Beach Girls by Luanne Rice

hadn't felt in too long to remember. He strained to see through the darkness, and he saw her drop her robe on the sand.
    Her bare skin was pale in the starlight. He saw the curve of her breasts and hips, and he drew in a slow breath. He sat on the edge of his seat, as if something was about to happen, something almost unbearable. She dove into the water—straight in, without having to stop and get used to the cold.
    He watched her head, her strong strokes, as she swam straight out. Venus hung in the west, illuminating her wake. Jack craned his neck, to keep her in his sight. He felt incredibly guilty and disloyal, thinking this way. But he was rocked by a surge of passion, and he wanted only to run down to the water's edge, dive in, swim out fast, meet Stevie in the waves.
    He momentarily lost sight of her—panic came up—where was she? Had she gone under? He scanned the water around the raft, about fifty yards offshore, and the big rock just beyond.
    She didn't need saving: she had bypassed the raft, swum straight to the huge rock. Jack remembered going out there as a boy. It was massive, granite, a great place to pretend to be shipwrecked. Mussels and barnacles covered its surface; lobster pots washed up in storms, their lines snagged on its jagged outcroppings.
    Jack watched as she hauled herself out of the sea, climbed to the top of the rock. She was nude and beautiful, and black water turned silver streaming off her body. Again, she opened her arms, as if to hold an invisible lover, and then she dove back in. She came steadily toward shore. Could she see him? Jack's pulse raced. He was torn in half—knowing he had to stay hidden, wanting to stand up so she'd see him.
    But he didn't move. She swam before dawn for privacy. This was her beach. He knew that right down to his bones. She owned the white sand, the deep blue sea, the granite, quartz, moonstones, and sea glass, the mystical seaweed: she possessed this place. All those people who came during sunny daylight hours and set up their blankets and chairs and umbrellas were missing the secret magic.
    Stevie had it. Backing silently away, Jack could almost believe she had called down the thunderstorm, cooled off the night. He wanted to wait, to see her body again, closer this time, silvered with sea water. He was in a trance. Part of him wanted to taste the salt on her skin—he knew it was wrong, didn't know where it was coming from. Still, the desire to watch her was so strong, he felt it pulling him down, down—to the tide's edge.
    He turned instead, to give her back the beach.
    Quickly, hoping she hadn't seen him, he grabbed his shoes and ran back up the sandy road to the house where his daughter lay sleeping.
     
    STEVIE SAW JACK
on the boardwalk just as she was finishing her swim. Her heart caught and lurched—was he waiting for her? Had he seen her undress? How could she get out of the water if he was standing there? She watched him hesitate, as if deciding whether to walk toward her. Instead he backed away, grabbed his shoes from the boardwalk, trotted up the road.
    The beach was hers again, as it was every day at this time. She wanted to feel the serenity, a connection with the earth's rhythms and mystery, that she always felt—but instead she felt almost wild.
    Seeing him there, that split second before he'd turned away, she had sensed his yearning. She could read it in his posture. She knew it by heart, because she felt it herself. Since childhood, since her mother had gone, Stevie had felt a sense of helpless longing; she satisfied it in all sorts of ways. She had fallen in love too hard and too wrong, traveled far and wide to escape herself, reached for stars that were really just cheap lights.
    Stevie's longing was deep and eternal; she knew she'd be searching for love until she found it. And on good days, she knew she had found it already: in nature, her early morning swims, Tilly, her birds, the secrets and intimacy of New York City. She hoped that