2. Miles
2
Miles
“I found him wandering the beach, Miles. In his pajamas. He was calling your mother’s name. He didn’t know how to get home.”
Mrs. Winters’ 2:00 a.m. call had sent him packing within the hour. No hesitation. No second-guessing. Just him, his truck, and a bag stuffed together in the dark.
Not that there was much to leave behind.
A rented room. Jobs that barely covered rent. And a couple of guys he drank with at Flanagan’s every Thursday—none of them close enough to ask why he still woke up in the middle of the night, soaked in sweat.
Here we are.
Miles pulled into the driveway, squinting as the mid-morning sun bounced off the faded coral siding of his dad’s beach house. He drained the last cold sip of gas station coffee and climbed out of his truck.
Ocean air hit him as his boots sank into the sandy driveway. Palm fronds and broken seashells crunched beneath each step.
The porch came into view—one corner occupied by a rocking chair with a fraying wicker seat, and an old Coleman cooler doubling as a side table in the other. His dad’s DIY wind chimes—fishing line strung with seashells—fluttered from the porch roof, clinking softly in the breeze. The AC unit jutted from the bedroom window, a recent addition after Miles had nearly melted through the last Fourth of July.
As he approached the house, he noticed the mailbox leaning to one side, half-swallowed by knee-high grass. Strips of paint curled from steps, and a lone shutter dangled from a single hinge, swaying like it might give up at any moment.
“Good grief, Dad,” he muttered, stooping to gather a stack of soggy newspapers slumped against the door.
He took a deep breath and knocked.
Once. Twice. Three times.
Then another.
Finally, the door swung open. His dad stood there in rumpled pajamas and a misaligned button-up shirt. Arthur’s silver hair stuck out in all directions, and something—maybe oatmeal—had dried at the corner of his mouth. For a heartbeat, Arthur’s gaze drifted past Miles, seeming to search the empty air before settling on him.
“Miles.” Arthur’s face brightened. “You’re early. The drive from Atlanta must’ve been quick.”
“Morning, Dad.” He forced a smile. “Five hours instead of six. Empty roads will do that.”
Miles stepped inside. The shirt that had once pulled across his dad’s shoulders now hung loose and the cuffs dangled past his wrists.
“Your mom ran to the store.” Arthur shuffled toward the kitchen. “She’ll be back soon.”
Miles’s stomach knotted.
Thirty-six years gone, yet his dad spoke like she’d only just stepped out. Miles had been just ten when she’d passed. At forty-six, he’d now lived nearly four times as long without her as with her. He sometimes struggled to remember the sound of her voice.
“Could use some coffee,” Miles said, setting his bag down. “Want a cup?”
“Already started.” Arthur gestured toward an empty coffeepot with water stains tracking down its side before moving from cabinet to cabinet—opening one, then another, then circling back—while Miles stepped away and surveyed the living room.
Piles of unread mail. Dishes with crusty food remnants. A blanket in a heap on the floor, like his dad had been sleeping on the couch. Dust covered the framed photos—Miles’s graduation, his parents’ anniversary, and his mom in the hospital when he was born.
And then the paintings. Stacked. Propped. Covering every inch of available space.
Almost all showed the same scene: the cove where they’d spread his mom’s ashes. Some at sunrise, others at sunset, the water shifting from silver to gold to dark blue. But the curve of the shore and the rocks remained constant. In each one, two small figures stood at the water’s edge—a man and a boy.
CRASH!
Miles snapped back from his thoughts.
He bolted.
“Dadgummit!” Arthur shouted. He stood in the middle of the kitchen, his right hand clenched against his side. Coffee grounds lay like black sand across the counter, dripping down onto the floor. Fragments of glass glinted on the tile where the coffeepot had exploded.
“Dad—” Miles approached, stepping carefully around the glass shards.
Arthur flinched.
“I need to check it.” Miles took his dad’s hand, finding a red mark where hot water had scalded him. He led Arthur over to the sink. “It’s not too bad,” Miles said, running cool water over the burn. “Where’s your first aid kit?”
“First aid ...”
“Medicine cabinet? Bathroom?”
Silence.
“Dad?”
Arthur looked up, blinking rapidly, his forehead creased. “Arthur, you need to finish that painting before the Lighthouse Festival. They’re expecting five new pieces by Friday.”
“Dad ...” Miles tried to swallow the lump in his throat. “It’s me, Miles. Your son.”
Arthur yanked his hand away, splashing water on the counter. “I know who you are. But we need to go. Before she leaves.”
“Before who leaves?”
“Elaine!” Arthur’s eyes cleared with sudden urgency. “Your mom. She’s waiting for us at the cove.” He patted his pockets. “Where’s my keys?”
“Dad, I don’t—”
“The painting I finished yesterday—where is it? I need to bring it to her.”
“Which one?”
“The cove.” Arthur’s voice cracked. “The one with her in it. She gave it to me—I have to give it back.”
The back of Miles’s neck prickled. His dad wasn’t just confused; he was somewhere else entirely.
Miles spotted a canvas propped against the fridge—another cove scene, this one at twilight, painted in deep purples and blues. He carefully stepped around the broken glass and picked it up. “This one?”
Arthur’s hands trembled as he reached for it. “No. Not this one. The colors are all wrong.” His fingers drifted over the painted shoreline. “The sun was setting, and ...”
Miles unclenched his fists, one finger at a time. The Alzheimer’s pamphlets from Dr. Mendez’s office flashed through his mind.
Redirect, don’t correct.
Miles took a deliberate breath and softened his tone. “Tell me more, Dad.”
As Arthur went on, his shoulders gradually relaxed and Miles guided him toward a kitchen chair. Once he was seated, Miles quickly swept up the glass.
