Amy
“Mom!” I called up the stairs. “Come on!” I held my bag over my shoulder and grabbed my flip-flops.
“Honey, I know you’re excited to be back home, but honestly, I’m too old to be at a public beach.”
I rolled my eyes and tried again. “We went through this already. You are not that old. Let’s go! Time’s ticking, and you’re only getting older.” I could hear her sigh upstairs and then finally she emerged on the steps.
I had been home for a week now and finally convinced my mom that we absolutely had to go to the beach. She was doing better. Her relationship with John had never been stronger, and her newfound hobby of gardening seemed to be keeping her away from the kitchen table. She was still smoking, but I was working on that.
Seth was doing well. With his music, anyway. How he was, I wasn’t sure, but his music seemed to be everywhere now. I often wondered how different his life would have been if he hadn’t met my curly hair or knobby knees. Not that I had knobby knees.
His thank you section on his album was on my mirror as a reminder. “For Amy,” it said, “you made this happen.” And beneath that was where he had scribbled “I’ll be waiting.”
This was a bit extreme, if you asked me, but apparently he felt that way, considering the fact that his whole album practically displayed our entire relationship and the emotions he had trouble expressing otherwise. Not that I was any better at it, but I was getting there.
There was also the matter of the letters. After reading them several times, I wrote back. I answered all twenty-one of them and, unlike him, I actually sent mine through email. I wasn’t sure whether he was reading them or not since he didn’t email back, but I hadn’t expected him to. He was busy and so was I, and we had agreed that it was best if we focused on the matter of living our lives day to day, not worrying what, if anything, would happen next.
When we reached the beach, I took it all in again, the water I loved so much, all of my memories of time spent on this sand. I could still see my dad running along the shore like so many times before, and me, swimming to the rock. Lifeguarding, burning my skin while Paul played tricks on me and annoyed me. There were happy memories but also sad ones. You can’t erase all the bad and try to keep only the good. There’s a balance and the bad is needed to appreciate all the good. There’s never a shortage of space to build new memories. Whether they become happy or sad moments is partly up to you.
My mom walked ahead of me and set up her chair and towel. I stood where I was, watching her. I wondered if she felt some kind of peace or bond like I did and had so many years ago. I watched her, a new memory already being formed, and I had a feeling it would be a good one.
I scanned the shore, knowing it was still too early for some people to begin a day at the beach. Still, it didn’t surprise me at all when I saw that there on the sand, facing the water, was a familiar figure already there, waiting.