“You doing okay?” I asked, softer.
“Better now that I’m here.” He looked at Bruce, and something passed between them, a quiet flicker I couldn’t quite read. “You picked a good spot.”
“Guy talk?” I teased.
Bruce laughed, but the laugh landed a beat late.
“Just guy talk.”
Lily came running up then, sand in her hair and triumph on her face.
“Uncle Jim, come see! It has a moat!”
Jim scooped her up with an exaggerated grunt.
“A moat? What kind of engineer are you, kid?”
“The best one,” Lily declared.
I watched them walk toward the water, my brother and my daughter, and I told myself the tightness I’d noticed in Jim’s jaw was just leftover stress from the move. Bruce reached over and squeezed my hand.
“You look happy,” he said.
“I am happy.”
And for that afternoon, I let myself believe it, even as some quieter part of me kept circling the beat that had landed late in his laugh.
The fourth afternoon smelled of coconut sunscreen and warm sand. Lily’s small hand tugged at the hem of my beach dress as we walked back toward the resort path.
“Mommy,” she whispered, glancing over her shoulder at Bruce and Jim, who lingered near the water’s edge in low conversation.
I bent slightly, brushing sand from her hair.
“What is it, baby?”
“Mommy… Daddy told me not to tell you what he and Uncle Jim did in our hotel room.”
The words landed like a stone in still water. I kept my face soft, but my chest went tight.
“But you always tell me not to keep secrets from you, Mommy. So I wanted to tell you.”
I knelt in front of her, the hot sand burning against my knees.
“That’s right, sweetheart. You can always tell me anything. What happened?”
Lily wrinkled her nose, trying to remember.
