Chapter 10
It feels strange to re-familiarize yourself with things you thought you lost and would never have again. A week ago, when I woke up the day after the incident at the dog park and saw Riley’s Jeep parked at the end of the driveway, I froze. Once again, my mind began to race, leaving me wondering if when I opened my eyes that morning I finally woke up out of the nightmare. Maybe Nate didn’t die. Maybe there was no accident.
But when I raised my arm to shift the curtains more, the bandage pulled at my sensitive skin. And I remembered.
Nate died.
Riley left.
And while Nate could never come back, Riley did.
I still jump occasionally late at night if I hear the backdoor open and noises coming from the kitchen. I still do a double take every time I see a towel of his draped over the railing outside his apartment to dry in the sun. And I definitely still look at Riley sideways when he offers to help .
I haven’t taken the trash out.
I didn’t need to drop Lucas at school early on Monday, meaning I didn’t have to rush to the studio after for my class .
And now, it’s clear to Riley that I’m looking at him sideways again when he enters the kitchen through the backdoor. I can’t quite decide if the look on my face stems from how Riley’s dressed—in slate grey jeans and a white Henley—or the fact that he’s dressed in real clothes at all.
“What?” he asks, stepping around me to get a glass from the cabinet.
My eyes follow his trail, landing on the microwave’s digital clock. Maybe that’s it. I’m staring at Riley in disbelief because he’s early .
“Do you want coffee?”
Riley shakes his head. “I’m good. Just had to grab something."
“It’s early,” I tell him. There’s nearly an hour until he has to be at school which is less than ten minutes away.
I rinse out my mug and place it in the dishwasher when Riley steps back into the mudroom, returning with Tides’s leash.
“What are you—”
“Just borrowing him for a bit.” Riley clicks his tongue, calling Tides and clips on his leash. “We’ll see you later.”
Later?
I push off the counter and follow Riley onto the back porch. He’s heading to his Jeep, one of his surfboards sticking out from the backseat.
Riley opens the door, sliding the front seat so Tides can jump in.
“Do you want me to come?”
Riley puts his hands on his hips defensively. “To career day? Why?”
I’m actually not sure why. If Nate were leading this, I wouldn’t give it a second thought.
“I already got a sub for my classes,” I offer. “I don’t have anything going on this morning.”
There’s a million things I could busy myself with before I teach later today .
“Are you saying you want to come and babysit me?”
I shake my head and wave him off. “No, of course not. Go.”
“Harper.” Riley sighs. “If you want to come, you have ten seconds to get in this car.”
I only needed eight to run into the house and grab my bag.
Riley makes a left out of the driveway. “It’s a lot easier if you go the other way,” I tell him. “If you go down to Palm Drive then—”
“Thanks, backseat driver. I’m aware. But I need coffee.”
I whip my head to him. “I just offered you coffee. You could’ve helped yourself.”
You always do , I think to myself.
Riley remains quiet.
“What?”
“You make terrible coffee,” he says before adding, “No offense.”
I furrow my eyebrow. “You never had a problem helping yourself before .” I’ve seen Riley walk out of my kitchen with more of my mugs than I care to count.
“Maybe Nate used to dump your sludge down the drain and remake it.”
“He did not.”
“Did too. Ask him.”
I see Riley’s chest swell with air, how it stays risen as he holds it in like he’s afraid of the next breath.
I know that breath. I’ve held that breath.
It’s the last one you take when your heart refuses to accept loss but your brain has already reminded you. And worse, I know how painful the exhale is, how it feels to be slapped with that loss over and over again.
The fingers on my left hand twitch, fighting to reach out, to just touch his shoulder, to let him know, I get it . But like Riley, my brain tells me something different than my heart.
It tells me, don’t .
“He hated your coffee,” he admits in a soft voice .
Maybe I should be saddened by this, that after nearly a decade together, my husband never had the balls to tell me I make awful coffee.
Instead, laughter breaks from me and flows freely out the roof of Riley’s open-air Jeep and I smile, because that’s how sweet Nate was. He would’ve probably sipped whatever sludge I brewed up until we grew old and grey just because he hated to hurt anyone’s feelings, especially mine.
At the drive-thru, Riley orders coffee for himself, and without asking, one for me too. I accept it without even thinking about the jitters that will follow but I’m too preoccupied thinking about how he knows exactly how I take it, with just a splash of cream.
Tides doesn’t let me focus on that for too long. He juts his head between us.
“Oh, a pup cup for your friend.”
The barista extends her arm, holding a small cup. Riley can barely grab a hold of it before Tides covers his snout with whipped cream.
“Come on, man, you’re making a mess of yourself. It’s almost show time.”
I take the now empty cup and reach into my bag, pulling out a packet of wipes.
“Of course you clean him like he’s a baby.”
