At Last (The Idle Point, Maine Stories)(27)

Not Gracie. Her bare feet gripped the rocks as she walked like she was born to it. A brisk wind was blowing in from the ocean and her slender body bent into it like a willow. No missteps, no awkwardness. She didn't spill a drop of lemonade. He wanted to stop in his tracks and just watch her move. The idea made him feel hot with embarrassment and something else, something deeply unsettling, that he couldn't identify. Or maybe he didn't want to. He never thought things like that. A girl was pretty or not. She had a great bod or she didn't. She was fun to be around or a total drag. He'd never wanted to stop time so he could watch a girl walk in the sunshine.





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Gracie found them a spot on a boulder halfway between Andy's Shack and the water.

"Here?" Noah asked. He didn't sound very enthusiastic about it.

"Sure," she said, settling down on the leeward side. "If we're quiet and don't disturb them, the seagulls will land near us and crack open clams and mussels while we eat."

"That's a good thing?"

She grinned up at him. "I think so." Funny how she felt more sure of herself here on the beach than she'd felt just minutes ago in the parking lot. "I love low tide," she said as he sat down next to her. "It's like watching the ocean reveal all of her secrets."

"All I see is dead fish."

"I see dead fish too, but there's so much more if you know where to look." She caught herself and shook her head. "Sorry. Like you really want to know my thoughts on low tide at Idle Point."

"Maybe I do," he said and there was something in his tone of voice that made her heartbeat leap forward. "I don't know a whole lot about low tide at Idle Point."

His voice was deep and the sound of it made her feel the way she did on nights when the moon was high. A little wild. A little crazy. Not at all like her careful, cautious self. She'd never felt this way before and it scared her. She'd seen enough of life to know what kind of trouble a girl could get into if she let herself follow her emotions. Her father was like that, making decisions spurred by demons she'd never understood. She'd watched him bring home one wife after another, searching in vain for the happiness he'd known with her mother.

But she wasn't her father. Her feet were planted firmly on the rocky shoreline of Idle Point. She wasn't about to let her life take her by surprise. She had plans for her future and she knew how to make her dreams come true. She also knew she should take a giant step away from Noah Chase right now but she couldn't move. Or maybe it was that she wouldn't move. Not while the boy she'd loved since she was five and a half years old was only inches away from her.

He asked questions about the docks and the fishing and she found herself telling him more than he ever wanted to know about the history of lighthouses. He even remembered Sam the Cat, then laughed when Gracie told him her official name was now Samantha the Dowager Queen of Idle Point

"You love it here," he said.

"It's my home."

"It's my home too," he said, "but I don't feel much of anything for it."

"Big surprise." She took a sip of lemonade. "You haven't really lived here since we were in kindergarten."

"Remember when you used to come home with me after school? I wanted to show you my stuff but—"

"Your father wouldn't let you." She bit off a piece of lobster roll and chewed slowly.

"You knew about that?"

"Gramma Del told me. I kept bugging her about why I couldn't see your electric train set." She kicked his ankle lightly. "Don't look so embarrassed. It's not like it was a big secret or anything."

"I never could figure it out. I mean, it's not like my old man is that big a snob."

Gracie laughed. "I'm not so sure about that."

"I had some of the other kids over and—" He muttered an oath. "Sorry, Gracie. I didn't mean to hurt you."

"Old news," she said. "I don't know what their problem is but my family doesn't like yours any better your family likes mine." Who cared what they thought anyway? It all seemed as far away and unimportant as the price of tea in China. The only thing that mattered was that Noah was back in Idle Point, sitting right here beside her on a sunny afternoon in June.

They watched quietly as a seagull landed a few feet away from them and began to hammer at a clam with his long, sharp beak. When that didn't work the gull picked up the clam and flew a lazy circle around the spot before dropping the clam onto the rocks below. The clamshell shattered open and the bird returned to enjoy his feast.