by Jenny Hale
At the end of the day, when Alice hadn’t been in the picture, he’d chosen to live in the city, and she wondered if he’d miss the fast-paced environment. Or had he only gone for his father? She’d never know because she wasn’t going to have any long conversations with Jack Murphy anymore. She needed to make a clean break so she could give her heart time to heal. She didn’t even want to think about whether or not that could actually happen. Right now, it didn’t feel like it would. He’d always be that what-if in her life, that beacon of happiness that she hadn’t followed. She wasn’t thinking about any of that today, though, because she was heading over to have a goodbye breakfast with Melly.
Melly was leaving for her parents’ tomorrow and Butch would be moving in by the end of next week. With Einstein in his crate, Henry over at Simon’s house for a play date, and Simon’s mother equipped with Alice’s number should she have any questions, Alice picked up the present she’d gotten her friend and called upstairs to Sasha.
“Sash! Ready to go over to Melly’s?”
They’d been quiet getting ready this morning as they shared the bathroom mirror, both of them trying not to be too emotional about their friend leaving. Melly’s moving was going to leave a hole that even someone as wonderful as Butch wouldn’t be able to fill.
Sasha came downstairs holding a brightly wrapped package and linked arms with Alice. Then, gifts in hand, they crossed the street to Melly’s. Melly had tears in her eyes when she opened the door, and Alice felt the change in the air by the absence of the starfish wreath that used to hang in the place of a doorknocker.
Melly waved her hands in the air frantically, her tears coming faster. “Oh! I knew I couldn’t do it without crying,” she said, smiling as she opened the door wider. “I made sure to have extra tissue boxes today because I’m never going to make it through this.”
With heavy hearts, they all went inside. The beautiful beach interior was now a sea of boxes, the floors dusty, the lighting harsh, all the lamps packed, leaving only the bright sunshine coming through the windows and the fluorescent kitchen light that ran along the ceiling in the open area between the counters and the living space on the other side. Alice set her gift down and climbed up on one of the barstools, grabbing a tissue just in case.
Melly gave Alice a hug—or rather, she plastered her with one, her arms squeezing Alice as if she were holding on for dear life. Then she did the same to Sasha. Sasha, as she always did when something was bothering her, went into chatty, smiley mode, thrusting her gift into Melly’s hands and talking a mile a minute about how she’d spent weeks trying to find something perfect. The gift was wrapped in mint green paper with little palm trees printed on it, and a giant bow tied around the middle.
Melly set it on the counter. “Wait,” she said with a sniffle. “I have something for the two of you.” She left the room and returned, carrying a large, flat gift, wrapped in blue paper with little fishes on it and tied with twine. “This is for the both of you,” she said, setting it on the bar between Sasha and Alice.
Sasha pulled the end of the twine, untying it and gently pulling it free. She set it aside and slipped her finger under the paper at one end, unfastening the tape that held it all together. With a tug, she pulled out a large picture frame, turning it around so both she and Alice could view it.
Alice swallowed, trying to keep her emotion at bay. It was the picture of the three of them, smiling, happy, the pastel colors of the shop behind them. They couldn’t have predicted this moment when Melly had set the camera out and taken the photo, but now it seemed like Melly had given them the perfect gift. The three of them looked radiant, laughing, their cheeks tanned from the sun, the light coming in behind them like a ray of hope.
“This is so good, it could be a print ad for the shop,” Sasha said, running a finger under her nose as if she had an itch, but Alice knew she, too, was trying to hold it together.
Alice pulled the frame closer to her, tilting it to get the glare off the glass so she could get a better look at her lovely friends. “It would go so well above the counter on the back wall so it’s the first thing everyone sees when they come in.”
“Maybe you can stay,” Sasha said, that chattiness coming back again. “You could be a photographer. Do portraits for people on the beach? Or you could take marketing photos for people. You should start a portfolio…”
Melly grinned at that. “Maybe one day,” she said.
