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Chapter 16
Hunter had never spent much time at the beach. He knew plenty of people who vacationed in Florida and the Caribbean, but the idea of lazing around at an oceanfront resort didn’t appeal to him, and he’d never had much interest in a bunch of sand and water.
Butthis. The red glow over the Pacific horizon illuminated the rough, rocky coastline edged with sea-plants and cypress trees. Waves splashed against the outcroppings, birds soared, and a cluster of sea lions lolled on a large rock not far from the shore. The Bliss Cove lighthouse, which he hadn’t yet visited, stood like a soldier guarding the bay.
“Have you been to the boardwalk?” The silver bracelets on Aria’s arm jingled as she pointed to the boardwalk that ran parallel to the ocean.
“Not yet.” He peered through the front window. The place was in full-swing on a Saturday evening, lights blazing and the Ferris wheel spinning in a multicolored circle. “Was that your local hangout when you were a kid?”
“Oh, definitely. We’d take in a movie at the Vitaphone…that was when it was the only theater anywhere nearby, but now Rainsville has a multiplex that’s taken away a lot of the Mortimers’ business…and then come to the boardwalk for ice cream or funnel cakes. We also spent a lot of time at the Mousehole and Ruby’s Kitchen or just wandering Starfish Avenue. Then in our teen years, it was all about sneaking around underneath the pier or going up to Lighthouse Point to make out.”
“Wish I’d known you back then.”
She shot him an amused look. “Somehow I don’t see you as the type to sneak around under a pier. Even as a teenager.”
“I wasn’t.” He gazed out the side window. The coastal hills melted into denser forests packed with redwood trees. “I didn’t have much of a social life in high school. I was laser-focused on my grades and the extracurriculars that would get me into Harvard.”
“Do you ever regret it? The path you took, I mean.”
“No. I made the path.”
“Still. It doesn’t sound like much fun.”
“I didn’t do it for fun.” He squinted at the rugged mountains. “Must be some good camping and hiking up there.”
“Tons of it, on the public land, at least. Some of it is private.” She guided the van around a curve hugging the coastline. “The redwoods have inspired a lot of fantastic stories about Bigfoot, fog spirits, Dark Watchers, even a rumored elf maiden. But the forest doesn’t give up its secrets easily.” She tossed him a smile. “Kind of like someone I know.”
“Maybe it just takes the right person to discover the secrets.” Hunter turned his attention to an outcropping of rocks jutting into the ocean. “This must have been a great place to grow up.”
“Yes, but like many things, I didn’t really appreciate it until later.” Aria pulled on to a narrow dirt road, and the van rattled to a stop in front of an old wooden house. “But I guess it’s better to figure something out late rather than not at all.”
She hopped out of the driver’s seat. Hunter followed, casting a glance over the weathered front porch and salt-encrusted windows. An Open sign was displayed in the window.
As Aria pushed open the door, a bell jingled to announce their arrival. The smells of salt and redwood filled the air. The gift shop held glass cases of jewelry, a rack of T-shirts, and several shelves of books and beach-related knick-knacks—sea animal statuettes, lamps, and snow globes.
“Aria.” A man in his mid-fifties with graying hair shuffled toward them, peering over the tops of his glasses. “It’s about time you stopped by. Lucifur has been wondering where you are.”
He indicated the gray cat lounging in an old chair, whiskers twitching and ears perked. Aria smiled and stroked her hand over the cat’s back.
“He looks great. Bert adopted Lucifur…that’s F-U-R…from the café last month,” she told Hunter. “Bert, this is my friend Hunter.”
Friend.Though she seemed to say the word without even thinking, it sounded almost foreign. A flush colored her cheeks, as if she’d just realized what she said.
“Good to meet you.” Hunter stepped forward to shake the older man’s hand. “Nice place you’ve got here.”
“Take your time looking around, and feel free to head into the museum.” Bert pointed to a curtained doorway leading to another room. “I need to check on something in the oven, but I’ll be right back to show you around.”
He disappeared through another door, and Hunter shot Aria a quizzical look. “Museum?”
“The Sea Glass Museum.”
“Sea glass?”
“Glass that’s been polished by the ocean.” Gesturing for him to follow her, she walked to the back room and pushed the curtain aside. “Say a hundred years ago, someone drinking a bottle of soda on the boardwalk carelessly threw the empty bottle in the ocean. The glass would break, and the waves would toss and tumble all those jagged pieces, smoothing out the edges and giving them a frosted patina. That’s sea glass. Discarded bottles and containers that the ocean has turned into something new.”
Though Hunter’s immediate reaction was to wonder how someone could create a museum out of trash, he followed Aria into the room. Display cases held hundreds of pieces of silky, frosted glass, all arranged by color, as well as whole bottles and jars with barnacles still clinging to the surface. There was a display of marbles that had been found in the sea, each one smooth and clouded.
Bert returned to give them a tour, and Hunter learned more about sea glass than he even knew existed, from the value of different colors to its increasing rarity.
