Forever Her Hero

by Belle Calhoune

  For all he knew the twins no longer remembered him. In a child’s life, a year was a lifetime. He didn’t want to believe they could so easily forget all the campouts on the beach, the sailing lessons or the trips to the aquarium at Woods Hole. Since the day they were born he’d loved them more than he could put into words. It would be painful to see a blank look on their faces. Even if their memories of him had faded, he still intended to be a permanent fixture in their lives from this point forward. He wasn’t going anywhere, not ever again.

  Lord, please let me help Ava and the kids any way I can. Let me make up for any pain I’ve caused them and help them continue to heal. And please give me the strength to stay on course and not run away from overwhelming feelings. Lord, give me strength.

  As he watched Ava take the twins by the hand and lead them across the beach to the stone path leading to their house, he felt a huge sense of loss wash over him. How many times had he sat on this beach with Billy and watched the kids make sand castles? How many times had he walked the stone path with Ava? There was so much he had to say to her in order to make things right between them.

  There’s no time like the present, a little voice buzzed in his ear. Why shouldn’t he follow them up to the house? Even though Ava was still bitter about his having left Cape Cod, he needed to get a few things straight with her. He needed to make her understand that accepting the assignment in Africa didn’t mean he’d abandoned them. And before she found out from someone else, he needed to tell her that he was the proud owner of a lighthouse and her new next-door neighbor.

  * * *

  Ava opened the back door of her house with trembling fingers. She was breathing hard, her chest rising and falling in an uneven rhythm as chaotic thoughts swirled in her head. Her palms were damp. She reminded herself to breathe in and out, slowly and evenly. As she ushered the kids through the door, she barely noticed their sandy feet and the dirty beach toys they’d brought inside. Feeling a bit dazed, she deposited Tully on the floor and began filling up his water bowl. She was just going through the motions. Her thoughts were all jumbled and unfocused. All she could think about was what had just happened on the beach. All she could focus on was Sawyer.

  Seeing him standing there on the beach holding her puppy in his arms had been a shock. It had felt like a jolt to the system. He was still so ruggedly handsome with a leanly muscled build, broad shoulders, chocolate-brown eyes and warm, caramel-colored skin. His features were no less arresting than they’d always been—sharp, high cheekbones and wide, almond-shaped eyes.

  She’d already replayed their encounter several times in her mind. And despite the anger that continued to course through her, she felt guilty about the way she’d treated him. It wasn’t like her to be snotty and rude. It wasn’t like her to turn her back on someone and walk away. But she’d been holding on to this anger for so long it was now bubbling over, unable to be contained.

  Sawyer was back in Buzzards Bay! He was home! A little burst of happiness flowed through her as the knowledge settled in around her heart that he was finally back home. That first moment of recognition when she’d locked gazes with him had been full of mixed emotions. Her initial reaction upon realizing it was him had been joy. Her second emotion had been pure, unbridled rage. How dare he just show up on the beach without a care in the world after a whole year of being gone? Didn’t he know what his absence had done to her family? Hadn’t he realized how deeply they’d missed him? How she had been lost without her best friend?

  The intensity of her feelings frightened her. She was always so reserved and contained with her emotions. It was rare that she showed her innermost feelings. But leave it to Sawyer to drag it to the surface. Ever since they were kids he’d possessed a knack for bringing out her intense side. From the first day they met he’d infuriated her, frustrated her, left her teary-eyed and somehow wedged himself firmly inside her heart.

  After digging through the odds-and-ends drawer beneath her kitchen counter, she found the one thing she knew would soothe her. For the past two years she’d been a cross-stitch enthusiast. Not only did it appeal to her artistic side, but it helped her deal with stress. And her panic attacks. As she began making X shapes on the cloth, she found herself relaxing. She took a deep breath and then exhaled, closing her eyes and sending up a prayer to God.

