The girl the ocean brings

By the time she arrived, the sun was slipping behind the trees. Shadows stretched long across the porch. The front door was half-open.

Kaia paused.

"Grandma?" she called softly as she stepped inside.

There were voices. Muffled. Urgent.

She rounded the corner and froze.

There was a man in their guest bed.

Bandaged. Unconscious. Pale against the old sheets.

Kaia's heart skipped. She took a step forward, eyes scanning him dark hair matted against his forehead, a sharp jawline marred by bruises, lips parted slightly as if trying to speak even in sleep.

He looked powerful, even in stillness. Out of place. Like someone who didn't belong here-but somehow had ended up exactly where he needed to be.

Leni turned from the bedside, her face calm but tired.

"Don't be afraid, child," she said gently. "We found him on the beach."

Kaia looked again at the man. "Is he...?"

"He's alive," Tomas answered as he entered with a bowl of water. "Not talking. He doesn't even know his name."

Kaia stepped closer, curiosity growing beneath her quiet.

"What happened to him?" she asked softly.

"We don't know," Leni said. "Plane crash, maybe. Storm, maybe. He had no ID. No wallet. Just a body, and breath."

Kaia's eyes stayed on his face.

He was a stranger. A broken mystery.

And yet... something about him didn't feel like a threat.

Kaia wasn't afraid.

She was curious.

Moved, even, by the fragile silence wrapped around this stranger who had washed into her life with the tide.

"We're going to take care of him," Leni said.

Kaia nodded slowly, eyes still on the man.

She didn't know why.

But she had a feeling.

He wasn't just passing through.

The sea had brought him here-torn, nameless, forgotten.

But Kaia didn't believe in accidents.

And neither, somewhere deep inside him, would he. Room smelled like lemongrass and rain. A breeze stirred the curtain by the window, and something cool pressed gently to his forehead.

A low groan escaped his chest before he could stop it.

"He's waking up," someone whispered-a girl's voice. Soft, but steady.

The light was too bright. He blinked against it.

His vision slowly focused. Rough wooden beams above him. The rustle of trees. Birds outside. Somewhere in the distance, a soft windchime clinked.

And then... her.

He turned his head and saw the girl sitting beside the bed.

She looked about eighteen. Brown-skinned, with soft, defined features-freckles across her nose, long lashes over deep-set eyes, and thick, coiled curls pinned in a half-bun with a hand-carved comb. Her presence was calm but impossible to ignore. The soft morning light through the window danced across her cheekbones, and for a second, she didn't seem real at all.She was clearly mixed-race, her skin kissed by the sun, her heritage visible in every beautiful detail of her. There was something about her that made the room feel smaller. Quieter. Realer. Her cheekbones were high, her lips soft and full, and there was a quiet strength in the way she held herself-as if she knew exactly who she was and saw no reason to prove it.

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