“HEY, JAKE,” I SAID, HOLDING the phone to my ear, feeling like a complete idiot. “I’m not sure how this boyfriend-girlfriend thing works between us now, but I was just wondering what you were doing for lunch today since I know the clinic closed early, and I haven’t heard from you, which is fine,” I quickly added, “I’m not trying to be stalkerish or clingy. Just hungry, I swear. Okay. Bye. Oh, and I love you.”
I gave myself a giant eye roll, ending the call and shoving the phone in my back pocket.
“Way to go, Mols,” I said out loud. “That was smooth. He won’t think you’re crazy at all.”
Letting out a giant sigh, I roamed around the empty inn, feeling an odd sense of boredom. It wasn’t something I was used to, usually excelling in the art of keeping myself busy from dusk till dawn. But knowing Jake had gotten out of work early today, I’d rushed around the house, taking advantage of my guests early morning activities around town. I’d cleaned their rooms with gusto and finished all my tasks before eleven, hoping to make use of my boyfriend’s open afternoon schedule.
But, now, it was well past one o’clock, my stomach was growling, and I was short one handsome doctor.
Boyfriend.
I’d said it this morning, and he hadn’t flinched. He was my boyfriend, right? I mean, when you started talking about moving halfway across the country for someone, it was well past casual dating. It wasn’t like Jake and I could ever be called casual anyhow. We’d been voted Most Likely to Get Married by our high school class, for God’s sake.
And was it too early to say I love you out loud? I mean, we did. We always had. But to actually say it was different somehow.
Everything was just moving so fast. Too fast? I wasn’t sure.
Realizing I was walking circles in the living room, I decided to go ahead and eat. Waiting for a man was pathetic, right? And I had a kitchen full of amazing leftovers calling my name.
Heading into the kitchen, I was interrupted by the phone in my pocket.
Smiling, I reached behind me and grabbed it, expecting to find my missing doctor.
Instead, I saw a local number I didn’t recognize. Being a business owner, I didn’t have the luxury to screen calls, so I answered on the second ring.
“Hello. By the Bay Inn,” I greeted cheerfully.
“Molly? This is Henry Miller.”
“Oh, hey, Henry,” I replied, instantly recognizing the elderly restaurant owner’s voice.
I knew most of the local restaurateurs well, having made numerous reservations for my guests over the years—before and after I had taken over the inn. Henry though, I had a special place in my heart for him, as he was the sweet man who always stole my vegetables from Terri in a feeble attempt to steal her heart.
“What’s up?” I asked.
“It’s Terri,” he said, immediately grabbing my attention. “I stopped by her place just now to grab a few things, and she looked like hell in a handbasket. Said she visited Jake earlier this week and was waiting for lab results. Do you know where I can find him? I think she needs to be seen right away.”
“Did you try the clinic?” I asked.
“Yes,” he replied. “Gave the emergency number on the answering machine a try, too. But it just went to his voice mail. Thought I’d try you next, seeing as you two are an item again.”
Sometimes, I forgot how quickly word got around this place.
“Um, I don’t actually know where he is, but I’ll see if I can track him down. How bad is she?” I asked, now back to my circular pattern in the living room.
“She doesn’t look good,” he answered honestly.
I could hear the worry in his deep voice.
“Then I’d go ahead and see if someone could give you a lift up to the hospital. Emergency services will do an airlift if needed, but there are several locals with private planes or boats who call in favors in situations like this. Don’t wait for Jake. If it’s as bad as you say, he’d be sending you that way, too. I’ll text you a list of names to try.”
“Right. Okay.”
A silence fell over the phone line.
“Do you want me to take her?” I asked. “You don’t have to do this.”
“No,” he answered. “I want to. I mean, I need to. Terri is special to me even if she’s too bullheaded to notice. I’m just worried, is all.”
I smiled warmly. I knew the old man had a crush on my Terri. I knew it.
“Then, take care of her,” I said. “And keep me updated. I’ll let you know if I hear from Jake.”
