4. Harbor Lights
Chapter four
Harbor Lights
Lila was just finishing up on her Wednesday conference call when she heard the knock at the front door. When she opened it, Wade was standing on the other side with his hands in his pockets.
“Everything okay?”
“Yeah.”
He glanced past her into the house. Then back at her.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?”
Something in his voice made her step outside and pull the door closed behind her.
“What’s going on?”
For the first time in as long as she’d known him, Wade looked like he was searching for the right words.
“I wanted to know if you’d have dinner with me. Before you go." He paused, then quickly added, “Do you remember the old IHOP? Down by the marina?"
Lila blinked.
“You want to take me on a date to the House of Pancakes?”
The word hung between them.
Date.
Neither acknowledged it.
Wade laughed first.
“No. The IHop closed years ago.”
“Good. Because that would’ve been a terrible date.”
His smile deepened.
“It would’ve been memorable.”
“Only if we were sixteen again.”
“Fair point.”
For a second neither of them said anything. The breeze moved through the palms at the edge of the yard and somewhere down the street a lawn mower started up. Wade shifted his weight.
“So?”
Lila looked at him more carefully than she had a moment earlier.
The thing about Wade was that he rarely looked nervous. Calm came naturally to him. But standing here on her front porch with his hands in his pockets, he was nervous. Quietly, visibly, genuinely nervous.
“It’s Harbor Lights now,” he continued. “Same building. Different owners. Better food.”
“That’s quite the sales pitch.”
“I practiced.”
That surprised a laugh out of her. Wade smiled.
“I’d like to take you there for dinner before you go back to Charlotte.”
He waited for her answer.
Lila couldn’t remember the last time a man had asked her to dinner.
No. That wasn’t entirely true. She could remember. She just preferred not to.
“Yes,” she said.
Something softened immediately in Wade’s expression.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
He nodded once.
“Friday?”
“Friday works.”
“Six?”
“Six works too.”
“Good.”
He looked away toward the street, then back at Lila.
“I’ll see you Friday.”
“You will.”
He turned and walked to his truck.
Lila stood at the railing and watched him back out of the driveway.
The restaurant sat at the far end of the marina, perched above the water on weathered pilings that had been there longer than either of them could remember.
As Wade pulled into the parking lot, the sun hung low over the Gulf, turning the water molten gold. Sailboat masts swayed gently against the sky, their reflections trembling across the harbor.
Lila stared out the window for a moment.
“Every evening I tell myself I’ve seen this a hundred times already.”
She shook her head.
“Then the sun starts going down and somehow it still surprises me.”
Wade glanced toward the water.
“Some things improve with age.”
When she looked at him, one corner of his mouth lifted.
She rolled her eyes.
“That line sounded better in your head, didn’t it?”
“A lot better.”
He laughed as he climbed out of the truck and walked around to open her door.
The hostess greeted them immediately and led them through the dining room toward the outdoor deck.
The restaurant buzzed with quiet conversation and the soft clink of glasses, but outside felt almost separate from everything else.
Strings of white lights hung overhead. A warm breeze drifted in off the water carrying traces of salt and seafood and something sweet from the flowering vines woven through the railing.
Their table overlooked the harbor, the water stretching out below them as sailboats rocked lazily in their slips.
Lila stopped.
“Oh.”
The hostess smiled knowingly.
“It’s our best table.”
Once she disappeared, Lila lowered herself into her chair and looked out across the harbor. The sky had become a watercolor painting. Pink, gold, and lavender. The colors spilling into one another above the distant horizon.
“This is beautiful.”
Wade settled into the chair across from her.
“I was hoping you’d think so.”
She looked at him and something warm fluttered unexpectedly inside her chest.
“Did you request this table?”
His expression turned suspiciously innocent and he shrugged. “I might know a guy.”
“You know the owner.”
“I know the owner’s cousin.”
“You are the owner’s cousin.”
“Technicality.”
She laughed.
The sound surprised her. Not because it wasn’t funny, but because she hadn’t realized how relaxed she felt. There was no tension. No pressure. No wondering whether she was saying the right thing or trying to impress anyone.
It was just Wade sitting across from her, exactly as he’d always been—comfortable in his own skin, comfortable with silence, and making it easy for her to be comfortable too.
A server appeared with menus and disappeared again, but neither of them opened theirs. The sunset had become too distracting.
They sat quietly watching boats drift through the harbor entrance while a young couple walked hand-in-hand along the dock below.
Farther out, a pelican skimmed low across the water.
The marina moved at its own unhurried pace, and for a little while it felt as though the rest of the world had agreed to slow down with it.
“I used to think everyone else had it figured out,” Lila said quietly.
Wade glanced at her.
“What?”
“When we were young.” She smiled faintly. “I remember looking at adults and assuming they knew exactly what they were doing.”
He barked out a laugh. “Biggest lie ever told.”
“Right?”
She shook her head. “Nobody tells you that fifty feels exactly like thirty-five except your knees make weird noises.”
“My back would like representation in that statement.”
She laughed again.
There it was—that easy rhythm she’d forgotten existed. Conversation flowed effortlessly after that as they traded stories about the years they’d spent apart. They talked about his daughters and her work, the people they’d lost, the plans they’d once made, and the lives they’d built instead.
The food arrived somewhere in the middle of it all, though neither of them paid much attention. They kept talking as darkness settled over the marina and the string lights overhead reflected across the water below. Everything felt softer after sunset, closer somehow.
The server stopped beside their table.
“Can I tempt either of you with dessert?”
Lila immediately shook her head. “I couldn’t eat another bite.”
The server looked toward Wade.
“I’ll take a slice of key lime pie.”
