Toby tucked his board under his arm and shut the van door. He locked up and handed me the keys. “Saves me hiding them under a rock.”
“That’s what you do?”
“It’s what everyone does.”
“And no one gets their van nicked?”
“Not as long as I can remember. Besides, it would be a brave man who stole Joe’s—oops, sorry. I’m doing it again.”
I snorted. “I didn’t mean you shouldn’t talk about Joe. I was just being nosy about your relationship with him. People fascinate me.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re fascinating people. Maybe you feel the same about horses.”
“Oh. Yeah. That makes sense.” He jerked his head at the path a few feet from the van. “You ready to hit the beach?”
“How far is it from here?”
“About three seconds.”
“For real? I can’t hear the sea.”
“Then you’re not listening.”
Toby led me to the path. It turned a corner much like the windy roads that had led us here, then sloped steeply up. The sand grew thicker and paler, and as we reached the top, the unmistakable salty scent of the ocean reached me.
A few more steps and we were on the most beautiful beach I’d ever seen. Pristine white sand stretched out, hugged by jagged rocks and cliffs, and in the distance, the deep blue sea overwhelmed the horizon, lapping gently at the shore on one side and crashing in waves at the other. It was the perfect alchemy of war and peace, and I was stunned into silence.
Toby gave me a moment, then he pointed at the more violent end. “That’s where the surfing’s at. You can swim in the middle where the lifeguards are or paddle at the other end when you bring Ella. Never go in further than your waist, though, no matter what anyone else is doing. The riptides are wild on this coast.”
His expression was so earnest I didn’t have the stones to admit I had little idea what a riptide actually was. Instead, I nodded and looked towards the far end of the beach where surfers were riding the waves. “I’m not planning on getting wet today. I’ll go where you go and watch.”
“Watch me surf?”
“Yeah. I’ve never seen it in real life. The last beach I went to was in Goa.”
“From the photo?”
“Yeah. I went there to find myself, and here I am, somewhere else, being a part-time dad. Can’t make it up.” I stopped walking and kicked my shoes off. My feet sank into warm sand, and the bitterness that had laced my words suddenly felt like regret. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that as a bad thing.”
Toby gave an easy shrug. “Don’t apologise to me. It’s not my life you’re dissing.”
“I wasn’t dissing anything.”
“But you’re not happy here, are you?”
His expression was more open than any I’d ever faced. Only Ella looked at me with such little judgement and expectation, and it made anything but honesty impossible. “No, but I wasn’t happy in London either, so I can’t exactly blame the scenery.”
Toby shifted his board to the other arm. The wind whipped up and blew his hair back, treating me to an unobscured view of his face. He looked as though he had something to say, but before he could take a breath, someone called his name.
He waved to whoever it was, and when he glanced back, the moment had passed.
We reached the place he deemed I should wait while he headed out to the ocean. I wanted to tell him to be careful in the raging sea, but I didn’t want him to laugh at me or think I was trying to dad him. So I said nothing. Just sat on the sand and watched him jog away from me.
It wasn’t the worst place I’d ever let a wave of despair hit me. I burrowed my toes into the sand and breathed the fresh sea air. There were people around me, but not so many that the beach was busy. Dogs and children played in the sand together and in the crystal-clear rock pools at the base of the cliffs. It was literal paradise. Perhaps if I’d had Ella with me, I’d have appreciated it more.
Or maybe she’d have been screaming for her bottle while I lost her dummy in the sand and wished we’d stayed at home. Who the hell knew?