EMORY
This town treats privacy the way it treats the “do not feed the seagulls” signs. Cute in theory. Rare in practice. Mostly something people mention right before ignoring it completely.
Three minutes after eight, Mrs. Kravitz comes into Holey Moley for a glazed twist and studies my face like she’s trying to identify visible signs of romantic activity in my pores.
“Beautiful morning,” she says.
“It is.”
“Very bright.”
“Sure is.”
“Good weather for…“ She pauses delicately. “Walking home.”
I hand her the box. “Enjoy your glazed twist, Mrs. Kravitz.”
She smiles like I’ve just confirmed a dozen separate rumors.“Oh, I will.” Then she leaves with a cheerful little, “toot toot.”
Miss Hattie is worse. She buys two jelly-filled doughnuts and winks at me so many times I start worrying about her left eye.
Frank hums “Let’s Get It On” behind the racks until Granny smacks the back of his arm with an order pad. “Ow,” Frank says.
“You’re lucky I didn’t use the stapler.”
“I was just humming.”
“My ass. You knew exactly what you were doing and I know you knew.”
Frank wisely returns to glazing.
Granny is the worst of all. Not because she says much. Because she doesn’t. She just keeps looking at me.
I try to ignore her. I refill napkins. Wipe down counters. Rearrange pink boxes by size. Answer questions from customers who are absolutely not asking the questions they actually came in to ask.
Yes, the blueberry glazed are fresh.
No, the fritters are not sold out.
No, I do not know why Jake’s light was on before sunrise, and also that is an extremely specific thing to notice while taking a walk.
By eleven thirty, my shoulders have taken up permanent residence somewhere near my ears.
“Go take a walk, honey,” Granny says.
“I’m working.”
Mr. Humphrey hmphs from the corner table over his obituary section and blueberry crumb bar.
“You’ve been in your head all morning,” she says.
“I have not.”
She points at my bkr. “That thing’s had a tighter hold on your hand than Jake had on your hip yesterday.”
Frank makes a sound behind the racks that is suspiciously close to a laugh.
Granny pats the counter. “Go.”
I leave before the entire bakery forms a subcommittee around my emotional state.
Outside, I tilt my face toward the sun and take a deep breath of salt air.
Doesn’t work.
Shells crunch under my flip flops as I head toward The Green. Somewhere behind me, Holey Moley’s door opens, and I resist the urge to turn around and see who’s arrived to continue the inquiry into my love life.
The bay is so bright under the overhead sun, I regret not grabbing my sunglasses.
A seagull cries overhead in a tone that feels judgmental. To be fair, that could describe any seagull around here.
I take another sip from my bkr even though I’m not thirsty.
That’s the first problem.
The second problem is that I notice I’m doing it.
My thumb worries the silicone sleeve, tracing the same spot over and over until the movement becomes less habit and more confession.
I used to carry this thing anytime I needed something to hold so I didn’t have to hold the truth.
Apparently we’re back there.
Wonderful.
A full circle emotional relapse. But hydrated.
My feet carry me toward The Green with far more confidence than my brain has displayed in the last twenty-four hours. The bench comes into view beneath the big oak.
Willard’s there. Of course. Peanut bag resting beside his leg. One ankle crossed over the other like the man has made an art form out of not hurrying.
Chip sits at his feet, clutching a peanut between his tiny paws with the focus of someone who has never once questioned his place in the universe.
French Fry is perched on the back of the bench. He turns his head when he sees me.
I stop walking. “Don’t start.”
French Fry opens his beak.
“I mean it.”
He lets out one sharp, rude squawk, then launches himself toward the dock, probably to commit a misdemeanor near a sandwich.
Willard glances up. He pats the bench beside him. I sit. For a minute, neither of us says anything.
That’s one of the things I love about him. He doesn’t rush to fill silence like it’s rude. He just lets it exist. Lets you decide whether you came for conversation or just need somewhere to set your thoughts down for a while.
The bench is warm where the sun hits it and cool beneath the oak shade. Ida’s plaque catches the light near my knee, polished smooth by weather and time and, I suspect, Willard’s hand.
He hands Chip another peanut. Chip abandons the one he already has to grab the new one.
“You look happy,” he says. And because Willard has never wasted time circling a point, there it is.
I stare out at the water. “I do?” I ask.
“You do.”
I take a sip from my bkr to buy time, which would probably work better if I didn’t know he could outwait me by roughly a century.
“Yes,” I admit finally. “I am.” The truth settles into my chest so cleanly it almost knocks the breath out of me.
I am.
I’m happy.
“That usually scares people more than they expect,” he says.
I curl both hands around my bkr. “Does it?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Great.”
He tosses another peanut toward Chip. “Folks prepare for sorrow, difficulties, and loss. They make plans for those.” He pauses. “Most people don’t know what to do when something good walks up and sits down.”
I look at him then, but he’s watching Chip. “It was different this time.”
He doesn’t ask different from what. He doesn’t have to.
Different from the almosts. The kiss. From every moment before now where I could still pretend this existed somewhere in the murky area between possibility and denial and me being emotionally dramatic in linen.
