The Water Between Us

Three days after leaving the hospital, Simone Carter arrived at her grandmother’s house in Beaufort, North Carolina, with one suitcase, a folder of discharge papers, and an emptiness she could not name without losing her breath.

The house stood beneath two live oaks, white paint peeling from the porch rails, wind chimes clicking in the salt-heavy air. Her grandmother, Evelyn Brooks, opened the screen door before Simone reached the first step.

“Oh, baby.”

Simone stopped.

Evelyn did not ask whether she was all right. She did not say everything happened for a reason. She simply opened her arms.

Simone walked into them and broke.

“I lost her,” Simone whispered into the shoulder of her grandmother’s cotton blouse.

“I know.”

“He left me in that water.”

Evelyn tightened her hold. “I know that too.”

Simone pulled back. “How?”

“Your mother called. She told me enough.” Evelyn’s eyes hardened. “Not all men deserve the mercy of being understood.”

Inside, the house smelled like cedar, coffee, and the lemon oil Evelyn had used on the same furniture for forty years. Simone’s old bedroom still had the pale blue curtains she had chosen at sixteen.

On the dresser sat a framed photograph of Simone at twenty-two, laughing beside her grandmother at graduation.

She turned it face down.

That evening, David called eleven times.

Simone watched the phone vibrate across the nightstand.

On the twelfth call, she answered.

“Simone.” His voice cracked with relief. “Thank God. I’ve been losing my mind.”

“You know what losing something feels like now?”

Silence.

“Please don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Make this uglier than it already is.”

Her fingers closed around the blanket. “You saved Rebecca.”

“It happened in seconds.”

“You swam away from me.”

“I saw her first.”

“You looked at me before the dock broke.”

Another silence.

Simone’s heartbeat changed.

“David.”

“I was panicking.”

“You saw me.”

“I don’t remember.”

“You remember enough to keep saying you don’t.”

His breathing came fast through the speaker. “Come home. We can talk with somebody. A counselor. Your doctor said stress is dangerous.”

“My doctor also said I need peace.”

“I can give you that.”

“You had a chance.”

“Simone, Rebecca means nothing.”

A bitter laugh escaped her. “You nearly let your wife drown for someone who means nothing?”

He whispered, “I made a mistake.”

“No. A mistake is forgetting an anniversary. You made a choice.”

He tried to speak again, but she ended the call.

The next morning, Simone found Evelyn at the kitchen table reading the local paper. A mug waited for her.

“You sleep?” Evelyn asked.

“No.”

“You eat?”

“Not really.”

“Then we start there.”

“I don’t want breakfast.”

“I didn’t ask what you wanted.”

Despite herself, Simone almost smiled.

She managed toast and half an egg.

Afterward, Evelyn pushed a yellow legal pad across the table.

“What’s this?”

“The beginning of your life becoming yours again.”

Simone frowned.

“Write down what belongs to you. Money. Property. Accounts. Business interests. Anything your husband might touch.”

“David would never steal from me.”

Evelyn gave her a long look.

“He would never cheat on you either, once.”

The words landed harder than Simone expected.

She looked at the blank page.

David Carter was not just her husband. He owned Carter Logistics, a regional shipping company that had grown too quickly and attracted men who spoke softly but carried guns beneath expensive jackets. Simone had spent years pretending not to see the edges of his business.

Her own money came from a trust left by her father and from a small chain of rehabilitation clinics she had inherited and expanded.

She wrote the first account number she remembered.

Then the second.

By noon, the page was full.

At one fifteen, her phone rang from an unknown number.

“Mrs. Carter?”

“Yes?”

“This is Daniel Price with Atlantic Crown Bank. I’m calling to verify your authorization on a transfer request.”

Simone sat straighter.

“What transfer?”

“A withdrawal of eight hundred thousand dollars from the Brooks Family Trust account.”

Her blood went cold.

“I didn’t authorize anything.”

There was a pause.

“Mrs. Carter, the request bears your digital signature.”

Evelyn looked up from across the room.

Simone stood slowly.

“Freeze the account,” she said. “Freeze everything attached to my name.”

“Ma’am, I’ll need to—”

“Do it now.”

She ended the call and stared at her grandmother.

Evelyn did not look surprised.

“What?” Simone asked.

“I was hoping I was wrong.”

“About what?”

Evelyn folded the newspaper.

“About why a man like David suddenly needed you back so badly.”

For the first time since the lake, Simone felt something stronger than grief.

Suspicion.

And beneath it, anger.

That night, Simone opened the notes app on her phone and typed one sentence she had heard Dr. Hayes say before discharge: grief does not move in a straight line. She hated the sentence because it sounded too neat. Still, she saved it.

Evelyn knocked once and entered with a hot-water bottle.

“You don’t have to be strong in this room,” she said.

“I’m not trying to be strong.”

“Yes, you are. You’ve been holding your jaw tight for six hours.”

Simone touched her face and realized it hurt.

“What if I never stop being angry?”

“Then we make sure anger works for you instead of owning the house.”

Simone looked toward the dark window. “I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do first.”

“Tomorrow you call the bank again. Then you call your doctor. Then you eat lunch.”

“That sounds small.”