Until the Tide Returns

The small, cozy, secluded house nestled away in the woods beside a creek stared back at me as I continued to stare at it not entirely sure I wanted to do this. A creek ran off in the distance I could hear and see it. On some level it was like I sensed it.

I was sitting on the hood of Landon’s car just staring at the small white house in front of me. Landon was in there. Talking to my grandmother. My maternal grandmother. Someone, who until recently, I never spared a thought towards. And here I was at her house. Where I would be living for quite some time.

I knew my father wouldn’t be able to leave Arizona, he was needed at work there and with the way the economy was it wouldn’t be easy for him to find one here that paid so well. It was something we had talked about on the phone on the way here. Now that we were actually in Maryland my father was going to come and stay with us. For a few days at least.

I suppose we could have gone to his parents first seeing as they did know about me, but Landon insisted that until I get a handle on whatever powers I had that this would be safer. I secretly believed it was because he knew my grandmother and would feel a bit more comfortable at her house.

So, here I sat. On the hood of Landon’s car more nervous than I had ever been as I waited for my father to arrive. Even with Landon here I couldn’t bring myself to go inside without my dad. I was about to be living away from him and it terrified me. I could at least meet this new world of mine with him beside me.

The screen door creaked and Landon stepped out making his way towards me. “I promise I was super careful when I climbed up here.”

“I’m not really worried, I think the layer of dead bugs is acting as a barrier against scratches.” I hadn’t really thought about how many dead bugs would be on the car after such a long ride and now that I looked at it there were certainly quite a few. It didn’t bother me though. He stopped when he reached the car and I leaned forward into him. His arms slipped around my waist pulling me closer to him. “She says she is really excited to meet you and that she understands you want to wait for your dad.”

“So she’s nice?” Landon chuckled and pressed a kiss to my forehead. Over the past few days we had become completely comfortable with each other. We spent a lot of time kissing, which I was super ok with. There was one night though he stopped abruptly letting out a grown and then jumped in the shower. I didn’t understand what had happened, but he looked embarrassed so I decided against asking him.

“Incredibly so. She’s in there cooking and putting away the stuff in our rooms.”

“She’s unpacking?” I tilted my head back so I could look at his face.

“She likes to keep busy. She’s pretty nervous about meeting you. She hasn’t even let herself peek through the window to look at you yet. She’s too worried that will make you more real to her and she’ll come running out here and freak you out.” He smiled at me.

“What am I supposed to call her?”

“I’ve always called her Gram. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind you using it.” When I didn’t say anything Landon pulled me off of the car. “Let’s go for a walk while we wait for your dad to get here.” He laced his fingers through mine and we started making our way towards the creek.

I didn’t understand it, but the closer we got to it the more I could feel it. Like it was running through me or something. Landon stopped when we were a few feet away and took his shoes off. “I want you to try something.”

“Ok?”

“Take your shoes off.” I did as he asked and we stepped into the cool water. He grabbed my hands in his and smiled. “Close your eyes, ok, now I want you to focus on the water we’re standing in. Feel it move, feel how it flows, now I want you to focus on parting it. Divert it’s path so it flows around us.” I really had no idea what I was doing so I imagined putting my hands into it and pulling it apart. The water still surrounded us, still touched us.

“It’s not working.” I sighed.

“I wasn’t really expecting you to grasp it on the first try.” He said softly. “We have plenty of time, just keep practicing.” I refocused my attention onto the water and kept trying. After what seemed like forever I was exhausted and ready to give up.

“Could you just do what I ask and part already?” I grumbled at the water. Something felt off. I opened my eyes and looked down, the water was going around us in a perfect circle. I shrieked and the circle closed, the water once again surrounding us. “I did it!” I shrieked jumping up and down ridiculously excited.

“That was amazing.” Landon said pressing a kiss to my forehead. “I knew you could do it.” The sun was beginning to set behind him. “And tomorrow we’ll practice some more, but I think for now we should go inside.”

“You think my dad is here?” I realized we had to have been out here for quite some time and there was a good chance he had been waiting for us for awhile.

“There’s a possibility.” We walked out of the creek and put our shoes on. “If he is there he isn’t going to be mad is he?”

“I don’t think so. Why?”

