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Contents ( 66)
  1. Cover
  2. Books by Valerie Fraser Luesse
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright Page
  5. Dedication
  6. Contents
  7. Map of Florida
  8. one
  9. two
  10. three
  11. four
  12. five
  13. six
  14. seven
  15. eight
  16. nine
  17. ten
  18. eleven
  19. twelve
  20. thirteen
  21. fourteen
  22. fifteen
  23. sixteen
  24. seventeen
  25. eighteen
  26. nineteen
  27. twenty
  28. twenty-one
  29. twenty-two
  30. twenty-three
  31. twenty-four
  32. twenty-five
  33. twenty-six
  34. twenty-seven
  35. twenty-eight
  36. twenty-nine
  37. thirty
  38. thirty-one
  39. thirty-two
  40. thirty-three
  41. thirty-four
  42. thirty-five
  43. thirty-six
  44. thirty-seven
  45. thirty-eight
  46. thirty-nine
  47. forty
  48. forty-one
  49. forty-two
  50. forty-three
  51. forty-four
  52. forty-five
  53. forty-six
  54. forty-seven
  55. forty-eight
  56. forty-nine
  57. fifty
  58. fifty-one
  59. Epilogue
  60. Keep Reading for a Preview of Valerie Luesse’s Next Book!
  61. Prologue
  62. one
  63. Acknowledgments
  64. About the Author
  65. Back Ads
  66. Back Cover

Kate read her way through pictures of beaches and palm trees, orange groves and sailboats, until she came to one that showed a smiling family of tourists posing next to a large alligator with its mouth muzzled shut. It made her sick to think of Marshall actually seeing something like that. As a teenage boy, he found it disturbing; as a man, he would consider it unacceptable and do whatever he could to stop it.

I hated this place. Any creature that’s too dangerous to be around people ought to be left alone.

I’d give anything to be with you right now.

I’m so in love with you, beautiful Kate,
Marshall

Next, she picked up a postcard that had always made her want to wrap her arms around Marshall and shield him from the world. It was a watercolor of Florida marshlands.

I wish the two of us could steal away to a place like this. No one would find us on Merritt Island. It’s so quiet and peaceful and away. The only thing missing is you.

Longing for you, beautiful Kate,
Marshall

Well into the stack, Kate read his neatly written message on the back of a postcard featuring Cubano’s Fish Camp.

People write messages on dollar bills and tack them to the wall of the café here. I wrote “Marshall Loves Kate” on one last night. Because I do.

I miss you so much, beautiful Kate,
Marshall

Finally came the postcard she had only read once because it broke her heart. It was a picture of Seven Mile Bridge on the old railroad Marshall had somehow pedaled across.

Can you even imagine pedaling across such beautiful water? I’ve never felt so free. The water and the sky made a tunnel of color where nothing could touch me. Nothing but you.

I love you, beautiful Kate,
Marshall

The extremity of it—of needing a solitary ride over the ocean to breathe free—what must that have been like? How ensnared Marshall must’ve felt, even at fifteen, even before the burden of family obligation overtook him.

Kate put the cards back in the box and folded part of her quilt over it to protect it from the ocean breeze while she took a walk along the shore. She said a silent prayer of thanks for sunny weather and asked God to watch over her son as he pedaled his way to some kind of understanding of his father. And then she prayed that Peyton would never feel as detached from the world as Marshall so often had.

That was the critical difference between them, really. Her son could touch the world in a way that her husband couldn’t. Part of Marshall was always observing, always standing at a distance, in a perpetual state of contemplation. But Peyton could reach out and dive in. He could look at a thing, make a decision, engage, and move on. Marshall always struggled with the moving on. Strangely enough, that’s one of many things that made her love him so much—how deeply he felt.