Chapter 108 - BEING A SLEEPYHEAD

The apartment felt unfamiliar the first night we came back , not because anything had changed in its layout, but because the air inside seemed fuller, as if the ship's salt had followed us home and left a faint ache of tide in everything. The suitcases were still out in the hall, a confetti of crayons and seed packets and a towel with tiny handprints on it. The pile of volunteer T-shirts we'd brought home smelled faintly of sunscreen and lemon soap; the living room still held a crooked string of paper stars the children had made. I loved all of it ;the smell, the mess, the evidence that two weeks of intentional chaos could make good trouble but my body didn't love it the way my heart did.