“Thank you, Molly.”
He hung up then, and I looked around the room, so silent and empty. I bit my lip, full of worry. I felt useless, and I had nothing to do. Pulling out my phone, I dialed Jake’s number. Like Henry had said, it rang and rang and finally went to voice mail.
“Where are you?” I asked out loud.
Of course, no one answered.
I called around, asking anyone I could get ahold of if they had seen Jake. I asked the nurse, Betty, who worked at the clinic. She reported he’d left right around the same time as her, wishing her a good weekend, and that was it. He hadn’t been seen around any of the restaurants or stores.
I even drove by his parents’ house and the clinic to be sure he wasn’t in the middle of some sort of mental breakdown.
But he was nowhere to be found.
Returning to the inn to take care of my afternoon duties, I put out the usual spread of light hors d’oeuvres and wine for the few guests who’d returned while I continually checked my phone.
Nothing.
Finally, I got a text from Henry’s number.
Henry: We’re here. Found Dr. Jake. He was already here at the hospital. Praise God! Getting checked in. Call in a bit with updates.
Jake was at the hospital?
It dawned on me why.
Dean.
The only reason he’d drive all the way up the coast was to visit his best friend. He hadn’t spoken much about Dean since that day he offered me a ride to the hospital.
And I’d never asked.
I’d been so caught up in my own issues that I never thought to take a moment to walk in his shoes. Did he feel guilt over the accident? Remorse?
There had once been a time when we confided in each other completely. Hours and hours had been spent exploring every thought and dream. We had known one another inside and out.
But, now, it seemed like we might be skipping a few steps in our rush toward our happily ever after. Our night on the beach, I’d felt it—the pull back to where we’d once been. But we’d both severed it, refusing to discuss the hard topics in favor of what was easy.
Because of that love that still lingered so fiercely between us.
I didn’t know how long I sat in the empty living room after my guests retired to their rooms or ventured back out into town for dinner. I was lost, without a clue on what to do. I moved through the motions of the rest of the evening, going on autopilot as I prepped for the following day.
Until, finally, I had nothing left to do but wait.
It wasn’t until I was about to head back to my room when I saw the headlights from Jake’s car. What normally brought a jolt of excitement to my heart suddenly brought something closer to dread. It had been hours since I heard any news from Henry, and I couldn’t help but fear the worst for my dear friend Terri.
I watched from the stained-glass window near the front door as he made his way inside. He looked tired and weary, like the weight of the world had just been dropped on his shoulders.
I took a deep breath and opened the door.
Our eyes met. It was like staring into a deep well of emotion.
Pain, regret, sadness. It was all there.
He brushed past me, his fingers clinging to mine for the briefest of moments. He smelled of soap and disinfectant, his hands rough from meticulous scrubbing.
I gave him time to get settled. He did so silently, taking off his coat and dropping it off in my room. He returned a second later and hovered in the entryway, his tired gaze settling on mine.
“Have you eaten?” I asked hesitantly, taking a single step forward.
He nodded. “On the way back,” he replied.
Not on the way home. I noticed the difference.
“Can I get you anything?” I asked, feeling awkward in front of him for probably the first time in weeks.
He was standoffish and rigid, nothing like the man I’d laughed with under the stars.
“Something to drink would be great,” he said.
Glad for the distraction, I nodded, turning toward the kitchen. I heard his footsteps headed toward the living room. The old sofa creaked under his solid weight as I grabbed some iced tea from the refrigerator, pouring it into a large glass piled high with ice.
By the time I made it out to the living room, he was resting on the sofa, his head leaned back toward the ceiling with his eyes closed.
Was this what a typical day at the hospital back in Chicago was like for him?
Setting the glass on the coffee table in front of him, I quietly took a seat in the chair beside him, allowing him time to decompress.
Finally, he sat up, stretching his neck, and reached for the iced tea. He drained nearly half of it in one gulp. “Thank you,” he said softly.
We sat in silence as he finished his tea, and I pretended not to watch. Eventually, the quiet got to me, and I couldn’t wait for him to regain his ability to speak.
