A Walk on the Beach

Hand in hand, we walked along the beach in Pompano Springs. My husband and I started walking together since we’ve been married. It’s sometimes the only time we have to spend together. I’m an ER doctor who’s on call all the time and my husband is an author who spends most of his time either at his office yelling at his publisher or in his study in our beautiful house. Even when we’re both home, I might not get to see him if he’s in his study writing. He likes to be alone when he’s writing. He promised he would write a novel for me and I would be the one with the only copy. It’s been five years since he made that promise. Yesterday he said it was almost done.
         I thought today was just going to be the normal walk on the beach, talk about your day, and hold the hand of the one you love. I was right, but with that something strange happened.
         As we were walking along the beach, I watched the kids making sand castles, snorkeling to find fish, and having a blast with the waves. I watched the mothers with their infants, laughing whenever the tide hit their feet. I had just found out I was pregnant with our first. I was so happy and couldn’t wait to tell the love of my life. I wanted to wait for the right moment and I knew that moment had come.
         I turned to face my husband, my lover, and my best friend. “Honey, you know I love you more than the stars in the sky and that’s never going to change.”
         “I love you too!” He smiled.
         “I have something to tell you!” I grinned and he could tell I was excited about something.
         “Guess what?”
         “What?” Now he was getting excited.
         I looked off into the distance toward the pier. Right as I was about to tell him, my eye caught something in the sand. “I’m-what is that?” I pointed in the objects direction. I let go of my husbands’ hands and went to investigate. What I found was a very unusual thing to find at a beach. I found the most beautiful red tin box with gold flowers and swirls. By the time I was holding it in my hands and staring at it, my husband was already by my side. He became so excited I thought he was going to have a heart attack. He was jumping around in the sand brainstorming what could be inside.
         “It could be an S.O.S from someone stranded on an uncharted island, it could have fallen off a boat and it’s filled with fishing supplies, it could be a child’s special box with trinkets inside, or, or, or…”
         As carefully as I could, I took off the lid. Inside were old letters. “Look at this!”
         My husband flipped out. We took the tin inside to read the letters.
         A woman wrote them to her husband who was off fighting a war. They begun as love letters, then she found out she was pregnant. She wrote about the baby growing inside her, she had lists of names, and she wrote about how much she missed her husband and wished he could be there for her during her pregnancy. She sent him pictures of the baby growing and pictures of her getting bigger. She wrote about how she almost lost the baby and during the last few months of her pregnancy, she wrote about what bed rest was like. The very last letter made me cry. It was the day she gave birth to a baby girl. There was a picture of a proud mother holding her beautiful daughter moments after she was born. She named her Emma.
         Tears streaked down my face. “Sweetie, what’s wrong?” My husband said as he wiped tears from my face. “Why are you crying?”
         “I never got to tell you.”
         I paused, waiting for my husband to say at least something. When he didn’t respond, I knew he was waiting for me to just come out and say it.
         I smiled. “I’m pregnant!”

Word Count: 692