The Ocean's Song (pt. 1) (Going through edits)

~35~

"Oh, it's really no problem. After hearing a backstory like yours, I'm glad to help out in any way!" He laughed and pulled into the driveway of her house. All the homesickness Naida had been repressing flooded back into her and she couldn't stop herself from crying.

She climbed out of the car and walked up the steps to her small, cute beach home. It was pastel pink with yellow fringes, had a wind chime hanging on the porch, the same windchime her father had given her when she moved out, and a large conch shell sitting by the door. With trembling fingers, she picked up the conch shell and reached inside it, grasping the key to her house, then put the key into the lock.

The door swung open with a small creak, revealing the halls of her humble home she had missed so dearly. Tears rolled down her smiling face as she walked past every painting she made and hung on the wall, as she stood in front of her window that offered the most splendid view of the ocean in town, and as she packed up her necessities that she would take back to the ocean, knowing that she probably wouldn't be coming back for another while.

Then, an awful smell ruined the fragile moment. Naida followed it with disgust to her fridge. Of course. She had been gone a month, why wouldn't some of the food be bad? She threw away all the expired stuff, and all the stuff that was going to expire this week, as she hoped to at least visit here again every other week. While she was at it, she made herself a sandwich.

She absentmindedly walked around the kitchen while she ate her sandwich, and spotted her phone on the counter. This wasn't an item that she was particularly attached to; it was old and cracked, and she really only used to message and call people. She walked over to it and turned it on. Instantly a month's worth of notifications, mostly missed calls and texts, exploded onto the screen. Naida chuckled and scrolled through them.

All of the recent ones were friends, family, and work colleagues worried about her and concerned about where she had gone. She copied and pasted a text to everyone who missed her. "Hey, I'm sorry for being so absent, and after today, I'm afraid I'll have to go back to that, but know that I am okay and I miss you. I've been taking long trips out to sea and there's not much internet in the middle of the ocean. I hope you've been well."