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“I don’t know what I believe anymore,” I said truthfully.

She nodded, staring at the coffee mug in her lap, her hands wrapped around it.

“What about you?” I asked quietly. “Do you believe in signs, fate, karma and all that stuff?”

Several beats of my heart later, she shrugged. “I don’t know. I think I’m kinda in the same boat as you, to be honest.”

She seemed lost, Bridget had said. I could see now how accurate that first impression was. She gave off an air of vulnerability so thick, I felt like I was wading through it. I had a hundred questions I wanted to ask her, but the timing was all wrong. She’d done me the courtesy of not giving me the third degree about what she saw yesterday morning. I’d give her the same courtesy.

Instead, we sipped our coffee in silence.

I FINISHED MY MOWING
jobs twice as fast on Monday. The renewed energy was a surprise, as was the fact that I hadn’t been able to get Maia out of my head all weekend. Saturday’s lesson had almost been lost, but I was somehow able to get it back on track again, and we’d spent a couple of hours on my back lawn as I taught her the basics.

She was a fast learner, brimming with natural talent. She had a good command over her body, and followed directions well. I gave her lots of praise, and she responded with growing confidence. It wouldn’t be long before we’d be heading out to the beach at this rate.

The more time I spent with her, the more I wanted to know. There was a story there, I could feel it. She seemed like a loner, quiet and shy at first, but the more time we spent together, the more she seemed to relax. Despite that, she didn’t really open up about herself. I could see that I was going to have to earn her trust. That suited me just fine. If she’d thrown herself at me, I probably would’ve run a mile.

She was similar to Em in some ways, but in others, they were very different. Em was brimming with confidence, whereas Maia was less self-assured. Em loved being around people, Maia seemed to shy away from them – me included, sometimes. I could tell when I was getting a little invasive because she’d move away, either physically or mentally. And yet, she would still inch back to me, eventually. I had the feeling she was waging some kind of inner battle. I could definitely relate to that.

I hurried through my last job of the day, intending on stopping by the café as soon as I was cleaned up. I’d ask her how she was feeling, whether she was sore after all our practice on Saturday. I was still insecure enough to need an excuse to see her. I didn’t remember it being this hard with Em. Mind you, Em had enough confidence for both of us. I was out of my depth here, that was for certain.

I went over the potential conversation in my head while I showered and changed. I was counting on Bridget to be there – she would be a chaperone, albeit an oblivious one. I prepped like the planner I was, the whole time barely a hair’s breadth away from abandoning the whole idea and collapsing on the couch with a beer and my brittle self-respect.

I drove into town and parked the truck near the delivery lane. Town was still busy and the heat seemed to hit me from two directions, both from the sun and reflected up off the concrete. People were everywhere, even on a Monday. Tourists swelled the town’s population by double or even triple at this time of year, and it was hellishly annoying at times. Still, I bet Bridget wasn’t complaining. The café seemed to be thriving.

As I walked barefoot along the back lane and approached the open back door of the café kitchen, I heard Bridget laughing – a deep, throaty chuckle I hadn’t heard in a while.

“I didn’t think I’d ever get the hang of it, but I did. And if I can do it, you can.”

“Is that a promise? Because it feels like my body’s just laughing at me – like ‘yeah, right, you want me to do what?’”

“Have a little patience, love – you’ll get it, you just need to practice.”

“Heath says the same thing, but I still feel like a complete amateur. I’ve never felt so uncoordinated in my life!”

I got a peculiar rush of pleasure, just hearing her say my name, and I paused just outside the door.

“Stop being so hard on yourself,” Bridget said. “It’s just a matter of training your body to respond – and that comes with – “

“Practice. Yeah, I know.”

Plates rattled against each other.

“Let’s have coffee and a muffin before you head off – it’s been a busy one today, I think we deserve it.”

“I won’t argue with that, thanks.”

There was a pause, and I thought I’d use it to announce my presence and get in on the coffee and muffin thing, but before I could, Maia spoke again.

“When I was at Heath’s on Saturday, he told me about your daughter. I saw the photos on his wall.”

My heart raced as the conversation came flooding back. I had no idea what she thought about the whole thing, but I didn’t move. I was hoping to gain a little insight, and the fact that I was eavesdropping didn’t bother me as much as it probably should’ve. Bridget, as usual, handled it beautifully.

“You look very much like her, don’t you think?”

“Very much. It explains why you looked at me so strangely the first day I came in here.”

“Did I? I honestly thought I hid that pretty well. You gave me quite a scare at first.”

“I can imagine.”

“He told me what happened to her. I’m so sorry. It must be very hard on you – on all of you.”

“It was. It still is, in a lot of ways. It’s the not knowing, that’s what makes it so difficult to bear. Some days are worse than others.”

The ache in her voice was clear. Christmas. Em’s birthday. The anniversary. I could almost read her mind.

“He told me it was her birthday on Friday. I’m so sorry. I just arrived in the middle of it all didn’t I? Completely oblivious.”

“It’s alright, love. You didn’t know, and life goes on, right? I still miss her, every day. But we can’t put our lives on hold, waiting for news. We have to move on. It doesn’t mean we’re giving up, it just means we’ve got to find a way to live with it, somehow. It’s all we can do, really.”