  A knock sounded at the back door, pulling her away from prayer and thoughts of Sawyer. Dolly and Casey were sitting at the counter snacking on grapes and playing rock, paper, scissors. Dolly slid down from her stool and ran toward the back door, answering the knock before Ava could admonish her about opening it before she knew who was outside. She pulled the door wide, and Sawyer was standing there in the doorway, his six-foot frame dwarfing her baby girl.

  “You look like my daddy,” Dolly announced in a voice filled with awe.

  “Yeah, people used to tell me that all the time when I was growing up, but I never believed them,” Sawyer said with a grin. “Do you remember me?”

  “I think so,” Dolly answered in a hesitant voice, turning toward Ava for reassurance. Ava nodded and smiled at her daughter, letting her know it was okay to talk to Sawyer.

  “You’re my uncle Sawyer!” Dolly said triumphantly. She reached for Sawyer’s hand and pulled him over the threshold until he was standing inside the kitchen. Sawyer reached behind him and pushed the door closed.

  Dolly’s brown eyes went wide. “Mommy said you went away to the other side of the world. Casey said you weren’t ever coming back, just like Daddy.”

  Ava’s heart sank at the mournful tone in her daughter’s voice. How in the world hadn’t she known the twins had written Sawyer off as dead? Had she been so wrapped up in her own grief and pain she’d neglected to notice their losses, their suffering?

  “I was gone for a long time,” Sawyer acknowledged, looking over at Ava with eyes full of regret. “But I’m back now for good.”

  He reached out and tugged at one of Dolly’s pigtails. She let out a squeal of excitement. When Sawyer held up his hand for a high five, Dolly slapped his palm with her own. Sawyer winced and shook his hand as if Dolly had hurt him. She beamed up at him, showcasing her missing front teeth.

  Something inside Ava melted a little bit. The kids sorely needed a male presence in their lives. They would benefit by having their uncle Sawyer back in Cape Cod. Admitting her family needed him didn’t change the slow burn eating its way through her.

  “Casey. Come say hello to Uncle Sawyer,” Ava said, noticing the way her son was studiously ignoring Sawyer. For a boy who never seemed to miss a thing, it was impossible to believe he was oblivious of Sawyer’s arrival at their home. She suspected her son was playing possum.

  Casey continued to sit at the table playing with his grapes, his eyes downcast. He made no attempt to get up from his stool or to speak to Sawyer.

  “Casey!” Ava said in a warning tone. “Did you hear me?”

  “Hey, buddy.” Sawyer’s tone was playful as he walked over to Casey. “How’s it going?”

  Finally, Casey looked up at Sawyer, his eyes glistening with an anger that made her want to wrap her arms around her son and soothe his heartbreak. He’d had so many losses in the past few years, too many to wrap his six-year-old head around. Everything he was feeling radiated from his eyes.

  “You told us you’d be coming right back! You don’t keep your promises,” Casey shouted.

  She saw Sawyer wince, and she knew Casey, in all his childish fury, had wounded him.

  “Casey Trask!” Ava scolded. “You watch your tone of voice in this house. Apologize to your uncle.”

  Casey folded his arms across his chest. His lower lip stuck out in a pout. “I’m sorry,” he apologized in a begrudging voice. “But you were gone for three hundred and forty-four days!” Casey announced. “That’s almost a whole year.”

  “He marked it on a calendar.” Dolly�
�s tone was filled with pride. “And I helped him.”

  Ava’s heart sank. Marking days on calendars? She’d had no idea the twins had been tracking Sawyer’s absence. What kind of mother had she turned into over the past two years? Yes, in the beginning she’d been aware that they missed him terribly, but as the weeks turned into months they seemed almost indifferent to his absence. It was as if they’d forgotten him, and for some reason she hadn’t done anything to solidify Sawyer’s memory in their minds. She’d been so furious with him for leaving them, so incredibly wounded, a part of her had told herself Sawyer deserved to be forgotten. A feeling of shame trickled through her at the realization. After everything they’d been through together, she had owed him more than that.

