Salt, Sand, and Somewhere In Between

The Ocean City boardwalk on the first Saturday of August, early morning before the crowds, was the one place Mari had ever been able to think clearly. The salt air hit different at seven-thirty, before the families with strollers took over every inch of the wooden planks. Before the funnel cake smell got too thick and the arcade sounds bled into each other until you couldn't hear yourself think. This early, it was just seagulls and the ocean and a paper bag of Johnson's Popcorn warm in her hands.

She grabbed another handful of the caramel corn and barely tasted it. Her phone was doing most of the work.

you are literally missing everything, Destiny had texted. Jaylen said the pool party is next Saturday

Mari typed back fast. tell him to wait for me obviously

She watched the three dots appear. Disappear. Appear again. That meant Destiny was overthinking her response, which meant something was going on that nobody was telling her about. Mari knew that pattern the way she knew her own face.

"Mija." Abuela Rosario said it the way she always did, like a small gentle correction. "You are here. Be here."

"I am here," Mari said, not looking up from her phone.

Abuela Rosario reached over and tilted the phone screen toward the boardwalk floor. Not snatching it, just redirecting it. Mari sighed and dropped the phone into the pocket of her shorts.

Abuela Rosario was wearing her wide straw hat and her linen blouse the color of sea glass. She moved slowly but with total certainty, the way she always did, like she was in no hurry because she knew exactly where she was going and the world would simply have to wait. She held her own bag of popcorn and occasionally fed a kernel to a bold seagull who had been following them since the Music Pier.

"You are nervous about the new school," Abuela said. It was not a question.

Mari shrugged. "I'm fine."

"You have been texting since we left the cottage. You are not fine. You are trying to hold on to things that are going to change whether you hold them or not."

That was the thing about Abuela Rosario. She didn't do long speeches. She just dropped one sentence right in the center of you and then ate more popcorn like she hadn't said anything at all.

Mari was about to say something back, something quick and easy that would end the conversation, when Abuela suddenly brightened and changed direction entirely.

"Oh! Come." Abuela Rosario veered toward the railing near the Music Pier where two separate groups of people were standing, not together but close. One was a girl around Mari's age, small and composed, standing with a woman who had the same watchful eyes. Near them was a tall boy with strawberry blonde hair who was looking at his sneakers like they owed him money. His dad stood beside him, hands in his pockets, not quite looking at his son.

"Abuela, what are you—"

But Abuela Rosario was already talking to the adults, warm and easy, like she'd known them for years. Mari hung back and assessed the situation the way she always did when dropped into something she hadn't agreed to.

The girl was pretty and put-together, and she noticed Mari noticing her and gave a small, patient smile. Okay, she's nice, Mari decided. Or she's really good at seeming nice. Either way, manageable.

The tall boy glanced up from his sneakers for approximately one second and then glanced back down. He wasn't rude about it. He just clearly wanted to be somewhere else entirely. Mari mentally filed him under probably thinks he's too cool for this and looked away.

Then there was a crash of sneakers on the boardwalk and a kid came skidding around the corner near the Johnson's Popcorn stand, slightly out of breath, wearing an expression that was one part proud and two parts lost.

"Hey," he said to nobody in particular. "Is this Ocean City?"

The girl blinked. "Yes?"

"Perfect," the kid said, like he had done this on purpose. "I meant to do that."

Mari felt the corner of her mouth pull up before she could stop it. She didn't want to be charmed. She pressed her lips together and looked at the ocean instead.

The kids began sorting themselves out the way kids do. Names floated around. The composed girl was Simone. The skidding kid was Tito, who had apparently taken the wrong bus from Wildwood and had decided that was the bus's fault, not his. The tall boy said his name was Declan and then went back to looking at the boardwalk like he was hoping a hole would open up in the wood.

And there was one more, a kid who had been there the whole time on a bench nearby, writing in a notebook, who looked up when Tito crashed through and said their name was River.

Five kids. None of them from the same place. None of them who would have ended up together if Abuela Rosario had not decided to simply rearrange the universe to suit herself.

Mari looked at the four of them. Tito was already telling Simone something that made her laugh despite herself. River was back in the notebook. Declan was still doing his thing with the sneakers.

This is my whole August, Mari thought. She was not excited about it.

Abuela Rosario materialized beside her and offered her more popcorn.

"They seem nice," Abuela said pleasantly.

"You don't know that."

"Neither do you," Abuela said. She took a small, unhurried bite of caramel corn. "I spoke with the families. I told them not to worry about the children this week. I am borrowing all five of you."

Mari stared at her grandmother. "You are what?"

Abuela Rosario smiled and fed the last kernel to the waiting seagull. Tito's face split into a grin. Simone blinked with something close to amusement. River looked up from the notebook again, interested. And Declan, for the first time since Mari had laid eyes on him, looked genuinely, deeply ill.

Mari felt exactly the same way. Which meant, she realized with sinking certainty, that this was really happening.