“Okay. Great. Come on.” He stepped out of line and headed for the nearest picnic table with her arms still around him. “How about if you sit over here? That’s it. Right here.”
She reluctantly took the only open seat beside a tall girl with red hair who was in the middle of a conversation with her group of friends.
“Someone is sitting there,” the redhead said.
“She’ll only be here a minute,” Jordan said, walking away. He didn’t want to get tangled up in any sort of mess right before meeting with Scott. Instead of slipping back in line, Jordan slid past the people at the front of the line. “I’m just going inside to look for someone.”
As soon as he entered, he saw that it wasn’t a restaurant but rather a well-organized deli where diners ordered their food and then took it to go or to eat out at the picnic tables. The air-conditioning inside felt invigorating after being in the hot weather all day. Jordan spotted Scott and went up to him, feeling relieved that he didn’t have to go back outside.
“Did you already order?” Scott asked.
“No, not yet.”
Scott nabbed the attention of the guy behind the counter. “And add whatever he wants to my check.”
“I can get it,” Jordan said.
“No, my treat. And if you like sweet stuff, you should try their chocolate haupia pie or the pineapple macadamia cheesecake.”
Jordan kept it simple and ordered a sandwich and a soft drink. He followed Scott out to the crowded picnic tables and was glad to see that the koala-bear girl wasn’t waiting for him. She seemed to have found someone else to latch on to and was now standing in line with two surfers, who were checking out the tattoo on the back of her neck as she pulled her hair to the side and bent her head so they could take a closer look.
Scott led the way to the farthest table and asked the guys sitting there if they minded Scott and Jordan joining them. The guys made room, and Jordan wedged onto the seat across from Scott. This wasn’t what he had expected for a business meeting. How could they talk privately with so many people around?
“Tell me about your assignment for Surf Days.” Scott jumped right in. “Are you just tracking The Eddie?”
Jordan kept his voice low. “No, I’m covering Sunset this week. Waimea was a side trip today.”
“Have they made the decision yet?” one of the guys at the table asked. “Is The Eddie on?”
“I haven’t heard,” Scott said.
“I heard they’ll call it after sunrise tomorrow. You know how they always say with The Eddie that ‘the bay calls the day.’ It’s up to the waves to decide.”
Scott turned to Jordan. “Are you looking for assignments from sponsors, or do you want to stay exclusive with Surf Days?”
“I’m open to what comes along.”
“Have you given any thought to going exclusive with a company like Moana Alii?”
“Not a lot of thought,” Jordan said honestly. “I mean, again, I’m open to other opportunities.”
Scott didn’t appear impressed with Jordan’s less-than-enthusiastic response. Jordan realized he should have replied more like he had seen Derek interact with the reps from the companies he really liked. Derek would have been positive and would have started to talk about contract points right up front.
Jordan took a bite of his sandwich and tried to recalibrate his thoughts so that he could find a natural way to restate his interest in Moana Alii surfboards and not blow this conversation.
Just then, a slim young woman in a wraparound beach dress came up to him and said, “Jordan, why didn’t you call me?”
He pulled back and gave her a startled look. He had never seen her before. She had short, dark hair, dark skin, and an accent. He didn’t recognize anything about her.
“I’m sorry to embarrass you like this,” she said. “But you said you were going to call, and you never did. I’ve been waiting. We had such a great time together.” She reached over and ran her fingers through his hair as all the guys at the table watched.
Jordan pulled back even farther. “Hey, I don’t know what’s going on, but you obviously have me mistaken for someone else.”
“Jordan, how can you say that to me? You’re breaking my heart! Don’t you remember what you told me last night on the beach? You said we were meant to be together. I believed you.” She reached for him as if she were going to pull a koala-bear move like the woman in line.
Jordan jumped up and put his hands in front of him on the defense. “I am not who you think I am. I don’t know how you know my name, but I don’t know you. Nothing happened between us.”
“You call last night nothing?” The woman burst into tears and ran off.
Jordan slowly sat down, stunned. He cautiously made eye contact with Scott, who looked humored at what had just happened, as did the other guys around the table.
“Cold,” one of them said.
“Dude,” another guy said, shaking his head.
“I was telling the truth. I don’t know her. I’ve never seen her before in my life.”
“If you say so.”
Jordan couldn’t believe this was happening. What a crazy mess! He looked down at his sandwich, but his appetite was gone.
“So, tell me what you’ve done so far for Surf Days.” Scott returned to their conversation as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
“I did the cover shot for the February issue.”
Scott and the other guys looked impressed.
“That was my big break. This is the first time I’ve been on assignment for them. I’m pretty much a rookie.” Jordan knew that if Derek were here he would be kicking Jordan under the table for talking himself down. This was his one chance to make an impression, and he was blowing it big-time.
Just then all the guys at the table looked past Jordan to someone who had apparently come along and was standing next to Jordan. By the inquisitive expressions on the guys’ faces, Jordan had a feeling the mystery woman had returned. He didn’t want to look, but he seemed to have no choice.
