I decide in favor of the bus. The same bus I took a year ago.

The three-hour drive to Carmel feels so incredibly long this time. I’m looking out the window, remembering last year and realizing how different it all is. I feel alone now. Not for a minute did I feel alone back then. Because he was there, somewhere, texting me every few minutes, seconds sometimes, making me smile, revealing himself to me slowly.

The timing of me being here so close to my birthday feels surreal. Maybe some things do happen on their own timeline and follow their own rules I don’t particularly understand.

I get my notebook out, open it and then close it again. Outside of work assignments and my manuscript, I haven’t been able to write anything this past year. Every time I saw someone and thought they could be a character in one of my stories, my next thought was, ‘but it will never work out, so what’s the point?’

For three-quarters of the way to my destination, I feel somewhat calm, but as it gets darker and Carmel is approaching, I’m starting to feel again those nerves I first felt when Alisa called me. That mix of disbelief and worry. He’s my ‘one that got away’. He truly is. And being back here, so close to him, about to meet him—hopefully—feels like breaking one of those unwritten rules that says you leave the ones that got away alone. They got away for a reason. It also goes against what I’ve always believed in, which is ‘what is meant to happen will happen no matter what you do’. Well, if I don’t stop in Carmel now and go looking for him, it won’t happen. I can’t believe I feel so torn, and I hesitate again. Where’s that confidence I felt on the plane? Where’s brave Maya? I’m a bundle of worries, nerves and what-ifs.

“Next stop, Carmel by the Sea,” announces the driver.

After going back and forth on my decision a few times, I know what I want to do.

“Anyone for Carmel?”

He looks in the mirror at all of us. There’s not that many people left—maybe six or so.

I raise my hand.

Twenty-Four

I find my way to the inn as if I’ve been there a hundred times, not once. It feels so nice to be here and have this familiar feeling. I don’t usually get attached to places—or people—that fast, but this small town has left a strong and obviously lasting impression on me. Maybe just the adventure, the almost magical—fairy-tale-like—feel of that day, perhaps just its beauty and serenity, the friendly people, the ocean, the hope of a life I didn’t even know I wanted.

“Good evening,” says the woman at the front desk as I put down my luggage. I hope they have a vacant room. After all, this is an oceanside town, and it must be popular in the summer if it’s anything like Cape Cod or Newport on the East Coast.