"Good-morning, Mr. Armstrong. Breakfast?"

"Morning, Glenda.  Not now."  Jarod Armstrong gaze was drawn past Maggie Sanderson's niece towards the path leading down to the coast.

 "Sorry, I forgot your ritual."

 "Ritual, Glenda?"

 "Yep.  Twenty years, now.  The morning after you arrive, you go down to the beach.  Just like you always book the first two weeks in August."

 Jarod chuckled.  "Never knew I was such a creature of habit."

 "Oh!  I wasn't criticizing." Jarod's smile grew as her cheeks flushed rosily.

"A man of my years takes it as a compliment when a young woman notices his movements."

 "You aren't old."  He strained to hear her mumbled response.  "I'll keep an eye out.  Have your breakfast ready."

 "Thank you, Glenda."  Jarod went out the screen door onto the back porch of the white, clapboard inn.

 Jarod took a deep breath, inhaling the salty tang of the sea with relish as he carefully traversed the downward path to the Atlantic.

 He scanned the horizon. Delighting in the view.

 Today, the ocean was a deep azure blue, reflecting the bright, cloudless sky.  White, foam topped crests rolled onto shore with their murmurs, whispers of secrets untold.

 He heard the cry of a seagull, from the direction of the rocky outcropping not half a mile distant.

 Hill Inn boasted a hidden beach. Patrons of the Inn tended to keep the undeniable beauty to themselves. Their own secret haven, heaven on earth.

 Jarod chuckled at his own fanciful thoughts.

 He reached the shore line, a trifle breathless from his efforts through the sand dunes. The ocean took on different colours. Turquoise ribbons and pools, palest of lime green in the shallows, deepening again to azure, thickening on the horizon into indigo.

 "You're late."

 Jarod smiled at the woman, resting on the silky smooth surface of the sand, warmed by the morning sun.

 "Forgive me, Skye.  My plane was delayed.  I didn't arrive until midnight.  Slept late, getting old.  Forty-five, forty-six, next month."

 She held out her hand.

He accepted it, sinking down on thes and beside her.

Jarod's heart pounded painfully as his gaze swept over her shining beauty.  Her hair was gold, spun sun shine, trailing down to mid-thigh.  Her eyes, the deep indigo of the skyline, skin the colour of ocean pounded sand.  Her lips were the palest pink of mother of pearl and her small, even teeth, white as a piece of bleached driftwood.  She could never belong in his mundane world.  She was of the sea.

 "Is aging onerous?  Would that I could know it, Beloved."

Jarod nodded.  His throat working hard with emotion.

"Our daughter is happy. Seanne joined with Taltos.  He will be a good provider."  She touched Jarod's cheek, her deep indigo gaze capturing his.  "It's time, my love. I've been selfish, keeping you bound to me so long."

 "Have I complained, dearest Skye?"

She smiled with infinite sadness.  Her eyes held ancient knowledge.  Aged, unpleasant secrets. "I give you back your youth."  Her sigh was soft, the whisper of warm tradewinds. "It's the least I can do, Beloved."  Her salty tears glittered like gems.  She kissed him deeply, hesitating but a moment, before returning to the sea.  His last glimpse was of her iridescent, blue tail, slapping the surface as she dived deeply into the waves.

 His awe at her metamorphosis as keen as the first time he witnessed it.
 

"Mr. Armstrong?  I thought you'd like some coffee.  I brought a thermos."

Jarod looked up, a perplexed frown upon his strong features.  His thoughts, a vague irritation that he had lost something, troublesome.

 His frown cleared, eyes widening.  Was he blind?

 Her warm brown eyes and her glossy chestnut hair, cut short, sculpted about her head.  Lush red lips and full curves.   She blushed at his avid stare.

"Thank you, Glenda.  Would you share a cup with an old man?"  How could he be so unaware of the passage of time?

 "Damn it, Jarod!  You aren't old and I'm not a child.  I turned twenty-six, last spring. God! As impossible as it sounds, you don't look a day over thirty." She passed him a metal mug of coffee, fixed exactly as he liked it.