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“Sure, of course. I think I have an extra one around somewhere.”
“Great.” He turns the thick page to our first days at home. My parents holding her, each of my brothers taking turns. Me looking so young, with fuller cheeks and freckles, my hair bone-straight because I hated my curls then. If I could go back and tell past me everything would be okay and hug her, I would.
He looks through more memories. Naked, smiley Olive covered in cake and frosting at her first birthday. Olive dressed as a koala when she didn’t have a say in what she wanted for her first Halloween. My family is in every other photo, whether it’s my mom or dad or my brothers. It makes my eyes leak thinking how full of love and family my daughter’s life was, even if her dad wasn’t around for most of it.
“I missed so much,” he says. “I wish I was there.”
“You’re here now. That’s all that matters.” I pause before I say what I’ve been wondering this whole time. “Did anything prompt you to come to Goldheart? Did anyone say anything?”
Max looks up. “My best friend when I lived in San Francisco mentioned Goldheart. His wife is from here.”
My forehead tenses. “Who’s his wife?”
“Raegan Mansfield.”
My eyes widen. “Raegan Stewart?”
“I think that was her name?” Max asks.
“Raegan is Annie’s little sister. Annie is my sister-in-law. Holy shit.”
“They’re moving to France.”
“I know, Annie is so proud of her. Raegan has always wanted to live there.”
“Wow,” he says. “Small world.”
“Yeah, small world.” I take another drink. Raegan has only been with Henry for a little over a year, but it’s another reminder of how close we were without knowing it. How we were kept apart by circumstance, but a small conversation with a mutual acquaintance steered him back to me.
“It’s always been nagging at me, though. My intuition just wouldn’t let go.”
“Really?” I ask. I can’t help but smile.
“Really.” His gaze makes my chest expand, because it says so much. The truth, that no one else felt right for us. No matter how logical we are, something illogical happened to us ten years ago.
I hold his stare, shifting on my feet. Do I tell him? Do I let him know?
“This is great, thank you,” he says, raising the beer and nodding to the photo album.
The magic is gone.
“I thought you might enjoy it. Olive was a really cute baby.”
“She looked like me as a baby. I should have my mom find my baby photos, and we can do a side-by-side comparison.”
“They say when the baby is first born, they look like the dad so the dad will claim them as his own. That he can’t deny paternity.”
“She is definitely my kid. I was that blond when I was little.”
He points to a picture of Olive at three, bright blond hair in two baby ponytails held together with bows, holding a sparkler on the Fourth of July. As he continues to flip, I lean closer so I can look at them. I try not to look at them because I’ll just cry at how little she is and how I blinked and she grew up, but it’s so nice to do this with her father.
“Oh.” He points to a picture. Olive is about two, in my arms. While her little arms are outreached in joy, my lips are turned down, and my body jerks, like it remembers.
“Were you sad there?”
I nod. “Cam found me sobbing on the floor one night, after Olive refused to go down. He moved in and kinda never left. He built the tiny house himself. I bought it off of him when he moved into town with his wife. Thought about turning it into an Airbnb.”
“I’m sorry that happened. That you felt like that.” His gaze is serious, and I look away and he does too. “I’m glad you had such a great family who was there for you.”
