A Year Later

The beach is more my home now than anywhere else. I've had more homes than I can count in my twenty-three years: as kids, my parents moved us four times, then I moved to England where I had two homes, then back to New Zealand, and finally I moved in with Jack a week before he proposed. That was six months ago now.

Though I never had the beach in England, that was where Henry was, so I always felt at home, but coming back to the beach I lived at as a child, I've never felt displaced. They say home is where the heart is after all, and I've always been a Kiwi at heart.

As Jack sits beside me on the sand and passes me an ice cream, I smile and relax.

"You okay?" he asks.

I nod. "He's here. I can feel him. It must sound weird because he was English and died there, but I can feel him here, on this beach. I always have since I came back."

He shrugs and licks his rum and raisin ice cream. "Doesn't sound weird at all. Some people have souls elsewhere, even if they've only been once. Hell, I believe some people are sometimes born away from their true selves, you know? It sounds like Henry was a Kiwi in soul and spirit."

I nod. "I believe so. He fit in when we visited, and Koroua loved him, he fit right into the kāinga. Either way, he's here right now, and he seems at peace."

"Good."

"Do you feel Maia still?" I ask in between licks of my ice cream.

He shakes his head. "Not really, not anymore. Sometimes I'll feel her in the little things, like when I go surfing, or when I go swimming. We used to joke she was a mermaid in a previous life. But I don't really feel her spirit, not properly. I miss it, but I also know she's at peace."

"I wonder if I'll stop feeling Henry, and I don't know how I feel about it."

"It's okay to be sad if that happens, but if he loves the sea, then I don't think you'll ever stop feeling him."

I stare at the water as the waves come in and out on repeat. Never have I felt more at peace than in this moment. Two years ago, I never thought I would be at peace again in the wake of Henry's murder, but here I am. He's still around and I have Jack, and a life I'm happy with.

"Kia mau ki te tokanga nui-a-noho," I say.

Jack smiles. "There is no place like home."

"There really isn't. I'm glad I left for a while, and I'm happy with the life I've had. Life brought me Henry and I'm glad it did; we had our time, as short as it was. I'm thankful. That life led me back home, and it's the best home ever."

"From the withered tree, the flower blooms."

I've never agreed with anything more.

The End