Sky, waves, the mist of the sea. A grey horizon stretched wide in front of me. I’d started my day early, packing a dry bag and picking up the single-person sea kayak from Mama and Dad’s garage.
In a couple of days, I’d drive up to Austin to sort out the apartment, and help Cole with the last couple of things before his flight. Then I’d return to Rockport for my last couple of weeks working for Uncle Bill.
And then? Then I was on my own.
To mark this long-awaited transition, I was kayaking out into the Gulf of Mexico to watch the sun rise on the last day of the year. There was a mild chop, so paddling took some concentration, muscles stretching and pulling across my back. The morning dawned cold and overcast; sunlight crept slowly across the low clouds. Finally, I rested the oar across my lap and uncapped my thermos of green tea, watching for hints of orange or pink to peek through the sky. The colors were slow to emerge, but as I sipped the slightly bitter brew, I began to make out more waves in the distance. The salt-brine scent of the Gulf was getting stronger, or my senses were waking up. I was close enough to still find the lights of Rockport and Fulton behind me, but not far enough to make out any of St. Jo ahead of me.
A very in the middle place to be.
But not a bad place. I sat there for a while, sipping my tea and watching the world come alive around me. The sun rose higher in the sky, eventually burning through the clouds and painting the waves with gold. Schools of fish darted just below the surface. A pelican soared by, low over the water.
Time seemed to slow down as I sat there, lost in thought. What would the next year bring? I was finally able to imagine some shape to my journey. And I knew what I would be missing, which was another kind of shape entirely.
I pushed away the melancholy, just like I’d pushed away every urge to text Karl back. To keep discussing round and round the same problems.
Eventually, I paddled back to shore and pulled my kayak up onto the beach. Shaking out my arms, I looked back from where I’d come. The day was still cloudy, but the grays had given way to purples and whites and oranges.
While hefting the boat to carry it to the car, I barely had time to brace before a tumult of golden fur raced across the sand and barreled into me.
“Parsley,” Karl called from the parking lot. She wasn’t paying him much mind, except for how she was guiding me towards him. And he was approaching me in return.
“Karl.” I sounded cautious, which irritated me. I didn’t like having reason for caution.
“Sorry, hi. I wasn’t trying to ambush you. Do you want help with the kayak?”
I shook my head. I’d grabbed the closest parking spot to the launch pad, thanks to no one else getting up so early on a cold-dark December morning. Parsley kept pace with me as I got the kayak onto my roof rack, so I was extra-careful to keep us both safe from falls.
Instead of tying down the boat, I turned and crossed my aching arms across my chest. “What is this, if not an ambush?”
All those wisps of golden sun found their way to his face and hair. He gleamed like a living statue, and I resisted another urge, curling my fists so I wouldn’t touch him.
“We were driving out to the airport park. I promised her a run on the dunes. But then I saw your car, and … just stopped. It was like I crashed landed in the parking lot, and I needed to be still and get my bearings for a sec. You weren’t in your car, so we’ve been walking the beach. Waiting. Hoping.”
I crouched to pat Parsley. “It sounds a little like an ambush.”
From down at sand level, I watched him shift back to lean against the hood of my car. “Yeah, I get that. It is an ambush. It just wasn’t my plan to track you down. Not yet. Not like this. If I’d planned—”
I gazed up his body, clad in jeans and a flannel shirt I knew to be nearly as soft as Parsley’s ears. Slowly, I rose and faced him, setting a hand on that comforting warm curve of the dog’s head. “Not yet?”
He sighed, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “Yeah. I wanted to do this right. You know? But it’s been weeks, and I’ve missed you, and there was your car, like a beacon I couldn’t ignore. Plus, Parsley really wanted to say hi.”
“Parsley did?” The question came out more tenderly than I’d intended, but I couldn’t take it back now.
She wagged at me as if to prove Karl wasn’t using her to deflect whatever this was. I scratched her ears, directing my reluctant smile entirely at her.
“No, not just Parsley. I miss you. I said that, but you can’t imagine how true it is. I miss your touch, and your determination, and the joy of sitting with you over a meal. I miss singing with you. How you curse freely. The color in your hair. I miss your strength, Margo. Your kindness.”
Good thing I’d lifted the kayak to the roof already. My whole torso felt wobbly. Under my rash guard I was all goosebumps. I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t even try.
Karl, though, had all the words. “It’s not that my house is too empty now. It’s not that you’re a generic beautiful woman and I could just go out and find a—a convenient replacement. There’s no convenient replacement for you, because you’re not convenient, Margo. You are so inconvenient.”
I had to laugh. “Karl.”
“That sounds wrong, but it’s also so true. You’re perfectly inconvenient, and the past couple of weeks without you have only shown me exactly what a Margo-shaped piece is missing from my life. You don’t need to fit into my pattern, because, and I didn’t even realize I was doing it, I threw out that puzzle. It wasn’t right for my life. It didn’t make room for you as you are, but more than that—it’s not who I am anymore. You talk about destinations as bad because they’re static, and what I figured out I did was make my destination so fixed in place I couldn’t see how I’d trapped myself in it.”
“Karl.” I wasn’t laughing now. I closed the distance between us. “This is the sweetest ambush, but it doesn’t fix everything. I got this job—”
“I heard. Congratulations.” He tried threading his fingers through my ocean-thick hair and failed, but his still managed to slip his palm around to cradle my neck. The familiar heat of his body near mine grounded me.
“How’d you know?”
On a huff of air, he tilted his forehead to mine. “Quiet Grace texted me. She really likes to remind us that not speaking much doesn’t mean she’s not opinionated.”
I got my hands on that soft shirt. Traced the hard muscles of his upper arms. “She really is.”
“She’s the one who told me about your job, too. It’s great, Margo. Are you excited?”
My heart was lurching towards his. I swallowed. “It’s all the things I said I wanted.”
Trust Karl, who could hear one flat note in a chorus, to catch the hitch in my words. His own voice was low and rough when he asked, “That you said you wanted, or that you do want?”
I waited before answering. Not because I didn’t know the answer, but because we weren’t really talking about who worked where. Those logistics only mattered if we’d addressed everything underneath them.
“I’m not taking the job, not until I know if there’s a way forward for us, too. I’ve been round and over it, and I don’t know how it would look, but maybe we can figure it out together? And I don’t mean eight months of long distance or constantly flying between the tour and Rockport, if that’s the thought that made your eyes light up. We need better plans, and I still don’t want to settle for this town.”
He nodded. “I understand. And … yes, on figuring it out together. I want that chance with you. The chance to be your partner.”
I rushed out more concerns. “And it’ll be years before I’m ready to have kids. If I got pregnant today, I’d terminate. I’m not going to want to recreate the big families we come from. All credit to my parents, but six children is ridiculous.”
Karl’s smile broke across his face as bright as sunlight on the waves. “Agreed. But Margo, you might find your life is full enough without children. Or maybe we’ll find we can’t have kids, can’t for whatever reason expand our family past the two of us.”
“The two of us, and my brother and sisters, and your siblings, and our cousins, and my godparents, and our parents, and my brothers-in-law and their managers, and your sister’s teammates, and the Graces, I’m sure.”
“And Parsley.”
At her name, the dog wedged her nose between our legs. I wiped dry my cheeks. “And Parsley.”
Karl closed his eyes, then opened them and let me see every feeling shining from their depths. “Margo, I love you.”
I didn’t need to wait before answering him. I kissed him once, fierce and firm. “I love you, too.”