coordination, art installations, or community projects.
He’s good at all of it, but I could tell his heart wasn’t in it.
It wasn’t the direction his art needed. He even took up stripping on the side to humor me and make extra money for his gallery exhibit. ”
I never saw him after we moved on to college, when I was consumed with football, draft prospects, and the future my father had laid out for me.
“But now he’s drawing again,” I say.
“Constantly. Like I said, he’s been sketching nonstop since we got here.
” Holly grins. “I keep telling him he should ask if you can model for him properly, not just the sneaky sketches he’s been doing.
You know, he’s been working on this gallery exhibition for years.
He has all these pieces he’s created over time, but he could never quite finish them.
He said something was missing. Working on each piece was like pulling teeth, like he’d struggle for months just to get one piece halfway decent, and even then, he was never satisfied with them.
But lately, he’s been talking about finally completing the collection. ”
The path curves around a rocky outcropping, and suddenly, we can see the fishing village ahead of us. Small boats bob in the protected harbor, their masts creating a forest of vertical lines against the sky. A few local fishermen are working on their nets, their voices carrying on the morning air.
“He’s really talented,” I say, thinking about the napkin sketch from last night, the way he’d captured not just our faces but something essential about each of us.
“He is. It kills me that he doesn’t see it sometimes. Something made him forget why he loved creating in the first place.”
We’ve reached the village now, and Holly pauses to look out over the harbor. The sunlight catches in her hair, and for a moment, I can see why Adrian is friends with her. There’s something warm and genuine about her that puts people at ease.
“What changed?” I ask. “Why is he drawing again now?”
Holly turns to look at me, and there’s something almost sad in her expression. “I think you know the answer to that.”
The words hit me like a physical blow, not because they’re devastating, but because they carry a certain truth I wasn’t prepared for. A responsibility I’m not sure I understand.
“Holly, I don’t think…”
“I’m not saying you have to do anything about it,” she says quickly.
“Adrian’s a grown man; he can handle his own feelings.
I just thought you should know. For years, he couldn’t create anything meaningful because he’d lost his inspiration.
And now, after a few days with you, he’s drawing like his life depends on it. ”
She starts walking again, heading back toward the resort. I follow, my mind reeling.
“I should probably get back,” Holly says. “But Vince?”
I look at her.
“Whatever happened between you two in high school, maybe it’s worth seeing where it could go. It could be the universe trying to tell you something.”
She picks up her pace, leaving me alone with my thoughts and the sound of waves against the rocks.
I walk slowly back to the resort, Holly’s words echoing in my head. Adrian lost his muse years ago. Adrian’s been drawing constantly since we got here. Adrian’s sketches are mostly of me.
The pieces of information swirl together, forming patterns I’m not sure I want to recognize. Because if Holly is right, if I’m somehow connected to Adrian’s ability to create, then what does that make me? What does that make us?
I think about the careful way Adrian has been avoiding me, the moments when his guard drops and I catch glimpses of something deeper. The way he looked at me across the dinner table last night, like he was trying to solve a puzzle he couldn’t quite see clearly.
Back in my room, I stand at the window overlooking the beach path we just walked. Somewhere in this resort, Adrian is probably sketching, his pencil moving across paper with the kind of certainty I’ve only seen in people who know exactly what they’re doing.
The thought should make me feel proud, maybe flattered. Instead, it fills me with something heavier, like a sense of responsibility I don’t know how to carry.
Because if I’m Adrian’s muse, if my being here has somehow reignited the part of him that creates, then what happens when this wedding week ends? What happens when we return to our separate lives, to the careful distance we’ve kept for years? Would I still matter? Would he still need me?
The ocean stretches endlessly beyond the glass, and I find myself wondering if some things are too complicated to be solved by good intentions and perfect timing. I wonder if some connections run so deep that trying to understand them is like trying to map the ocean floor with your bare hands.
Outside, a seabird cries, sharp and lonely against the sky.
The sound echoes long after the bird is gone, and I’m left standing at the window, wondering what the hell I’m supposed to do with the knowledge that I might be the reason Adrian Callahan remembers how to make art, and I am nothing more than that.
The question follows me for the rest of the morning, persistent as the tide.