The sun beat down in long streaming rays, hot and bright. Her breath caught. If she didn’t know better…but it couldn’t be. Jack was gone. “It’s not him.” She slowed, trying to catch her breath.
Hailey screamed for him again. “Daddy!” Not a panicked scream, but a squeal of delight.
“No! Hailey, stop. Please stop.” She watched as Hailey flung herself at the stranger. Her arms wrapped around his waist, her face against him as if she were clinging for life.
“I’m so sorry.” Amanda uttered the words, but her brain couldn’t keep up.
“Daddy, I’ve been waiting,” Hailey said.
The man squatted down, his knees dipping into the water as he put his hands on her daughter’s shoulders. “Hailey?”
Hailey wrapped her arms around his neck. “I knew you would come back.”
He placed his large hand across her back, raising the other with his palm up.
Don’t you touch my daughter. Her breath seemed to solidify in her chest.
The man’s eyes locked with hers.
She stumbled to a stop as the familiar face registered. She took a step back.
“Amanda.” He stood, with Hailey still hanging on him. “It’s you?”
She stood there, confused and trying to grasp what just happened. She knew it wasn’t Jack, but she clung to his name, his familiar face.
Just then Maeve came up to them, her hand tightly holding Jesse’s. “What’s happening?” Alarm etched her face. “I was coming up the beach from the house when—”
“I don’t…” Amanda closed her eyes. Tears streamed down her face as she huffed, trying to catch her breath. She stepped back, shaking her head.
Paul Grant stood there looking at her.
“Oh my gosh.” They were the only words she could string together. He looked the same. The hair, the tan. Wasn’t like she hadn’t seen him in just shorts and sweaty hundreds of times before. They’d been inseparable: her, Paul, and Jack.
“Amanda, I didn’t know—”
Amanda snatched Hailey from him. She wrapped her arms around her, rocking her. “You scared me to death. Hailey, that’s not Daddy.” She breathed in the familiar scent of her baby’s hair. “Don’t ever run from me again. You’re okay. Shh.”
Hailey cried quiet tears. “I thought…” Her body lay against Amanda, soft like a rag doll.
“I know, baby. It’s okay.”
She could feel him still watching them. “You’re okay. It’s Paul. Do you remember? You were so little.”
“What is going on?” Maeve demanded an answer.
“I was a friend. Am a friend of theirs…hers—”
“He was the best man in our wedding.” Amanda stared at him, still hardly able to blink.
“Thank goodness.” Maeve let go of Jesse’s hand. “What a small world. You can’t be too careful these days. Are we okay here?”
“Yeah.” Amanda nodded, swallowing hard. “Hailey, honey, it’s Paul. See?”
Her daughter slid off her and stood, facing Paul. “I thought it was Daddy. I’ve been praying so hard for him to come home so we can be happy again.”
Amanda’s heart froze right there. In that moment, it seemed to fall into a thousand shards around her. Hailey wasn’t doing okay. She felt Jack’s absence, her sorrow. For all the efforts to protect them from the grief she was trying to survive herself, they still had to go through it too.
“Hailey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to get you all excited…” He held his hand to his heart. “Amanda, I had no idea. I didn’t know you were…”
“How could you? I didn’t tell anyone.” She inhaled and then threw her arms around his neck. “Paul, I can’t believe it’s you.”
He looked confused. “I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”
“I live here now.”
“It’s so good to see you,” he said.
“It’s really you.” She’d wondered what she’d say to him if she ever saw him again, how she could apologize for her behavior. “I’m so sorry I was unkind. It wasn’t your fault.”
“I wanted to call you a hundred times.”
“I don’t blame you for not calling. I told you not to. How can you ever forgive me?”
“Please don’t push me away again.” He held his arms out to Hailey. “Hailey, do you remember me? You were my little Lightning Bug. Remember?”
Hailey nodded slowly but inched over and clung to Amanda’s legs.
“I can’t believe how big Jesse has gotten. He’s the spitting image of Jack.”
“He is.” Amanda looked at Jesse standing there next to Maeve. “I’m sorry. Paul, this is my friend Maeve. She lives up the beach from here.” Amanda gestured between the two. “Maeve. Paul.”
Maeve gave him a nod. “I know Paul. That was quite an entrance.”
“Not intentional. I promise.”
Amanda shook her head, then explained to Maeve. “Between the two of them, Paul and Jack, Paul was always the quiet one. They were best friends when I met them.”
Paul looked concerned. “Hailey, are you okay? Jesse, do you remember me?”
Jesse shook his head.
Amanda held out her hand. “Come here, Jesse.” She took her son’s hand in her own, then turned back to Maeve. “There was a time when the three of us—Paul, Jack, and me—were always together. We’ve shared a lot of memories.”
“We have.”
“You looked like Jack jogging up that beach.” She lifted her other hand, gracefully outlining the shape she could still see so vividly in her mind. “The silhouette. The way you move. I mean, the sun was behind you, but yeah. I thought…I mean, for a second…” She stood there blinking, not a single word coming to her, just that image. So much like Jack.
Maeve broke the silence. “Would you two like to catch up? I could take the kids back to my house or sit with them at yours. I’d be happy to do that. Hailey and Jesse, would you like to spend some time with me so your momma can visit with Paul?”
Hailey walked from Amanda to Maeve, never turning her back on Paul, as if she thought he might disappear. “Yes ma’am.” She took Maeve’s hand and then grabbed Jesse’s with her