Lila raised an eyebrow.
“You’re still hungry?”
“No.”
“Then why are you ordering dessert?”
Wade handed his menu to the server.
“Because I’ve known you since you were sixteen years old, and I’ve never once seen you turn down key lime pie.”
“That was thirty years ago.”
The corner of his mouth lifted.
“I’m willing to bet on it.”
The server smiled knowingly and disappeared.
“I am not eating your pie,” Lila informed him.
“Of course you’re not.”
A few minutes later the server returned carrying a single slice of key lime pie and set it between them.
Alongside it, she placed two spoons.
Lila looked from the pie to Wade, then to the spoons, and back to Wade.
“You planned this.”
“I ordered pie.”
“You ordered two spoons.”
“I believe in being prepared.”
She laughed despite herself.
Wade picked up one spoon and nudged the other toward her.
“I hate you.”
“You absolutely do not.”
Five minutes later they had finished the entire slice.
Lila sat back smiling. “That was your fault.”
“I accept no responsibility.”
The marina had grown quiet by then. Most of the other diners had already left, and the staff moved around them without rushing, as if no one wanted to disturb the peaceful end of the evening. Neither of them seemed eager to leave.
For a while they sat watching moonlight shimmer across the harbor. The silence felt different now, full instead of empty.
“You know,” he said quietly, “I’ve thought about taking you to dinner for a long time.”
Her heart stumbled. The words weren’t dramatic, and he hadn’t said them dramatically. Somehow that made them worse. Or better. She couldn’t decide.
She looked down at the table before finally meeting his eyes.
“Thirty years is a pretty long time to plan a dinner.”
His smile softened.
“Yeah.”
The marina lights reflected in the water behind him, and the breeze stirred a loose strand of her hair. Neither looked away.
For one suspended moment, it felt as though the years between eighteen and now had quietly disappeared—not erased, simply folded away to make room for whatever came next.
And for the first time since coming home, Lila found herself regretting that she’d be leaving soon.
Eventually Wade cleared his throat.
“We should probably let these people close.”
Lila glanced around.
The restaurant was nearly empty now. A server wiped down a table near the railing. Someone stacked chairs at the far end of the deck.
“Probably.”
Neither of them moved.
Wade smiled.
“Probably is doing a lot of work there.”
She laughed.
“A little.”
A few minutes later they were walking through the parking lot toward his truck.
The conversation had quieted but not ended. It moved comfortably between them now, picking up and drifting away without effort.
By the time Wade turned onto her street, the neighborhood was dark except for porch lights and the occasional glow of a television through a window.
He pulled into the driveway and shifted into park.
Neither of them immediately reached for the door handle.
The porch light cast a warm pool of light across the front steps.
“Well,” Wade said.
“Well.”
Another small silence settled between them.
Lila looked toward the Gulf beyond the house. The moon hung low over the water, bright enough to silver the tops of the waves.
“It’s too nice to go inside.”
Wade followed her gaze.
“Yeah.”
She hesitated. Then asked, “Want to take a walk?”
His eyes came back to hers.
“On the beach?”
She nodded. “If you’re not in a hurry.”
The corner of his mouth lifted. “I don’t believe I’ve been in a hurry all evening.”
They left their shoes beside the stairs and followed the path through the scrub.
The beach was nearly empty.
A couple sat farther down the shoreline near the water. Beyond them there was only darkness, moonlight, and the steady sound of the Gulf moving against the sand.
For a while they walked without speaking. The wet sand was cool beneath their feet, and the only sounds were the waves rolling onto shore and the soft rustle of sea oats in the dunes.
“How’s it feel?” Wade asked eventually. “The house being almost done.”
Lila considered it. She thought about the walkthrough. The rooms coming alive under the lights.
“Strange,” she said. “Good strange. I keep walking through it expecting to find something that still needs doing.”
“And?”
“And everything’s done. Other than painting the bedrooms. That should be satisfying but it’s mostly just disorienting.”
“I spent months waking up every morning knowing exactly what needed to happen next,” she said. “Call the contractor. Pick tile. Meet an inspector. Argue with Danny about budgets.”
“He lost most of those arguments.”
“He lost all of those arguments.”
“I stand corrected,” he said.
She nudged his shoulder.
He smiled.
“So now what?”
There it was. The question everyone kept asking, and the one she kept avoiding.
“I don’t know.”
The honesty surprised her.
Wade nodded. “Fair answer.”
They walked a few more steps.
Then she said, “Danny mentioned another property.”
“On Marlowe Lane.”
She looked at him. “You already know about it?”
“Danny mentioned it to me, too.”
“Of course he did.”
“It’s a small town.”
“I’m not—I haven’t done anything with it.”
“Are you going to?”
“I don’t know yet. He said it needs work—that it has potential.”
“Everything in this town seems to have potential,” Wade said, looking out at the water. “Maybe that’s why some of us stay.”
They walked another hundred yards before either of them spoke again. The shoreline curved gently ahead of them, waves rolling in and retreating across the sand with their steady rhythmic hiss.
Lila was looking out at the water when Wade reached over and took her hand. Not suddenly or hesitantly. Simply as though he’d been thinking about it long enough and there was no longer a reason not to.
Her breath caught, just slightly. She looked down at their joined hands and then up at him.
Wade didn’t say anything.
Neither did she.
She tightened her fingers around his as they walked back toward the house.
At the bottom of the stairs Wade stopped.
The porch light cast a warm glow across the deck.
“Thank you for dinner,” Lila said.
“Thank you for helping me finish my pie.”
She laughed. “Good night, Wade.”
“Good night, Lila.”
He stood there a second longer than necessary. Then turned and headed back toward his truck.