2. Jake
JAKE
The Pinch of Tides glides easy toward the dock, the bay kicking back that deep gold from the last of the afternoon sun. The water’s calm enough I can feel the boat settle under my hands instead of fight me, and after a full day working crab pots, that counts as kindness.
Hank is sprawled on the bench beside me.
Seventy pounds of English bulldog, wrinkles, bottom teeth, and a tongue hanging out one side of his mouth like a drunken sailor.
He’s upside down, legs twitching every now and then, probably dreaming about the crabs I “accidentally” let tumble onto the boat deck instead of into the crate.
Chasing crabs is his favorite activity.
It’s also his only activity.
He goes everywhere with me. Boat. Bar. Town. As long as there are snuggles to collect, a lap to park his head on, and a cookie waiting at the other end, he’s in.
I cut the engine. Hank rolls over and lifts his head just enough to scan the dock, lets out an annoyed sigh because he knows this requires him to get up, then drops it back down and starts fake snoring.
“Almost home,” I tell him.
One eye opens. That’s all the effort he’s giving me.
“Hey, Tommy,” I call. “Mind grabbing that line and tying me off?”
“Sure thing, Jake.”
Tommy catches the rope and loops it around the cleat in a neat figure eight like he’s been doing it his whole life. A lot of us around here have.
I step onto the dock, muck boots landing on weathered wood, and roll my shoulder out. Nothing dramatic. Just loosening up the familiar pull that comes from hauling pots all day.
I turn back and hoist Hank onto the dock instead of lowering the ramp and waiting on him to decide he feels like using it. He goes limp on purpose.
Tommy laughs. “He looks like a sack of taters when you do that.”
“He feels like one too.”
The second his feet hit the planks, Hank acts like he got there under his own power, lumbering down the dock with a snort, chest out and not one ounce of gratitude for the lift.
Tommy bends to scratch his back. “How’d y’all do today?”
I nod toward the crate. “Enough blue crab for Bethany to run a locals special tonight.”
“Nice.”
I lift the crate, settle the weight against my hip, and head toward the prep area behind The Knuckle.
The smell hits before I even round the side of the building.
Salt, fish, fryer oil drifting out from inside, and that faint sun-baked dock smell that gets into everything around here and never really leaves.
The business has been in my family longer than I’ve been alive.
My granddad built the original place with his own hands back when Blue Crab Bay was quieter and people came because they meant to, not because some magazine called it charming.
Dad added the restaurant later, when the town got busier and the summers got louder.
Crabbing was supposed to be my life too.
I learned knots before numbers. Tides before time zones.
Could bait a line and read the weather before I could color inside the lines.
Dad used to say the bay was the only boss worth answering to.
Granddad always said the bay didn’t care whether you answered or not.
Then football happened.
I loved it. Loved the discipline. The strategy.
The way every inch had to be earned. Loved Saturdays at Neyland, the whole place shaking under your feet with a hundred thousand Tennessee Volunteers singing Rocky Top.
Loved walking out to cannons firing in a Buccaneers jersey, knowing I’d worked for every bit of it.
I still love the game. Probably always will.
But this is where my breathing evens out. Where the noise fades.
Most days.
Tommy falls into step beside me. “You need help?”
“Thanks. I’ve got it. Go check on your mama.”
He nods. “She’s doing better today. Still mad about it.”
I smile. “Sounds right.”
“She wanted me to thank you. For checking in. For bringing soup.”
“It wasn’t much.”
“It was to her.”
I set the crate down by the prep sink and glance back at him. “Anytime. If y’all need anything, you know where I am.”
“We appreciate you, Jake,” he says quietly.
I’ve always been uncomfortable with praise. I never know where to put it. Feels too much like being watched for something I was going to do anyway.
I lift a hand and jerk my chin toward the other side of The Point. “Go on. Don’t let her catch you standing around.”
That gets a laugh out of him.
“Yes, sir.”
“Don’t start that.”
He grins, tells Hank goodbye like Hank outranks both of us, because he does, and heads up the dock.
Once he’s gone, it gets quiet again in that particular Blue Crab Bay way. Never silent. Just layered. Gulls arguing overhead. Water moving under the dock. Ropes creaking. Laughter carrying off the patio at The Knuckle.
Hank lets out a sharp arf.
I look over.
French Fry, the resident seagull and Hank’s sworn nemesis, is perched on a piling, looking down his beak as if he owns the dock and we’re lucky he allows us access.
Hank arfs again, ready to start something.
French Fry doesn’t move so much as a feather.
I lean my forearms on the railing and look out at the water before either of them makes me referee a dockside war.
Coming back here wasn’t the plan people thought I had.
Hell, it wasn’t the plan I thought I had either.
But plans change when life hits hard enough.
When you realize there are worse things than going home.
I could’ve left again. Plenty of people expected me to.
But I needed something that didn’t ask me to be anyone other than who I am.
Here, I’m not Jake the quarterback. I’m just Jake. The one who fixes a busted cleat without being asked. The one who checks on people when they go quiet too long. The one who remembers the extra hush puppies and who takes their beer in a bottle instead of a glass.
It’s a good life. Quiet. A life built out of showing up.
Most of the time, it’s enough.
But sometimes, usually when the sun drops lower, I catch myself wondering what might’ve been. Not just the game. Everything.
Mo slips into my head the way she always does. Even now, after all this time, she can still do that.
I haven’t spoken to Emory Donovan in almost ten years, but I haven’t forgotten the sound of her laugh. How she counts steps without realizing it. No matter where she is, she always smelled like sugar and the beach.
I still call her Mo in my head. Probably always will. Some names settle in and stay there.
I heard she might be coming back to town.
The thought of seeing Mo again rattles me more than any fourth-quarter drive ever did.
Actually seeing Mo? That scares the hell out of me because I don’t know what it’ll undo.
I push off the railing and head for the prep sink. Get the crabs on ice. Scrub my hands, letting the saltwater and the day wash away, my thoughts along with it. My palms are rougher than they used to be. Strong in a different way. Earned in a different way too.
I dry them on a towel and look up.
There’s a figure standing near the water’s edge.
Still. Too still.
I don’t need a second glance or a closer look. I know.
Mo.
She’s here.
Everything in me goes quiet. Ten years apart doesn’t dull that kind of knowing.
She starts across the bridge, and the sight of her lands a punch to my gut. Everything I built to keep myself steady suddenly feels like it’s crumbling.
Hank snorts at my feet, and I don’t know if he’s telling me to move or just reminding me to breathe.
I don’t blink. I’m afraid if I do, she’ll be gone.
I fight the urge to call out to her.
Because I learned the cost of moving too fast ten years ago.
Learned what it feels like to reach with your whole heart and feel nothing reach back.