9. Jace
Jace
Ipush open the deck door. The orange end-of-day light falls across the lodge bar, catching the wood counter and the bottles lined up behind Yumi. The string lights are on between the palm trees. “Riptide” by Vance Joy plays from the speaker, and the upbeat song grates on my nerves.
After my lessons, I went back out to surf for over an hour, until it got too dark. I should have stayed in the water. It’s the only place my thoughts stop spinning.
And it didn’t work.
Every wave I caught dragged me back to the same place: her too-blue eyes, the surprise on her face—and my name in her mouth, let slip like a confession.
I shake my head. Evan’s already there, sitting at a high-top, a glass of soda in front of him. No alcohol, same as ever. He’s ordered a local beer for me.
I drop onto the stool across from him and take a long, cold pull. Evan watches me with that calm I envy as much as it gets under my skin. He waits.
“Jesus, Evan. You know who’s back?”
“Yeah.”
I set my beer down too hard on the table.
“What do you mean, yeah?”
“Ran into her last night. Flat tire on the highway. I drove her to the lodge.”
The stool creaks when I go stiff.
“Are you serious? And you don’t tell me? A text, Evan. All you had to do was type three words—‘Summer’s here’—and I’d have—”
“You’d have what?”
He doesn’t raise his voice. It’s worse.
“I wouldn’t have been caught off guard like an idiot this morning.”
Evan doesn’t take offense. He never takes offense—which is what makes him insufferable and irreplaceable.
“I didn’t have five minutes, Jace. I had a shit day.”
“Try mine.”
“You want the long version?”
I don’t want the long version. I want to stay angry. But Evan’s already starting, in that flat cop voice of a guy who’s seen too much bullshit in a single day.
“This morning, seven a.m., some guy on the waterfront calls me in a panic. Two sea lions sprawled out on his deck. Blocking his front door, won’t budge. He wants me to arrest them.”
“Arrest them?”
“His words, not mine. Spent forty minutes trying to convince two six-hundred-pound animals they’d be better off on the beach. One of them barked at me. Worse than my boss.”
I hold back a smile. Evan keeps going.
“Then three guys with GoPros climbed the fence at Star Park to do some urban exploring on the rides. Cole and I had to haul them out before one of those idiots busted his ass on a rusted-out gondola and slapped us with a lawsuit.”
“Again? That’s the third time this month, right?”
Evan nods and goes on.
“And to top it off, a fifteen-year-old kid with hypothermia on the beach. Tourist, no wetsuit, stayed in the water too long. I was on patrol when I saw him shivering on the sand. His dad was filming instead of calling for help.”
He takes a sip of his soda.
“That was my day. So yeah, the text—I forgot. Sorry.”
“Riptide” ends. Another track takes over, slower.
“And besides… it’s been six years, Jace.”
The number lands heavy. Six years since she vanished. Six years of carefully avoiding the subject.
“Nobody thought she’d come back.”
I don’t answer.
“What did you say to her?” Evan asks quietly.
I turn the bottle between my fingers. The wet label peels away.
“Nothing good.”
Evan doesn’t push. That’s why he’s my best friend—he knows when to back off.
I should do the same. Let the subject die, drink my beer, talk about something else. But the image comes back: the beach, the sun, Flip betraying me.
“That dumbass dog jumped all over her. She was on her knees in the sand, petting him. I called Flip, she turned around, and—”
I stop.
She didn’t have that body last time. Or that face. The eyes, yeah—that cold, clear blue that forgives nothing. But the rest… She’s become…
Evan watches me in silence.
“Then Maya showed up. She needed the first-aid kit.”
“Great timing.”
“Tell me about it. I didn’t even have time to… I don’t know. React. Do anything.”
“And Summer?”
“What about Summer?”
“Did she say something?”
Jace…
My name in her mouth. The way she said it.
“No. Nothing.”
Evan nods, but he knows me too well to buy that.
Behind us, footsteps cross the deck boards, followed by the smell of a cigarette.
Noah crosses the bar toward the shared restrooms, a bucket in one hand, a mop in the other, a lit cigarette in the corner of his mouth. He looks like hell—shoulders hunched, dark circles under his eyes, his coveralls rumpled like he slept in them. Maybe he did.
“Hey, Noah!” Evan calls.
My brother stops and turns his head.
“What?”
His voice is curt, but there’s no real bite to it. Noah’s just in a hurry, on edge. Then his eyes land on me. They harden, his jaw tightens. The usual wall.
My stomach twists. I don’t say anything.
“Guess who’s back,” Evan says.
Noah sets the bucket down and takes a drag off his cigarette.
“No idea, and I don’t have time, Evan.”
“Summer.”
The name hangs between us. Noah doesn’t move. His face doesn’t change—or barely. His eyelids flicker, nothing more.
“Great,” he says. “Since when?”
“Last night. She’s staying at the lodge.”
Two hundred yards from my trailer. Of course.
“Day off,” Noah says. “I wasn’t around yesterday.”
Technically, he was. Noah lives at the lodge. But he spends his days off shut in his cabin, sleeping or staring at the ceiling.
Evan doesn’t answer. I search for something to say to my brother, but I come up with nothing—like always.
Noah grabs his bucket and heads for the restrooms, smoke trailing behind him. His mop scrapes against the wood.
The unease stays, settled between Evan and me.
“One day he’s going to say hi to me. I still believe it,” Evan murmurs.
I don’t laugh. Neither does he.
Beyond the deck, the ocean is a dark line that blurs into the sky.
“What are you going to do?” Evan asks.
The question is simple. The answer isn’t.
I’m a guy who does things. I teach lessons, I fix boards, I drive the van, I take in abandoned dogs. I’m not a guy who waits.
And yet.
My beer’s warm. I finish it anyway and set the bottle down harder than necessary.
Six years… and now she shows up.