“This is amazing,” Alice said, still looking at the photo.
Melly bit her lip, obviously trying not to cry as well. “I love taking photos because they make such great memories and we just never know when we’ll need them. I have a copy of that myself to take with me.”
“I got something for you too!” Sasha said, sliding her palm-tree-wrapped gift toward Melly: her attempt at keeping her emotion in check. If any of them spent too long thinking about it, they wouldn’t get through this.
Slowly and carefully, Melly picked it up, looking down at it for a second as if she didn’t want to open it, as if she wanted time to slow down. She tugged on the ribbon until it fell loose and then opened one end. She slid the box out to reveal a handmade, fabric-covered photo album.
“For your photos,” Sasha said, finally showing her emotion. She cleared her throat and smiled, tears sliding down her cheeks. She wiped them away with the back of her hand, her eyes blinking too much while she forced a smile.
Melly ran her hand delicately over the album cover. It was a beachy plaid colored with shades of apricot, and sea-foam greens, sandy browns and sea-oat tans. Melly set it down and put her face in her hands, and she started to sob. Her reaction to the gift seemed overly sentimental, and Alice wondered what was going through her mind. While they were all sad, Melly looked positively heartbroken, so much so that it was alarming to Alice. Melly’s face was crumpled, her chest heaving, and she was barely able to catch her breath.
“This is the perfect gift,” she finally managed, after the worst had subsided. “I know just what photo to begin with,” she said, standing up and grabbing her bag. “I take it with me everywhere. It’s the photo that started this whole journey for me.”
Her face looked so forlorn that Alice was actually concerned for her friend. The pain was so visible that Alice just knew she was about to share whatever it was that had lurked there the whole time they’d known her. There had been more to her past, and Melly was finally going to tell them. Alice took in a breath to steady herself for whatever support her friend might need.
“Let’s have a seat together on the sofa.” Melly grabbed an envelope and came back over, setting it in her lap. “I’ve never told anyone this story before, but I’ve never had any friends as true as you two. Would you like to hear what really brought me to the Outer Banks?”
Alice couldn’t think of any reasons better than a new job, distance from her ex-husband, and a beautiful location, but she did remember her earlier exchange with Sasha and she wondered again if there was more to the story with her ex-husband. She couldn’t wait to hear; she felt so fortunate to have this last moment to support her friend. It was clear that Melly needed Alice and Sasha.
Sasha leaned in and patted Melly’s knee, urging her to confide in them.
“The bike shop you all bought—it belonged to a man.”
Alice felt the confusion on her face. Of course it belonged to a man. But it occurred to her that she’d never told Melly about him. How did Melly know that? Had Gramps made another little friend? She didn’t remember meeting any young girls over her summers with Gramps, like when she’d met Jack. Had Melly rented a bike from him? Had he shared something with her? But Melly didn’t grow up here… Alice’s mind was going a hundred miles an hour trying to figure it out before Melly could tell them. Would Melly know something about Gramps that Alice needed to know? Suddenly she wanted to hear this story more than anything in the world. Her pulse racing in her ears, she listened.
Melly pulled a photo from the envelope and set it on he
r lap, facing them. The edges were worn, the finish faded. Alice held her breath, only becoming more confused by the photo in Melly’s possession. It was Gramps—younger—in black and white. He was on the pier, holding a fish, a proud smile on his lips like she’d seen him hundreds of times. How had Melly gotten this photo and why would this have brought her here? Alice tried to swallow but her mouth was bone dry.
“My mother gave me this photo,” Melly said, looking down at it. “She told me it was of a man in the Outer Banks. He owned a bike shop, and he was the kindest man she’d ever met.”
With that one description of Gramps, Alice knew Melly’s story was true. But how had he known Melly’s mother? Alice spread her fingers on her thighs, her hands cold and sweaty as she awaited more explanation. She’d felt so close to Melly from the very beginning. Had Gramps initiated some sort of connection between the two of them? The room was completely quiet except for Alice’s thoughts and the sound of the ocean coming through the window. Sasha caught Alice’s eye. She looked riveted by what Melly had said, only making Alice’s curiosity more unbearable.
