Page 22 of Kiss Me, Darling

I flipped her hand over, letting the sand dollar drop upside down into my palm, and showed her the hundreds of little hairs on the bottom. Then I dipped my hand into the water just enough to wet it again. The hairs all began moving.

“Oh that’s so creepy, but also really cool! Can I?” She held out her hand.

I took my time cupping her hand and wrist, feeling her sun warmed skin, the soft layer of salt, and deposited the sea urchin in her hand once again. She squealed and laughed.

“Let’s look for more.”

Lucy moved with a lot more excitement now, yelling with delight when she discovered a sea star. “It’s so pretty! What is that?”

I looked down at her feet. There was definitely a large sea star, it’s five long points stretched out over the sand, and beside it was something much darker and rounder. “That’s a different kind of sea urchin.”

“Wait!” Lucy held the sand dollar over the water, looking from her hand to the sea star by her feet. “The sand dollar has a sea star on it! Look!”

The edges of the sand dollar were fuzzy and there were slits at regular intervals, but in the very center was the image of a rounder, more flowery version of a sea star.

Then Lucy froze. She went very, very still. The kind of frozen that makes you freeze and wonder what the heck is going on.

“Scott. What the hell is that?”

Not ten feet in front of us a shadow moved. Then I realized it was more than a shadow. The thing causing the shadow was enormous. At least it felt that way in the moment. It was definitely bigger than me. Dark and spotted.

Lucy dropped the sand dollar. “Is that a stingray?”

“Not unless it's a mutant. Stingrays are way smaller. Like a puppy.” This thing was the size of my freaking bedroom.

I took Lucy’s hand. “Let’s move slowly back to the boat.”

“My heart is pumping so hard!”

So was mine. Like a hammer in my chest. I could hear each beat in my ears so loud it drowned out the gentle waves moving past our legs. The creature floated through the water, the edges of its wings rippling as it moved. It was really pretty, but I wouldn’t understand that thought until much, much later. In the moment, I was too panicked to think anything other thanrun!

We walked backward, one step at a time, while the ray (it had to be a ray of some kind) floated over the sand, then slowly disappeared into the deeper, darker water, moving toward the island.

“That was nuts!” Lucy whispered. “Wait. Where’s the boat?”

I spun around looking at the spot where the boat should be, only to find nothing. “Shit!” The damn thing had floated away! It was still along the sandbar, but at least fifty yards away now.

And drifting.

So I started running as fast as I could in two feet of water. All I could think as I panicked was that at any moment it would begin floating into deeper water and then I’d really be screwed. I was a good swimmer, but chasing down a boat caught in a good current wasn’t exactly something I wanted to test.

I didn’t care that I probably looked like Chevy Chase in a Griswold movie, water splashing every which way as I attempted to high step, arms out to help balance, eyes wide.

Maybe my future wasn’t in these deep, artistic movies I’d been making. Perhaps I needed to consider a future in comedy. This week I was certainly logging the experience. I always heard that love made people do crazy things.

I didn’t realize it also meant being awkward.

I’d never been awkward a day in my life. I was always Scott Kain, future movie star. Everyone always complimented my smile and good looks. It put a lot of pressure on me to fulfill their prophecies, but it also gave me an easy confidence.

A confidence that evaporated when I realized the only woman I ever loved might slip through my fingers. Now I was Mr. Awkward with a capital A, running down a sandbar at top speed to catch a boat I hadn’t properly anchored while attempting to impress said woman.

I was a mess.

But I caught the boat. I only had to make a last minute dive to swim the last few meters to the stern, haul myself in and then drag up the useless anchor. Lucy watched me from the sandbar, alternating between laughter and double checking her surroundings for more giant visitors.

“Oh, how I wish I had a camera,” she said as she hopped into the boat. “That was priceless.”

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