Chapter 33
I follow the link to a website for Café Huckleberry, a beachfront bakery and café in Elk, only twenty miles south of where we’d first looked for Mary in Fort Bragg.
The website is fresh and spare—a white background featuring full-color images of eclairs, croissants, and their specialty, huckleberry scones.
The “About Us” section highlights the owners—Mary and Jack Huckleberry—who opened the award-winning coastal attraction six years ago.
Their picture features my mother in profile gazing up at a man with silver hair and warm brown eyes.
The energy is similar to that of the photo Beau and I just snapped in the car.
Beau pays the bill and ushers us out before I emerge from my haze. We drive for a bit with him clutching my hand, my knuckles white in his grip.
“Talk to me, Phe. What do you want to do?”
“I want to go see her.”
“Okay,” he says. “Of course.”
“But I can go alone. We’re done with your project, and I don’t want to prolong this wild-goose chase for you.”
“Hey.” Beau shakes his head. “I’m not leaving you. Let’s see this through.”
And when we stop for gas, Beau makes it happen, finding a place to stay while I stare out the window. We won’t arrive until late tonight, but I can look for her in the morning.
The drive to Elk is the longest stretch of our trip as we cut westward along two-way country roads.
The landscape blurs outside the window—meadows, farmland, hay-colored brush.
I steer my focus straight ahead. I don’t usually get carsick, but my stomach is gurgling—some combination of shock and huckleberry pie.
My mother is really alive—baking confections along the ocean beside her new husband. She’s smiling and fulfilled, after ditching me and Dad three decades ago. My feelings cycle through hope, resentment, rage, excitement, and disbelief in a game of emotional roulette.
We arrive at a cliffside cottage in Elk as the sun slips into the ocean. Clad in white clapboard siding and moss-green trim, it’s perched on the bluff like a lonely spectator over the churning Pacific, a man-made spec in the wild landscape.
“How’d you ...” I don’t know what I’m asking. How did Beau book an oceanfront cottage on a few hours’ notice? How did he know that a secluded bungalow fit my tempestuous mood? How did he read me when I am stream of consciousness written in invisible ink?
Beau kisses me on the temple, lingering for a moment before stepping out of the car.
I follow him to the door and wait as he searches on his phone for the key code.
He waves me into the cottage—it’s an angular bungalow with wide-plank pine floors and a linen sectional positioned in front of a floor-to-ceiling brick hearth.
Tucked into one corner is a white-tiled kitchen.
A small bedroom on the opposite side has a wrought iron bed, layered with textures of cream, white, and gray.
But the highlight is the wall of windows in the living room.
They could tempt someone to walk right off the bluff and into the ocean.
It’s cozy and menacing, soothing and foreboding.
I lean my forehead against the glass, watching as the surf pummels the rocks, as the whitecaps froth and churn before drifting onto the beach pacified.
I don’t know how long I’ve been standing here, but the sun has set, and the moon has taken over.
I startle when Beau wraps his arms around my waist, pulling my back to his front.
He’s turned on a light in the corner and brought our bags in from the car.
“What do you need? Food, wine, sleep, distraction, or do you want to talk it out?”
I pivot in his arms until my nose is pressed to his hard chest, and I breathe him in like a palate cleanser.
I tuck my arms against my ribs and let him hold me.
We sway slightly, his palms making comforting circles on my spine.
Perhaps I should work through what I’m feeling and what I might say to my mother.
I could write a script and have Beau playact several permutations of how my mother might react.
But there are no answers to be gleaned through make-believe, and I need to save my emotional stamina for the real event.
Besides, I want to stay in this moment—not because I’m too afraid to face tomorrow, but because tonight is too beautiful to miss.
So I hum, “You.”
“I like the sound of that. Do you want to soak in the hot tub? I know you love them.”
I pull back, delighted. “You remembered?”
“Hard to forget the image of you in that white bikini.” He trails featherlight fingers over my clavicle to push my spaghetti strap off one shoulder as his other hand teases my waist, lifting the hem of my tank top. He pulls my hips to his and drops his mouth to my neck.
I slide Beau’s shirt up, and he yanks it off, dropping it to the floor.
We strip in fits and starts as he pulls me toward the back deck, fumbling for the porch light.
I open the patio door, and the sound of the waves roars to greet us as I step out of my shorts and underwear in one move, letting them fall to the redwood deck.
Beau whistles once—a low release of air—before he says, “I thought nothing would top that bikini.”
I’m laid bare in the moonlight, resisting the urge to cover myself because I’m feeling naked in more ways than one.
The wind dances across my skin as his eyes heat.
“Come here,” he growls. I watch as he drops his pants, stepping into the hot tub with an arm outstretched to me.
The water is a tonic, so hot it shocks me; the contrast is stark against the brisk night.
And Beau is there, wrapping me in his arms and pulling my thighs around his hips as the water bubbles and churns.
Beau’s breath is warm on my lips, his body solid, smooth, and slippery.
I clasp my hands around his neck and fall into a kiss I hope gives me the strength to deal with what comes tomorrow.
And the thought creeps in again. I love this man. I love him with a certainty that astounds me. I’ve been sure of nothing in my life, and my lack of conviction has enabled me to float above want, to be satisfied when disappointment could have owned me.
There’s an expiration date looming—to this trip, to this version of us—but I’m starting to daydream about making us work. About laying my heart out for him—more naked than I’ve ever allowed myself.
I love him.
And I’m crying. The tears trail down my cheeks, and tightness constricts my throat as if the love itself has a fist around it. I bury my face into his neck and inhale as his hands thread into my hair and he pulls back to look at me.
“What’s wrong?” He kisses my cheek, my eyes, my nose.
“Nothing’s wrong,” I whisper.
“Why are you crying?”
“I’m happy,” I admit. “This moment, right here. And maybe I won’t be happy tomorrow. And I certainly wasn’t three weeks ago. But here. With you and the moon and sea and the goddamn sky full of stars, I’m so happy that it’s overflowing.”
He laughs—this rich, delighted sound—and pulls me back into him, brushing lips over mine until our kiss mixes with my tears, and the stars rain over us, and the ocean plays the only song we agree on.