Sea Sounds

Only one person was on the beach that evening. A shaded figure, dressed in a long black jacket, stood at the edge of the great blue abyss. The figure stared, over the tops of the cresting waves, out to sea. They were humming.

The breeze off the salted shore whistled the old tune. Seagulls sang the melody through the rain hazed mist, hungry for the food that was no longer so easily found. The waves, of course, provided the harmonies. The discordant cacophony of the summer crowds had come and left. It was a new song now. 

“He’s out there again,” said May Connors. “He’s just standing there.” May was in the living room, perched over the back of a couch, spying out the bay window. With her sharp brown eyes of thirteen years, she was peering through the glistening, rain soaked glass. She was wearing blue pajamas, a two piece set that had a pink colored ring about the ankles and wrists. The tapping of the rain on the window flirted with the smokey fire kindled in the fireplace across the room. All that, and the smell of bread and cooking stew wafting its way in from the kitchen made their house warm and comfortable.

“Who is, hun?” called Connor Connors from the kitchen.

“The man on the beach from this morning. He’s been there for... actually, I don’t know. I didn’t see him show back up. But he’s been there for at least five minutes.”

Connors walked out from the kitchen, wiping his hands on a worn dish rag, and stood quietly behind the girl with his arms crossed, and then with a shrug and a “Hm,” he tousled her hair, messing up the jet black strands that had been combed to perfection earlier that day. Then, “Well, it’s impolite to stare, and dinner’s ready, come on.”

May continued peering out the window, though she was losing sight of the figure as the rain began to fall harder, making little downward streams on the glass. “It’s only impolite to stare if someone knows you’re staring. If they don’t know, then it’s just looking with intent.” she said precociously.

The man clicked his tongue, “With intent? Ms. April is teaching you too quickly, I’ll have to have a word with her.”

“I think you’re just looking for a reason to ‘have a word with her.’” May stuck her tongue out at Connor Connors.

“Oh! that’s it you…” Connor picked her up as if she weighed nothing and lovingly tossed her over his right shoulder. She kicked his back and thumped on his chest, giggling wildly. He carried her to the kitchen and plopped her at the table, set for two.

After dinner, May went back to the window. It was dark now. The rain continued to play a staccato march on the glass and the wind was whistling through the cracks in the cabin. May peered into the darkness, wondering if the mysterious sentinel was still out there, standing guard.

After a good long stare, May gave up and melted into the couch, her feet covered by a knitted blanket, the rest of her warmed by the crackling fire. Sounds of dishes being hand washed clinked away in the kitchen. And soon after, May was deep in sleep.

That night, she dreamed of the figure at the shoreline. May was standing behind them. Her feet were stuck in the sand so she couldn’t move. She couldn’t catch a glimpse of their face, but she could hear them humming a recognizable tune. The sound of the waves roared louder and louder, threatening to block out the humming, and still May couldn’t move. She didn’t feel trapped though, just swaddled in the sand, in a quiet comfort.

But then, alongside the humming, she heard something that sounded like music. Soft trumpeted music piped its way into her brain, like an echo of a memory. It sounded old. Older than May, maybe even older than Connor. The song played on as her dream dissolved into total darkness.

She woke up chilled. She was in her own bed on the other end of the small house she shared with Connors. He must have carried her there while she was asleep. But if he had, he had done a terrible job of putting the blankets over her. Or if he had tried, she kicked them off in her sleep. She shivered, yawned, and stretched all at once and in doing so, kicked her blankets even farther down the end of the bed, right to the edge, where they toppled over and landed on the ground with a soft thump. Satisfied with her morning stretch, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and put her bare feet on the cold hardwood floor.

A pleasant tingle crawled up her lower back and she bent over to pick up the large blanket on the floor and tossed it on her bed. Putting her feet into her slippers, she went to leave her small room, looked back at the blanket and decided to wrap it around her. She walked into the living room. Connors stood at the large bay window, the sun rays pouring in on his face. He didn’t notice May until she walked up next to him and gently bumped his arm with his shoulder. He looked down at her with tired blue eyes and found her comfortably leaning against his side. It was odd, but when May looked up at him, he looked as if he didn’t recognize her for a few short moments, but then his smile turned warm and he put his hand around her shoulder.

“Your friend is out there again,” he said, pointing only with his nose towards the shore. May looked out the window. The wind had picked up but the rain and fog had blown away. The house they lived in creaked and settled under the force of the blustery air. There, on where water met earth, a solitary black shape stood like a monolith against a backdrop of endless blue.

May and Connor stood in silence watching the watcher. Connor couldn’t help wonder if they were spying or looking “with intent.” And then, matter of factly, May said, “I’m going to talk to them.” 

Her caretaker blinked himself back to reality and hesitated. “I don’t know, she might…”

“She?” May interrupted. And as if by a cosmic force of happenstance, a sharp gust of wind that rattled the windows of the house loosed long dark hair of the shoreline statue. The hair waved chaotically in the wind like a shadow trying to pull itself out of the body. “Oh.” May said quietly. Her feet wanted to both take one backwards in awe, and forward in curiosity. Curiosity won out and she pressed her face to the glass. It was cold against her nose.

“She,” said Connors definitively and turned around and walked back into the kitchen. “Make sure to wear a coat,” he said as an afterthought.