“Terri…is she…” I swallowed hard, tears stinging my eyes. “How is she?”
“She’s okay,” he said, finally turning toward me. It was like he’d suddenly remembered who I was, beyond the bearer of beverages. His hand reached out for me. “She’s fine. Promise.”
I nodded, my tears betraying my need to stay strong.
“It was a heart attack,” he went on, his eyes almost blank as the words fell from his lips. “She’ll be in the hospital for a while, but she’ll be okay in the long run.”
“A heart attack, but how?” I asked. “I thought you said she was fine the other day?”
“I thought so too,” he mumbled, the pain evident in his voice. “Nothing more than a urinary infection like every other old person in this town. But cardiac disease doesn’t always present like it should in women.” He took a deep breath. “And I missed it.”
The pit of my stomach dropped. “You couldn’t have known, Jake.”
He turned away, his gaze distant and without emotion.
“It’s my fault,” he whispered softly.
“What?”
“The whole thing. I’m her doctor. I should have seen it. She came to me, and I should have seen it.”
He turned around to face me, and I could see the haunted look in his eyes. I’d seen it once before in my life.
On someone who’d shared those same bright blue eyes.
Jake’s father.
I stood just then, realizing both of us could use a bit of fresh air. Taking his lifeless hand in mine, I pulled him upright. He barely noticed, so focused on nothing and everything in his blank, far-off stare. But he followed nonetheless as I led us toward the patio, in the direction of the water. The bay was still tonight, and like always, it gave me the strength I needed to carry on.
With his hand nestled between mine, I squeezed it tightly. “Jake, look at me.”
It took a few more times, but eventually, he did, turning his gaze toward me.
“Terri is fine, do you hear me? She’s still alive and kicking, and she will be for a long time. That woman has more gusto and stubbornness than a mule in heat. She’ll outlive us all.”
A weak smile bloomed across his face but died just as quickly. The change in setting didn’t seem to faze him at all. “I don’t even have her test results back yet. In Chicago, I could have had those tests run the same day if I needed to. Better yet, I could have sent her to the damn hospital ten minutes away, not three fucking hours. I’m useless here, Molly. Terri could have died while I waited around for those test results. And the worst part of it all is, me. In the few weeks I’ve been here, I’ve become complacent—leaving my phone in the damn car when I’m supposed to be on call, missing signs of an impending heart attack. I’m a fucking heart surgeon! I sent her home when I should have driven her to the damn hospital myself.”
My soul ached for him. For the boy who would always check on my scraped knees and twisted ankles. Jake had been a doctor long before he went to school or took the Hippocratic Oath.
“I know where you’re headed with this, and I won’t allow it, Jake. You’re an amazing doctor. This is not your fault—”
“Don’t say it, Molly,” he said, taking a few steps away from me. “Don’t say I’m not like him.”
“I wasn’t going to,” I replied. “But surely this isn’t the first time you’ve second-guessed yourself. We’re all human, Jake, even doctors. You can’t tell me there isn’t a single moment of your career you can’t look back at and wish you’d done something differently.”
“Of course. Dozens of them. I’m a perfectionist. I second-guess everything,” he said, his voice rising.
“Then, what is different now? Why is this moment sending you over the edge?”
“Because, this time, I care!” he shouted to the heavens.
All those emotions he’d carried through the door with him, so carefully boxed up inside him, broke open in that moment. The rage, the pain, and most importantly, the regret. He fell to his knees. That great big bear of a man I’d loved since I could barely walk crumpled to the ground and roared as the tears fell to the grassy sod below.
The sound echoing from his mouth, out of his lungs, destroyed me. I’d heard him cry only once—when his mom died. He’d sobbed in my arms as he told me the story, crushed under the weight of the news. Back then, I’d been holding a boy grieving over the lost years with his mother that he’d never get back. But, now, as I knelt on the soft green grass next to him, wrapping my arms around his shoulders, I was holding on to a man.
