Betsy woke up early, her mind whirling with thoughts and concerns and the restlessness she always felt when she was away from work, away from the field.

Deciding she needed to get rid of some of the excess energy, she took an early ride on her old bike. She rode several miles—for well over an hour—and she did a lot of thinking and praying as she did.

She returned to her mother’s house tired, sweating, and a lot clearer in her mind than she’d been in a long time.

She was also a little sad. Sad but determined.

Her mother was awake, drinking tea and knitting in her favorite recliner by the window, when Betsy came back into the house.

“Do you want any breakfast?” her mother asked. “I can make you something.”

“I’m fine. Don’t get up.”

“Well, get a banana. You need vitamins after all that exercise.”

Betsy chuckled, but she grabbed a banana and a bottle of water before she sank into a chair next to her mother in the small living room.

She felt her mother studying her in a way that was very familiar.

“How are your knees?” Betsy asked.

“Not bad this morning. How are you feeling?”

“Good. I feel pretty good.”

“What are your plans for the day?”

“They’re pretty flexible. I can take you grocery shopping this morning, if you want. And then I’ll probably visit John this afternoon.”

Her mother made humming sound but didn’t reply in words.

Betsy tightened her lips. “Don’t start, Mom. Please.”

“I’m not starting anything.”

“I know what you’re thinking.”

“It wouldn’t bother you the way it does, if you didn’t know I’m right.”

Of course her mother was right. She almost always was. That was one of the conclusions Betsy had come to this morning. She sighed deeply and leaned back in her chair, closing her eyes as she admitted, “I know. I know. But John isn’t just my boss. He’s my friend, and he was pushed into this thing against his will. I can’t just abandon him.”

“No one is expecting you to abandon him. But you also need to do what’s best for you.”

“I’m going to. I mean, I need to think more about what that will look like, but I’m going to try to think of the future as well as what’s working for me right now. And you’re right. At the moment, I really am happy. I love my work, and I feel like I’m really contributing something important. I don’t feel alone because I have so much community with my team. With John. But if—when—John gets married, things are going to feel a lot different for me. I didn’t think I was… I was holding out any hope or daydreams or… I mean, I’ve never let myself think like that about him. But John said something to me yesterday that really drove things home to me.”

She hadn’t intended to spill so much of her personal feelings, and now she felt a little embarrassed about it—even with her mother.

“What did he say?”

Betsy shook her head, still feeling a pang of pain at the memory of John’s curt words the day before. “It was nothing really. He was annoyed and said something thoughtless. That I wasn’t his boss or his girlfriend and so I had no say on his life. He didn’t mean it to… hurt the way it did. It shouldn’t have hurt my feelings so much.”

Her mother frowned. “He shouldn’t speak to you that way.”

“I know. He felt bad right away about it. But it shouldn’t have hurt me so much. It just drove home the fact that, in some way, we’re kind of acting like a couple—just like you said the other day. Without any romance or… or anything between us, but still… I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it necessarily, but it’s not good for me emotionally.”

“I think that’s right, honey. I’m sure it’s a hard thing to deal with, but I think you’ll be better off if you try to… shake things up.”

“That’s what I’m going to do. I don’t know about my job. I really don’t want to give it up. But maybe I will. Or maybe I’ll find other ways to… to find the distance I need.”

“So maybe you don’t go see John every day?”

“I promised him I would. No matter what, he’s important to me.”

“I know, honey. But you’re just as important as he is. And you can’t keep visiting him if it hurts you.”

“Yesterday was just a fluke. He’s really a great guy. He would never hurt me on purpose.”

“Of course not. I know he wouldn’t. But he doesn’t have to intend it for it to happen. Men…” She trailed off, as if she second-guessed speaking her mind.

“Men what?” Betsy prompted, genuinely curious, despite her lingering angst about the decisions she needed to make.

“Men don’t always know what they do to us. And so they’ll keep taking what’s offered because we keep giving without getting what we need in return.”

For some reason, the quiet words caused a lump of emotion to tighten in Betsy’s throat.

She was thirty now. She was smart and organized and good at her job. She was practical and reasonable and generally made good decisions. She was content. She was happy. She felt like in most ways she had her life together.

And yet she still found herself in the same kind of emotional situations she’d been in all through high school and college. Accepting less than what she really wanted from a man, even if it hurt her.

Finally, her throat relaxed enough for her to say quietly, “I didn’t realize… I haven’t been yearning for him all this time. I haven’t been that silly.”

“I know, honey.”

“But I guess maybe it was always there at the back of my mind.”

