Jake started shouting and pointing, “Hey, Dad! look!”

Jeff got up and went to Jake.  I didn’t look up from my book.  I imagined he found minnows or a crab or something. 

Then Jeff started hollering, “Miranda!  Look up!”

I was nursing an umbrella drink with one shot of vodka and two drinks worth of mixer.  The concoction, lemon and strawberry and frozen, was the perfect beach drink for the perfect beach day.  We were alone on the beach other than some surf fishers off in the distance, their poles set up in a row with them sitting in camp chairs around a cooler.  Occasionally their laughter would ring loud enough that we could hear them.  They were having a fine time.

Jeff was beside me and the Designated Parent for the day.  We took turns.  Our son Jake was playing in the shallow surf, his floaties bright orange against the blue water and blue sky and his blue swimming trunks.  Jake’s blue eyes had been wide with excitement since we arrived.  I vowed to make his first trip to the beach memorable and was succeeding.  Each night he fell asleep at the dinner table and we carried him to the second bedroom of our rented condo.  He would sleep all night and wake me before dawn.  He with a glass of milk and I with my coffee would sit on the balcony and watch the sun come up.  We were making memories that I hoped would sustain him his whole life.  Shared, quality time in paradise.

“I closed my book and looked up.”

“Oh!”  I rubbed my eyes.

I hadn’t even had a full shot of vodka yet and yet, there he was.  Puff.  In all of his majesty, scales gleaming iridescent purple, pink, blue, and green in the bright sun.