The Sweetness of Forgetting

by Kristin Harmel

Mamie to bundle up in a jacket, the three of us are headed for the beach at Paines Creek, which was my favorite place to watch the sun sink into the horizon when I was in high school. It’s a quiet beach in Brewster, and if you walk carefully out on the rocks jutting out where the creek empties into Cape Cod Bay, you have a great view of the western

Joe’s Dockside, a tiny restaurant that’s been on the Cape even longer than our family bakery. People drive from miles away and wait in

Monsieur Haddam shakes his head. “There is no need to thank me. It was our duty. In our religion, we are taught, ‘Whoever saves one life, saves the entire world.’ ” Alain makes a strange strangled sound. “In the Talmud, it is written, ‘If you save one life, it is as if you have saved the world,’ ” he says softly.

other for a moment and smile. “We are not so different, then,” Monsieur Haddam says. He looks at Henri and Simon, then back at Alain. “I never understood the discord between our religions. If there is one thing I learned from the time young Rose spent with us, it is that we are all speaking to the same God. It is not religion that divides man. It is good and evil here on earth that separates us.” The words sink in as we look at one another

“I mean that love is all around us,” Alain says. “But the older we get, the more confusing it becomes. The more times we’ve been hurt, the harder it is to see love right in front of us, or to accept love into our hearts and truly believe in it. And if you cannot accept love, you can never really feel it.” Annie looks