Page 24 of The Beach Cottage
“How do you do it?” Bea asked, smothering another yawn with her hand. “I feel like I need to sleep for a week.”
Betsy shrugged. “You learn to give your body the rest it needs in the best ways that you can. If I have a busy day, I make sure to go to bed at a decent time.”
Bea groaned.
Betsy only smiled as the car navigated through a bumpy patch of the track and onto the main road. “Are you ready to learn the location of my secret fishing hole?”
Bea shrugged. “I don’t know. I suppose so.”
Betsy gave her side-eye. “If I show you my fishing hole, you have to keep it secret. Those are the rules. I don’t want a sudden onslaught of noisy young people descending on the place. It’s nice and quiet, and that’s the way I want it to stay.”
“Me and my friends are hardly young people,” Bea muttered.
“Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea.” Betsy laughed. “You’re still young, beautiful and strong. You should own that, honey. And don’t ever tell yourself otherwise. Life’s too short to be holding back affirmations for yourself. No one else’s encouragement really matters in the end — oh, don’t get me wrong. It’s nice to receive it. But ultimately, only the words you speak over yourself will set you free.”
Bea stared out the window, pondering. Betsy was right. In the end, it was Bea’s inner voice she listened to for more hours of the day than she did anyone else’s. It was her voice that pushed her to take a leap of faith or held her back from the edge. It was her own words of encouragement to keep going that had gotten her through the divorce.
They pulled up alongside the narrow, winding road and climbed out. They had to carry their fishing gear along an overgrown trail that was hard to see at times, but finally Betsy stopped and set her tackle box down beside a small cove.
She sighed. “Here we are.”
“It’s stunning,” Bea said. “And so quiet.”
The water lapped at a golden beach, and they were surrounded with tall black and brown cliffs that muted the sounds of the outside world. A few birds twittered and the low waves hushed along the shoreline, but otherwise, it was silent in that small world. The water was darker blue along the cliffs.
“It looks pretty deep there,” Bea said, pointing.
Betsy nodded. “It gets deep fast. I’ve swum here many times in the summer months. And the sand drops away quickly, but it’s a great place for a dip. No riptide, and the waves are small. You can lie on an inflatable raft and go to sleep.”
“You know this from experience?”
“Let’s just say, when I tipped off the raft and into the water, I got the fright of my life.”
Bea laughed.
It only took a few minutes to set up their rods and to bait their hooks. And before long, the two of them stood side by side, knee-deep in the cool water, lines flung farther to sea.
“I’ve brought your father here a few times,” Betsy announced suddenly, her voice soft.
She wasn’t sure how to respond. She didn’t want to pry, but she was curious. “The two of you are friends?”
“We’ve been friends for many years. Since before your mother died.”
“You said you have something of hers?”
“Oh, yes. That’s right.” Betsy foraged in the pocket of her dress. “Here you go. I brought it to give to you, but then forgot all about it. I’d forget my head if it wasn’t attached these days.”
She handed Bea a small music box. It was made of silver, but tarnished, and it fit into the palm of her hand. She opened it, and a tiny plastic ballerina stood en pointe and began to twirl as tinny music echoed across the water. Images of her mother holding it up to the light in her bedroom, her laughter contagious as she spun around in circles like the little ballerina.
“Wow, I’d forgotten how beautiful it is. The carvings are so intricate.”
“She carried that thing with her everywhere. I offered to give it to your dad once, but he said I should keep hold of it to give to you, since you’d always liked it. He didn’t want to misplace it while he was waiting.”
Bea ignored the gentle jab about her absent years. “How did you get hold of it?”
Betsy shrugged. “She dropped it. I was going to give it back to her the next time I saw her…”
“But you didn’t see her again,” Bea suggested, her heart constricting.
