The Heart of the Sea

Water, bright and tender, as far as I can see.

We gather on the shore in the evening, worn, ever-grieving,

Young and old,

Hand in hand in hand.

Our eyes scan the long line of the horizon,

Dreaming.

Hope clouds our shallow breath like fog,

The only prayer we can muster.

The sea.

The endless sea, licking at our toes,

Gentle now,

Apologetic,

As if it too is wishful for a new beginning.

In the beginning…

Before…at first—

A week ago?

A month, perhaps?

Silence lay thick, like cotton in our ears,

Like linen on our eyes.

We, the survivors,

We, the dead.

Washed up, together and alone.

Some families. Some couples.

Some so battered they didn’t last the night.

A few hundred.

A few more.

Then quiet.

Camps sprang up, built of branches and drift,

Bits of this and that,

Tucked into mountainside meadows rife with

Blue camas flowers and purple foxglove,

Bright paintbrush and pale Queen Anne’s Lace

A world of color, as if it hadn’t all been washed away.

What was a Queen now?

What was a mountain?

That’s what bothers me most, I think,

Now, with so much lost.

All the thoughts

That steal my breath,

Stiffen my chest,

Slow my blood,

I push them deep into the cold of me.

The things I must not think about.

So many things

To turn away from,

To survive.

I cannot look at them straight on.

Not now.

But I don’t want forgetting. Not exactly. Not for good.

How can my mind rest in this endless sea of grief?

Our people.

Our art.

Our books and music and the creations of our minds; our hearts,

Our dreams, whole and broken;

Our people.

There was no singing,

In the early days.

But now we search the shore

At every low tide, no matter the time.

A twice-a-day ritual.

Like meeting for church,

Or for a class.

Remember those?

And sometimes Jackson sings, as we search the flotsam.

A few of us join him.

I do.

Searching and singing.

Singing and searching.

We’re never sure if our finds among the cobbles and foam

Will make us laugh (a car bumper in the shape of a heart),

Or break our hearts all over again (so many shoes, so many shoes).

I walk with him, his grey hair pale on sun browned skin.

He is the oldest—the leader of our camp—all spit and sinew.

At sixteen, I am youngest and still wild.

I wear my brown hair in tangles to match the kelp forest,

Tie it with a strand of bladderwrack.

I know my name—Maggie Richards.

It hurts to say out loud,

Sweet and sharp at once,

That gift from people who loved me and are gone.

There’s a spot up the beach,

Broken trees from the once-forest, fallen into shoreline,

New tide pools forming in the rocks.

We find things here a lot;

Useful things,

Hurtful things,

Horrible things,

Hung up in rotting branches or washed into crevices.

An arrow of sunlight shoots sideways from the dark rocks, glancing,

Gleaming, sharp and bright.

It says all I need to hear.

I peek at Jackson and he offers a nod, his weathered face bemused.

I take off,

Running down the sand.

I am a doe.

My feet fly,

Slapping the edge of the surf.

I aim for the light.

The sea spills over the sand, into the cracks,

Rushing,

Racing.

But I’m fast too

And I know what I saw.

Metal gleaming.

My eyes have grown keen, in these long, slow times.

There!

It sparks again, at the edge of black rock.

Panting, I arrive

And reach my arm deep into the rocks,

Cheek to stone.

I drag it up

And stare.

A locket.

Silver heart, cracked open, full of sand.

Hinge bent.

Broken.

Chain tarnished with salt and sorrow.

A lump rises in my throat.

It is my heart.

My heart is in my throat.

Not mine, of course,

But like.

Familiar.

My little sister had one too.

My sister.

I slip it into my pocket and say nothing.

These days the camps are busy.

Each soul falling into tasks, returning and returning.

Each doing what they can.

There are four camps, all within walking distance of one another.

There’s talk of winter.

Will there be snow on these mountains, with the sea all around?

Will there be storms?

That evening a herd of deer passes through, confused but unafraid.

We look at one another.

Peter and David and Brenda want to go after them—

Meat for the camp.

“We’ll share with the other camps too,” David promises,

His sincerity sizzling like fat in a pan.

But Jackson shakes his head.

“Not yet. The sea provides. Let them be.”

Tanya nods. She’s the prettiest of us with her thick black braids, and honeyed skin.

“Let them be,” she says. “They’ll get fat on summer greens. We may need them come winter.”

At dawn we go to check the fishing nets.

Collect the snails. Fill the makeshift pots with water.

Check the snares.

Gather the wood, and the berries.

Dry the nettles, and the roots.

Jackson asks if I want to walk to Camp 2,

Three miles up the slope.

In my pocket, the pads of my fingers smooth the locket.

I go with him.

The leaders of the camps meet often.

They talk of stores, and troubles.

They make plans.

There’s Jackson, thin and tough from a life at sea—wise enough.

Natalie, her face round as the moon, her ears keen enough to hear hearts. She was a doctor.

Lou is tall—dark haired and fair minded. His sharp eyes linger on Tanya when they can.

And hers linger back.

I see that much.

Jules. He was a dancer, and his grace carried over.

Today is different. Today they don’t speak of the coming winter,

Or of rotations to scour the shore.

Today is about the future.

“We must make paper,” Natalie says. “We must make a lot.”

“And ink,” Jules agrees.

“I did that once in middle school,” I tell them, voice soft.

Jackson’s smile is father-proud.

“It isn’t just the paper, though,” Lou frowns. “Someone must be the scribe. Every life. All we can remember. The facts. Our skills. Everything.”

Natalie nods. “Math and science.”

“The tall tales,” Jackson sighs, his gaze growing distant.

The skin around Lou’s eyes is tight. “One person won’t be enough.”

Jules puts a hand up on his shoulder. “There’s time.”

“We’ll forget.”

“We’ll forget,” Natalie’s voice hitches.

I rub my fingers over the locket. Back and forth.

Ebb and flow.

“We should have a place for special things too,” I say under my breath.

I don’t know they heard me until I look up—

All eyes on me.

“Explain,” Jackson offers.

My thumb on the locket shifts to and fro,

Past to present and back again.

“A place to visit. A place to remember,” I say, freeing the locket

By way of explanation.

It waits, swinging,

Catching the light and

Bouncing it back again.

Our pendulum;

Harmless,

Useless,

Its only weight, the weight of wondering—

Heavy with remembrance.

Jules is the first to speak, his voice tender as the sea in moonlight.

“Yes,” he says.

Lou only nods.

“On top of the mountain,” Natalie whispers.

I turn to Jackson, but he looks away, his throat working.

Swallow.

Swallow.

The future isn’t bright. Even I know that.

It’s tarnished and twisted and half full of sea water.

But I heard an owl back at camp that night, over the rushing of the sea,

And it made me warm, somehow, in places our fire couldn’t reach.

“Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you?” She called from the trees.

“We take care of each other,” I answer back. “We remember that much, just like we always have.”