“Dude! So good to see you.” Anthony grabs me up, slapping my back in a man hug that leaves me choking for air.

Alice, his yellow lab and also the office mascot, bumps into my legs as her tail goes a mile a minute. “Good to see you too, man. Happy to be back. Hey everyone.”

I wave to the room, with its twenty employees sitting in various positions or noshing on the bagels I just put down on a communal table. The place has surely grown since my great-grandfather started it. He’d built the company with only three employees: himself and another tour guide who would load up a dozen people in a Jeep and take them out to see the horses, and a receptionist who helped with bookings. Over the years, my grandfather and father have expanded to allow eight full-time tour guides, a marketing team, a social media coordinator, three sales members, three receptionists and an office manager.

“Still haven’t found a razor I see.” Diane, the North Carolina Wild Horse Association’s longest tenured employee, besides my father of course, winks at me.

Her salt and pepper hair is the same as I always remember it, but her spunk for life and passion for this job, even in the twenty-seven years I’ve known her, has never waned.

"I actually happen to like this look on me. Makes me more manly. More capable to oversee this unruly lot." I stretched my arms wide and pointed to the employees in the room.

She rolls her eyes. "I'll still swat your head with my newspaper and tell your father. Don't forget that."

Thing was, she really did scare the crap out of me.

"Are you coming in here to be some new overlord?" A voice from the back pipes up, and I smile, seeing our lone IT and social media wizard.

Melissa has been with the association for three years, and she's my dad's favorite person, not to mention employee. She always has fresh ideas, is positive in the workplace, and definitely isn't bad on the eyes either.

Blake's face pops into my head, the way she stared so desperately out at the setting sun. As if it was the one cure to her loneliness. And I knew she was lonely. Because I felt the same empty, hollow rattling in every crevice of my body as well.

“Listen, y’all … I’m not here to take anyone’s place, or to pull rank. I’ve been quietly helping with the business for a long time, learning from my father. I know you all know exactly how to excel at your jobs, and that you put that to practice. I’m an animal psychologist for God’s sake, not a businessman. I’ll be here, to help, to give advice, but this is your company too. Some of you have been here longer than I have. So please, it’s business as usual.”

“You’re damn right I’ve been here longer than you. Wiped your damn diapers, boy.” Diane plugs her nose like I stink.

The whole office cracks up, and I may or may not be blushing.

Melissa passes me on the way to the printer and pats my back. “Sounds good, boss. In that case, how about you see some of the business? I’m going out to a meeting this afternoon in town, and wanted you to tag along.”

“Of course, I’m going to get up to date with all of you this week about what you’re working on. Where is lunch?”

“The Crab House, of course. Come on, I’ll get you some soup.”

Last time I’d been home, Melissa had offered to take me to lunch since she had been relatively new to the company. I’d been going to the Crab House, an Outer Banks institution, for years … but had never gotten the crab bisque for some reason. Well … it was a religious experience and she was there to witness it. Funny, I think Dad had been trying to secretly set me up with her. Sure, she was pretty … but I hadn’t been able to think about a woman in that way in a long time.

Ten years to be exact.

“Awesome, I’m in. But only if you’re buying.” I flirt a little, because my personality leans toward it and because I want to keep a friendly environment in the office.

She laughs, her auburn curls bouncing with every facial expression. “Well, technically it’s a business lunch. And since you’re the boss man now, it’s on you!”

* * *

An hour later, I’m sitting across from Melissa at the best local spot. Even in the off-season, it’s packed, simply because the locals know how good the food is. They even put up with it in the summer, when the line for a table is around the block.

We order drinks, a water for her and a beer for me, because why not? I’m back in the Banks, and I feel both elated and confused about it.

“So who is this meeting with?” I pop a piece of calamari in my mouth, savoring the freshest seafood I’ve had in months. A Tom Petty song plays softly in the background, and I’m transported to the easier times of summer.

Boston is no joke when it comes to good cuisine, but there is just nothing like the seafood joints in my hometown.

“A new graphic designer, she’s local. I’ve only spoken to her through her email form on her website, and I want to feel her out before I tell her exactly what the job is. Sometimes people are weird if you tell them you work with the association, like it’s double the amount of pressure. I mean, I get it. The horses are legend around here and everyone wants to protect them while also promoting our area.”

She talks with her hands, an adopted behavior from her Tri-state area upbringing.

“Got it, I agree with you. Going into meetings blind, with no expectations, sometimes helps both parties. Do you have any of her work?”

Melissa pulls out her iPhone and scrolls through some apps before opening a folder. “Here, she’s done work for a lot of different companies, both here and throughout the U.S.”

I take the phone, scrolling through the images. This girl is good, whoever she is. The graphics pop and draw you in, and I find myself really wanting to stop by the local ice cream store or the clothing shop around the block. Her designs include the perfect amount of salesmanship, but are subtle and … beautiful. I’m suddenly anxious to meet her.

“These are great. You really know how to find good talent, huh?” Melissa had tripled our social media following since she came on board.

“That’s why you pay me the big bucks.” She snorts, because we both know she could make double the salary somewhere else. But our company is run like a family, because we are one, and you can’t beat the relaxed atmosphere and weather down here.

Some days, I question why I ever left. And then the storm cloud that is never far from my head moves back in, making me all too aware of why I fled.

Five minutes pass as we wait, talking interspersed with noshing on some appetizers.

“And here are your other guests, Miss.” The waiter shows up beside me, and I turn my head to see the graphic’s whiz Melissa has schedule this meeting with.

But the only person moving to sit down at our table is Blake.

Her clean, apple scent hits my nose, transporting me back to a blanket on the beach when we were sixteen. My body is stock still, like if I move even a hair on my head, she’ll bolt like a skittish animal.

“It’s so good to meet you!” Melissa extends a hand, and Blake, who hasn’t looked across the table yet, glances over at me.

And freezes. She’s halfway into the chair next to Melissa, her hands gripping the arms of the wicker seat, her pale blue eyes locked onto my face. Whispers of memories float between us, invisible like spiderwebs, trapping us slowly in the haze of words we can’t say.

“Uh-huh.” Melissa coughs and the trance is broken, my eyes flitting to my employee as she gives me a what-the-fuck expression.

“Hi.” I can’t help but turn back to Blake, who has collapsed into the chair as if holding herself up and being in the same airspace as me just uses too much energy.

“Hi.” Her eyes look somewhere over my shoulder, the contact too painful to make.

But I’ve heard her voice, and my skin tingles with recognition. It’s been so long since that tone hit my ears, playing music only made for me.

“Do you two … know each other?” Melissa’s voice is awkward, and no one budges.

“Did you tell her to get me here?” Stone, hard as a boulder. That’s the tenor her voice takes, and it makes me flinch. Blake’s face is impassive, so much more jaded than the carefree girl I once knew.

“Absolutely not, I swear. I would never … I would have never come if I knew.” She looks like I’ve slapped her with my answer, and I realize it sounds terrible. “I mean, not that I don’t want to see you. God, that’s all I want to do.”

Agony radiates through my body at being so close yet so far from her. It’s like she’s oceans, eons, away. The connection we once had was so violently severed that I can’t read her the way I used to, can’t intuit her entire thought-process with just the raise of a perky blond eyebrow.

“Should I … do you need a minute?” Melissa chimes in again, having no idea that the world has just crumbled down on Blake’s and my head.

“No need, this was a mistake. Sorry for wasting your time.” Blake says this to Melissa, grabs the bag that was hanging on the back of her chair, and bolts out of the restaurant.

“Fuck.” It only takes me a second before my chair is scraping the linoleum, and I’m running after her.