Forget all the elephants in the room I’ve yet to address with Riley. I haven’t acknowledged the dog in the car accompanying us to Career Day when Riley is a surf instructor.
“Why did you bring him?”
“You know, having a cop for a dad is sort of like having a superhero for a dad.”
I drop my eyes to my lap.
“Do you know what’s cooler?”
I feel Riley staring. “I have a feeling you’re about to tell me.” I sigh. “What? ”
Riley doesn’t tell me until I look up and meet his eyes.
“When your superhero dad’s sidekick is a dog who can surf.”
“Tides can’t surf.”
Tides can do a lot of things. He can open doors. He can sniff out a kilo of cocaine being carted up the California coast taped to the bottom of a garbage truck. But Tides in the water at the beach? His name was ironic. The ocean scared him, the crashing waves sent him into an anxious tailspin. He’d bark at people going in, as if he was giving them a warning to stay far, far away.
My stomach drops. Maybe he knew something all along.
“We got him in one time.”
“You did not.”
“Did too.” Stopping at a light, Riley takes his phone out, swiping at the screen before handing it to me.
My breath hitches when Nate steps into the frame, Tides held across the back of his shoulders. I instinctively want to reach out, to sink my fingers into the strong muscles of his back, to hold onto a memory I never had or was even a part of.
A familiar dull anger slowly washes over me. It’s another moment between Nate and Riley—and Finn, who I realize is filming. It’s another moment that isn’t mine to recall, to cherish, to hold onto so dearly. And now that I know what it’s only like to have memories of Nate, it’s devastating. Mine are limited. But Riley has so many more—the beginning, middle, and end.
The flat water on screen is nothing seasoned surfers would enjoy. But on this day, Nate, Finn, and Riley are there as friends. And friends always find a way to have fun.
Nate gets Tides to hop up on the board like he’s jumping on the couch before he gives the board a heavy push.
“ Up, Tides. Up!”
I jump when Tides flings his head to the front seat at the sound of Nate calling his name.
“Atta boy! ”
Nate hoots and laughs, cheering when Tides rides the small wave with a wagging tail back to shore.
I’m tempted to replay the video just to hear that laugh again, but instead pass the phone back. “When was this?”
“Last September. You and Caroline went away for that girls' trip.”
People who say you always regret the things you don’t do never lost someone they missed out on so much with.
“We should get going.” Riley taps the clock on the dash. We’re at Lucas's school.
I get out of the car, sliding my seat forward so Tides can hop out. “How do you plan to get a dog in exactly?”
Riley shrugs, pulling his board out. “If they gave me any trouble, I was going to say he’s my service dog.”
“Your service dog?”
“Yeah.” He takes Tides’s leash from my hand.
“Why would you have a service dog? I mean—”
“Requiring me to provide proof, and refusing me entry anywhere based on a lack of violates the American Disabilities Act. I’d be well able to seek legal discourse against the school board, and the city.” Riley smirks. “And considering I’m an attorney—”
I cut in, “You went to law school. That doesn’t exactly mean you’re an attorney.”
“No, but passing the Bar does.”
I stop in my tracks.
“When did you pass the Bar?” I shake my head, muddled with confusion because Nate never said a word. “When did you take it?”
All of the dozens of conversations I’ve had with Nate rumble between my ears. I never understood why Riley went to law school in the first place. I could understand deciding not to practice law. But I didn’t see how he was putting his degree to good—or at the very least, any use—running The Surf Shack .
“Does it matter?” Riley tucks his board under his arm. “Today I’m a surf instructor.”
Today, Riley isn’t just a surf instructor.
He’s something else entirely.
I couldn’t blame anyone for looking at us like we were two lunatics when we checked in at the office. After all, we had a surfboard and a dog in toe. But I’d do it all again if it brought the same joy to Lucas's face when Riley walked into the classroom. For once, I’ve never been happier to be second fiddle.
I let Riley and Tides steal the show and I swear, above the children’s laughter as Tides showed off on Riley’s cue, I swore I could hear Nate say, told ya so, Harper. Go easy on Riley. He’s a good one.
How can I say that anyone isn’t good when they go out of their way to not just show up for my son, but to make him feel like the coolest kid in the world?
“You know,” I begin as we walk out to the parking lot. “Since you’re now a fan favorite at the elementary school, maybe you should become an honorary member of the PTA,” I joke.
“Right.” A laugh rumbles in Riley’s chest. “I’m sure I’m exactly what they’re looking for.”
“Well, the single mothers, maybe.”
Riley stops walking. I’m about to clarify, to explain that I’m trying to complement him and say there probably are a few women on the PTA who wouldn’t mind having a handsome, single guy around but then I realize it’s me—I’m the single mother.