Melly broke the silence again. “He’d shown up at my mother’s doorstep one day, and he told her that no one in his family knew he’d come, but he wanted to see me. I was about five. My mom was terrified at first of this stranger, but then she remembered him from the day she adopted me. He had been there with my birth parents. He told her he was my grandfather.”
Alice could literally feel the blood drain from her face. Her whole body started to shake. She wanted to say something, do something, but she was frozen, her mind taking all this in.
“You see, my mother, like me, couldn’t have children—which we had a little chuckle over because we aren’t blood relatives; but it was as if we were meant to be together.”
Tears sprang to Alice’s eyes, a wave of relief for her own parents washing over her. They’d been right. They’d been so right. Melly’s parents were good and they’d been everything Alice’s own parents had wanted for their first daughter. Melly was wonderful—it seemed as though she’d had a great relationship with her parents—and just as Alice had always wanted in a sister, they got along brilliantly. As she looked at Melly, really looked at her, it occurred to her that Melly had no idea to whom she was telling this story. But Alice’s need to hear it in full kept her silent.
“You were adopted,” she said, in the form of a statement. That was all she could get out before the silence took over again. She was in awe of the person in front of her. They’d spent all those days together completely unaware…
“My parents have never hidden the fact that I was adopted, and they told me my birth parents were amazing people, that they loved me so much, they knew my mom and dad would be the best for me. My mom told me about the talk she’d had with them in the hospital just before I was born and how perfect they were. And she told me about the man in the bike shop—my grandfather.” Her eyes dropped down to the photo. “I’ve known about him for quite a while. I’ve had this picture since my tenth birthday, but I only recently felt like I had the courage to find him.
“I came here, hoping to meet him, and I was disappointed to find the shop had been sold. But I met you two instead, so I feel like it was meant to be.” She smiled, the photo now unsteady in her hands.
“I prayed to learn more about where I came from. Not because I needed more family—mine was wonderful. But because I felt in my bones like I was missing something great.” She shook her head. Alice took stock of the oval shape of Melly’s face, the curve of her nose—both like Alice’s father’s and her own.
Sasha’s eyes were the size of saucers, as she silently pressed Alice to say something, but she still couldn’t find the words when she looked at her sister. She noticed the thin curve of her lips, like her mother’s, and now she couldn’t believe she hadn’t spotted the resemblance before. It was practically glaring now. Melly’s hair was thick, like her grandma’s, her height similar to Gramps’s…
“I don’t know where he is now; that was my only lead. But my mom told me how much he adored this area and I just wanted to be near him. I’ve never felt different from anyone else growing up. I’ve had the best life. But there’s this small part of me that felt a tiny void without the rest of my family present. He was my family. And I set out to tell him that. But I was too late and he’d gone.”
Alice had put her hands over her mouth to stifle the total disbelief that something this wonderful could be true. She was staring right into the face of her sister. The sister she’d always wanted. The sister she’d missed so many years with. Tears were hot in her eyes, her breathing shallow.
She’d asked the sea—Gramps—to tell her if she’d made the right decision coming here, and this moment, this one moment, was worth anything else that had happened. It didn’t matter whether Seaside Sprinkles was a success or the pier made it or anything—she had found her sister! Melly had been right here all along.
Melly must have read her face because she, too, had stopped talking and was now looking at Alice as if she’d just seen her, curiosity all over her face. The two of them hadn’t even realized that Sasha was gone. They were both lost in thought.
Melly was the first to speak again: “I almost asked what had happened to the man at the bike shop that day when I first met you, but I figured you wouldn’t know…” They both stared at each other, hope in Melly’s eyes. Alice knew it was hope because she’d had that kind of hope before—the hope for something meant for her. “Do you? Do you know what happened to him?”
