27. Marnie
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Marnie
We pull into an empty parking spot outside the entrance to East Chop Beach Club.
When Caleb picked me up today, he didn’t tell me where we were going. Only to wear a bathing suit and to be ready at two o’clock.
It took me a comical amount of time to pick out a swimsuit while getting ready.
I couldn’t find my one matching black set from when I went bridge jumping and I have no recollection of where it could be.
After trying on each combination of varying patterns and colors, I settled on the hunter green bikini top with black and white polka dot bottoms and threw on a thin white V-neck and jean shorts overtop.
I’ve never felt self-conscious while wearing clothing, but something about going on a first date made me second guess everything. I had to remind myself that Caleb would never judge me for something as trivial as my clothes.
I tilt my sunglasses up to the top of my head to read the sign. My eyes widen in disbelief. “You belong to the Beach Club?”
“Well, no, but we’re going to the beach.
It’s a smaller, lesser-known beach right next to the Beach Club.
Not a lot of people come here because they think this is a private beach.
This was one of my favorite places to go as a kid and it’s special to me, so I wanted to share it with you. ” Caleb blushes and diverts his eyes.
“Why, Caleb, are you nervous?”
“No way.” He shakes his head. “I’m cool as a cucumber.”
“You sure? You’re rambling. And referring to yourself as a vegetable.”
“Fruit,” he corrects.
My eyebrows knit together. “What?”
“A cucumber is most definitely a fruit.”
“Oh no, are we about to have our first fight?”
Now it’s his turn to be confused. “What are you talking about?”
I cross my arms. “A cucumber is a vegetable, and you cannot convince me otherwise.”
“Ah, the classic fruit versus vegetable debate,” he chuckles.
“What on earth makes it a fruit? It’s housed with the vegetables at the grocery store.”
Caleb shrugs. “Technically, it has seeds. And it grows from a flower. Therefore, fruit.”
I tip my head back and laugh. “Fine, our first fight is a draw. That checks out, though, seeing as I can name about a dozen tip jar questions where we have also disagreed.”
“I wouldn’t really consider those fights, more like modest, respectful debates.”
My head cocks to the side. “Are we about to have a fight about having our first fight?”
His expression turns shy, as if unsure how to respond.
I reach over and place my hand on his forearm. “Caleb, I’m just teasing.”
He rubs the back of his neck, a sheepish smile forming. “I’m sorry, it’s been a while since I’ve planned a date. I just want to do everything right.”
Even if he won’t admit it out loud, he’s nervous. It’s adorable, and it settles all my feelings of earlier insecurities. He’s showing me something important to him, and I’m hoping to finally get a peek behind the curtain. A look at the real Caleb. “This is perfect,” I assure him.
He perks up, relieved by my words, and turns the car off.
I unbuckle and reach for the door handle, but Caleb gently grabs my forearm and puts my arm back in my lap. I look at him questioningly, but he doesn’t say anything. He just exits his door and jogs around to my side.
I bite back a smile.
He opens my door and offers me his hand to help me down from the truck. Then he moves toward the trunk to grab a few items I didn’t notice until now.
A large beach blanket, a soft-sided cooler, and a pair of towels.
“Let me help you with those,” I say, trying to take something out of his hands.
“Not a chance. You pack it, you carry it. Don’t you know beach etiquette?” He slings the cooler over his left shoulder and tucks the blanket and towels under the same arm, making space on his right side to offer me his hand again.
I don’t bother hiding my smile this time, and I lower my sunglasses and take his hand as we start down the sandy path to the beach.
A light breeze tugs at the hair in my braid, pulling out a few short strands to frame my face. Soft clouds float across the sky with the breeze, sun shining overhead. The day is beautiful.
We take our time with careful, slow steps, drawing this out as long as we can, neither of us in a rush.
The sand path turns into a set of wooden planks like the one outside my cottage, depositing us right into the squishy sand that leads down to the water.
Caleb stops a few feet from the shoreline. “Welcome to Jetty Beach. My favorite hidden gem.”
The small stretch of beach runs only a few hundred feet in length. At the far end is a long jetty—similar to the one at the Jaws Bridge—that has a metal tower on the end complete with a red light at the top.
