Page 76 of Every Heartbeat After

I meant what I said to her. We’re not done. Not even close. At the height of my love for my ex-wife, I never felt the way I do with Tess. She is ever-present in my mind. There isn’t a meal I eat that I don’t think, would Tess like this? Every sunrise I’ve witnessed on this trip has been beautiful, but it wasn’t until I watched one with Tess beside me that the sight truly took my breath away.

She’s everything I’ve been walking toward since the day I stepped out of my old life. Perhaps even before then. Like it was all a labyrinth I had to trudge through to get to her. Even knowing that she’d eventually leave my love on the table, I’d do it again in a heartbeat and consider myself lucky for the suffering.

“Family stuff,” Tomas repeats, then clicks his tongue as though tasting a flavor he can’t quite identify. “Are we talking, like, your parents? That kind of family stuff?”

I find myself nodding before I remember he cannot see me. Then I clear my throat. “The very same.”

“It’s about damn time. I’m proud of you, Rookie.” And he genuinely is. I can hear it in his voice. Still cautious, like he knows he’s treading on sensitive waters, but warm with the pride of someone who’s watched you struggle for far too long to figure out what everyone else already knew. “Listen, it’s late, and the wife hates when I take work calls in bed. But you take all the time you need. We’ll be here when you get back.”

We share quick goodbyes before I can tell him he has no reason to be proud of me. I drop the phone on the comforter. It feels too cool to the touch without Tess here to warm it. I push off the crumpled bedding to stand in the middle of my room, the only light coming from the pool deck below, and wonder what the hell I’m supposed to do now.

I can’t sleep, that much is certain. But I can’t leave without saying goodbye to Tess. So I do the only other thing that remotely calms my nerves like her presence does: I put on my running shoes.

The lobby is quiet. Even the wall-mounted television by one of the sitting areas is muted. I pause at the mouth of the hallway, listening to the quiet whir of the palm-frond fan overhead and the dull tap of the night receptionist’s pen against a notebook he’s perusing. The windows facing the pool deck frame a scene familiar to anyone who grew up on the Gulf. Blue light from the pool flickers and flows across the leaves of the palm trees. Someone must’ve put up the chairs to save them from the wind, because aside from displaced fronds that lie scattered around the concrete, the deck is otherwise empty.

My gaze flickers to the photo of Tess and her parents, and another pang of guilt twists my stomach. I step closer and, with my voice low and arms crossed, mutter my apology.

“I hope you know I meant every word I told her. And I’m not giving up. I promise. I just need to take care of my family and give her some space. There was too much pushing on my part and not enough waiting for her to pull. I’m sorry about that. About all of it.” My voice breaks, and I swallow past the fault line to clear it. “But I’m not sorry about loving her.”

“Who could ever be?”

I glance up, only to lock eyes with Mauricio, who’s smiling at me warmly. At first I hardly recognize him in the dark gray mechanic’s jumpsuit he’s wearing. His name tag sits lopsided atop his chest pocket, but I can just make outFacilities Managerin fine print underneath his name. His gaze tracks mine, and he turns the label to rights. “Leak in a guest’s room. They trust you more when you come in uniform.” His gaze lifts to mine and he shrugs. “I knew when the storm rolled in to be ready. There’s one every season, no matter how new the roof is.”

How has it only been a few hours since we all sat in the Ortizes’ kitchen stuffing ourselves and laughing over one of this man’s many ridiculous tales of guests’ antics? It feels like a lifetime ago. Before the world and all its contents flipped upside down, turning into something I don’t recognize anymore.

You’d think I’d be no stranger to it, the upending. But it turns out, no matter how many times it happens, you don’t get desensitized to it. It hurts just as damn much every single time.

Whatever Mauricio reads in my expression, it flattens the smile in his. He turns to the photo and shakes his head. “The most beautiful family. Every year, we looked forward to their arrival. It was like the resort came alive when they showed up.”

I picture Tess on the beach the night we hunted for crabs, all laughter and giddiness and sunshine, even in the dark. “I can imagine.”

“It killed that little girl to lose them. And we—Jenna, my brother, and I—felt so powerless. To know Tessa is to love her. And to not be able to fix the heart of the one you love… That is its own special hell.” He sniffs, pats his pocket, and removes a cigarette that he leaves dangling between his fingers. “Thank you for bringing her back to us. It makes it so much easier to let her go.”

My gaze drifts from Mauricio back to the photo. “Do you really think she won’t come back?”

The corner of his mouth turns up, wrinkling his deeply tanned skin. “I think that whether she does or doesn’t is a matter as fluid as time. Always up for debate. Always able to change, sometimes in the blink of an eye. Either way, we will be here.”

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re awfully wise?” I say with a raspy chuckle.

He nods toward the picture. “Only Tessa.”

Of course. She always could see the best in people. She certainly saw the best in me. I drop my gaze, frowning at the pearlescent floor. “She didn’t get to finish her list.”

“What list?”

I pull up the note on my phone, but I can’t bring myself to erase her salacious addition, so I refrain from showing it to someone who might as well be her family. “Of what she wanted to do with her last trip here.” The truth is, I looked for a whole sand dollar on every morning run, but all I could find were a bunch of pieces. It felt like a metaphor I didn’t want to look too closely at. And as far as figuring out what to do with the rest of her life, well, I think that one’s a lot like time. As Mauricio said, always changing. Always in flux.

Hard to give advice when I, too, remain largely unsure. For the last few years, the rest of my life looked a lot like my daily reality: go to work, go to the bar, perhaps have some meaningless sex, then rinse and repeat. Ever since meeting Tess, that all changed. Now it’s a blank slate save for her face, her name, her everything.

“Anything I can help with?” Mauricio asks, eyebrows perched high on his forehead as though he was tracking my thoughts.

God, I hope not.

I return my attention to the list, feeling hopelessness rise like a wave in my chest, until I catch a glimpse of something through the window, just barely peeking out from the shroud of shadows surrounding the pool deck.

“Mo, you wouldn’t happen to own a jackhammer, would you?”

He follows my gaze, a smile slowly creeping over his face. “No, but I do have a masonry blade and chisel.”

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