It’s said that starting something new on the first Monday in December is a bad idea. The waves started first. She was sure they were waves, the comforting, familiar sound of white and blue and the whoosh as the water trickled back through the sand. She didn’t open her eyes for a long while, wanting to hover in the half awake, half asleep feeling for as long as possible. But inevitably, then sunlight pulled her to the surface, and she was conscious.
Canary sheets, new, clean, cool. Alone. She stood up, still holding onto one corner, and stepped through the open doorway of this room, into the sun room off the side. The front door was open too. Open to an expanse of yellow sand, and the cobalt sea that woke her. Dropping the sheet, in underwear and a tee, she sat at the small table in the center of the room. She felt the cold, polygonal shapes of the mosaic making indents in her thighs. She traced the designs on the small matching coffee table. A few wild grains of the ocre sand had pushed their way in through the open doorway, the breeze was warm, as though it was coming off a dessert, not the ocean. In the most casual way, she felt lost.
“Coffee?”
She spun around, this was real? Well, she’d “Love some…”
The woman was friendly, familiar, but she couldn’t remember her name…her mother? No, certainly not. But images did not come flooding back to her. She hoped when she brought the coffee, the woman would sit down and join her.
Again realizing she was in her underwear, she decided to look in the dresser across from the end of the bed. It was filled with her clothes, things that smelled familiar. She grabbed a wrap-skirt, and tied it around her waist. She picked the sheet back up, but only to place it back on the bed, unmade. She felt lost, yet comfortable. Not quite sure where she was, or why, but at the same time, not surprised.
The woman came back with the coffee, and did join her at the table with her own small cup. “Thank you…” she trailed off.
“Lydia,” smiling. “I own this small inn here. You’ve been sleeping for a day or so…you had a long few days of travel…Joan.”
That opened a door. Joan slowly sipped her coffee, sensing conversation was not necessarily necessary. She was brought a little closer to earth, a little more of the dreamlike cloud she felt like she was in lifted. “Thank you…yes, it was a long few days…coming from LA.” She looked out at the blue water again…waves continuously and quietly crushing the sand into even tinier bits. Fiji. She had known nothing about it, wanted to go on a vacation alone. Here she was.
“Thank you for the coffee, I think I needed it.” Said Joan. “I am sorry if I am acting a bit loopy, I must have needed this vacation badly.”
“Think nothing of it, Joan. I think you’re right on – spend the day on the beach, relaxing. I will be around and we can talk whenever you’d like.”
“Do you have an international phone I can use?” asked Joan.
“Yes, of course. Who would you like to call?”
Joan didn’t know. She just felt so out of touch…wouldn’t some one be worried about where she was? ‘I am a grown woman,’ thought Joan to herself, looking down at the same time towards her own lap.
Lydia rose, taking the empty cups with her, seemingly satisfied with out an answer.
Joan did not feel depressed, did not get back into bed. The coffee had not cleared her head, but had given her some energy. She went back to her dresser, and decided to grab her notebook to write down her thoughts, or at least put pen ot paper to try to find them.
There was a small, new notebook in her dresser, with an envelope sticking out the top. She picked up the empty notebook, and pulled out the letter, from her sister.
(((More to come soon…)))
