Chapter 7
The beach slowly began to return to its normal rhythm, though the immediate area around us remained a respectful, quiet bubble. Captain Mitchell approached, his imposing frame casting a long, protective shadow over the ruined patch of sand.
With surprising grace for a man of his size, he carefully lowered himself onto one knee, the joints in his knees popping softly.
“Mind if I sit here for a minute, buddy?” he asked, his voice entirely different now—soft, gravelly, and endlessly kind.
Noah sniffled, wiping his wet cheeks with the back of his sandy wrist. He looked at the flat, chaotic mess where his fortress had stood. “My castle is broken,” he whispered. “She did it on purpose.”
“She did,” Captain Mitchell agreed immediately. He didn’t offer empty platitudes. He didn’t tell Noah it was an accident or that the woman didn’t mean it. He respected my son enough to give him the raw, unfiltered truth. “Some people have ugly hearts, Noah. But we don’t build things for them.”
I stared at the lifeguard, stunned that he knew my son’s name.
Mitchell placed the open golden box on the sand between them. The antique brass compass gleamed in the sunlight.
“Do you know where I got this compass, Noah?” Mitchell asked.
Noah shook his head, his eyes fixed on the gleaming brass.
“Your dad gave it to me,” Mitchell said softly.
I gasped, my hand flying to my mouth. Simon?
“A long time ago,” Mitchell continued, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “He handed it to me up in that tower. He told me it was ‘for the times I couldn’t figure out how to navigate the crazy people on this beach.’ He was a funny guy, your dad.”
Noah’s eyes went wide. “You knew my dad?”
“I knew him well,” Mitchell said. He reached into the box. “But I didn’t come over here just to show you the compass. I came to show you what’s hidden underneath it.”
Captain Mitchell slipped his thick, calloused fingers under the dark velvet lining of the box and lifted it out entirely. Hidden beneath the velvet, protected from the salt and the sun for who knows how long, was a laminated photograph. The edges were slightly yellowed, a testament to years spent hidden away in a lifeguard station drawer.
He handed the photograph to me first.
My breath caught in my throat. The man in the picture was undeniably Simon, but a version of him from before the weight of corporate deadlines and mortgages had settled on his shoulders. He was younger, shirtless, his chest deeply tanned, and his arms were coated in wet sand all the way up to his elbows.
But it was what he stood next to that made my heart shatter all over again.
Simon was standing beside a sandcastle of impossible proportions. It wasn’t just a fortress; it was a sprawling, chaotic, magnificent monstrosity. I had never seen anything like it. He was laughing so hard his eyes were squeezed shut, capturing a moment of pure, unadulterated joy.
I stared at the photograph far longer than I intended, my thumb tracing the outline of his face through the plastic.
May you like
Noah pressed against my arm, standing on his tiptoes to see. I lowered the picture so he could look.
“Before you were even born, Noah,” Captain Mitchell said, his voice reverent, “your father used to come to this exact spot. Early. Sometimes an hour before the sun even came up. And he built castles.”
