23. Ellie
Twenty Three
Ellie
By nine the next morning, three people had congratulated me for something I had not done.
The first was a woman buying reef-safe sunscreen.
The second was a man booked on the morning snorkel trip, who seemed disappointed when I explained that Savannah Brooks would not be joining him.
The third was Dennis, the delivery driver, who handed me a box of replacement regulators and said, “Good for you both,” before returning to his truck.
I carried the box inside.
Hank was behind the counter, removing Captain Pancake’s NO COMMENT bandana. The dog had spent the previous ten minutes attempting to pull it over his eyes.
“What did you do?” Hank asked.
“Apparently, I participated in a national radio interview without leaving my kitchen.”
“Efficient.”
“Dennis congratulated me.”
“Dennis supports love.”
“Dennis describes marriage as a complicated tax event.”
“He contains nuance.”
Captain Pancake pushed his nose into the regulator box.
I moved it before he could expand into equipment inspection.
The sign on the front door remained, although Hank had crossed out the list of prohibited subjects and written:
USE COMMON SENSE
“That seems optimistic,” I said.
“I got tired of updating it.”
“Someone will interpret this as permission.”
“Use your customer-service voice.”
“My customer-service voice is excellent.”
“It is your normal voice with less blinking.”
I began unpacking the regulators.
I had watched Annie’s interview twice.
The first time, alone at home after she texted to tell me it had happened.
The second, behind Rosa’s counter while Rosa pretended she needed to verify the captions.
Annie had said she was a lesbian. She had admitted that the stories involving men had been useful to her career and that she had allowed them to continue. She had talked about fear without presenting it as something that absolved her.
Then Daniel Price had asked about me.
Annie had refused to answer.
Not no to whatever existed between us.
No to the idea that speaking honestly about herself gave her permission to speak for me.
I had told her I saw the interview and that she looked happy onstage. Both things were true.
Neither explained what it had done to me.
Hank placed a clipboard beside the register.
“You watched the whole thing?”
“Yes.”
“What did you think?”
“I already told you. She looked happy.”
“That was the concert.”
“I also saw the interview.”
He waited.
Hank had either learned this technique from my mother or developed it independently through years of handling nervous divers.
“She chose to do it without using me,” I said.
“That mattered.”
“Yes.”
“Does it change anything?”
“It changes something.”
He nodded and carried the empty regulator box toward the office.
That was all.
No advice.
No suggestion that Annie deserved another chance.
I appreciated him more when he was irritating in limited doses.
At ten, a couple arrived for a refresher course. At eleven-thirty, I spent fifteen minutes explaining buoyancy to a man who believed his previous instructor had been “too focused on physics.”
At noon, Rosa sent over two sandwiches and a note:
ONE IS FOR HANK. THIS SHOULD NOT REQUIRE SUPERVISION.
I gave Hank the smaller one.
He inspected the filling.
“Yours has more turkey.”
“Rosa’s decisions are final.”
“You chose first.”
“I manage operations.”
“You manage injustice.”
We ate behind the counter while Captain Pancake moved between us, presenting himself as a neutral party in a disagreement involving bread.
My phone remained silent.
Normally, Annie would have sent something by then. A strange lamp. An offensive carpet. Rachel attempting to replace a meal with packaged oats.
I checked the screen once.
Then again while pretending to calculate tank inventory.
At twelve-thirty, I placed the phone in the drawer beneath the register.
Hank watched.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You have a face.”
“I have several.”
“That one is angry at an object for failing to receive a message.”
“It is in a drawer.”
“Recent development.”
I closed the drawer harder than necessary.
The afternoon group consisted of four certified divers: two from Georgia, one from Ohio, and a woman from Miami who had brought enough backup clips to secure a small aircraft.
The sea was calm, with visibility close to seventy feet. We descended beside the reef and moved through warm blue water while a school of yellowtail snapper shifted above us.
For nearly six minutes, I did not think about Annie.