A man deeply crippled and heartbroken over his own mistakes.
Feeling my arms around him, he turned, eyes rimmed in red. He planted himself on the ground, like we had done as kids. I noticed the knees of his jeans were stained green as he stretched his long legs out in front of him.
“I can’t stay here,” he said softly.
“What?” My throat went dry as my mind tried to make sense of his words. Just twenty-four hours earlier, I had been flying high at the idea of him waking up in my bed, greeting guests, and making his mark.
And, now…
“I can’t go on like this, Molly. I wasn’t trained for this kind of life. I’m a surgeon. I thrive on chaos and speed. Sitting around and waiting for lab results while my patients are slowly dying? I can’t do that. I need to know I’m making a difference.”
“You are making a difference,” I pushed. “You saved Terri’s life today.”
“No,” he countered. “Henry saved Terri’s life today. If he hadn’t stopped by her house today, who knows what would have happened? And I couldn’t have done shit to stop it while here, on this godforsaken island.”
“So, you’re going to run because, suddenly, your patients have names and faces you know and recognize? So that you don’t have to feel anymore? Because we’ll still be here, Jake. We’ll still need prescriptions for the flu and someone to check on our lab results. The only difference is, it won’t be you.”
“Exactly!” he said with conviction. “I’m too close. Too close,” he repeated. “I can’t be the one to do this. I need out. I—” His voice cracked, fading into nothing.
We both looked out onto the black water. The moon above highlighted its tiny movements, making it almost shimmer before us.
“So, what does this mean for us?” I asked softly, turning away from the pristine view, as my heart slowly began to crumble.
His eyes explored mine. Those wild blue irises that had haunted me for years studied every inch of my face, as if he were searching for answers somewhere deep inside me.
“Come with me,” he finally said.
My chest tightened.
“Come with me,” he repeated, this time with a resolute clarity behind his words.
“What? I can’t just—”
His hands wrapped around mine as he shifted in the grass, pulling me closer. “You can, Molly. Come with me. Let’s not make the same mistakes of our past. Make a life with me in Chicago. You’ll love it there. We’ll eat at a different restaurant every night. My apartment is big enough for the both of us, and if you hate it, we’ll move. Hell, if you hate Chicago, we can go anywhere in the world.”
Except here.
He didn’t say it, but the words hung there, in the air like a puff of smoke.
Leave my hometown. Leave my family and career, everything I’d ever known, for the one thing I’d always wanted.
Him.
All I had to do was say yes.
I could see the light and excitement burning bright in his eyes. The word was right there on the tip of my tongue.
But I couldn’t do it.
So, instead, I kissed him.
I kissed him hello and good-bye, all at once. In that kiss, I gave him my heart and my soul and whatever else I had left.
He took ahold of my sadness, mistaking it for enthusiasm. With his hands on the sides of my face, he kissed me back just as passionately.
And, as tears of loss fell from my eyes, tears of joy fell from his.
I should have stopped it.
I should have told him it was the end.
But I was greedy and hurting and clinging to every moment I had, still wrapped up in his embrace. So, for a few more minutes, I let him believe in the possibility of forever while I let myself drown in certainty of our tragic end.
His smell, his taste, and the warmth of our bodies moving together.
We took our time in undressing each other. We used the moon as our night-light, the lazy waves as our music, and the grass as our bed. I let my head fall back, savoring every sensation of his lips as they left a wet path everywhere they touched.
Somewhere in the midst of our passion, our eyes met. His full of hope, mine void of any. He saw the truth in my eyes, the words I had yet to say.
“Molly, no,” he whispered, the hope draining from his eyes like a sieve.
My tears turned into tortured sobs as he pulled me closer, tightly squeezing me against him.
“I can’t let you go,” he said, stroking my hair between his fingers. “I won’t do it.”
Pulling back, I could see the conviction, the determination, the zeal in his eyes. If he couldn’t convince me with words, he’d do so with his body.
And, God help me, I’d let him.