Despite the nice weather, there are only a handful of people here.
Vibrant, colorful umbrellas take up the center part of the beach where a few people are sun tanning.
Behind the umbrellas, up near the dunes, some guys are playing netless badminton while another group is throwing a football back and forth.
In the water, two kids are having a contest to see who can ride the waves furthest into shore, and a lone swimmer is doing laps parallel to the coast.
“Look.” Caleb points to the water.
A flash of dark brown and white swoops down ahead of us into the water.
The osprey snatches a small fish from below the surface, its scales glistening against the sun as the bird flies off.
We turn around to watch it land atop an old light post where two fuzzy heads pop up out of the nest to accept the fish.
“So, what’s the plan? Beach picnic?”
“Yes, but first we are going to hunt for sea glass. If you’re feeling brave, we can climb the jetty, too.”
We set up our blanket at the end of the beach near the base of the jetty and spread out our stuff to anchor it down against the breeze.
“So, how exactly do you do this?”
He takes my hand and leads me to the water.
“When hunting for sea glass, you want to find where the water meets the sand. It leaves a dark line when the wave recedes, and that is the sweet spot.” His hand traces through the air, outlining the most recent line of foam left behind by the retreating wave.
“Everything the waves carry in gets deposited there. You’ll have to sift through the shells and rocks to find some of them, especially the smaller ones, but that is where you’ll find the sea glass. ”
We start off down the beach, taking slow, meticulous steps to examine each cluster of sediment. I follow his lead, trailing behind to watch him snag a few pieces, getting a feel for his techniques in both spotting and retrieving before attempting it myself.
Something catches my eye in the next patch of rocks, and I get a rush of excitement. “Is this sea glass?” I ask, plucking it from the sand and showing it to Caleb.
He takes it from me and holds it up to the sun, eyes squinting as he examines it. “This is a pebble.” He hands it back to me and I toss it into the sand where I found it, my shoulders deflating.
“How do I know if it’s sea glass versus a pebble?”
“When the waves come in, everything they deposit is still damp. That will cast a shine on the sea glass and make it stand out in a way a pebble wouldn’t.
Plus, most sea glass is a different color than the shells and rocks.
” He points to a small brown piece beside an orange jingle shell.
“So you’ll be able to spot real sea glass amongst it. ”
We continue down the beach at a snail’s pace, carefully scouring the sand.
I open my palm and look down at the five pieces I’ve found, all ranging in sizes from my pinky nail to a quarter. All greens and browns so far, but I’m determined to find a variety. I love the concentration this takes. The focus. And I’ve got to say, the rewards are pretty sweet.
“What do the colors mean?” I ask him, both of us grabbing pieces side by side.
“Just the color bottle it came from, but that will tell you how rare it is.”
Caleb holds his hand out flat to display his stash, and I do that same. He traces his finger along my palm, sorting through my pieces. His touch is so gentle that my hand threatens to tremble at the sensation and drop everything back into the water.
“You’re going to find a lot of browns, greens, and clears, since those are the most common glass bottle colors.
” He reaches down to pluck up another with ease—a blue one—and deposits it into my hand.
“Maybe even some dark blues like this one thrown in there, but even these are becoming less common nowadays.”
I peer up at him through my lashes. “And the rare colors?”
“Those are your reds, yellows, light purples. If I had to guess, I’d say orange is the rarest. I’ve never found an orange piece before.
If you find any of those rare colors, make sure you keep them somewhere safe.
A lot of those were discontinued for glass bottle manufacturing, so we may never find them again. ”
Our hands grow fuller the further down the beach we get. I swipe across a collection of shells and reveal a hidden light blue piece, letting out a small squeal of excitement when I see it.
“How do you know so much about this?” I ask.
He drops another green one into my pile.
“My mom used to have mason jars filled with them all around the house. Some families collect pennies or shells, mine collected sea glass. One day I pulled a jar off the shelf and dumped the pieces out and started making art with it on the dining room table.” He chuckles, as if reliving the memory.
“She came home from the grocery store and caught me, and I thought I was going to be in so much trouble.”
I hang on his every word, desperate for an insight into his childhood. Any ounce of information about his family that he keeps so carefully guarded.