“That’s perfectly natural and normal. Any other woman in your situation would probably have felt the same way. John is a good, decent man, and he’s quite a looker too.”

Betsy couldn’t help but giggle at her mother’s choice of words. “A looker?”

Her mother’s eyes widened. “Isn’t he?”

“Yes, he is.” Despite herself, Betsy was starting to feel better. She always felt better  when decisions were made, when she could see some sort of plan for her future—no matter what it was. “I can’t just stop seeing him all together for the next two weeks, though.”

“Of course not. But maybe you can start filling your mind with something else as well. Eileen told me yesterday that her nephew just moved to Nag’s Head. He took over a dental practice there. He’s around forty and was divorced a few years ago. She says he’s a good Christian man.”

“Mom—”

“Don’t Mom me. He doesn’t know anyone in the area. I’m sure he’d like a nice girl to show him around.”

Betsy groaned.

“It will give you something else to think about,” her mother added.

That was true. She had no desire to go out with some strange guy, but maybe it was a good idea to do it, just to show herself new possibilities in her world.

“Okay,” she said at last. “If you and Eileen want to fix us up and the guy is willing, then I’d be okay with that.”

Her mother smiled. “Excellent. You always were a very smart girl.”

A smart girl.

That was Betsy.

Smart. Practical. Organized. Reliable.

Basic.

Boring.

Not the kind of girl who guys daydreamed about.

***

She had a surprisingly good morning—shopping with her mother and then going to a cute sandwich shop on the beach for lunch.

She arrived at Balm in Gilead at about one-forty-five, and when she asked the glowering Zeke where to find John, she was told curtly, “Studio.” He pointed down a hall on the first floor, so she wandered in that direction.

She peeked into the rooms she passed until she saw John in a big room at the end of the hall.

It was indeed a studio, filled with several easels and a couple of big drafting tables. There were a few people working in the room, including John—who was standing in front of a canvas on an easel and scowling as he stroked a paintbrush across it.

She’d known that guests were required to participate in five creative activities each week, but she’d never expected to see John painting.

She walked over quietly, curious about what she would see on his canvas.

He turned his head and saw her, and then he moved forward to block her before she could see.

“Hey!” she objected. “I wanted to see.”

“It’s none of your business.”

“That’s not very nice.” She was smiling now because, despite his scowl, she could tell he wasn’t annoyed with her.

“Tough.”

“Why won’t you show me?”

“Because it sucks.”

“I’m sure it doesn’t suck.”

“It sure as hell does.”

“Why did you decide to paint?”

“What else am I supposed to do? I wasn’t about to join a singalong or ramble endlessly in a journal.”

She chuckled. “Don’t they have dance lessons?”

He scowled even more deeply at her, causing her to burst into laughter.

“Please let me see,” she begged playfully.

“Maybe after it’s done. I’m supposed to do this for ten more minutes or I can’t check it off for the week.”

She nodded, pleased that he was taking the requirements seriously. “I’ll go wander around and come back. But you have to let me see it when you’re done.”

She heard him muttering as she left the room, “I have to do no such thing.”

She was smiling as she went back to the hall. She found a chair in the lobby and killed time by texting Nancy, her best friend on the team.

It was two o’clock before she realized it, and she slipped her phone in her small purse and went back to the studio.

John was still working. He seemed so focused that she was able to sneak in silently and was behind him before he realized it.

He jerked and tried to block her view when he became aware of her presence, but this time she was able to see the canvas.

“Oh, it’s good!” she exclaimed.

“No, it’s not.” He curled up his lip as he gave up trying to block her view.

“It is good.”

“You don’t have to lie to me.”

“I’m not lying. You’re not some sort of secret genius painter, but it’s way better than I could do.”

She studied the painting seriously, her first impression confirmed the longer she looked at it.

He’d painted the beach—ocean waves, sand dunes, and lots of blue sky. There was someone in the distance, walking on the beach, although the figure was too vague to identify. If the painting was supposed to be purely representational, then it wouldn’t have been great—because so many of the lines were blurred or fuzzy. But the overall effect was quite nice.

“I like it.”

He was studying her face carefully, and he must have finally concluded she was speaking the truth. “Thanks,” he mumbled. “I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t have to.”

“I know. But did you enjoy painting it at all?”

He gave a half-shrug. “It wasn’t terrible.”

“I guess that’s better than nothing.”

She was smiling as she helped him clean his supplies and move the canvas to the other side of the studio to dry, freeing up the easel for someone else to use.

