You both needed out. The kind of out that doesn’t mean running—just leaving. Too many lies, too much pressure, too many people pulling at Rafe until you could barely see the boy you first fell for. Outer Banks had become a war zone. With the Pogues, with his dad, with everything.

So you drove. No map, no real plan. Just west. And now you’re here. Second day in a quiet little beach town in Oregon—foggy mornings, cliffs that fall into the sea, a beach house that creaks when the wind passes through. It’s peaceful, like time holds its breath for you two.

You’d begged Rafe to get up for the sunrise. He grumbled about it, but when the first light slid through the window this morning, he was already awake—watching you instead.

You’re barefoot in the sand now, the old wood porch still damp from the mist. All you’re wearing is his white button-up, loose and barely brushing your thighs, bikini bottoms underneath, skin chilled but awake. The wind plays in your hair like it remembers you from some dream.

And him—just those low-hanging swim shorts, hair messy, chest bare, eyes soft but unreadable. His body is here, but his eyes? They’ve been holding onto you since the second you stepped out. He doesn’t even pretend not to stare.

“God, you’re staring,” you tease, your voice still husky with sleep.

“Can you blame me?” he fires back, quiet but warm, like the old Rafe. The real one.

You laugh and run toward the water, feet kicking up sand. It’s freezing. You yelp, spinning to face him—just in time for him to wrap one arm around your waist and pull you straight into the ocean. The cold hits like a shock, but you don’t even care. Your legs wrap around his hips, arms around his neck, his body solid beneath your soaked shirt that’s now fully see-through.

Your laughter fills the air—but it dies quickly. He’s looking at you with something else now. Something heavy, something soft. And you know.

“I love you,” he says, like it’s been sitting at the edge of his tongue for years and he finally let it fall. No noise, no chaos. Just the truth. Simple. Raw.

You blink, stunned not by the words but the moment. How quiet it is. How right. Your fingertips curl against his neck.

“I know,” you whisper back, your voice breaking just a little. “I’ve always known.”

And then you’re kissing—like the first time, but deeper. Slower. The kind of kiss you’d write into a letter you never send. The sun stretches over the water, catching in his hair, on your skin. The waves roll on, but everything else stands still.

You finally got a place that wasn’t about the drama. Just you. Him. And a sunrise that didn’t belong to anyone else.