Chapter 52
Fifty-Two
Late golden hour.
The walk carries me past the boardwalk and into quieter sand, where footprints fade, and noise thins out. I took the long way around, not because I had to, but because I wanted to. There’s peace in these walks. In the summer air, and the rhythm of my own two feet moving forward.
It’s become my thing. No destination, no clock to answer, just me, tracing the edges of Grove and letting the town unravel itself in fragments.
I’ve learned more of it in the last two weeks than I did in the nearly two months before.
Hidden alleys, softened corners. Old gems I used to pass by without a second glance.
New gems, too.
Built right into the dunes, the restaurant looks more like it was found than built. Dark wood gleams under strung lights, and lanterns glow through climbing vines.
A beautiful addition to Grove.
Wood creaks underfoot, and even through the bustle I find them right away. Their booth is tucked in shadows, music curling around Aspen and Dylan’s relaxed forms.
It’s not a full table.
Not yet.
Dylan clocks me first, lifting his chin in that lazy kind of greeting. “About time.”
I grin. “Hi to you too.”
Aspen’s already half out of her seat, arms circling me. Her bangles chime against my back.
“Hey, you.” She pulls back just enough to look at me. “You look good.”
“So do you.”
She really does. The sun loves her more than anyone else, warming her skin, and setting her hazel eyes alight.
“No, really,” she insists, nudging Dylan. “Tell me she doesn’t look amazing.”
He tips his glass at me. “Summer tan’s working overtime.”
I beam, and it’s not just the lantern dusting my face. The spark comes from within, too.
I do look good. Skin still sun-warmed from the walk. Curls falling pretty down my back after an overnight method that finally worked.
Sure, I swiped on a little blush, a little highlighter, but the real win is that when I checked the mirror earlier, I didn’t just recognise myself. I liked her.
Aspen tilts her head. “What’s in these walks you’ve been doing? I swear I need to tag along more and absorb some of the magic.”
The clink of cutlery and chatter fills the pause as a server drops off water.
“They only work if you’ve got a million thoughts in your head you need to spill somewhere.”
Wild, how things change. I used to walk to outrun my thoughts. Now I walk to meet them. To sit with them.
I never would’ve stuck with it if someone hadn’t gone to bat for it.
Dr. Gazelle was the one who mentioned the forum—Twinless Twins.
I didn’t expect much, wasn’t even keen on it at the start, but it was genuinely the best thing she could’ve suggested.
Something about talking to people who actually get it…
“Thoughts?” Aspen echoes, tapping her glass against mine. “I’ve got a million of them.”
“Yeah?” Dylan drawls. “I’m all ears.”
“I can vouch. Dylan’s a fantastic listener.” Our late-night trades haven’t stopped; they just happen now with sand beneath us instead of back-deck boards.
A server arrives with a polite smile in place before Aspen can reply. “Evening. Are we ready to order?”
“We’re just waiting on one more.”
One. The number sinks like a stone, rippling up my back.
No. Not tonight. I won’t let it ruin the aroma of garlic and butter in the air, the salt of the ocean threading close.
“This place is gorgeous, isn’t it?” I add a layer of cheer to my tone. “It looks like it was pulled straight off Pinterest.”
“Sure,” Dylan grunts. “Couldn’t care less about aesthetics, though. If the food’s good, I’m set. I’m starving.”
“You had training today?”
“Yeah.” He looses an exhale. “It’s been rough recently. Coach’s been riding us like he’s on a warpath. Taking it out on everyone because—” He stops, lips flattening. “Doesn’t matter.”
It does matter. I can hear it in the cut-off edge of the sentence. I almost ask, but Reese appears, and the moment folds before I can open it.
The evening’s a blend. Good in that lazy, slightly too-warm, late-July way. Laughter spills easy, glasses clink, and forks scrape against plates. Everything smells of salt, charred seafood, and squeezed citrus.
But underneath it all, there’s this… hum.
Not loud enough to ruin anything, just consistent enough to remind me that time’s moving. That nothing stays paused forever.
“Can’t believe it’s almost over,” Reese whistles, stretching his arms overhead. “Almost three months gone, just like that. What a time, huh?”
The breeze shifts cooler now, raising the hair on my arms.
“When do you guys leave?”
“Not sure yet. Maybe two weeks? Three? Depends on how things pan out.”
Something twists in my chest. I drown it with a gulp of juice, but it sticks anyway.
By the time the plates are cleared and glasses are topped off, the blues in the sky have given way to the kind of indigo that hints at nightfall and scattered stars to come.
Dylan’s mid-story, leaning in like the table’s his stage. “—and it was insane. Carson hit five threes in a row, easy. Even started talking trash, smiling a little. And you know how he’s been, so it was—”
My heart trips, once, twice, and not just from the sound of his name. Too fast. Dylan stops himself too fast.
It’s not the first time either. I’ve noticed it, how Carson’s name never surfaces unless I ask. And even then, it’s always the same lines. He’s fine. He’s busy. Same old.