  “Do you two know what a mission is?” Sawyer asked the children. Both of them nodded, showing they didn’t have a clue. “It’s something very important that helps a lot of people,” he explained. “That’s what I was doing over in Africa. A lot of people were depending on me to help them.”

  “So you like those people better than you like us.” Casey’s arms were folded across his chest, and his words sounded accusatory.

  “There’s no one in this world I like better than the two of you.” He bent down and went nose-to-nose with Casey. “I’m not going anywhere, Casey. I promise you. I’m back in town to stay.”

  “Prove it!” Casey demanded. “When I do something bad to Dolly, Mommy says the best way to show I’m sorry is by my actions.”

  Sawyer crossed his arms across his chest. “Oh, you want proof? Okay, come outside with me and I’ll give you proof.”

  Sawyer quickly walked toward the back door, with Casey on his heels and Dolly trailing behind them. Filled with curiosity, Ava followed behind them, her interest piqued as Sawyer made his way to the edge of the property. He walked right up to the white picket fence that separated their property from the cliff and the beach down below. From this vantage point they had a bird’s-eye view of miles and miles of ocean and the vast expanse of sandy beach.

  Sawyer pointed in the direction of the lighthouse. “Do you know who lives there?” he asked the twins.

  They both nodded. “That’s Mr. P’s house,” Dolly chirped. “Except he went to Heaven.”

  Sawyer smiled. “Nope. That is not Mr. P’s house. Not anymore.”

  Ava could see the confusion on the children’s faces, and it mirrored her own bewilderment. What in the world was Sawyer trying to prove by bringing them outside and showing them the lighthouse? Casey and Dolly were still grappling with Mr. P’s passing. She hoped there was a method to Sawyer’s madness other than reminding the twins of yet another loss.

  Sawyer stood there with his arms folded across his chest, a huge smile taking over his face. “I am now the proud owner of Mr. P’s lighthouse.”

  “You mean you live there?” Casey asked, eyes wide with amazement.

  He nodded enthusiastically, a pleased-with-himself grin etched on his face. “Yep. I live there, Casey. Right next door to you.”

  Ava let out a gasp of surprise. Right next door? Sawyer was the man she’d seen darting inside the lighthouse earlier. He was their new neighbor?

  As the children jumped up and down in celebration, Ava felt goose bumps popping up on her arms. She wrapped her arms around her middle as she tried to process Sawyer’s news. Living in such close proximity to him might prove to be problematic. Even though they’d once been best friends, a lot of water had flowed under the bridge since then. A part of her longed to go back to those days of innocence when their biggest problem had been coming up with enough money to go to the matinee.

  She let out a soft sigh. So many things had changed between them since then, and for the life of her she didn’t know how to get back to that place in time where they’d been able to finish each other’s sentences and thumb wrestle for bragging rights. She didn’t know how to get her best friend back.

  Because no matter how hard she tried, Ava couldn’t forget that one year ago they’d shared a tender kiss that had disturbed Sawyer so much he’d taken off for Africa the very next day.

  Chapter Two

  Fifteen minutes later they were all back inside the house. The twins were peppering him with questions about living in Africa and his coast guard mission. He’d already played a game of Uno with them, as well as one round of Scrabble and three rounds of hide-and-seek. As it neared dinnertime, they begged him to stay for dinner, oblivious of the fact that their mother didn’t seem inclined to issue an invitation. With no shame, the twins took matters into their own hands.

  “Mommy, can Uncle Sawyer stay for dinner?” Dolly asked, her hands crossed prayerfully in front of her.

  “Can he? That would be so cool,” Casey added. “He can tell us more about Africa.”

  “Please, please,” they pleaded in unison.

  Ava looked at the twins and nodded, a smile beginning to form at the corners of her mouth. Suddenly, she looked the way she used to, before her world had turned upside down.

  Casey shouted, “Yes!” and high-fived his sister. Sawyer was slightly amazed at his quick turnaround. An hour earlier Casey had been angrier than a hornet. Now, secure in the knowledge that his uncle Sawyer was sticking around, he was content.