Then one diver pointed toward a turtle resting beneath a ledge.
I acknowledged it with a normal hand signal and did not imagine Annie reacting with both arms.
Progress could be humiliatingly specific.
When we surfaced, the woman from Miami removed her regulator.
“Did you see the nurse shark?”
“Yes.”
“My husband will be furious.”
“Because he missed it?”
“He stayed home for the dishwasher repair.”
“That sounds responsible.”
“It is making a grinding noise.”
“Then perhaps he chose correctly.”
She looked toward the horizon.
“He did not.”
Back at the dock, I helped unload the tanks while Mateo rinsed the masks.
The woman who had bought sunscreen that morning waited near the shop entrance. When she saw me, she approached with the cautious expression people used around unfamiliar dogs.
“I wanted to apologize.”
“For the sunscreen?”
“For congratulating you.”
“You were trying to be kind.”
“I was also assuming too much. My sister came out last year, and she hated when people congratulated her girlfriend as though they had issued a joint statement.”
A smile escaped me.
“Your sister sounds sensible.”
“She is exhausting.”
“Those qualities often coexist.”
The woman nodded toward the shop.
“I hope the dive was good.”
“It was.”
She left without asking anything else.
The apology stayed with me longer than the congratulations had.
At five-thirty, I counted the register, checked the morning bookings, and opened the drawer.
No messages.
I resented Annie for respecting a boundary I had created.
That seemed unfair, so I resented myself for several minutes too.
Hank locked the equipment cage.
“Rosa sent pie.”
“Is that dinner?”
“It can become dinner.”
We crossed the road.
The café was nearly empty, but Rosa had saved the back table. She placed grilled fish in front of me before I sat down.
“I was promised pie.”
“Food first.”
“Hank has pie.”
“Hank is older.”
“That is not nutritional science.”
“It is inheritance law.”
I sat.
The small television above the shelves was showing an entertainment panel beneath the banner:
SAVANNAH brOOKS SHARES HER TRUTH
Rosa switched it off.
“Thank you.”
“I was checking the weather.”
“There were four celebrity journalists.”
“They predict storms.”
I ate several bites before she returned to wipe the table beside mine.
“Did she contact you?” she asked.
“No.”
Rosa nodded.
That was it.
No interrogation.
No observation about Annie giving me space.
No instruction to do anything.
She carried the empty glasses toward the counter and began discussing pie crust with Hank.
I had expected interference.
Its absence left me alone with the decision.
My phone was in my pocket.
I took it out and found one message, sent twelve minutes earlier.
Annie: I was trying to give you a quiet day. I’m discovering that restraint involves a great deal of staring at my phone.
I read it twice.
Me: You survived until five-thirty.
Her response arrived immediately.
Annie: Barely. There should be medical recognition.
Me: I can send Captain Pancake’s veterinarian.
Annie: That feels punitive.
I smiled.
Rosa passed behind me with two plates and did not look in my direction, which meant she had already gathered the necessary information.
Me: How was your first day off?
There was a pause.
Annie: I woke at six because my body believes sound check begins before breakfast.
Annie: I reorganized a drawer and found fourteen hotel key cards.
Annie: Rachel called and said reorganizing drawers does not qualify as rest.
Me: She may have a point.
Annie: Please do not strengthen her position.
I ate another bite of fish.
Me: Are you at home?
Annie: Yes.
Me: How is the suspicious natural light?
Annie: Aggressive. This house has too many windows and no respect for recovery.
The conversation could have continued safely for the rest of the evening. Small jokes. Harmless details. Nothing that required either of us to decide what happened after her five days ended.
I looked around the café.
Hank was arguing that pie contained fruit and therefore met several dietary categories. Rosa was refusing to recognize his research. Two tourists examined a map near the door. Outside, the Reef Rascal sign moved in the evening breeze.
This was still my life.
It had not become less mine because Annie had briefly entered it.
I returned to the screen.
