Part 4 — Remembering Who I Was
The following morning, I rented paddleboards.
Normally, I would have found ten reasons not to.
Too expensive.
Too difficult with the kids.
Too much effort.
Someone might fall.
But Max and Darlene begged.
So I said yes.
I watched them wobble across the shallow water, fall in, climb back up, and laugh until they could barely stand.
And then something unexpected happened.
I started laughing too.
Not the polite laugh I used around other parents.
Not the tired little laugh I gave when Mark made a joke after I’d had a long day.
A real laugh.
Loud.
Uncontrolled.
From somewhere deep inside me.
I hadn’t realized how long it had been since I had heard myself sound like that.
Around lunchtime, Mark texted.
What are we doing for dinner Thursday when I get back?
Then another message appeared.
I called the room and nobody answered. Put Darlene on for a second?
I was sitting at the end of the dock with my feet in the water.
A pelican landed in the shallows nearby.
I read the messages.
And did nothing.
An hour later:
Sarah?
I turned my phone facedown.
Then Darlene ran toward me, dripping wet and covered in sand.
“Mom! Come see the starfish!”
I stood immediately.
“Coming.”
My phone stayed on the dock.
That evening, after the children were asleep, I sat alone on the cottage balcony and listened to the ocean.
For some reason, I thought about my mother.
Growing up, she always described me the same way.
“Sarah’s the easy one.”
I had loved that.
For thirty-six years, I wore those words like a medal.
I was easy.
I didn’t complain.
I didn’t demand.
I adapted.
I forgave.
I understood.
I took care of things.
If someone forgot something, I remembered it.
If someone was uncomfortable, I fixed it.
If someone needed more space, I made myself smaller.
Sitting there in the darkness, I finally understood something that hurt far more than I expected.
Being “the easy one” had stopped being a compliment a long time ago.
It had become my job description.
And I was exhausted.
On the third day, I kept waiting for guilt.
Surely it would come.
Surely some voice inside me would whisper that I had overreacted.
That Mark deserved his time with his friends.
That I should have stayed at the original hotel.
That good wives didn’t disappear with the children during a family vacation.
But the guilt never arrived.
Instead, something else did.
I stood beside the pool watching Max carefully teach Darlene how to float on her back.
“Relax,” he told her importantly. “You can’t float if you’re scared.”
I smiled at that.
Because suddenly I knew what I was feeling.
I felt like Sarah.
Not Mark’s wife.
Not Max, Darlene, and Cynthia’s mother.
Not the trip organizer.
Not the person who remembered everybody’s sunscreen.
Not the woman carrying someone else’s golf clubs through an airport.
Just Sarah.
I hadn’t realized how much I missed her.