And Riley…
I shake my head, deciding his type of handsome would be best suited—better appreciated—by someone else. Someone who might be in the mood for the surfing guy in low slung pants who always looks like he just rolled out of bed and has a five o’clock shadow an hour after shaving, if he ever does. Riley is far from my type, far from Nate who was meticulously neat and clean cut, had manners and believed, like me, that if you’re not early, you’re late.
Riley was early today , I remind myself before quickly deciding that today is the exception, not the norm.
“Who’s that?”
I blink to clear my thoughts and wave back at Margot across the lot. “Margot. She’s the school counselor Lucas meets with to…help with things.”
We make it to the car and I find Riley pouting.
“Kids shouldn’t need counseling.”
“They shouldn’t,” I agree. “But Lucas does. I think it’s nice he has an outlet to talk about everything with. I still wish it was me, but…I guess I’m not cool enough for Career Day and not enough to confide in.”
I keep walking to Riley’s Jeep. When I reach for the door, he stops me.
“You are.”
I shake my head. “Are what?”
“Enough,” Riley tells me earnestly. “Of everything.”
Tides tugs at the leash and Riley opens the door so he can jump in, but I remain in place while Riley loads his surfboard.
“What?” he asks, finding me staring.
I press my lips together. “That might have been the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”
What I also mean to say but don’t is and I didn’t realize how badly I needed to hear it.
“Is that your way of saying, thank you, Riley ?”
I sigh. “Thank you, Riley, for saying something nice to me. And for coming today.”
“I’d do anything for Lucas.”
I swallow over the lump that has formed in my throat because I believe him. “I know. ”
Riley walks around the car while I climb into the passenger seat. Pulling the door closed, I get a glimpse of Margot before she walks into school.
That’s when I remember.
“I have a favor.”
Riley starts the engine. “Another? I just entertained twenty second graders for an hour. Look at Tides. He’s exhausted.”
“I wasn’t the one who asked you to do that.”
“You’re right. Your plan was to entertain them with stretching .”
I roll my eyes. “There’s more to yoga than stretching . You’d know that if you tried it.”
Riley clicks his tongue. “Oh. Right. Breathing too. Hard to remember to do that sometimes.”
Buckling my seatbelt, I turn to face him. “You can try to talk me in circles but I’m still going to ask you for a favor. It’s for me and Lucas.”
“Guess I’m saying yes to half of it then,” Riley says, pulling out of the parking space.
“I want you to teach me how to surf.”
The street is clear from cars and yet Riley fully breaks at the exit and turns his head to me.
“I want to teach Lucas,” I continue. “So, I’d like you to teach me the basics. You know, how to get up and everything.”
Riley returns his attention to the street and finally moves forward. “You can ask Finn.”
Chewing on the inside of my cheek, I tilt my head back and forth. “I know I could. It’s just…Margot said—”
“Does Margot surf?”
I furrow my brow. “I don’t know. Probably not."
“Then why do we care about what Margot says?” Riley reaches into the cupholder, pulling on his wayfarers.
“Because,” I begin, “she’s been meeting with Lucas and—”
“You already told me she’s Lucas's counselor.”
I’m a bit taken aback by his tone. “Well, since she is the counselor, she’s been trying to give me some advice on how to handle things at home.”
Riley scoffs. “And she suggested surfing?”
“No. She said it would be nice for Lucas and I to do something together that Nate loved. It might help him get over some of the things confusing him. And since Nate loved surfing and always wanted to teach Lucas—”
“Ask Finn,” he snaps.
I look at his injured arm sitting idly in his lap. “I know you still have to wear that. I didn’t mean we start today.” Clearing my throat, I take a deep breath. “I actually just thought it might be nice if you were involved too.”
Riley says nothing.
I’m trying to be the bigger person and include him.
And still, he says nothing.
All of a sudden, I’m embarrassed. Maybe it’s a stupid idea. Nate loved to surf, but he loved other things too. Like service. Animals. Lucas and I can volunteer at an animal shelter instead, but instead of involving Riley in that, I’ll keep it to myself.
I certainly won’t tell him the reason I’m asking in the first place is Lucas is afraid of the water. I plan to keep everything to myself from now on, and I’m doing a pretty good job at it because we’re almost home and I haven’t said anything else.
“I don’t think me teaching you is a good idea, Harper.”
I still don’t say anything, not even when he pulls into the driveway and I get out of the car, unclipping Tides’s leash so he can roam the backyard. His paw crunches against something at the foot of the seat and I reach down, picking up a crumbled paper bag.
From the florist.
Folding it, I shut the door and hand it to Riley.
“I don’t think you buying me flowers because my husband can’t anymore is a good idea.”
I shut—alright, slam —the door and make my way to the porch .
“You never had an issue with it when he was deployed.”
I stop, turning slowly.
“That was you?”
Again, Riley says nothing. But his silence is enough of an answer for me.
I turn back, whistle for Tides and head into the house.
And this time, I lock the door behind me.