Chapter Twenty-Two
After helping Mei across the mud, Alexandre held her hand a beat longer than necessary before gesturing for her to take the lead.
As Mei forged ahead on the slippery trail, Alexandre marveled at how she’d come back to life.
The fire had returned to her eyes. Each of her steps was more confident than the last. At times, Alexandre caught her smiling to herself when she spotted a patch of wildflowers, or hopped from one rock to another to cross a muddy patch.
He couldn’t help but notice how good she looked in a tank top and athletic shorts, with her ponytail windswept and her cheeks flushed from the sun.
Ahead of him, Mei motioned for him to join her beside a puddle. “Look!”
Alexandre peered down. “Tadpoles!” The chubby little creatures flitted under the surface of the water. For a minute, he was back in his lab, surrounded by tanks of zebrafish. Alexandre gulped down some water to banish the thought.
They reached the nature reserve and entered through a metal gate. A short distance in, they paused to read an informational sign about seabirds.
“This is a nesting ground for albatrosses,” Alexandre said.
“How appropriate.”
Alexandre knew Mei was thinking about her called-off wedding. For him, would his failed tenure always hang around his neck? Last semester, he’d been so busy that the shame began receding. But with the upcoming conference, it once again lurked under his skin.
“I see one!” Mei pointed to the grassy hill in front of them, just as a large gray-and-white bird opened its wings and stepped into the breeze. It swooped close enough for them to spot the triangular markings on the underside of its wings.
“Okay, you’re pretty impressive. Sorry for associating you with misery,” Mei said to the albatross. “Maybe it’s a sign that the things we carry don’t have to weigh us down.” She glanced at Alexandre and laughed self-consciously.
“I like that.”
They followed the last stretch of trail over the sand, until it ended at their destination: Ka‘ena Point. Ahead of them, the rocky shore dropped off into the vast blue ocean.
“We did it!” Mei jumped into the air. Alexandre pulled her into a sweaty embrace.
She was momentarily still. Then she relaxed against him, her arms encircling his waist, her head against his chest. From this vantage point, they could see the cloud-shrouded mountains looming between the north and west coasts.
“After you told me about this hike, I read a little about it,” Mei said. “This is a sacred spot for Native Hawaiians. They believed the recently deceased leap from this point to join their ancestors.”
Alexandre imagined a parade of ghosts, young and old, walking the same trail, then bidding this world goodbye to reunite with their loved ones.
He pressed his lips together. It was too easy to take life for granted.
He was so lucky to be healthy and alive in this beautiful place with a woman he cared about.
They sat on a sandy ledge overlooking the waves. Alexandre handed Mei a hummus wrap. They ate in contemplative silence.
“Today was amazing,” Mei said. “I was in the moment the whole time. I can’t remember the last time I felt like that. These last few months have been something.”
“How are you doing with all that?” Alexandre ventured.
Mei covered her eyes and laughed. “Terrible. I used all my savings to pay off the wedding. I moved into a crappy apartment. Work is a nightmare.” She told him about her manager’s mind games, and how he’d hired Erika, a younger, less-qualified woman, for the job he’d dangled in front of her for months.
“I didn’t know it had gotten so bad,” Alexandre said incredulously. “Are you planning to leave?”
“I don’t want to! You saw the amazing work I do when I’m not cranking out content like a maniac. I still love my team and want to be there for the IPO.”
“I get that. But the job is toxic.”
“It’s not the job! It’s James. And Erika, even though I don’t know her. Everything used to be perfect. It’s not fair that I should have to leave. I was there first.”
“It doesn’t sound like either of them will be leaving anytime soon.” So this is what I must have sounded like when Luc begged me to leave research. “Aren’t there lots of marketing jobs in New York? You’d get hired in a second.”
Mei’s eyes flashed, surprising him. “Stop. Just stop. How long did it take you to leave Oregon? One year? Two?”
“Two years. Though leaving tenure track, which I’d worked for my entire life, is a little harder than just finding another marketing job,” Alexandre snapped, then instantly felt bad. Why was he so angry?
“Stop making it sound like it’s so easy! You know it’s not. You haven’t even fully left your old job. You’ve spent this whole trip working on zebrafish stuff.”
Alexandre held Mei’s challenging gaze. In the distance, a large seabird alighted back on the ground. He blew out a breath. “You’re right. I’m being unfair, acting like it’s so easy to walk away.”
Mei watched a wave fizzle over the black rocks. “What helped you?”
“I don’t know if I have much advice. Clearly, I haven’t figured anything out.”
“You’re in a better place than I am.”
Alexandre tried to recall those blurry weeks after Luc’s intervention. “I started seeing a therapist.”
“I just found a new one.”
“Good. Therapy helped me see how work was an addiction. When I was sad, I worked. When I was lonely, I worked. It’s probably the ultimate sign of my addiction, but I used work to avoid the fact that my tenure wasn’t happening.” He felt Mei’s hand on his shoulder.
“That all sounds very familiar.” Mei paused. “How do you break the cycle?”
“By focusing on my life outside of work. In Oregon, I forced myself to go running by blocking time on my calendar. Or I’d drive to a trail and make myself hike.
Each week, my therapist made me report all the nonwork things I’d done.
At first, I resented it. Over time, I realized those activities made me feel better. More like myself.”
Mei smiled. “Kind of like today.”
Alexandre nudged his knee against hers. “Just like today.”
They stared at the horizon. The sea was a rich azure that hinted at its depths.
“I have an idea,” Mei said. “We spend the rest of our trip having days like today. Hiking. Exploring. Doing whatever outdoorsy stuff people do in Hawai‘i.”
“And not working.” Alexandre saw Mei hesitate, then nod. He squeezed her hand. “We’ll keep each other strong. We’ll live our Hawai‘i dreams.”
“You mean we’ll be Livin our Hawai‘i dreams,” she said with an exaggerated eye roll.
Alexandre laughed. The fact that Mei could poke fun at her job was a good sign.
“Oh my god, look!” Mei jumped to her feet and pointed at the ocean. “I just saw something.”
Alexandre stood to get a better view. The waves were choppy. Then he saw it. A humpback whale’s giant fin broke the surface, then disappeared in a splash of white water.
Wow. Who needed zebrafish when he could see whales?
Screw zebrafish. Alexandre chuckled to himself. “Screw zebrafish,” he said out loud.
Mei turned to him with surprise. Then she faced the water and shouted, “Screw Livin, too!”
Alexandre draped an arm around her. Together, they watched the majestic creature breach the surface of the water, sharing in the moment, before disappearing beneath the waves.