I used to think it was for my sake, but sitting here, watching the laughter that’s carried us all night sputter and die at the mention of his name, I’m not so sure anymore.
I lean in, trying for casual, but my chest is tight. “How’s Carson been?”
Such a simple question, but such a heavy pause before the answer comes. Dylan clears his throat. “You know how he gets when he’s in his head. Total boring prick.”
I’m not sure I buy it. My eyes flick to Reese, but all I get is a nod too tight, too controlled, before his hand slams the table—too loud.
“I’m getting a drink.”
And just like that, he’s gone, leaving me with the thud of my pulse loud in my ears. What the hell?
I’ve seen Carson once in the past two weeks. Just once, a few days ago.
My skin was shining, but not in the way you’d see on some girl-next-door in a magazine spread. No, it was the sticky Grove-is-breaking-it’s-own-heat-records kind of shine.
Too hot for errands, too hot for moving, and definitely too hot for what I was doing. But I couldn’t let it go. I had a picture in my head, and it wouldn’t leave me alone.
A few days back I’d found this hidden stretch between the dunes. It was untouched, practically glowing, and ever since then, I couldn’t stop obsessing over how it would look with the sun beating down at its highest point.
Now I know.
Waiting in line for an iced mango lemonade felt like my little reward.
“Warm today, huh?” the guy behind me said.
“Extremely.”
Short and sweet, but he kept going.
“It’d be the perfect evening for a nice dinner out.”
I glanced sideways then, trying to gauge if it was just small talk or… something else. Hard to tell; he gave nothing away. So I just smiled again, this one thinner.
“You got plans?”
Damn it.
The next few minutes were a blur of sidesteps and polite deflections. The man didn’t quit. At least I was next up to order, and once I moved aside, I had my phone to make it look like I was busy.
But before I could even unlock the screen, I felt it. A prickle at my nape that wasn’t just the humidity. I scanned.
Striped umbrellas shading couples with sodas. A stroller rocking like a pendulum. Seagulls tearing at scraps.
Normal. All of it normal.
Nothing. Nothing. Noth—
There.
My stomach. It dropped, twisted, and flipped, like something inside me just unlatched. His cap was pulled so low his face was swallowed in shadow, but I didn’t need to see it to know.
That solid build. Set like he wanted to disappear into the crowd, but couldn’t. Those arms. Swimmers arms. Strong enough to hold me through storms, weak enough once to tremble when I broke apart inside them.
And if there was still any doubt—the pendant on his chest, catching light like it always did.
Carson.
I knew he saw me. I felt it. A tingle across my cheeks, then a sweep lower, feathering down the line of my throat until it caught on the camera strap pressed against my collarbone.
I waited. Blood roaring in my ears, I waited. For a glance. A shift. Any sign he hadn’t erased me.
Nothing. He didn’t move.
My own feet nearly betrayed me, twitching forward.
I wanted to go to him. To cross not just the few meters of space, but the gulf that had widened every day since the fallout on his deck. How many times had I hovered over the call button? And now—he was there. Right there.
Why hadn’t we spoke?
That wasn’t part of the print. I didn’t say erase me. I didn’t say disappear. I only said I needed some space to prove I could stand alone. But this? This plunge from everything to nothing? It tore me open in places I didn’t know could still tear.
I missed him. Missed him like air in my lungs, like water in my veins, like something primal I wasn’t built to live without. Every thought curved back to him. He lived in the edges of my joy, the hollow of my ache.
Even when I stumbled on that hidden stretch of dunes, my first thought wasn’t this is beautiful—it was him. How much he’d love it. How badly I wanted to turn and share it.
And now he was here. And I had the photos in my camera to do just that.
Just as I was about to throw caution to the wind and close the distance—
“Brielle?”
My name sliced through. I jolted sideways, fingers fumbling for my wallet as I headed toward the counter. But even as I did, I glanced back.
Gone.
Just air where he’d been.
The barista slid my drink across. “No charge. Someone already paid.”
A napkin came with it, folded once.
I almost balled it up, expecting the scrawl of digits from the stranger behind me in line.
But the writing stopped me cold.
No number. No signature. Just the tilt of letters I could place anywhere.
Proud of you.
Later, after the restaurant, after the fire we built lazy in the sand, we drift back toward our side of the strip. I ease my pace, and Aspen matches it, slipping beside me.
It’s the kind of night that feels like it could stretch on forever.
Sand clings grainy to my ankles. Smoke threads through my hair. Ahead, the others are laughing at something I didn’t catch. Behind, a bottle clinks in someone’s bag. But here, in the pocket between noise and hush, it’s quieter.
I ask, “Is he okay?”
She doesn’t ask who I mean; she doesn’t need to.
The silence before her answer stretches thin, and when it finally comes it’s nothing like I want. “He’s… giving you space.”
I stop walking.
Not he’s okay.
Not he’s fine.
Just that.
Aspen doesn’t turn to me, but I know she hears all the questions I don’t know how to voice.
“That’s all I can say.”
She keeps walking.
And I follow. A million thoughts in my head, all of them belonging to him.