“This made it real,” I say quietly. “In a way I wasn’t prepared for.”
Willard stays quiet.
“I woke up with him, and it just…” I shake my head. There are plenty of things I could say.
I could say it felt normal in a way nothing else has. I could say when he opened his eyes and looked at me, in that moment, before the rest of the world came rushing in, I forgot how to be afraid. Instead I say, “It felt easy.”
I stare out at the ocean because it feels safer than staring directly at my own feelings. “It shouldn’t have felt that easy,” I mumble.
“Why not?”
I laugh softly and lean back against the bench. “Oh, I don’t know. My entire personality?”
Willard lifts his hat and pats his forehead with a folded handkerchief before settling it back into place.
“You’ve been scared of happy before.”
“Yes.”
“This doesn’t sound like that.”
I turn the bkr slowly in my hands. The straw bumps against my wrist.
He’s right.
Before, fear always arrived early. It stood between me and wanting. It made lists. It pointed out exits. It used words like temporary and realistic and don’t get ahead of yourself.
This feels worse.
Because the wanting already got in.
“Before,” I say slowly, “I was scared of wanting something I might not get to keep. But now…” I press my lips together. “Now it already felt like mine.”
I look toward the water before he can see too much of my face. “Like I walked into something that had been waiting for me, and I don’t know what to do with that.”
Chip drops his peanut and chatters at it like he’s been personally betrayed by the nut.
“I built a whole life around not needing too much,” I say after a minute. “Very elegant system. Clean lines. Minimal risk. Mild to moderate spiritual erosion.”
“Lonely.”
I glance sideways at him. “Maybe.”
“Maybe,” he repeats.
I exhale. “Okay. Yes. Lonely. But organized.”
Chip scurries over my foot like I’m part of the bench now and therefore public infrastructure.
I tip my head back against the wood and stare up through the oak branches.
“I don’t want to run,” I say quietly.
“Then don’t.”
I let my head fall back into place and look at him. “That sounds simple.”
“Usually isn’t.”
“No kidding.”
I fidget with the straw again. “What if I do it anyway? What if I panic and make one of my neat little sensible decisions and convince myself it’s for the best? Then spend the rest of my life pretending it was emotional maturity?”
Because running has never looked chaotic on me. It looks responsible. Reasonable. Thoughtful.
It comes with explanations. It wears sensible shoes and says words like timeline.
It says this is complicated when what it means is I’m scared.
It says I need to think when what it really means is I already found the nearest exit.
“What am I supposed to do instead?” I ask.
Willard studies the ocean for a long moment before answering. “What do you want to do?”
That should not be a difficult question.
It is an absurdly difficult question.
Because the answer rises so fast and so plainly it makes my chest ache.
I want to go find Jake.
I want to stop standing outside my own life like I’m waiting for permission to enter it.
I want one day—just one—where I enjoy being happy without locating the nearest emergency exit.
I want to see his face when he looks up and realizes I came looking for him.
The thought makes me smile.
“I want to stop treating this like a problem I need to solve,” I say softly. “I want to be happy.”
Willard nods once.
For a while, the only sounds are Chip munching his peanut, the buoy bell out in the water, the hum of a boat idling, and the faint ting of the flagpole rope.
Then Willard says, “My wife used to put the good dishes on the table for no reason.”
I turn toward him. He keeps his eyes on the water.
“Middle of the week. Soup from a can sometimes. Sandwiches.” A small smile touches his mouth. “Didn’t matter. Said saving joy for later was a good way to end up not using it at all.”
Something in his voice catches me off guard. I look down at Ida’s plaque again.
Ida Mae Brown
Beloved wife. Beloved friend.
The best seat is always beside you.
My throat tightens, and I can feel my eyes welling up. “I think I would’ve liked her,” I say quietly.
Willard smiles. “She’d have liked you.”
“Even with the emotional support water bottle?”
“Especially with that.” He glances at it. “She believed women should always have at least one thing in their hand when men were making them foolish.” His mouth twitches. “Lucky for me it was never a frying pan.”
I laugh, and this time it comes easier.
I stand, brushing sugar from my shorts that I’m pretty sure has been there since this morning.
Willard tips his chin up at me. “Emory.”
“Yes.”
“You don’t have to decide the rest of your life today.”
Relief loosens something in my chest so fast I almost sit back down. Then he adds, “But you can decide not to ruin a perfectly good afternoon by auditioning tragedies for tomorrow.”
Chip chatters in agreement.
I smile down at both of them. “Thank you.”
He tips his hat. “Anytime.”
I take one step down the shell path, then stop and look back. “Do you think he knows?” I ask quietly. “That I’m trying. Even if I’m scared.”
“I think he’s been knowing a long time.”
I start back down the shell path toward the dock.
Toward Jake.
I count the first eighteen steps before I stop.
For once, I don’t feel like I need to measure the distance.
I still don’t know what happens next.
I still don’t know what I’m doing about Birmingham or timing or all the big life shaped questions waiting just beyond this afternoon.
But for once, I don’t start solving tomorrow to avoid living today.
For now, I just keep walking.