The Selkie Tide

The ferry heaved and dipped on the caustic waters of the Irish sea, just like Nora Quinn's stomach since she departed the Dublin port at dawn. Leaning against the railing, her tousled black hair rippled into knotty whirls by the wind, as sprays of salt muddled her glasses. In front of her was the deep verdigris ribbon of waves that spread out to Inisheer, Ireland. Her hands were tucked into the deep pocket of her thick, heather gray hoodie. In it, Nora could feel the vintage porcelain medicine tin carrying four separate doses of her antidepressants and two ibuprofen tablets. The tin itself was rather unremarkable. White, and unengraved, but Nora had wrapped it in one of her mother's worn-out mulberry scarves. It was pine green and adorned with white lace that resembled sea foam. Her mother, Kathleen, had worn the scarf to every midnight mass for decades. Kathleen. To this day, the name caused Nora's throat to tighten. She never thought of her mother as fragile. Kathleen Quinn, had auburn hair that resembled rays of sun all on its own, and green eyes that smoldered. She had only been seventeen when Nora was conceived in the summer of 1984. Scarcely a woman, and still a girl with dreams of becoming a swimming champion. Kathleen was a herculean swimmer. Although she could grapple with the fiercest currents, she never brawled with the sea. She caressed it. But after Nora's birth out of wedlock, the town priest declared Kathleen scorned. She swallowed her tears and pushed her pain deep into the pit of her stomach, where it churned into a silent, looming well. "You're my anchor," she used to say, pushing Nora's dark hair from her ruddy cheeks. "You keep me from sailing away."

The ferry's low horn blew out across the mist. Passengers tottered in from the cold. Nora stood, stagnant where she was, the wind turning her cheeks to ice as she reminisced. It was the sort of day that Kathleen would have wept was befitting for a plunge.

"Cold water ruffles the senses," she'd remark, wading into the surf even in March, as Nora was perched on the coarse sand, swaddled in a towel.

"Be along, Nora! The sea won't bite!"

Nora would bleat, "But it's so cold!"

"So am I!" Kathleen would snicker, and duck under a frothing wave.

She always emerged from the water glistening, alive, hair slick against her skull with bright eyes that looked like crystal. Nora would look at her mother and wonder if she was a creature not of the land, but of the sea. For she was too smooth in water, and too rough on shore.

After hearing the news of Kathleen's death, Nora’s boyfriend Roger begged her to re-think traveling to Ireland solo

"You don't need to always do everything on your own," he protested gently in the kitchen of their London flat. Nora gazed down at a dark cup of tea, eyes tracing the wavy reflection of a tired woman staring back at her.

She sighed and brushed her hand against his fine hair. "I'm sorry love, it's something I’ve ought to do on my own." Roger was a good man. He was tender, and mellow, with a quiet disposition that made Nora feel immune to the harshness of the world. They'd been together for ten years, since meeting at the British science festival in Liverpool. Nora spent many cycles of many seasons trying to unearth who she was at her nexus, separate from Kathleen. But in those moments leaning over the railing, the sea's tempest bite on her skin, she knew that Kathleen had woven herself into every corner of Nora's life. Whether deliberate or not, even into the cusps of their rows.

"You think you're better than me now," Kathleen had once scowled in the doorway as Nora came back from the Galway transit station, sporting a new gravitas and the local university's berry-red pin on her sweater. "Because you stay home and read books and write about science instead of working for what you're worth?" she continued, unrelenting. Nora flung her book-bag by the blistering fireplace. She scampered from her mother, cheeks tainted with salty tears. The memory of this specific brawl crawled its way into Nora's mind for years, habitually. Maybe she did think herself better. Maybe she was more pompous than she was intelligent. But the truth was facile. Kathleen never had such choices. Not like Nora's. And that was the unspoken hurt which brooded over them for a lifetime. Inside the cabin of the ferry, people napped, read, and ate sandwiches from crumpled paper. Nora sat by the window, etching a flower on the foggy glass. Her mother had been a stunning woman. Kathleen was naturally lissome and well-proportioned, with lucent skin and an irradiant smile. In spirit, she carried herself with a strength that defeated any semblance of what a submissive woman should be. Nora always felt like the dull shadow of her mother's glory. Kathleen would remark, "you have my eyes," but she didn't. She knew she didn't. Hers were not green, they were ordinarily brown. Functional. Nora always wanted to tell her mother she was wrong, and yet the words always found a way to warp like a sea wrack in her throat. And then, it was too late.

Outside, the waters eased and settled. Nora sipped instant coffee as she envisioned her mother's memorial service. Kathleen's few friends would visit the old sandstone church. They would speak about Kathleen- her greatness, her beauty, her vast courage. They probably wouldn't mention a word about her ill temper, or her grief. How she spent her days gazing out at the open air as if waiting for something to return to her. Nora smiled faintly.

"You were always waiting, weren't you, Mum?"

Nora’s most beloved childhood story flashed before her then, as she lingered on the Baltic birch of the ferry boat. Kathleen had recited it over a hundred times, often crouched by Nora's little floor bed as the scent of fresh linens and breathy chamomile mingled in the air. "Long, long ago," she'd whisper close. "There was once a strong fisherman who dragged in a seal's skin on the shore. And alongside it, was a seal-woman, a selkie- otherworldly and beautiful. She was unclothed and shivering up a storm. The fisherman happily whisked her away to his small abode where she warmed up by the fireside, drinking hot tea out of a flask, " Kathleen said aloud as she gently patted Nora's tum.

"They wed, and the fisherman hid her skin in a locked wooden chest, so that she would never return to the sea. The selkie woman gave birth to children she loved with her whole heart. But each night, she'd stroll along the cliffs, hearing the waves belting out her name."

Little Nora whispered like a twinkle of bells, "And then what happened?" even though she knew.

Kathleen exhaled.

"One day, she got her treasured skin back. And even though it pained her to leave her children behind, she went back to her sea. Some say that she still watches over them when the moon is full."

When Nora had first learned of the tale, she considered it a tragic fantasy. But now as she neared her middle age, she knew it was real, and sorrowful. Kathleen had been a selkie all these years- her skin concealed behind decades of motherhood and steadfast duty. The ferry announcement crackled on the loudspeaker,

"Arriving at the harbor. Passengers, please prepare to disembark the ship."

Nora stood up, her muscles immalleable and rigid after the six-hour journey. She waddled to the deck one last time, grasping onto the railing sullenly, dithering at the edge, hair loose and libertine. Nora shakily untied Kathleen's mulberry scarf from the medicine tin, its fabric soft against her hands. For a moment she stood there, not knowing what to do next. Without notice the wind came aghast, it blew strong and steady and swept the wispy silk away from her fingers. The scarf whirled and danced into the air, spinning, as it started to drift down toward the mineral-rich water. Nora squeezed her eyes closed and allowed the wind to carry off her tears.

She blinked them open once more and gasped. Far down, alongside ancient limestone rocks, the waters sparkled. A figure twirled there, slicing through the waves with intuitive ease. It was a young, fresh-faced girl of sixteen, with shimmering hair streaming behind her, skin milky and radiant. She glided further out, glancing once back to wave. Nora froze there, stunned breath in throat, as the girl vanished into the deep emerald edge of the horizon.

“Goodbye, Mum,” she hushed.

“Go on, you beautiful creature. You’ve waited long enough.”