I didn't know then that Graham had spent the previous evening desperately trying to stop our team from examining several financial records.
And when he saw me beside the pool, he recognized me before I spoke.
He simply pretended he didn't.
That decision would cost him far more than his job.
Noah was seven years old, curious, energetic, and convinced that every swimming pool in the world existed primarily for his enjoyment.
He loved water.
He loved beaches.
And he loved asking questions that usually required explanations much longer than I expected.
His father, Andre Carter, had died three years earlier in a road accident.
Andre was thirty-five.
He worked as an architect and had a laugh so infectious that strangers sometimes started smiling before he finished telling a joke.
We met at a charity event in Atlanta.
I was helping organize a fundraiser.
Andre was representing a design firm contributing plans for a community center.
He approached me after a presentation and asked whether I believed a building could make people feel welcome before anyone said a word.
I told him that depended on who designed it.
He laughed.
Then asked if I wanted to get coffee.
Three years later, we were married.
Two years after that, Noah was born.
Andre loved being a father.
He assembled furniture badly.
Read children's books in ridiculous voices.
And insisted that every family vacation include at least one day where nobody followed a schedule.
He also believed Noah should learn to swim early.
When our son was four, Andre began taking him to supervised lessons.
Noah was nervous at first.
Then he discovered he loved the water.
Andre used to call him his little dolphin.
After the accident, Noah stopped wanting to visit pools.
For months, he refused even to watch swimming videos.
I didn't force him.
Grief made people retreat from ordinary things in ways that didn't always make sense to outsiders.
Eventually, he asked if we could return to lessons.
I cried in the parking lot after his first session.
Not because he swam perfectly.
Because he smiled when he climbed out.
And that smile looked so much like Andre's that for a moment I couldn't breathe.
Three years later, Noah still loved swimming.
He also loved red popsicles.
He would choose the red flavor even when it wasn't the best one, simply because he liked watching his tongue turn bright red.
That Friday morning, when I told him we were visiting a beautiful resort, he nearly jumped off the kitchen chair.
“Does it have a pool?”
“Yes.”
“A big one?”