His dad smiled. “It was perfect.”
That smile—the same one from Little League games and high school graduation, the one that had somehow held steady at his mom’s funeral—was still there, even as the rest of him slipped away.
Miles nodded and grabbed the kettle. “Let’s have some tea instead.”
While the kettle heated, Miles wiped coffee grounds from the counter, keeping one eye on his dad. The hardest part of loving someone, he realized, wasn’t the sacrifice; it was watching them search for pieces of themselves they might never find again.
“I’m sorry,” Arthur said after a long silence. “It’s happening more often, isn’t it?”
Miles paused. “We’re figuring it out, Dad. One day at a time.”
“Your mom was always better at this—knowing what to say.” Arthur glanced at the painting. “She would’ve helped me remember.”
The kettle whistled, and Miles busied himself with mugs and tea bags, grateful for the distraction from the sheen in his eyes. His dad—who had taught him to catch a football, to change a tire, to get back up after falling—now looked at him with such trust and uncertainty that, despite all the research he’d done and the professionals he’d talked to, Miles still felt completely unprepared.
“You’re doing fine.” He placed a mug of tea in front of his dad, along with a sketchpad and pencil from the table. “How about you show me how to draw the cove?”
Arthur picked up the pencil and, with sure strokes, he sketched the shoreline, the rocks, and the meeting of sky and sea.
While his dad worked away, Miles slipped onto the back porch for a moment alone. The ocean stretched endlessly before him. He leaned against the railing, breathing in the salty air, trying to loosen the tightness in his chest.
He pulled out his phone and scrolled through the string of texts he’d sent within ten minutes of Mrs. Winters’ call.
Sorry, Mrs. Hendricks. Family emergency. Can’t mow this week.
Hey Jim, need to raincheck on fixing that deck. My dad needs me in Hadley Cove.
Megan, can you cover my dog walking route for a few days? Family stuff.
Just three texts and he was free. No plants to water. No pet to feed. No one waiting for him. Three years of drifting. Running. Remembering the fire climbing those walls—and how, for the first time in his life, he had frozen.
Miles let out a breath, shaking his head like he could clear it. The screen door creaked behind him.
“The light’s better in the morning,” Arthur said, stepping onto the porch with his sketchpad. “That’s when I like to paint the cove. The way the sun hits the water, it’s like seeing the world being born again.”
Miles studied his dad’s sketch—lines drawn by a man trying to hold on to what time had already erased. “It’s good, Dad. Really good—the rocks, the shore, the dunes.”
“Your mom loved this place.” Arthur didn’t look away from the horizon. “That’s why I bought the house. To keep her close.”
Miles swallowed, then nodded toward the door. “Come on, Dad. Let’s eat.”
Back inside, Miles pulled open the fridge. Wilted spinach. The last two end pieces of wholegrain bread, left in an untied bag. A half-used lemon in the crisper had shriveled and hardened. The almond milk—still technically in date—smelled questionable. Digging through the pantry, he found a can of chickpeas pushed to the back.
Mental note: First thing tomorrow, groceries.
He drained and rinsed the chickpeas, then mashed them with a fork while heating a pan he found after opening three different cabinets. As the chickpeas sizzled, he tossed in the spinach and seasoned with the few spices he could find in his dad’s pantry.
“Hope you still like chickpea scramble.” Miles set down two mismatched plates—one cracked, the other too small.
Arthur watched as Miles sat down across from him. “I’ve painted the cove a thousand times,” he said between bites. “Morning, evening, summer, winter. It’s never the same, not really.” He pointed toward the living room with his fork, dropping food onto his shirt without noticing. “That one store in town used to sell them. People like beach paintings.”
“They’re good, Dad. More than good.” Miles meant it. Despite everything, his dad’s talent remained intact.
“It’s been a while since I went down there,” Arthur said, brushing his sleeve across his mouth. “My knees aren’t what they used to be.”
“Maybe we could go together. When you feel up to it.” Miles stacked their plates, noting the half-eaten meal. “Let me finish unpacking, and we’ll figure out what to do today.”
In the guest room—now his room—Miles scanned the walls and the twin bed. The walls were bare, save for a single watercolor print of a lighthouse. Dust coated the dresser, and the sheets smelled musty. A draft whistled beneath the gap in the window frame and through the curtains that had certainly lost their color years ago. The closet door hung open, revealing empty hangers and a single cardboard box. It wasn’t much, but it would do.
His visits had always been brief—holidays wedged between excuses to rush back to Atlanta, to whatever job was paying the bills.
Miles unzipped his duffel. Three T-shirts, two pairs of jeans, socks, underwear. That was it. Everything else was still in his truck—if there even was more.
When had it become so easy to pack his life away?
At the bottom of his duffel, something wrapped in a handkerchief waited. He paused.
Slowly, he unwrapped the small wooden box, its lid carved with a sunflower—his mom’s favorite keepsake box, and one of the few things recovered from the fire. His finger brushed over the scorch marks along one edge, a permanent reminder of that night.
The hinges creaked as he lifted the lid, revealing a velvet lining—once midnight blue—now a soft indigo. In the center lay the single object that had traveled with him to the fire station, touched before each shift and slipped into his pocket. The thing he’d clung to through sleepless nights. Pressed to his ear when his dad’s diagnosis had come. Gripped tight through the evening his career had fallen apart.
His breath steadied.
He reached for it. It felt the same—solid, smooth, real.
Just like that day on the beach. The day they’d scattered his mother’s ashes.
His thumb traced the ridges as he slowly turned the spiral shell.
Then—her voice. Small. Sure. Cut across the years:
“It’s magic,” the little girl with kind green eyes had told him. “From the ocean. It’ll help.”