I leaned back against the wall outside the door and took a deep breath, exhaling slowly. She was right, and I couldn’t help but feel that it was a kind of validation. Despite my mental assurances that I wasn’t doing anything wrong by spending time with Maia, I still felt like I was, somehow. I’d been holding on so tightly to Em all these years, that letting go of that rope, even just a little bit, left me feeling vulnerable and anxious. I wanted to move on, but the actual doing of it, that was another matter entirely. I felt as if I was on a cliff edge, getting ready to jump, and I was scared to death.

I could hear them moving around in the kitchen but the conversation seemed to lull, so I poked my head in the door before I lost my nerve completely.

“Knock knock.”

Bridget whirled around. “Oh! You gave me a fright! Come in, love. We were just about to have a coffee and a muffin. Can you stay and join us?”

“Thanks,” I smiled, walking into the kitchen and trying to put what I’d just heard behind me. “I’d love to.”

She smiled, disappearing into the café. I glanced over at Maia, who was standing with her back to the counter, watching me. I had a niggling feeling that she might have known I’d been listening in.

“Hi,” she said shyly, her arms crossed behind her.

The way she was standing there like that made me want to take her in my arms and kiss her.

Holy shit.

Where the hell did that come from? The floor felt like it was tilting beneath my feet.

“Hi,” I said, trying hard to recover. “I thought I’d just come by and see how you were doing, after Saturday.”

She leant back against the counter. “Well, I’m now acutely aware that I have muscles I didn’t realise existed, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Despite the attack of vertigo just moments ago, I smiled. “Yeah, well, all part of the territory, I’m afraid. You did well, though. You picked it up pretty quickly. Have you been practicing since then?”

She snorted. “Are you kidding? I can barely move!”

“Sounds like you need some light exercise to loosen up your muscles.”

She raised her eyebrows at me, like I was crazy. My smile widened.

“Have you ever been boogie-boarding?” I asked, scratching my chin.

Before she could answer, Bridget came back into the kitchen with a full tray of coffee and muffins.

“Boogie-boarding? Now that’s fun,” she said, nodding at Maia. “Let’s go sit out the back, where it’s cooler. Can you grab an extra chair, love?”

Maia followed her outside while I grabbed a chair from one of the tables in the café and took it out the back.

“You’ve never done it?” Bridget was saying, handing a plate with a muffin on it to Maia. “It’s a tonne of fun. And the best part is, anyone can do it.”

“Well, if anyone can do it, then it can’t be that hard.”

“It’s not,” I said, sitting down between them. “It’s easy. And you can just get stuck in and have a go, you don’t need to learn how to pop up or anything. You just hold onto the board and ride the wave in.”

“That does sound pretty easy,” she admitted.

I took the bull by the horns. “It is. Want to give it a shot?”

What the hell was going on? Was it something in the air out here? That made twice in three days!

She stirred her coffee. “Okay, yeah. If you’ll give me some pointers?”

“I’ll do better than that. I’ll give you pointers, lend you a board and take you out. What are you doing after work?”

“You mean now, today?”

“Why not? Unless you have something better to do?”

I had the feeling I’d be really disappointed if she said she did.

“No. No, I don’t have any plans.”

Then she smiled, another genuine smile, complete with crinkles and dimples. Like a sledgehammer to the face, I realised that smile was going to be the undoing of me.

MAIA INSISTED ON
following me to the beach in her car. Maybe she was trying to keep some distance between us. Maybe she had the right idea. I felt like I was slowly going mad, giving up a little bit more of my sanity every time I saw her.

My rational side was being pushed into a corner, and whether consciously or unconsciously, I kinda wanted it to stay there, for a little while at least. Jas was right, I was the sensible one. And Vinnie was also right – sometimes I was too sensible. I felt like I’d spent the past five years being sensible. Maybe now it was time to relax and have a little bit of fun. Where was the harm in that?

I had stopped by my place on the way, changing into my trunks, grabbing a towel and throwing a couple of boogie boards into the back of the truck. Maia had waited outside. As we drove out to the bay in convoy, I kept trying to stop imagining how that red swimsuit might look on her. I was only marginally successful.

I glanced in the rear-vision mirror as I indicated a turn right, off the main road. Maia’s station wagon kept a safe distance as I drove down onto the gravel road that led down to the bay. I pulled into a space big enough for both vehicles, between a campervan and a family sedan. The beach was busy, which was pretty typical. Lots of surfers out, plenty of kids playing in the shallows.

I got out of the truck and waited for her, watching the surf. It was good, even, perfect for boogie boarding. I was really looking forward to this.

“How’s it looking?” she asked, walking over to stand beside me.

I looked over at her, with her sunglasses and her shorts and that white singlet, red straps peeking through from underneath. She’d tied her long brown hair up in a ponytail high on her head, shading her eyes with her hand as she looked out over the beach.

God, she was gorgeous. I’d been so busy trying not to compare her to Em, I’d failed to notice how beautiful she was in her own right. Until now. It felt like the temperature had just risen by about a hundred degrees.

“It’s looking perfect,” I said. “Just perfect.”

She squinted up at me through her sunglasses and I wanted to say something witty, something funny. I wanted to make her smile again, but I was speechless. All I could think about was kissing her. I wondered how those rosebud-red lips would feel on mine. It was only a fantasy – one I knew I’d probably never have the guts to act on – but she looked at me like she could read my mind. It was unnerving. If she knew what I was thinking, what might her answer be?