Slowly turning, Jordan saw Mariana’s face light up with a big smile, as if the fun part of her vacation had just begun.
“Hi, Jordan.”
“Hi.”
All the guys at the table stopped eating, waiting to see how this episode was going to play out.
Mariana seemed to enjoy all the attention. “Do you want to introduce me to your friends?”
With a sweeping hand gesture around the table Jordan pointed at Mariana and said, “This is Mariana. She’s from Brazil, and we’re renting at the same beach house.”
The guys all said their hellos, and then Mariana said, “And this is my friend who is also from Brazil, Tianna.”
The woman with the short, dark hair who had just put on such a convincing show for them reappeared and leaned over to give Jordan a tiny kiss on the cheek. “Sorry. She put me up to it.”
“We saw the girl in line who was all over you,” Mariana said. “I knew it was the perfect time to play a little joke on you. You should have seen your face!” Mariana imitated Jordan’s stunned expression, and everyone laughed.
Mariana’s joke went over much better with the guys at the table than it did with Jordan. Within a few minutes, she had commandeered the table, and Jordan’s conversation with Scott fizzled.
“I have to catch up with some other people,” Scott said before he had finished eating. “You’re on my radar now, so I’ll be watching for your work. Maybe we’ll have a chance to talk later in the week.”
“I hope so.” Jordan stood when Scott rose to leave and decided to go, too. That way he thought he could at least walk Scott out to his car. But Scott had made a beeline for the parking lot; by the time Jordan had gotten away from the table, it was too late for him to casually catch up with Scott and try to talk to him some more.
Jordan wove his way through the crowd of beachgoers to his car. The majority of meanderers seemed to have gathered here in search of directions to a party. That was
the last thing Jordan was looking for tonight.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
As Sierra walked along the beach alone at sunset, she felt the restlessness in her spirit dissipate. It was as if the ferocious waves had challenged her to a contest to see which of them was the most agitated, and the roaring waves won. As her bare feet left their mark in the cooled sand along the shoreline, she felt little bits of her frustration being left behind with each step.
Sierra drew in deep breaths, tasting the salty air as she exhaled. She sent whispered prayers into the wind and felt her thoughts refocusing. In a small way the ocean water’s churning reminded Sierra of the way their old washing machine used to twist and chug in the basement of her grandmother’s one-hundred-year-old house where they lived in Portland.
During Sierra’s high school days, she used to go on a search for her mother when Sierra returned home from school. Often she found her mom in the damp, quiet basement sorting laundry. Sierra would review the daily drama, as her mother calmly folded towels and listened. Her mother rarely gave advice. Sometimes she offered suggestions. Mostly she listened. And that was all Sierra needed to make sense of her life.
Sierra’s memories of that dank, musty place were vivid as she watched the clouds turn the shade of apricots. The sun cast glittering spears of golden light into the ocean, and the waves continued to foam and rage and throw themselves at the shore. She decided what she liked the most about those times with her mom in the basement was that she knew she had her mother’s full attention. In a family of six children, that was a rare occurrence.
Multiplying that feeling many times over, Sierra felt as she walked along the beach that she had God’s full attention, in spite of the millions of children He kept an eye on day and night. It wasn’t as if she sensed Him giving her any advice or specific direction for the future. But she was okay with that. What she felt was that her dilemma mattered to Him, and eventually everything would work out.
Sierra strolled back to the beach house, trying to picture herself living in a Brazilian village. It could be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. She might love the simplicity of it all. Life in its most elemental form without all the confusing influence of modern Western society. No one in the village would care that she didn’t have a cell phone. No one would ever show up for a wedding wearing the same aqua dress.
And no one in the village would say that I reminded them of a mermaid.
She put that thought aside as she approached the beach house. Dusting the sand off her feet, she entered and called out, “Hello, anyone else here?”
No reply echoed her call. She was alone.
A wash of unexpected emotion came over her. She thought she had just calmed all those churned-up feelings. “That’s it,” she muttered to herself. “I’m going to call my mom.”
Sierra went to the bedroom and borrowed Mariana’s laptop so she could log on to the online phone service she used. A moment later she heard her mother’s voice answer the phone, and when she did, Sierra leaked tears.
“Are you all right?” her mom asked.
“Yes, pretty much. Do you have a few minutes?”
“Of course.”
Sierra took advantage of talking freely without anyone overhearing her. She gave her mom all the details about the wedding, talking to Paul, meeting Jordan, ending up at the same beach house with him, the storm, and the collapsed staircase. Sierra concluded with a summary of how she knew she needed to be objective. Jordan had work to do, and she was pretty sure he was over her already, if he ever had been intrigued to begin with. What mattered now was that she focus on her decision about whether to take the position in the village.
Sierra concluded with, “I took a long walk on the beach and prayed about everything, and I’m okay. Really. It’s beautiful here, and I’m glad I came. I just wanted to talk to you and tell you what’s been happening.”
