After a long moment, I let her go, and pull Joel in. “Is it all right if I hug you, too?” she asks.
“Yes,” he says, and he takes her into his embrace, his eyes closed. I think of him burning down the church, of the letter he wrote that never was delivered. I think of her face when she was so tiny and at least I had that.
After a moment, he releases her and clears his throat. “It’s good to meet you.”
“Yes.” She, too, is emotional, and we are strangers but not strangers and it’s both intensely beautiful and awkward. “These are my children, Alexa and Renee.”
I’m struggling to keep my face composed to avoid letting tears fall, but it’s very hard. I can’t even speak.
“I’ve been hoping for a DNA match for years and years,” she said. “I’m so glad you did the test.”
I’m still unable to speak. She has my eyes, the same particular aquamarine, in Joel’s angular face, and so does one of her children. “You’re so beautiful,” I say.
The children endure it for a long moment, and then they point to the center jungle gym. “Can we go play now?”
We laugh and sit down and begin the business of getting to know each other.
Acknowledgments
Sometimes, a book changes your life. In 2021, my husband and I took a long car trip up the coast of Oregon, and there is no way to express how deeply I fell in love with that wild, rocky, lonely, beautiful place. I found myself returning every few months, writing this book, looking at the waves and the seagulls and the skies, walking the beaches endlessly.
Thanks to the Waves Motel in Cannon Beach, where I wrote a lot of pages, and made friends with a giant seagull who banged on the window to get my attention. I did not feed him, but he came back anyway. A lot.
Thanks to the Haystack Rock Awareness Program in Cannon Beach （for a happy treat, follow them on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/haystackrockawareness）， particularly Lisa Habeker, who listened patiently to all my questions and waded with me through the tide pools to tell me all about the creatures that live there, and roost in the rocks, and create their own worlds. I fell in love with sea stars and puffins thanks to you, with all the magical, strange worlds along the edge of the sea.
Thank you to my wonderful team at Lake Union, particularly my editor Alicia Clancy, and all the hardworking people in marketing and PR who do so much heavy lifting on behalf of my books, especially Ashley Vanicek. Thank you to Shasti O’Leary Soudant for my beautiful covers. Thanks, always and forever, to my badass agent, Meg Ruley, who has been holding down the corners of my career for more years than I would say aloud. Your laugh is one of my favorite things.
And always, thank you to Neal, who walks dogs and does dishes and soothes me when I’m tangled up in my own head. I’m so glad I found you.
Oh, and dear reader, I moved to the Oregon coast, to a house with windows like Suze’s, overlooking a moody, rocky beach. Sometimes, a book leads a writer home.