Me: What are you doing with the rest of your time off?
The typing indicator appeared and disappeared.
Annie: I have been instructed to rest.
Me: That is not a location.
Annie: My house. Possibly a grocery store if the situation becomes critical.
Me: You have staff.
Annie: I also have dignity.
Me: Do you know where the grocery store is?
A longer pause followed.
Annie: I can locate it using modern navigation systems.
I laughed.
Hank looked over from the counter.
“Phone funny?”
“No.”
“Convincing.”
I lowered my gaze to the keyboard.
Inviting Annie back would not mean I trusted her completely. It would not erase the market, the office, Claire, or the millions of strangers who now knew enough to invent whatever remained.
It meant I wanted to see her.
The distinction should have made the decision smaller.
It did not.
I thought of my mother asking whether Annie threatened my peace or merely inconvenienced my control. I thought of the unfinished song, the private recording, and the fact that Annie had accepted every limit without behaving as though restraint earned her a prize.
Then I noticed that I was waiting for certainty.
Certainty had never been one of the available options.
Me: You could come to Pelican Key.
I sent it before I could revise the sentence into something less honest.
The typing indicator appeared immediately, then vanished.
Thirty seconds passed.
Then a full minute.
Annie: Are you sure?
I appreciated the question.
I also wanted to throw my phone into the water.
Me: No.
A pause.
Me: That is why this is an invitation, not a declaration.
Annie: What exactly are you inviting me to?
Reasonable.
Annoying, but reasonable.
Me: Two days. Quietly. No press. No team unless someone genuinely needs to come. No surprise arrival, no dramatic transportation, and no assumption that anything is fixed.
Her answer took longer this time.
Annie: Understood.
Then:
Annie: Rachel says she does not need to come, but she would like reassurance that you will not abandon me at sea.
Me: I cannot guarantee appropriate behavior aboard vessels.
Annie: She finds that acceptable.
Me: Commercial flight.
Annie: I did not propose anything else.
Me: You once wrote “Do not offer transportation” on a legal pad.
Annie: That list was private.
Me: It was visible during a video call.
Annie: Technology continues to violate me.
The warmth in my chest felt dangerous.
It also felt good.
Annie: Tomorrow?
The word appeared on the screen.
For a moment, I saw Molly’s final message.
Tomorrow, then.
I had spent years distrusting the word because it promised time no one could guarantee.
This tomorrow was not a promise.
It was a flight I could track.
Me: Tomorrow afternoon. Send me the details before you book.
Annie: I will.
Me: And Annie?
Annie: Yes?
I considered warning her not to expect too much.
Not to make me regret the invitation.
Not to arrive believing she already knew how the two days would end.
All true.
None necessary.
Me: Bring the bad hat.
Three dots appeared.
Annie: I thought you hated the hat.
Me: I want proof Savannah Brooks is capable of questionable judgment in multiple areas.
Annie: I can provide extensive documentation.
I put the phone down.
Rosa appeared with a slice of pie.
“I did not order dessert.”
“No.”
She placed it in front of me.
“You invited her.”
“How do you know?”
“Your shoulders have returned to their normal location.”
“That is not evidence.”
“It is enough for pie.”
Hank raised his fork from the counter.
“Tell her Captain Pancake expects a gift.”
“She is not bribing the dog.”
“He has been through a difficult period.”
“He stole two sandwiches today.”
“Coping behavior.”
I ate the pie without answering.
At home, I changed the sheets because they needed changing.
I put clean towels in the bathroom because I had laundry.
Then I stood in the spare bedroom, looked at the neatly made bed, and carried one of the pillows back to mine.
My phone buzzed.
Annie: Flight booked. Arrival 2:10. Commercial aircraft. No marching band.
A second message followed.
Annie: The hat is packed.
I saved the flight information and placed the phone on the kitchen counter.
Before going to bed, I switched on the porch light.
The front steps were uneven after dark.
I left it on.