Maxwell stepped out from a door marked Employees Only.

“Benny, thanks, man.” Maxwell slapped a heavyset guy on the back. “I owe you one!”

“Don’t worry about it,” the middle-aged man replied, scratching his bushy black beard.

“Someday, and that day may never come,” Maxwell lowered his voice into a husky gruff, “you may call upon me to do a service for you….”

Benny let out a hearty laugh you wanted to hug. “You’re quoting The Godfather to your godfather—I love it!”

“Always!” Maxwell extended his arms and Benny squeezed him so tight, he lifted Maxwell’s six-foot frame from the ground.

“You tell your mutha to get well soon, capisce?” He placed Maxwell back on the floor.

“I’ll send your love.” Maxwell straightened the hem of his shirt, smiling all the way to his ears.

He watched Benny leave, and as soon as the man stepped into the parking lot, Maxwell turned to Vera and his face collapsed.

He plodded over and sank onto the wooden bench across from her, no longer pretending. “Sorry about that. He’s a family friend, and our seafood vendor, and now sort of a manager. He’s helping us out. Things have fallen…behind.”

“I understand. You’re busy.” As she said it, her eyes flitted between empty tables, not intentionally, but she couldn’t stop herself.

Maxwell caught her meaning. “Yeah, every summer there seem to be fewer tourists. Ever since the hurricane.”

Vera bit her lip. While the gas explosion gripped the nightmares of most people in Roaring Creek, it was the hurricane that plagued Vera, with images of rain battering her house and sounds of glass breaking. The fear of that day lived inside of her.

Maxwell sighed. “We’ve had seven summers like this. It’s so weird, ’cause it feels like yesterday and a million years ago all at the same time.”

Vera nodded. It was hard to remember life pre-hurricane, or pre-explosion, as if her time before had been shot on grainy black-and-white footage that was starting to erode. “Do you go to the memorials?”

The first year after the explosion, the town carved the names of those lost into a fountain. The next year, they planted eighteen trees in the park. And every year, they held vigils and rallies. Society excelled at remembering the dead, but it didn’t always do so well at supporting the living.

“I used to, but it made my mom so much worse afterward, and it didn’t help me at all. And as Chloe got older, I mean, it’s her birthday, so it feels twisted to make the day so dark for her. She didn’t even know him, which is…just…sad. Half the people here still go—they all lost somebody or knew someone who was hurt. It wasn’t just my dad.” He waved his hands around at the restaurant staff who weren’t at all busy, but who continued to show up knowing the tips weren’t flowing in. Vera didn’t lose anyone that day, and she felt guilty about that. They all grieved something so specific, yet her world was spared. “Those memorials, everyone’s all smiling and singing, but their eyes, it’s like they’re blank.” He shivered.