“I’ll book a trip for you and Dad soon… but I need to do this by myself. I’ve been living life in the shadows recently.
I need to step into the light.”
Cleansing, even. I walked barefoot along endless stretches of sand, the ocean curling around my ankles like a gentle invitation.
I let the salt cling to my skin, I let the sun kiss parts of me that hadn’t felt light in months.
I read three books in four days. I swam at sunrise.
I slept with the windows open and let the breeze carry away the last pieces of who I had been in that house.
When I came back, I had a tan, a few extra freckles, and not a single regret.
The next morning, my father gave me the divorce papers I’d filed for before I left.
The fallout was swift and oddly satisfying. Aidan’s mother, of all people, was livid. I heard later that she’d cornered him in the kitchen the moment I left.
“She cooked!
I met with a cousin a few days later. She’d been at the party too, and apparently, Aidan had run outside after me that night, frantic and unsure.
But he didn’t know which way I’d gone.
“He stood on the sidewalk, Lacey, spinning in place like a child who’d lost his mother in a crowd,” she’d said, giggling.
That felt about right.
Now, looking back, I don’t feel any anger or regret.
Just clarity.Continue reading…
