After a year and a half of trying to move on from the what-ifs, the tides have pulled Alexandra Rivera and Zachariah Kim back together again.
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In the h...
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When sunlight pours through the window and drenches his skin in gold, I wonder how it's possible to be this in love.
It's early enough in the morning that the rest of the island still feels asleep, but it's all an illusion. The ocean is alive, lapping gently against the shore outside the window. A heart beats next to mine, faster as his eyes slowly open, taking in his surroundings like the first steps through a misty morning. Once they arrive at me, there's nowhere else left to look, and the tide pulls me deeper until I'm submerged in him—only ever him.
My fingers trace over the arm draped across my waist, slowly making its way down every hill and valley along the curve of my side. His fingers leisurely skip around my hip, the same way in which his lips peppered kisses last night. But it's different this morning. Every move is a precursor to the same outcome but a different path requiring less energy. Slow, thoughtful, carving itself deep into a memory neither of us wants to forget. A dream so elaborate that reality had no choice but to take hold of it until they were one and the same.
He tugs my lips down to his where he whispers how much he loves me, and for the first time in my life, I accept it wholly without hesitation.
As a symphony of nature's morning calls rings out around us, I pull myself on top of him and move to the same uneven rhythm of the waves dancing along the shore outside. Pulling him in, breathing him out, and gliding along the surface until I'm left gasping for air. There's a vulnerability to morning sex nobody ever talks about. How each move feels more instinctive because our mind is still waking up.
He hugs me to his chest when we're done and keeps me close like he's not convinced this isn't a dream, afraid that if he lets me go, I'll never find my way back to him. Part of me feels that way, too, but the warmth radiating off him brings me back down to Earth. Back down to him, this person I call home. It's only ever been him. The universe allowing me this opportunity to recognize that is one of the greatest blessings I've received.
"I never want this to stop," he murmurs breathily with his eyes still closed.
I chuckle, feeling the vibrations between our bare chests. "The being together part or—"
"Both," he replies. His arms tighten around my waist until our bodies align with one another and not even a breath of air separates us. "Both."
The two of us remain entangled with one another until he slowly drifts back to sleep. Normally, I would quickly follow right behind him, but my mind is too awake to allow it. Not a mind racing against the clock to outrun a beating heart, but one alive with all the wonders of the good things in life.
It's the greatest surprise in life, to see what falling in love can do to a person.
As soon as I know I can slip away without waking him, I tiptoe around the house and find my way to the garage. Like just about every house in Hawai'i, it's used primarily for storage, and leaning up against the back wall rests a few surfboards. A short, bright red board sticks out at me, and my thoughts flood with the memories tethered to it. I pull it away and tuck it under my arms before heading out to the beach.
I've never acquired the skills necessary to be able to surf, but there's something tranquil about letting the gentle rocking of the waves soothe my soul. The last time I swam out here with Zachariah was when his stepdad attempted to teach me how to surf.
As soon as my legs drape on either side of the board and I'm coasting a little way out on the water, I take in this feeling inside me. It seems silly and grand all at once, and I know as hard as I might try, there's no way I'll ever be able to explain it to someone else. There's a connection Indigenous people have to their land, the way their mana grows within it, that cannot exist between the confines of simple words. It's a feeling like no other, the way I can hold myself in place, planted firmly in this slice of paradise I call my home. A realization that no other place can make me feel the way Hawai'i does. Now that my heart beats steadily, I feel much more at peace in my place within the universe.
When Zachariah finally emerges from the house, the sun is high enough up in the sky that rays of bright light heat my skin with an incandescent glow. He swims out and lifts himself onto the board he's brought with him, pulling up alongside me until our feet dangle inches away from each other in the water. He casts his eyes out along those glimmery crests of water before us.
As our days together feel like they're finally starting, I let my eyes wander over him without a care in the world. Every inch of his body, mind, and soul entwined with mine.
"You're beautiful," I tell him.
He blushes with his entire body before paddling closer so our toes now touch in the water. It feels liberating to be around each other without reservation.
"Is it weird this feels like the beginning of something?" he asks quietly, so quietly I barely hear him over the sound of water slapping against our skin.
I look up at the sky where the sun shines down on us. "It's a new day. Why wouldn't it?"
"Sometimes I look at you and forget you're real. And that you're mine." Romanticism is a good look on Zachariah. "Feels like a dream."
"If only my dreams were as sweet as this."
He looks at me with the faintest smile. When we've spent so long wrapped up in each other, some words need no explanation. The greatest feelings are shared without a second thought. We cast our line and reach inside the depths of our worries, only to realize they were never as strong as we made them out to be. At some point, we fell in without realizing it, but the water is cool and nice and I never want to leave.
Sometimes the what-ifs are the best things about life. Because if there are no what-ifs, how do we encourage ourselves to try something new? To experience life beyond where we are? That glorious horizon of our imagination, full of things that could come to be, just might be, if only we allow our inspiration to take us where we want to go. We realize that life we thought was someone else's is just our own, the one we never thought we'd have the courage to pursue.
Words cannot explain what Zachariah is to me. A love once discarded, only to come full bloom. This love I feel for him is beautiful. We are beautiful. When the world takes us in and feels like it was stitched into the universe just for the two of us to explore together, I realize how sweet it is to let a heart run free.
Maybe we aren't meant to be. Maybe we just are. Because most love stories aren't made from rainbows, nor do they sweep us straight off our feet. Some love stories creep up on us so slowly we don't even realize we're in one. They come from the most unsuspecting places, full of messy mistakes and bittersweet missteps. But through the chaos, we settle into our places next to each other, because loving not in a tangled mess but a comfortable partnership side-by-side is where we find some of the greatest love stories.
"So, what do we do now?" Zachariah asks. His words reiterate everything that felt like a dream last night—we're done running and hiding. The only road ahead of us now is wide open. A horizon that never stops expanding. A home that never feels empty.
When I look at him, I know he feels it all too well. "Whatever we want," I reply.
Above the luscious green peaks of the Ko'olau Mountain Range, birds weave through rays of sunlight; somewhere in the heart of Mililani, my family begins to rebuild their house into a home; behind us on the edge of paradise, our wave crashes gently against the shore.
