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“They are, but we’re having dinner at the house tonight.”
“I see.”
Ava sighed. “Aine, you dated him for what, four months?”
“What’s your point?”
“My point is, you’re seeing someone else now, and you aren’t a four-year-old. Get over it.”
Aine didn’t bother responding. Instead, she leaned down, kissed Sam and then her mother’s cheek, and hugged her. “Have a great time on the cruise. What time is Stan picking you up?”
“A little before seven in the morning. I’ll try not to wake you.”
Aine nodded, hugged her mother again, and then walked out the back door of the house without saying another word to her sister. She was about to go in her own front door when she saw Stuart pull into the driveway.
“Hey, pretty girl,” he said, climbing out of his truck.
“Stuart, I wasn’t expecting you.”
“I finished the job I was on earlier than I thought I would.”
“Do you want to come in?”
“Have you had dinner?”
Aine shook her head.
“Good. I made a reservation.”
“Where?”
“It’s a surprise.”
Aine smiled. This was exactly what she needed—a night out with her current boyfriend would help her forget about the one who came before him.
“Let me change,” she said, pointing to a spot on her shirt where Sam had spit up.
“I’ll be out on the trail.”
She watched Stuart walk out to the bench that sat between the house she shared with her mother and the Pacific Ocean. November was one of the best times of the year to see gray whales as they began their migration south. Between now and mid-January, over eighteen thousand would travel between their northern feeding grounds to Baja California, where the warm-water lagoons would become nurseries for expectant females.
Even though it was chilly, she and Stuart often walked to dinner, whale-watching along the way.
Aine put on a pair of flannel-lined jeans, a wool sweater, and a down jacket. Stuart, who had lived in Yachats all his life, wasn’t as sensitive to the cold as she was, but he never gave her a hard time about it.
“Ready?” he said when she joined him on the trail. She started walking south, to town, but Stuart grabbed her hand. “Our reservation is this way.” He smiled and pulled her in the opposite direction.
There was only one restaurant north of where they lived that was within walking distance—the Overleaf.
She’d suggest they go somewhere else, but getting a reservation at the restaurant with the best view of the coastline was hard to come by. In fact, how had he when he thought he was going to have to work late?
“What’s the occasion?” she asked.
“I saved the owner’s ass, and in exchange, he gave me his table for dinner tonight.”
“I’m not really dressed for a fancy dinner,” she said, looking down at her jeans.
“This is Yachats, Aine. You know no one dresses for dinner.”