Finally, Alice spoke, taking Gramps’s photo with a wobbly hand, feeling lightheaded. “Yes, I know what happened to him,” she said, working to fill her lungs with breath so she could finish the explanation. “This is my gramps.”
Melly’s eyes were wide now, tears rolling down her cheeks. Alice wondered if she could see what Alice had seen, if she recognized her own eyes in Alice’s, the similarities in their faces. Melly’s bottom lip was quivering, and she was clearly robbed of her voice just like Alice had been. But it didn’t matter. She didn’t have to speak for Alice to know what she felt. Because Alice felt it too. Two only children now had each other.
“We’re sisters,” Alice said, the word rolling off her tongue and sounding so right, yet foreign at the same time. How had she missed this? How had she spent so much time with Melly and not felt it? Because now it was so clear to her, so obvious that she couldn’t not see it. “But Gramps called you Grace.”
Melly smiled. “That was the name given to me at the hospital, but my parents changed my name. They called me Melissa Grace St. James.”
“Mm.” That made Alice smile, her vision blurred with emotion. She put her arms around Melly, the two of them holding each other, both of them crying tears of joy. Everything was all coming together now. When they’d finally let go of one another, Alice said, “I can tell you all about your other family—our family.”
Sasha suddenly came back in, out of breath, having obviously sprinted back to the shop. She handed the locket to Melly and then slid a small, folded piece of paper discreetly into Alice’s hand as Melly’s focus was on the locket. Alice knew what the paper was: it was Gramps’s letter, stating that both girls should have the shop. Alice knew her friend well, and what she was saying with that gesture was to include Melly, to ask her to be a part of Seaside Sprinkles, just as Gramps had intended.
Melly got up to get another tissue and Sasha leaned over quickly and whispered, “There’s enough room upstairs for three of us. We can squeeze her in.”
Alice didn’t need time to think about it. She knew that Jack was already paying well over the mortgage rate to rent the cottage for Butch—Melly had asked Alice to tell Jack that it was too much, but he’d insisted on paying a good price. Melly had enough income from the rent that if she wanted to stay, she could probably swing it. And, in time, if they could make a go of Seaside Sprinkles, they’d have enough to pay her a salary.
Melly came back, her eyes still on the
locket. “This is us,” she whispered. “Together.” She grabbed Alice’s hands, laughing and crying at the same time.
Finding her was so amazing that Alice felt as though her heart would burst. Giggling through her tears, she said, “I have so much to tell you that I don’t even know where to begin. I have the answers to all your questions.”
“I can’t wait to hear them!” Melly laughed. “I have so many questions that we could stay up all night talking. For days!” Then she held Alice’s gaze. “Just when we found each other, we’re being pulled apart again.”
Alice nodded. Then, the hope she’d lost so many times swelled in her chest and she knew that this time, it wouldn’t leave her. “I have an idea,” she said, thinking of all the possibilities before them. “I want to discuss it with you, but I need to be sure I have it all worked out.” She didn’t want to raise Melly’s hopes only to have the plan not work out. “Give me just a little time and then I’ll tell you all about it.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
It had been two weeks since Jack had left. Alice had forced herself not to think about him—as much as she’d practiced keeping him off her mind, she wasn’t getting any better at it. She just tried to keep her focus on Seaside Sprinkles.
The machines were gleaming, the toppings bar was brimming with local candies and chocolates, and the ceiling was a flock of brightly colored birds. The Donation Station was complete: a small shelf anchored to the wall, with a stool and a bright yellow-and-white striped cushion below. On the shelf was Alice’s laptop, covered in local bumper stickers and open to their website, where patrons could donate to the pier. On the other side of the old showroom, across a sea of white tables and chairs, there was a brightly painted bookshelf. Sasha had filled it with books from the second-hand shop and all the chairs saved for the locals were scattered around it. Alice couldn’t bring herself to change the one she’d labeled “Jack” in a moment of weakness. Perhaps it had been her last surge of optimism. Now it just felt like stupidity.