“I’m so glad you called. I’ve been wondering how things were going for you.” Her mother paused and then asked, “Sierra, do you have any sort of peace about taking the position in the village?”
Sierra heard herself say, “Yes.” She wasn’t sure that’s how she really felt or if that’s what she thought her mom expected her to say. Backtracking she said, “Actually, I don’t know. I think so. I’m willing. It seems to be what’s next.”
Her mom paused again and then said, “Sierra, you are a woman of options. You know that, don’t you?”
“Yes.” Again she wasn’t sure if that was a true answer or an expected answer.
“I’ve been thinking about all this and praying along with you, and I think there is an option you should consider.”
“What’s that?”
“I think you should come back to the States for a while.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I’m not sure. A mother’s intuition, perhaps. I know you can live in a village and do a lot of good there. But it’s not really you. You didn’t grow up longing to live in the jungle. You love to help people and to start new projects. You can do that anywhere. I just think you should look into using your gifts somewhere in the US for a few years. If your heart still tugs for you to return to Brazil, then you can always return. For now, think about coming home.”
Sierra felt her teeth clenching. The last thing she wanted to do at her age was to go home and move in with her parents. That would be like admitting defeat. She could never live at home again. Not after all the independence she had experienced over the years.
“I’ll think about it.”
“Good. That’s all I want you to do. Just think about it. Consider all your options.”
“Okay. Thanks, Mom.” Sierra felt herself shutting down. This wasn’t what she had expected to hear and certainly not what she had wanted to hear. She had called because she was hoping for a listening ear, the way her mom had listened back in high school. She wasn’t looking for direction.
“Let me give you one more thing to consider.”
Sierra felt her defenses go up even higher.
“I know that you have been deliberate and diligent in seeking whatever it is that God wants for you. Your father and I think that’s wonderful. We admire your determination. You have always had a strong spirit. Now, consider asking yourself a simple question. Ask, ‘What do I want?’ and then listen to your answer.”
“Okay,” Sierra said automatically.
“The reason I’m suggesting this is because, in this case, I think you’ll find that what you want is exactly what God wants.”
Sierra immediately thought that wouldn’t be true.
“You know how God tells us to delight ourselves in the Lord, and He will give us the desires of our heart? Well, you have been delighting yourself in the Lord for many years, Sierra. I honestly think that, if you take a close look at the desires in your heart right now, you will see that’s what God is leading you to do.”
Sierra found herself disagreeing with her mother, which didn’t happen very often. To her way of thinking, she would be selfish to ask herself what she wanted. All she wanted was for her life to count for God, and that meant doing what God wanted her to do, even if it was something she didn’t want to.
After Sierra ended the call, she stretched out on the bed and listened to the clucking of the geckos as their gentle sounds floated through the open window. Outside the sky had darkened, but the air still was warm, and the sound of the crashing waves continued like the steady beat of a tribal drum. The sound calmed her down and helped her to lower her defenses.
In the darkened room, Sierra thought about her mother’s line that Sierra was a woman of options. What were the options that were available to her? She knew she could go back to school. She hadn’t finished college yet. That would be a good option—that is, if she could decide on a major. Another option was to try something different and do a search for ministry opportunities in different places of the world. What if a ministry in Africa needed someone with her skills? Or Switzerland? She had visited there with h
er friend Christy when she was in high school. Sierra loved Switzerland. Why couldn’t she go there to do something meaningful?
Because you don’t really want to go there.
Overhead the ceiling fan moved the air without making a sound. Inwardly she felt as if all her thoughts were being moved around. Even though she couldn’t hear the sound with her ears, it seemed as if she could “hear” dreams crashing and breaking into pieces as her hopes bumped into reality and her feelings collided with the facts.
Her idealized memory of how her mother had always been there to listen but kept her opinions to herself was now crumpled up and ready to be tossed away. What her mother had said really messed with her mind.
Finally, Sierra gave in and asked the question her mom had suggested.
Okay, so what do I want?
The answer made a grand entrance into her thoughts.
I want to move to Santa Barbara and continue this relationship with Jordan until it comes to a natural conclusion. That’s what I want.
Sierra hopped up and exited the bedroom. She went to the kitchen and turned on the light. Knocking some pots and pans around, trying to decide what to make for dinner, she concluded that her mom was way off track this time. She had to be. Her advice was just bad. Moving to Santa Barbara couldn’t be the answer for Sierra’s future. Chasing Jordan was definitely not a godly goal. That was something other women did. She had more substance than that.
Just then someone rapped on the door. Sierra tried to pull herself together. She turned on the porch light and looked through the slatted windows on the side. She could see the profile of a guy she didn’t know.
“Are you looking for Mariana?” Sierra asked without unlocking the door.
“No, I’m looking for Jordan.”
“He’s not here. Do you want to try calling his cell to see when he’ll be back?”
“I called him a couple of times and left messages. He hasn’t called me back.”
Sierra noticed that the guy had a surfboard in a travel cover with him.