“Sorry I had to finish that up,” he said, as they left the room together. “I hope I didn’t waste most of the time you have to visit me today.”

The words were bland, perfectly normal conversation, but she felt her cheeks warming slightly at the implication that he didn’t want to miss out on his time with her.

Just another sign that she didn’t have nearly enough emotional distance with him. It wasn’t good for her heart.

She mentally squared her shoulders and gave him a casual smile. “I’m not really on a schedule today.”

“Oh. Good.”

“What did you want to do?”

“I don’t know. What do you want to do?”

It wasn’t like him to be indecisive. He nearly always had an opinion about things—often a very strong opinion. She wasn’t sure if she liked the change or was worried by it.

“What have you done so far today?”

“I ran this morning. And then I read, had lunch, and painted.”

She didn’t ask him what he read, since that had led to the argument yesterday. “Have you walked on the beach at all?”

His brows drew together. “I ran on the beach.”

“I know that. I meant walking—just for fun. To feel the sand between your toes. You painted a picture of someone doing that, but you haven’t done it yourself?”

“Why is that such a big deal? I like to run.”

It seemed so characteristic of him to choose to run—working himself hard, doing something that felt productive—rather than just relax and enjoy himself. It bothered her a lot. “Of course you do. But let’s go walk.”

He still seemed confused at her reaction, but he didn’t object. They walked out the back doors, by the pool, and then down the walkway to the beach.

The breeze was a little cooler than yesterday, but the sun was bright and it was quite comfortable. When they got to the wet sand, she leaned over and took off her sandals.

John just stood and watched her until she gave him a significant look.

With a sigh, he toed his shoes off and then bent over to pick them up. “What’s the big deal?”

“The big deal is that it’s nice and there’s no reason for you not to enjoy it.”

“Fine. I’ll enjoy it.” He sounded rather crabby.

She was torn between giggling and scowling, but the giggling won out.

They walked through the rise and fall of the tide in silence for several minutes, and Betsy enjoyed the feel of the breeze, the warmth of the sun, the tickling of the moving sand, the sounds of birds and waves. The beach wasn’t very crowded—dotted with the occasional walker, runner, or fisher.

It was a good thing she’d come to a few hard decisions this morning because otherwise she might get lost in the fact that walking on the beach with John like this felt private, intimate, special.

She wasn’t going to fall into traps like that, though.

“Is something different about you?” he asked after several minutes of silence.

She blinked. Could he possibly have read her mind and realized all the conclusions she’d come to that morning? “What do you mean?” It was mostly a stall question, but she had no idea what else to say.

“I don’t know. Something looks different about you. Did you do something different with your hair… or something?” He was staring at her, more questioning than admiring.

She’d tried out a little makeup this morning. Not for John. But because she’d wanted to see if she could pull it off, see if she could feel a little different about herself. She was startled that John had even noticed it.

Of course, he had assumed it was her hair. “I always wear my hair this way,” she said, patting her ponytail.

“Yeah. I guess so. Just something seemed different.” His brow was wrinkled, and she knew he was still trying to figure it out—but evidently the makeup was so subtle he couldn’t pinpoint what was making the difference. “You always wear your hair like that?”

She couldn’t hold back a laugh. “Yes, Sherlock. I always wear the same ponytail.”

“Why?”

He seemed genuinely interested and not like he wanted her to fix her hair in a different style, so she wasn’t self-conscious or defensive about the question. “I don’t know. It’s just easy and keeps my hair off my face so it doesn’t bother me.”

“Why would it bother you?”

“If I’m working or focusing or something, it falls down over my shoulders.”

“You’re not working now.”

“Yeah. I suppose.”

“What does it look like when it’s down? I can’t believe I don’t even know this.” He was still gazing at her face, but his expression had changed.

She couldn’t specify the difference, but her cheeks began to flush. “It looks like… hair.”

“Show me.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Show me.”

She reached up slowly to the elastic band and, feeling like an idiot, slid it out of her hair. Her hair was plain old light brown, but it was thick and smooth. It fell down around her neck and shoulders in a heavy cascade.

John’s face changed again, and she could have sworn she saw admiration. She’d never seen that in his eyes when he looked at her before. “There’s a lot of it,” he said, rather gruffly.

She smothered an ironic laugh. No way to hold on to silly daydreams when John was around. He always brought her back to reality very quickly. “What did you expect?”

“I don’t know. It doesn’t look like that much when it’s up.”

She sighed and smoothed her hair down. She was tempted to pull it back in its normal ponytail, but she didn’t.

“Did you always wear the ponytail?” he asked after a minute.

