Hello, I borrowed a bit of this from some
sort of fable I remember hearing
once, and while I spent many days on the beaches of Florida and in her waves,
I never saw the beach cluttered with what you will soon find out, but there
it is anyway! <=) -Evan-
Sea
by Evan
The sand was hot. A bit too hot. The sun was high and beat down on them in a steady unflagging glare. It would have been almost unbearable if not for the humid but playful sea breeze that pushed only a few cotton white puffs of cloud across the perfect blue sky. Seiji wished he had not forgotten his sun glasses.
It was blinding.
He walked quickly to the water, the white sand
burning the soles of his feet. The water was shockingly cold for the heat of the day.
Small birds ignored him as the wave receded and they raced forward onto the wet hard
packed sand, quickly pecking around for their lunch, then racing back to the safety of the
dry sand when another inevitable wave crashed forth.Watching the process under the poor
shield of his hand made him smile just a little.
Sai was already far ahead of him on the curiously empty stretch beach.
It seemed a perfect day for the tourists to burn and the local surf boys to miss school.
The sleepy blue curls of the massive waves were usually crowded with boards.
But not today.
In fact if Seiji turned from the South, away from the distant glittering towers of the hotels that cluttered the shore and instead faced north, where the shore dwindled off into the horizon and all signs of civilization where hidden nicely away behind the vine choked dunes, he could imagine he was stepping on to the shores of the New World for the first time. Sai was bending down to examine something washed up among the shells and driftwood, sea glass and green tangles of sea weed.
What did the Spanish think? When they stumbled off their wooden boats and lay on this scorching sand dreaming of gold and silver. It wasn't much more for him to see the tall mast off anchored safely out beyond the breakers, the white sails, sagging after months of travel. To hear the excited but wearied Spanish voices as their dingys met the surf.
He smiled softly to himself again.
It was easy to think one would find the fountain of youth here.
Sai was picking something up and looking at it very carefully in his hands. He then drew his hand back and tossed the thing as far as he could (which was quite far) back into the churning waves. He paused only a moment before he was leaning down again.
Seiji walked slowly towards him, enjoying the bubbling hiss of the water as it rushed back to met another wave, splashing around his ankles. He stopped for a moment and put one knee down into the damp sand not minding when it soaked his trousers and washed his hands in the cold but fresh salt water. Seiji touched his lips with his hand and tasted the salt, there was nothing like it, the strength of it, the age of it, the sheer enormity of it, his gaze flickered back up over the expanse of water to the sky.
No wonder, the explorers though the world dropped off into nothing. He looked back to the sandy earth beneath him. It was full of small bits of smooth shell and coral shattered by waves, pink, blue, mother of pearl, crystals, the ridged white of a clam, the smooth glossy black of a mussel, scattered and placed as if an artist had laboured on its perfection, and not the random toss of the wave or wind.
The intricate simplicity of its smallest detail.
Seiji was humbled.
Sai was still carefully looking through the ocean debris and
occasionally picking something up and throwing it back into the sea.
As Seiji came closer he saw that in the debris many star fish
had been washed up to the dry sand, and perished in the sun. More than just a few, he
realised, as he came closer and he saw Sai was picking up the creatures that hadn't quite
gone completely and sending them back where they belonged. He frowned.
So many star fish lay amongst the sea weed, Sai's slow labourious progress was barely
worthwhile. There were far too many.
Another spiny star was tossed back in with a small splash.
Seiji came to stand next to Sai.
"Why bother?"
Sai paused, his pale skin pink from the sun, a smile easy on his face.
Another star in his hand.
"There are too many." Seiji said, a little sadly. "What
difference does it make?"
Sai's smile broadened, but it was a slow, thoughtful gesture. He held up the star fish he had found suffering under the sun.
"It makes a difference to this one?"
And he tossed it back into the cool depths.
Seiji watched the small occassional splash for a time and then sighed.
He leant down beside Sai and lifted a dying star fish from the shore.
the end