  He wished he could say the same about Casey’s mother. Despite her smile, Ava’s body language told a different story. She seemed tense and on edge. He had the feeling it had everything to do with his presence. When the kids scampered off to pick up their room before dinner, he moved toward the kitchen where Ava was cutting up vegetables for a salad.

  “Anything I can do to help?” he offered. The silence between them was beginning to be uncomfortable. The beauty of their relationship had always rested in the easy flow of their conversations and the natural rhythms of their discussions. Ever since he could remember, Ava had been his sounding board, the one person he could always talk to about anything and everything. But something had shifted between them. Ever since he arrived at the house, he’d been itching to fill the empty space lying between them with conversation.

  “No, I’ve got it. I’m just making a garden salad with some chicken stir-fry and jasmine rice.” She didn’t even bother to look up at him from her dinner preparations.

  “You cut off all your hair.” The words tumbled out of his mouth. For as long as he’d known Ava, her hair had trailed down her back. Now it was a sleek, shoulder-length bob. He stared at her, deciding that the short style suited her delicate features.

  “It was too much of a hassle,” she explained, wrinkling her nose. “With the kids in kindergarten now, I have to be out of the house by seven forty-five in order to make it to their school on time. We really hustle in the morning.”

  The thought of Ava and the kids bustling around the house in the morning tugged at his heart something fierce. Ever since Billy’s death, she’d valiantly raised the twins and shouldered them through the mourning process. She’d stuffed down her own grief in order to help Casey and Dolly deal with their own fear and pain. According to his aunt Nancy, some nights Ava crumpled her body into their small twin beds and held them in her arms, determined to be there when the nightmares came. From what he’d witnessed firsthand, Ava Trask was an amazing mother.

  “You never were a morning person, even when we were kids,” Sawyer teased, wanting to see Ava let loose and relax. She seemed so tense, so ill at ease. He wasn’t sure if it was because of everything she’d been through or because of him.

  “When you become a parent you don’t really have a choice,” she explained. “You just have to learn how to adapt, otherwise the kids would be late for school every day and I’d never get anything done around here.”

  “If you don’t mind my saying so, you seem less than thrilled about my moving next door,” Sawyer said with a grimace.

  She was standing at the kitchen counter dicing green
peppers, onions and carrots. Every time the knife hit the cutting block, he winced. She seemed to be on edge and had been avoiding eye contact with him. The vegetables seemed to be taking a beating.

  Ava shrugged. “Sawyer, the kids are over the moon about it, so I’m thankful for their sakes.”

  “But not your own?” He studied her expression carefully, picking up on her reservations by her pursed lips and the awkward tilt of her head.

  She sighed. “I didn’t say that. It’s just that we haven’t seen you for a year, and then you turn up on the beach having just bought the lighthouse next door.” She let out a shaky laugh. “You have to admit, it’s a little unexpected.”

  “Ava, you know how I feel about Mr. P’s lighthouse. I’ve loved it since the first time I saw it.” He studied her expression, wondering if she remembered all the times Mr. P had invited them over to his lighthouse when they were kids. He’d been amazing to them, as generous and kind as one could imagine. Between playing pirate, teaching them to catch crabs and watching old movies with them, he’d played the role of grandfather in their lives. He’d taught Sawyer what it meant to be part of a community and how to establish bonds that lasted a lifetime.

  “Is it odd to want to help out my family?”

  “No, not at all.” She let out a sigh. “But I don’t want to rely on someone who—”

  “Who bailed on you?” he said in a gruff tone. “Just say it.”

  She finally looked straight at him. “What the twins need most of all is consistency. I’m not trying to make you feel bad, but when you left it took us a long time to get back to normal.”

  As they locked gazes, tension crackled in the air between them. Ava looked away, focusing instead on the cutting board. “After Billy died, you were our rock. You did so much for us. No matter what, I’ll always be grateful for that.” Midway through, her voice became husky with emotion. “Other than my sisters, you were there for us like nobody else.”