“Because,” He laced his fingers through mine, “we’re going to have to tell him about us.”

“Oh. That.” I really wasn’t sure how my dad was going to handle that. I knew he would be ok with everything else because that was who I am. This was completely different. Because I had a boyfriend who was going to be living with me and my dad would be in a different state.

“You ok?”

“I’m just trying to figure out what to tell him. Somehow I don’t think going ‘hey Dad great to see you, by the way Mom looked into my future and Landon and I are a permanent thing so hey, at least we know it will work out’ will go over so well.”

“I find it incredibly adorable when you over think everything and start rambling.”

A blush spread across my cheeks. “You know very well I’m not rambling.”

“I also know that when you break the news to your dad you will ramble. Which I’m looking forward to. Especially the part when you scrunch your nose slightly after you realize you are indeed rambling.”

“I scrunch my nose?”

“Don’t worry” he whispered as we approached the house, “it’s rather endearing.” My blush deepened and I turned my attention to the windows at the back of the house. One was lit up, the curtains drawn to the side, and I could make out two figures inside. One was most definitely my father.

“He’s here.” We walked silently to the back door, Landon opened it for me and stepped to the side. “You go in first.” I whispered. He grabbed my hand a smile on his face and tugged me inside behind him.

“Hey Gram, Jason.” The two stopped whatever they were doing and looked at us.

I didn’t know what to expect when I finally met my grandmother, but it wasn’t this. Maybe I was expecting the stereotypical short little old lady with cat related merchandise all over the house, well, ok that was what Granny -my dads mom- was like. So I was surprised by the woman in her mid 50’s who stood beside my father, she was exactly the same height I was, and we had the same blue eyes. That was where the similarities stopped. Her blonde hair was pulled back into a bun. She wore a tunic and patchwork jeans, and most of the décor had a hippy vibe to it. She was beautiful, there was no denying that. But nothing about her said ‘Grandma’.

“The one downside about all of this is that I can not take credit for how beautiful you are.” She said walking across the kitchen and pulling me into a hug, “We tend to take after our fathers in everything except the eyes.” She let go of me and placed her hands on my shoulders looking me over as if to affirm I was real and not some apparition. “You are definitely a lot taller than the last time I saw you.”

“Um..” I responded looking to my father for help. He smiled and walked over pulling me away from my grandmother and gave me a hug.

“I missed you kiddo.”

“I missed you too Dad.” He released me from the hug and wrapped his arm around my shoulder pulling me close to him.

“I’m so sorry dear,” My grandmother smiled warmly at me. “I’m Christina, you can either call me that or Gram as Landon does, the choice is entirely up to you.”

“Ok.”

“I have something for you. I’ll be right back.” Christina (I wasn’t ready to call her Gram yet) left the kitchen leaving my father, Landon, and me alone.

“It’s nice to see you again sir.” Landon said reaching a hand out and shaking my fathers hand.

“Landon, I would like to thank you for helping Beckett through this, everything you’ve done and are doing for her. I am indescribably grateful she has you here for her.”

“There is no need to thank me. I am just happy I finally found her.” I began blushing again and looked down at my feet.

“If there is anything you need, anything at all don’t hesitate to ask.”

“There is one thing.” I could hear the smile in his voice, what was he going to ask for? “I would like your permission to take Beckett out on a date tomorrow night.” It was completely silent for at least 15 seconds, fifteen very long seconds.

“I’m uh… I’m not sure that’s such a great idea.” My dad finally said, and something in me snapped. Who was he to tell Landon he couldn’t take me on a date? It was my life. “It’s just I’m not sure the two of you should start anything. She has a lot to learn and her focus should be on that.”

“Underst-”

“Dad.” I stepped away to stand beside Landon and stare my father in the face. “Hate to break it to you, but you don’t run my life anymore. I’m going to be living here from now on as will Landon, and I’m placing my money on that being the real reason you’re saying no. But guess what? I’m my own person, I’ve done a lot these past few weeks that I never would have done had you been there. Hell, Landon probably still wouldn’t have realized who I was if you’d still been around. I got to sit in on an actual class in a high school, and I even corrected the teacher. Apparently I’m really smart.”