Spreading me wide, his hands caressed every part of me. From the hollowed recesses of my collarbone to the tender flesh of my thighs, he made sure he left his mark everywhere.
Like a brand.
If only he knew I’d been his and his alone from the moment we met and every second thereafter. Even when it’d hurt.
No, especially when it’d hurt.
Because that was when I had known it was real. It was in those dark hours, when I’d cursed his name for not loving me enough to stay, that I had known it was true love and not some silly high school crush I’d eventually get over.
What existed between us was undeniable, and no matter how much it’d hurt to watch him walk away, I knew the happy moments we shared, it made all the pain worth it. It made it all worth it.
When our bodies joined this time, for the very last time, I closed my eyes and relished the feel of him inside me.
The power of every thrust.
The pleasure of each caress.
The unconditional love I felt in his embrace.
Our eyes met, his baby blues locked on to mine, as we made love. He didn’t beg, but I could see the uncertainty written across his face.
He knew I wouldn’t leave home.
Not now, maybe not ever.
And he couldn’t stay.
Just like before, when a heartbroken eighteen-year-old girl had watched the love of her life board a ferry and leave her behind, this grown woman would be doing the same.
How cruel fate had turned out to be.
But, like Dean had said that day in the hospital when I told him of my never-ending love for Jake, sometimes, you loved someone for as long as you were given.
A day, a month, or a lifetime.
Even if it hurt.
So, I’d love this man for a lifetime even if we were given only a fraction of it.
When it was over, I couldn’t bring myself to move. To do so would mean facing the reality of what was happening between us. So, I just let him hold me there, on the grass, with his heat still wet inside me as we cursed the hours and minutes for stealing our last moments of happiness.
Finally, when a chill began to crawl across the ground, Jake lifted me into his arms and carried us into my room. He gently set me on my bed before disappearing for a moment to grab our clothes. He dropped everything on the wood floor by the door and slipped under the covers beside me. He smelled of earth and heat. I snuggled into his warmth, afraid to close my eyes, for fear sleep would claim me.
“If my mom hadn’t died,” he whispered into the darkness, “if I’d stayed, what do you think our lives would have been like?”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “I guess I always thought we’d come back here after graduation and take over the inn and the clinic.”
“Would we be married?”
“Yes,” I answered. “Do you think my mom would let you live here otherwise?”
“My mom would have loved a beach wedding,” he said. “She always told me you’d make the prettiest bride.”
“Really?”
“Yeah,” he said softly. “That always followed some sort of safe-sex talk. ‘Don’t get that poor girl pregnant. She’s too pretty to be walking down the aisle in a muumuu.’”
I laughed, remembering how much I loved his mother. It had been a while since I thought of her in that way, as someone I’d lost rather than someone who had taken him away.
“I always pictured us getting married here,” I said. “Just friends and family out on the lawn with the bay in the background. I’d wear my mom’s simple lace gown, and you’d be waiting for me in a crisp linen suit. We’d say, I do, and exchange rings. It would be the perfect end to our fairy-tale story.”
“It would have been. But life didn’t work out that way for us.”
“So, what do we do now?” I asked. “I don’t know how to leave this bed, knowing I’ll never see you again. Will I ever see you again?”
“I wish I could say yes, Molly. I do. Because, leaving this bed, not knowing whether I’ll ever see your face again…” He shook his head, his eyes squeezing shut. “But you and I need to live. I see that now. We’ve spent twelve years apart, and what have we accomplished? You’ve cemented yourself to this place in hopes that I’d return, like some knight in shining armor, so we could make that backyard wedding fantasy a reality. Hell, you even tried to marry Dean in a desperate attempt to replace me.”
His words stung, but they were true. I might have stayed here at first because I had been afraid to venture out on my own, but then it’d become my home base, hoping eventually he’d return here, to his home, to me. And when he hadn’t, I’d tried to marry my best friend.
“And I’m the worst one of all. I ran away from home rather than facing my grief. I stuffed it so far deep inside me that, now, every patient I work on is just another faceless part of the job. And, to make matters worse, I chose to work on heart patients in some deranged attempt to connect with my dead mother.”
