?Hey, Martha. It?s the old lying son of a bitch.?

Andrew Rhovnik paused at the lump in his throat that had suddenly formed. Lying son of a bitch. He had thought his wife harsh when she had said it the last time they had spoke. How long ago was it? A year ago maybe? The drugs and alcohol had her so addled over the last year that she had gone back and forth unsure which of her daughters was alive and which was dead. He had corrected her that it was Yaya who had died. Sofia was married and living off-world. That was when she had called him a lying son of a bitch. She had said that Yaya had visited her the week before and Sofia was buried in the cold, hard ground where she deserved to be.

Sofia was the Rhovnik to Martha. Martha always believed that Yaya was more Polk than Rhovnik.

The bitterness was swallowed back and he started again. ?I?m sorry it?s me doing this. I know you deserve better. Your sister is in France. She said she couldn?t make it back. Soph is? well, I don?t know where Soph is much these days. She and I aren?t exactly talking which is my fault. I ****ed up.?

Maybe it should be one of her boyfriends here instead of Andrew. He knew only too well that his wife had slept around in the nearly two decades that they had lived separately. The latest had been an art gallery owner from Charleston lured in by her early work who was talking to her about putting together enough pieces for a show. He?d lasted long enough to find out how bad her addiction had become and how little she was actually painting these days. He had left. None of her boyfriends ever lasted very long.

?I suppose I should say something. Maybe a prayer. Or a piece of poetry. You know I was never good at saying the right thing. Crappy brother, crappy husband, crappy father. You did deserve better than me, but I wish you could have been there for the girls despite what I was and what I was not. Maybe that?s my fault too. Maybe if I?d been a better husband, you would have been a better mother.?

His wedding band looked dull on his finger. Had it always looked that way? Was it the lighting? In the decades since his wife left, he had never removed it. That wasn?t, of course, to say he had always honored the vow. There had been women to warm his bed and keep the loneliness at bay. None of them stuck. They weren?t his wife. They weren?t the woman he had promised his life to love and to hold.

Someone approached from behind. He could hear a gasp as the cool ocean water licked at the newcomer?s toes as she waded to calf level at his side. He didn?t look. He didn?t need to look. He knew her cool, calculating blue eyes by heart. He knew the high cheek bones that were so much like her mother?s and the scar at her hairline that had been caused by shrapnel when she was nineteen.

Sofia DeMuer looked out over the Atlantic Ocean in front of her mother?s oceanfront home. Her lips were pursed in a tight frown that twisted her features in confusion. Even she was not entirely sure why she was here. Her father did not deserve her support. Her mother did not deserve her tears. ?The water is so still this evening. I?m not really sure I?ve ever seen it the calm. It feels wrong. Mom was more like a hurricane. She created disasters wherever she went.?

?Don?t say that, Soph,? Andrew said quietly and with a heavy load of exhaustion weighing down his voice.

The blue eyes were leveled on her father and finally Andrew could not help but look her way. Her hair was swept up in a messy ponytail. The bottom of her cropped sweat pants were getting wet, her hands missing in the sleeves of a sweatshirt that was more than likely given its size her husband?s. ?I shouldn?t tell the truth because she?s dead??

?We?re spreading her ashes. Can?t we at least try to think of the good times we had with her? Don?t we owe that to her memory?? Andrew asked, his fingers tensing around the urn in his hands. Part of him agreed with Sofia. Another part wanted to believe there was something worthwhile in his marriage. Something good had to come out of all that pain and all that heartache.

?I don?t have any of those anymore, Dad. Not of her. Let?s get this over with,? Soph said in response.

Andrew nodded slowly, removing the lid from the urn. The waves crashed in and rolled up to them before the tide took them on out once again. It was a continual, never ending process that Martha Polk Rhovnik had loved but that made Andrew feel small and powerless. Maybe that?s why she had escaped here. Maybe she enjoyed the fact that even the great, ancient Rhovniks had no power over the ebb and flow of this great ocean.

He dipped a hand in and tossed the ashes out to be caught by the wind and carried into the waves. Sofia stood silently at his side. The process was repeated. She didn?t offer to help. He didn?t make her but he found himself grateful he was not alone. He was alone too much these days. His mother said so, his assistant said so, he could feel the ghost of Yaya saying so. It was good not to be alone in this.

Sofia and Sonja. His two wickedly smart little brown-haired beauties. They were his gifts from Martha. They would never be grown women to him. He would always imagine them as they were when they ran around the farm with their pigtails flapping and the knees of their overalls worn and their shoes a muddy mess. The pain and heartache of his marriage had been worth it. He had the memories of Sonja, of his Yaya. He still had Sofia -- the strong, fierce, and dangerous woman that stood at his side now.

Eventually, the urn was empty and they stood in silence, knowing that the ocean was pulling the last of Martha into its grasp.

Sofia turned to leave and Andrew reached out to wrap a hand around her bicep to stop her. ?I?m sorry.?

Her blue eyes studied her father for a moment before she gave a nod, the grip of his fingers releasing her arm. ?So am I, Dad. I wish that was enough to change things.?

And with that, she left the water and her father, her feet leaving a trail of prints as she crept up the sandy shoreline.