“Beckett I never-”

“I was even embarrassed in front of the entire senior class and it was pretty cool. I went shopping with some friends after mistakenly thinking Tank was going to run me over and learned that I can heal my scratches with water. Yeah, water heals me. I went to Billy’s restaurant and had some creep hit on me outside the bathroom and try to kiss me but I kneed him in the groin to stop him. I went to lunch with Landon in the middle of the day, and then I hung out at his house. And then I went to a dance and learned that pool water makes me violently ill. It’s pretty freaking horrible. But it was totally worth it because now I know what I am, what I’m supposed to do with my life, and who I’m supposed to be with. So I drove, ok well Landon drove because I clearly don’t know how to drive and I probably shouldn’t learn since Mom likes to freak me out and I would probably crash, anyway we drove across the country to get here where we’re supposed to be. I’m not going to be living with you anymore Dad. I won’t be on my own but I might as well be since I’m living with people who I haven’t known my entire life. So you need to trust that I can make my own decisions ok?”

Christina had walked in during my little rant and stood back holding something wrapped in tissue paper. My dad just stared at me his jaw set. I really wasn’t sure what was going through his head, what he thought of my little speech.

“What did you mean by knowing who you’re supposed to be with? You’re 17, you have your whole life ahead of you.” It figures that that was the one thing he picked up on.

“Mom can see my present and future, she’s psychic when it comes to me. And she can speak to me telepathically.”

“How long has she been talking to you?”

“Oh, it was just the one time, a few days ago. She had something important to tell me.” I reached over and grabbed Landon’s hand. As I was hoping Dad noticed. “Landon and I are together Dad, as in a relationship. One that is going to be sticking around forever. So get used to it.”

“Well then.” My fathers voice was gruff. “I guess I don’t really have a say in the matter.” He pulled out a chair from the small table and sat down. Christina slowly walked over and handed me what she had been holding.

“I’ve been waiting to give this to you for quite some time.” I pulled the dark tissue paper away slowly. It was a photo frame, I flipped it over and looked at the picture inside. A girl that could have only been a few years older than I was smiled back at me holding a newborn baby. It took me a moment to realize the girl with the ringlet curls in her light brown hair and dimples on each of her cheeks was my mother. The eyes were what gave it away. “I took that just after you were born. Such a perfect baby.”

I continued to stare at the girl in the photo. She was my mother. I finally knew what she looked like, and for some reason I felt the urge to cry. I had always imagined what she looked like, but now that I saw how beautiful and happy she was it made me realize how incredibly real she was. Yes, I heard her voice, spoken to her, but this, it made it much more real.

“That’s you and me kid.” I jumped, startled. “She took that about an hour after you were born, and the next day I had to give you up.”

“The next day?” My voice cracked. I felt everyone’s eyes on me wanting to ask what I meant.

“It was the only way to keep you safe. Let your father see the photo and the have Landon give him my phone number, I know he’s been looking for me and I would like to speak to him.”

“Really?”

“I owe him at least that much for taking such great care of you. I’ll be waiting for his call. Never forget that I love you Beckett.”

“I won’t.” I whispered tracing my finger across the picture.

“Beckett? Who are you talking to?” I looked away from the picture and to my dad.

“Mom.” I held the picture out to him and he took it, his eyes widening in recognition. “She wants you to call her, Landon will give you her number.” Landon pulled his phone out of his pocket and began scrolling through his contacts and then handed my father the phone. “She said she’d be waiting.”

“It’s best if you just go with it.” Landon added after my fathers face contorted in confusion. “Especially when it comes to Maya.”

“I take it her name is Maya?”

“You didn’t know her name?” There was no judgment in Christina’s tone, only curiosity. My fathers face reddened and I patted his shoulder.

“He was drunk and in the middle of the woods on a camping trip, and some beautiful woman came up to him offering what any hormonal teen male wants. He didn’t bother with asking questions.” Christina and I laughed as my father attempted to scold me.

“It doesn’t surprise me, Maya was always very strong willed and went after whatever she wanted it. She saw Beckett when she glimpsed into her daughters future and wanted her, and she saw you Jason. She would have done anything to get you to give that to her.”

“Well then, I guess I should give her a call.” My dad took his phone and dialed the number before leaving the house. Christina turned to us with a smile.

“Why don’t I show where your rooms are and then we’ll set the table for dinner? I hope you like pot roast.”