Page 60 of Seas the Dating Coach

My eyebrows pinch as I glance at the brackish, near-black water around my calves. I began swimming in the bay, only moving to the ocean when my parents felt I was strong enough to tackle the beach’s waves. Most island kids start out that way. That’s why the park playground at the south end of the island has a little man-made beach on the bayside.

And after my parents died, swimming became my way to escape the pain that I didn’t understand at the time was grief. When the water silenced the noises of the world, I could hear my mom’s voice again. I could remember what she sounded like, singing our favorite songs as we danced around the kitchen. I feel safer in the water than I do on dry land most days.

A memory flits at the edges of my mind, a bit hazy at the corners—of us being near water and Finn being uncomfortable. It must have been when he’d been coaching me to approach men at bars. Yes, I’d wanted to say hello to the ocean and…

My chin snaps up, finding Finn practically vibrating, the tendons in his neck popping. I slowly rise, leaving my sandals and my tote on the dock boards.

“I’m perfectly safe here, but I don’t mind coming next to you.”

“I know.” He runs a frustrated hand through those gorgeous locks. “I know how capable you are.”

His shoulders drop in ragged increments as I pad over, releasing completely when I’m standing two feet in front of him.

“What is it about water?”

Finn’s head shakes, his jaw a steel trap again.

I press my lips together, surveying his body. His knuckles are white from where they grip his laptop. Brynn gets like this when she’s stressed. Rigid. Silent. Completely shutdown. With her, I usually make something savory to coax the words out, but I can’t do that now.

“Let me just...” I collect his computer, crouching to set it against the exterior wall.

I’m halfway to standing when I remember something else I do with Brynn—talking side by side. When we’re walking on the beach or sitting on the couch, she’s more willing to open up. I rest my back on the blue siding, my fingers close but not touching Finn’s. For a full minute, we watch the boats’ fenders bump against the dock, their ropes straining against the galvanized cleats. The guitarist begins the delicate, almost-hypnotic introduction to “Dust in the Wind.”

“It’s not that I can’t swim.”

I say nothing, waiting.

“I…I learned young, but then my broth—”

My head turns to catch Finn’s eyes closed, his dark lashes firmly pressed to his cheeks.

“I was eight. No one else was around, which almost never happened, and my brother said we should swim. I was just excited that he was taking an interest in me, since he’d spent most of my life ignoring me. It was fun at first—a few cannon balls, a water fight. But then…”

I can’t not touch Finn, so I slip my pinky around his.

Finn’s throat bobs with a swallow. “I thought he’d let go right away. He’d dunk me. I’d dunk him. I fought when the air got thin, but I couldn’t overpower him. He was thirteen and so much stronger than me. When the chlorine burned down my lungs, I—I thought…”

My other hand grips his arm as spikes piston down my legs. I know Finn is fine—he’s here telling me this story—but my racing pulse doesn’t seem to understand.

“The gardener was tearing into Brody when I came to the surface. I scrambled onto the pool deck, gasping, but Brody just puffed out his chest, looking terrifyingly similar to my father, and told us both that nothing happened. He told the gardener he didn’t see anything—not if he wanted to keep his job. Brody hissed that our father would never respect me if I couldn’t handle a little roughhousing. I coughed and sputtered for hours afterward, but I…I’ve never told anyone.”

Before his chin drops against his chest, I catch his cheek with my palm. “I—I don’t know what to say…I—” Darn my inability to form the right words. “I’m sorry. I’msosorry. That never should have happened.”

Finn’s shoulders rise and fall before he leans into my touch, his lashes closing. My heart aches as moisture congests at the bridge of my nose. I want to wrap my arms around this giant man, to build a bubble fortress with my body until nothing can hurt him. Standing on my tiptoes, I do just that—slide my hands around him and give Finn the snuggest hug. When his beard scruff burrows in my hair with an exhale, I squeeze tighter.

“I’d felt so lost afterward.” His whispered words tickle my neck. “That itchy sensation that I didn’t quite measure up had always been there, but I felt the separation even more after that. My father and brother were in one orbit, and I was in another. It became hard to sleep, though I never told anyone the nightmares were about drowning. After that, my nanny took me to my grandmother’s library whenever I woke up. Everyone else would be asleep, and she’d snuggle us into a worn leather chair and read to me for hours.”

“I like her.” I gently slide my fingers into the fringes of his hair, tracing his spine down and then back up again.

Finn’s shoulders collapse with another heart-squeezing exhale. “I did too. She was the only person who encouraged me to pursue my interests—until my sister came along, that is.”

Was.The glint of sorrow in that word is enough to know that she’s no longer with us.

“What was her name?”

“Magda.” The reverent way Finn says her name makes my chest tight.

A question about where his mother was in all this hovers on the tip of my tongue, but I don’t voice it. Finn has already divulged so much. If his mother had been in the picture, he’d have mentioned it. His casual mention of a gardener and a nanny confirms my suspicions that Finn must have had a wealthy upbringing, though, it seems, an emotionally impoverished one.

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