Even after Michael and I crossed that last invisible threshold—skin against skin, breath tangled with breath—I lay there awake for hours, staring at the dark ceiling, listening to the soft rush of waves against the stilts beneath the bungalow.
I wasn't used to another man's body beside mine. And I definitely wasn't used to this… feeling. Not peace or resolution. It was a crack in the surface of the part of me I'd kept sealed for too long.
With the sun fully risen and Michael still asleep, I slipped quietly from the bed and padded out to the deck.
The planks were warm beneath my feet. The bungalow sat over the water like something out of a fantasy, but its beauty wasn't fake. It was earned—weathered wood and rust on the hardware.
I caught my reflection in the glass door—my body thinner than it used to be. Eighteen months of grief had stripped away whatever softness I'd carried. I ran a hand through my hair, noting how much longer I'd let it grow between haircuts.
I didn't bother with it often anymore. I didn't bother with a lot of things.
Marissa used to say I looked like someone who thought too much—brow constantly slightly furrowed and eyes that never quite settled. "Even your face is analyzing something," she'd laugh.
I wanted to know if that's what Michael saw yesterday. Did he see a man lost in thought?
I carried my journal out with me and sat on the low bench built into the railing. Toward the end—after Marissa's mother died—we had started talking about what if.
Not in a maudlin way. Only practical matters. That's where she always focused.
She said if anything happened to her, she wanted her ashes scattered here. "Not because I believe in paradise, but it was the one place where I could fully breathe."
She told me to use something biodegradable. No fanfare. No poems. "You'll know when it's time."
I didn't realize until now that I'd taken that conversation as a command and made a promise.
I had the postcard tucked inside the back cover of my journal. It bore a vintage-style illustration, sun-faded palm trees against a watercolor sky. I'd picked it up two days ago in a moment of impulse, unsure whether I'd ever fill it out.
Now, I slid it free.
My pen shook slightly as I clicked it open.
You'd hate what this place has become. Too curated. Too indulgent. Too plastic.
But you'd love that I came.
I stopped there, pen hovering.
Marissa would've hated the resort, yes. Still, she would've loved the stubbornness that brought me here—the ritual and the follow-through.
I remembered every word of her request and didn't try to make it poetic. I just did it.
She hated sentimentality but respected grief that didn't apologize for itself.
I picked up the pen again, trying to finish the sentence. I stared at the words until the ink started to blur.
You'd love that I came.
You'd love that I kept my promise.
You'd love—
You'd—
My hand stopped. That's what broke me.
It wasn't the ashes or the ocean. Sleeping in bed with a man didn't do it either.
It was the moment I realized I was still writing to someone who couldn't write back.
