The Lake Remembers

The dock was older now, the wood grayer and soft in places where it had taken in years of sun and rain. It still groaned the same way underfoot, though, like it remembered every barefoot step, every summer night jump into the lake. Emma sat at the edge, feet dangling over the side, the cool water lapping gently against her toes.

She hadn’t been back here in fourteen years.

The cabin behind her, nestled between two white pines, stood mostly unchanged. The screen door still squealed on its hinges, the porch swing still leaned slightly to the left. The smell of damp wood and pine needles drifted on the breeze. It was all as it had been—and yet, different. Smaller. Quieter. And empty.

She came alone this time.

Her fingers brushed against the dock beside her. Years ago, there had been four of them: her, her older brother Ben, her cousin Laurel, and Jonah. God, Jonah.

They were seventeen, maybe eighteen, that summer. The last summer.

Then

It was Jonah’s idea to build the raft.

“We’ll be like pirates,” he’d declared, standing shirtless with a crooked stick he called a mast. “Or castaways. Whichever’s more romantic.”

“Romantic for who?” Laurel teased. “We’re one broken barrel away from sinking.”

They laughed, every one of them, and Emma felt it—the sense of invincibility that only comes when you’re too young to know what you’ll lose.

They called it The Driftwood Queen. It barely floated, but they loved it anyway.

One night, they paddled it into the middle of the lake. Laurel played music from her phone, balancing it on a sandwich baggie to keep it dry. Ben passed around lukewarm root beer. The sky stretched wide above them, littered with stars.

Jonah lay beside Emma, both of them on their backs, looking up.

“This is the life,” he whispered.

Emma turned toward him. “You always say that.”

“Because it always is.”

She hesitated, then asked, “What do you think we’ll be like in ten years?”

Jonah smiled without looking at her. “I’ll be a grizzled lake hermit. Ben will own some tech company. Laurel will be famous, probably banned from five countries for singing too loud. You…”

He turned his head. “You’ll be the one who actually leaves this place. And does something real. You’ll write books, or teach, or cure cancer. Something big.”

“Why not you?”

“I’m better at being here than being out there.”

There was something in his voice then—soft and sad, but content.

Emma didn’t say anything. She wanted to. She wanted to say she didn’t want to go without him. That this lake only mattered if he was here. But she was seventeen, and sometimes courage comes later than it should.

Now

Emma reached into her backpack and pulled out a small box. Inside were photos: Jonah with the fish Ben caught. Laurel singing on the porch. Her and Ben, mid-jump into the lake. She smiled, tears slipping down her cheeks.

Then she pulled out the tin Jonah gave her—“Secret Keeper.” At the time, it had been a joke. Each of them wrote something on a scrap of paper and sealed it inside.

She hadn’t opened it since.

Ben’s said, “I once stole a pack of gum from the gas station and felt guilty for a year.”

Laurel’s: “I kissed Sarah Kline in 7th grade and told no one until now.”

Jonah’s:

“I’m in love with Emma.”

The paper shook in her hands. Her breath caught.

He never told her. Or maybe he had, in ways she wasn’t ready to see. In the way he looked at her when she wasn’t watching, in how he always offered the last marshmallow, or how he’d once biked six miles to bring her her favorite pie after a bad day.

She stared at the words until the tears came again—quiet, relentless.

That night, the lake was still as glass.

Emma lit a fire and roasted a marshmallow until it blackened, just like Jonah liked it. She didn’t even like marshmallows. But she ate it anyway, smiling through the sting in her chest.

Then she walked to the dock and knelt. She read the note again. Then she whispered, “Me too,” and let it drift into the water.

It floated for a moment, then sank.

She didn’t come to forget. She came to remember.

One Year Later

The cabin smelled the same: cedar, pine, the faint trace of dust.

Emma stood on the porch waiting, a second mug of coffee steaming in her hand. She turned as tires crunched down the dirt path.

Ben stepped out of the car first—older, with streaks of gray at his temples and a soft roundness to his jawline that hadn't been there before. Laurel climbed out behind him, guitar case in hand, sunglasses perched on her head.

“Well, this place is exactly how I remember it,” Ben said, stretching.

Laurel looked toward the lake and went quiet.

Emma handed them each a mug and motioned to the dock. They walked together in silence, the three of them. The absence of the fourth hung between them, not heavy, just present. Known.

At the edge of the dock, they sat, feet dangling over the side.

Ben broke the silence. “He told me once—Jonah, I mean—that he was going to tell you.”

Emma looked down. “He did. Just… not in time.”

Laurel reached into her jacket and pulled something out—a worn piece of driftwood with a name carved into it: The Driftwood Queen.

“I found it on the shoreline last fall,” she said. “I think the lake wanted to give it back.”

They passed it around, running fingers over the familiar grooves.

“He really loved this place,” Ben said.

Emma nodded. “So did we. Because he did.”

They stayed until the sun dipped behind the trees, painting the water in gold and soft orange. Laurel hummed a song—one Jonah used to sing, half-sarcastic and off-key.

Emma smiled. “He would’ve hated how well you sing it now.”

Laurel grinned. “That’s why I’m doing it.”

When they stood to leave, Emma paused and looked back at the water. The reflection shimmered in the dusk, and for a heartbeat, it almost looked like Jonah was there—young, grinning, waiting at the end of the dock.

She didn’t squint to check.

She didn’t need to.

The lake remembers.

And now, so would they.