The sand crunched under my bare feet, trousers rolled up, shoes in hand as I walked along the edge of the water. I successfully dodged  the kid with the two ice cream cones, racing toward his mother, sitting on her towel under the big striped umbrella. One big bright mushroom, squeezed in, nothing to mark it as different from the hundreds of others packed on the beach. I smiled, remembering better days, carefree days, when I was that boy.

But I wasn't Mrs. Nemhar's little Sel anymore, my only concern getting that ice cream cone back to Mama before it melted or I dropped it in the sand. And this is no longer home. 

As I look out over the beach, I can't help but wonder if I messed up. Coming back here. I got a new life started in Seattle, but it is so different. The grey skies, the cold streets. I thought that drug tip smelled. Should never have paid that agent but I wanted to believe. Wanted an excuse to come home one more time. Wasted trip. 

But it had to be done. "I have a new home now", I thought to myself as I dusted the sand from my feet and put my socks and shoes back on. I straitened and turned my back on the crowds, the dames, the life. Maybe I would come back again, if business truly brought me here. But it would never be the same, never be home again. You can't go back, only forward. "I better get that solid", I thought to myself, "or I won't survive long. Just have to make my own sunny skies in Seattle".