“Why are you all of a sudden obsessed with my hair?”

“What else do I have to think about?”

She thought about this and then nodded. “I’ve worn it since... high school?”

“Even back then?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

It was the same question he’d asked before, but she knew he wanted the deeper answer. She hesitated briefly before she admitted, “I guess I never thought I was very pretty, so I didn’t want to look like I was trying.”

His eyes widened. “Why did you think that?”

“Because I wasn’t. I mean, I wasn’t ugly or anything. I was just… plain. Kids would sometimes call me ‘Basic Betty.’”

“What? Why?” He looked almost outraged at the old nickname.

“It wasn’t an insult. Not really. I was just always… basic. Nothing special. So I didn’t want to embarrass myself by trying to look in a way I couldn’t really be. I don’t know if that makes any sense.”

“It makes sense. It’s just not rational.”

She slanted him an annoyed look. “I know it’s not rational. Insecurities never are. That’s how I felt. I never tried to work very hard on my appearance because I didn’t want to be disappointed when I wasn’t pretty at the end of it.”

“But you are pretty,” he said. The words were blunt, obviously not spoken to make her feel better.

“I think I probably improved with age.”

“Or you were pretty all along and just didn’t know it.”

“Maybe.” She was blushing again, but there was no way she could stop herself. She always did when she was self-conscious or embarrassed, and now she was both.

“I didn’t realize you were insecure,” he said after a few moments, softly, like he was speaking to himself.

“Everyone is about something. I’ve gotten better about it. It’s just that I’ve never thought I was… one of those women.”

“Which women?”

The ones men were attracted to, the ones men fell in love with.

She wasn’t prepared to give that answer to John, though, so she said, “The pretty ones.”

“That’s stupid.”

She rolled her eyes. “I can always count on you for kind words.”

He obviously knew she was being sarcastic, but he answered her seriously, “You can always count on me for true words.”

“Yeah. I know.”

They walked in silence for several minutes after that, each of them lost in their own thoughts.

After a long time, John murmured, “This hardly feels like the real world. Don’t you think?”

She turned to look at him and was hit with a wave of attraction at the sight of his brown hair and tanned skin in the golden sunlight, his blue eyes deep with the reflection of the ocean, his lean body warm and strong and right there.

She swallowed over the feeling and pushed it down. “What do you mean?”

“This feels so far away from the real world, all the things we normally deal with, all the… all the hard things. It doesn’t feel real.”

The words hurt her strangely. She raised a hand to her chest unconsciously. “It does feel far away from all that. But this is the real world too.”

He gazed down at her, and she had no idea what he was thinking.

She continued, focusing on the ideas rather than the sight of John so close to her. “The real world isn’t just the hard things. It’s the good things too.”

“Yeah.” His reply felt automatic rather than genuine.

“It is.”

“I know. Of course.”

She wondered if he really did know. He certainly didn’t act like it. In a way, she could understand, since he’d committed his life to doing anything he could to make the hard things better. Those were the things that would feel the realest to him.

But the result was he’d seemed to cut himself off from the rest, the enjoyment, the pleasures of life. She’d never realized it before—not the way she could see it now.

He smiled a lot and laughed a lot and seemed content as he did his job. It wasn’t like he lived his life constantly unhappy. But he couldn’t seem to let go, surrender, give in to simple enjoyments, if they didn’t have constructive purpose.

She wondered why she hadn’t seen it before.

It worried her.

“What’s the matter?” he demanded, after they’d walked in silence for a few more minutes.

“It’s nothing.” The denial was automatic, since obviously she couldn’t tell him what she’d been thinking. He would hate that she’d had such thoughts about him.

“I’m trying to do better,” he said, stopping again and looking down at her.

For no good reason, her breath caught in her throat. “What do you mean?”

“I’m trying to do better—in staying here, in… in down time. I’m trying to do better. I’m working on it.”

Of course he was. He was trying. He was working.

She wanted to do something, to say something, to address what she’d sensed in him. But there was nothing really she could say.

And it wasn’t her place.

He wasn’t her boyfriend. They weren’t in an intimate relationship.

He was her boss and maybe—sometimes—her friend. She needed to do better at keeping her heart in the right place.

“I know,” she said at last with another casual smile. “I’m glad.”

His brows had lowered, wrinkling his forehead, and he was peering at her face.

She turned away and started walking again.

He fell into step with her, and they talked about conversational things—her mother, their co-workers, the people he’d seen and met at the center.

She didn’t have any more of those deep feelings of intimacy or waves of attraction for him, so she considered the visit a success.