Silence fell between us.
“We’re total nutjobs,” I said softly.
“No, we’re just a little broken, and we’ve been depending on one another for far too long to pick up the sharp edges of our broken lives and put them all back together again.”
Tears stung my eyes as I nodded in agreement, nudging my head into his shoulder. “I don’t know how to move on from you.”
“Nor I, you,” he said.
Taking a deep breath, I pulled back, finding those bright blue eyes once more. “But we’ll try.”
A sad smile tugged at his lips. “We’ll try.”
“I used to write you letters,” I confessed, “when I was angry or sad or just plain missed you.”
“You did?” he asked. “But I never—”
“I didn’t send them,” I explained. “But it helped me stay connected to you, even when I couldn’t. Even when I shouldn’t. Moving on doesn’t require letting go of everything we shared. I realize that now. We can honor our past while creating a future.”
“So, you’ll write me again?” he asked.
“Yes, and you’ll do the same. As many unsent letters as it takes. I’ll be your Dear Diary and you’ll be mine. Tell me everything. Tell me nothing. But, knowing, somewhere out there, you’re thinking of me, even for the briefest moment in between your shifts at the hospital or before a blind date, it will make moving on easier.”
My heart burned, like fire tearing at my soul.
“For me, too,” he whispered. “And maybe, one day, we’ll be ready to see each other again with a pile full of unread letters and a lifetime of memories, and we’ll finally be ready to share something real together.”
“Even for a day.”
“You can do a lot in a day.”
“I’m never going to forget you,” I said, each word more ragged than the one before.
He swept the tears from my cheeks with his thumb, his gaze never wavering. “I’m counting on it.”
I didn’t know how long I lay in his arms that night, willing sleep away.
But, eventually, the night claimed me, and I awoke to the crisp morning sun peeking through the window. Birds chirped, and a truck drove by on the gravel road.
Life moved on.
I looked to my right, the place where Jake had been just hours earlier, holding me while I wept. The salty stains of my tears were gone.
And so was he.
All that remained was a single sheet of paper.
Mols,
I know we’re not supposed to send these letters we write to each other, but watching you fall asleep tonight has left me aching to leave you with something.
Maybe I feel guilty, knowing you’ll wake up in the morning and find me gone. Call it the pragmatic in me, but I think it’s easier this way. If I spend another day here, I’ll never leave.
And you deserve better than what I’ve become.
You deserve so much more, Molly.
Stop waiting for your life to begin and live it. Whatever that means to you, do it. Don’t ask anyone’s permission or opinion. Go be young and wild. Do all the things you were meant to do, and maybe, someday, we’ll find each other in the same place at the right time.
For the last time.
Yours always,
Jake
I crumpled up the piece of paper in my hand, hot, wet tears once more falling to the bedsheets.
What was I doing? Letting him go?
Again.
Racing around, I threw on my grass-stained clothes from the night before and grabbed my phone.
Jogging across the foyer in as quiet a fashion as I could accomplish, I snuck out the door and dialed my mother’s number. She picked up on the second ring, bright and happy, like it was noon instead of barely sunrise.
“Can you do me a favor?” I asked, attempting to mask the emotions tugging at my vocal cords.
“Sure, hon, anything. You know that.”
“Can you open the inn this morning? I need to go do something.”
She seemed a little taken aback by my abrupt request. But seeing as it was the first time I’d actually asked for something like this, it was understandable. Hell, even when Dean had been placed in the hospital, they’d had to nearly knock me out from driving back down here to make breakfast for everyone.
“Of course,” she replied in an obvious attempt to keep her cool. “Everything okay?”
“Yep,” I said, hopping into my car and firing up the engine. “Just need to go grab something from the ferry. Be right back.”
I didn’t give her a chance to ask any questions. I was sure she had a dozen.
Wiping the last remaining tears from my cheeks, I backed out of the driveway and headed out of town.
I hoped I wasn’t late.