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The wildlife center is exactly what the guidebook said it would be. Small and family-run, with palm trees and foliage all around. It’s inhabited by the green-tailed monkeys that live on the island. They run wild all over the countryside, but here they’re more numerous, jumping from tree to tree and watching us with big eyes.
Phillip takes pictures of me next to the monkeys, and I pester him into taking a picture with me, too. A fellow tourist snaps the shot of us.
“To remember the trip by,” I tell him.
He rolls his eyes. “It’s not memorable enough? You fell off a boat, Eden.”
I elbow his side, and he reaches for me, tickling until I finally end up tucked beneath his arm. He drapes it around my shoulders and keeps it there for the rest of our tour around the little center.
After our visit, we drive on. Our route takes us from spot to spot, all the way to a cove on the north end of the island. We eat lunch there, high above the crashing waves of the Atlantic, and I make him tell me about his childhood, and his experiences in law school and the late nights he spent in the library.
In return, he quizzes me about my books, and I finally tell him the name of my first one, the flop, and he listens attentively. Like he truly cares.
Our last stop of the day is at a deserted beach mentioned in the guidebook. We make our way to it using a combination of GPS and a very friendly man who points us in the right direction. The sun is hanging midway down the sky, the afternoon fading. I sit down on the sand, and Phillip sinks beside me. The deep-blue waves beat softly against the shore.
“I can’t believe we’re here,” I say. “That this is my life right now.”
“It could be your life more often. You know, if you wanted it to,” he says. “There are ways to incorporate traveling into your reality.”
I rest my head on my knees. “Yes. I used to be kinda jealous of Kaelie, actually. She gets to travel so much for work. But now, I don’t know if I want that.”
“No?”
“I like it like this, when it’s rare and special. And I like that I’ve been here long enough to become someone else.” I turn to look at the man beside me. Strong profile. Arms outstretched behind him, propping him up. “I don’t want to lose this entirely when I go back home.”
His blue eyes shift to me. “Lose what?”
“My vacation self.”
“Ah. Well, you can carry her with you pretty easily.”
“I’ll try. Because the person I am right now… it’s such an upgrade from who I’ve been the past few months.”
His lips tip into the frown similar to one he’d worn during our first days of vacationing together. “Because of the dipshit?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Sorry. We don’t need to talk about our exes.”
“We can talk about whatever you’d like,” he says. “I believe I’m the one who brought up avian genitalia earlier, so you have a free pass for eternity.”
I brush my shoulder against his. “I’ll never let you live that down.”
“I expect nothing less from you. But you can tell me. It was rough after you found out about…?”
“Yes. All our friends knew, my entire family. It took me a few weeks before I felt ready to have all of the conversations, you know. Anyway. I like who I’ve become here, on this island. Free-spirited and adventurous, and not so hung up on the past.”
“Mm-hmm,” he says. “You are probably more like this than you realize when you’re back home.”
“You think?”
Phillip’s eyes slide from the ocean to me. “Yes. You’re a planner and a hopeless optimist. You like talking to strangers and you’re curious. You strive to do a good job, and you’re a little afraid of messing up.”
“That’s… a pretty good assessment.”
“I pay attention,” he says.
The sea is rougher on this side of the island. Without the natural buffer provided by the island from the open Atlantic Ocean, the waves on this coast are higher, and the water looks darker.
It’s beautiful.