May, still wrapped in the blanket, approached carefully not wanting to startle the woman who she had watched for a day now. But now she was almost within touching distance. Almost on instinct, she wanted to walk right up to the shadowy woman and bump her gently with her shoulder. But she was sure that would be even more startling than she intended. She decided to take a few steps to the right and stood next to the stranger. “Hi,” she started slowly. “I’ve seen you from my house.” 

The figure stood silently, hair dancing violently in the wind. May watched it dance to the tune of the wind before speaking again.

“My dad and I live at that one back there,” she turned and pointed to the cottage in which she lived with Connor. The home that she grew up in looked small and wind torn. She’d never felt embarrassed of her home before, but for some reason, she wanted to impress the stranger.

She started to turn back and found the woman wasn’t looking where she was pointing but rather at her. Cold brown eyes inspected her. “His name’s Connor, my dad.”

The stranger blinked.

“We live here year round, which is cool, because I get to see the town when it’s super busy and when it’s super empty too. I don’t know which I like more. I have friends who live here year round and we go to school together, but then every summer I make new friends who are just visiting too.” May was making circles in the sand with her feet, she wanted to look back up at the woman, but was nervous. She felt like she was spying more being there next to her than by watching her from the window.

“I was wondering what you were looking at,” continued May, “Sometimes I come out here too, during the busy season, and there’s lots of boats and ships anchored out there. But it’s fall now, and everybody’s left so there’s not much really to look at. Unless you just like water, I guess. Is it the water you like? I like it too, I once saw a picture of water that was so crystal blue that you could see the sand underneath for musta been miles out, and that was cool, but I like the water here because it matches the sky, and when you look out, you can’t really tell where the water stops and the sky starts.”

The stranger sighed, shoulders drooping. “You talk quite a bit, don’t you?”

“My dad says so. He says I’m learning really fast too,” sparkled May, “but I don’t think I talk too much, I just say what’s in my head if nothing else is being said, but I don’t interrupt either, so if you want to talk, you can talk too. But if you don’t want to, that's fine too, I have plenty of things to say.”

The stranger’s lips pulled up at the corners slightly. She pulled her hair back roughly and put it into a long ponytail with a hair tie that had been around her wrist. May did her best not to giggle, but the wind was now blowing the pony tail and it looked like it was wagging and she couldn’t help but think of a happy dog.

The woman did not speak, not for a few moments at least. Then: “Connor is your father?” 

“Yep, you probably saw him doing yard work in the summer, if you were here. He has blond hair, and a big belly. Not like a big belly, but he’s not skinny, either. Ms. April, my teacher, tells me he’s handsome, but I don’t know about that.”

May could have sworn she heard a small laugh, but at that moment the wind whistled loudly and water from the ocean sprayed up at them, wetting their faces.

“He treats you well?” she asked.

What a weird question to ask a stranger, thought May. “Yeah, he’s the best. He’s a really good cook. He’s always in the kitchen. I think he’s already started making lunch. I slept in. But I could run back and ask him if he has enough food for you and you could come to eat with us.” 

The woman started to speak and then stopped herself, gathering her thoughts first. “Thanks, tell him thanks.” 

“Yeah? Okay, yeah! I’ll ask him if he has more. I’ll go back now and ask him. I’ll let you know. I’ll ask him if— What’s your name, anyways?”

An emotion May didn’t understand and wouldn’t for a long time flashed across the woman’s face. “Tara,” was all she said.

“Cool, cool, I’ll ask him if you can come. It’s super nice to meet you, Tara. I’ll go ask him now,” said May before she turned and ran awkwardly back up the beach to the house. Tara watched her go.

The back door flew open and slammed with a thud against the wall, the spring stretched to its limit. “Dad! Dad, I talked to her. Her name is Tara, and she has really cool hair. I asked her if she was hungry and she told me she wanted to come to lunch with us, and I invited her back here, but I wanted to make sure you have enough food to share, but if you don’t that’s okay cause I figure she can eat some of mine, I only need like half a sandwich,” the words spewed out of May’s mouth like popped corn.

Connor Connors had been watching from the window. He watched as his daughter approached the woman he once knew with the most trepidatious steps. He watched as she almost broke down the woman’s walls with her contagious spark and her joy of life, and he watched as she turned heel and ran with fleeted feet across the sandy dune. He also watched as the woman walked quickly out of the frame of the big bay window. And finally, he watched now as his daughter looked out the window, first gesturing enthusiastically, then stopping to look quizzically out the window.

“She’s gone,” said May.

Why May wanted so badly for the mysterious woman to come inside, she couldn’t say. But when she realized that she had gone, May felt a sense of loss. She peered to the left and right corners of the bay window, trying to catch the wild haired woman. But she couldn’t spot her.

They ate lunch silently. May ate very little, perhaps in hopes that the woman would return, and sit with them at the table. They would talk about what they would do today, and the things that had been bothering them. They would tell stories, and May could make them both laugh. But she didn’t return, and the day went on as most other days do.

The wind had died down, the fall shower was long gone and the waves were peaceful. It had even warmed up a little. May had gone to bed a few hours ago, and Connor had tried to. He lay in his bed until he began to hear the seagulls waking up with their songs; the reflection of the rising sun dimly lit up the morning sky through his curtains.

He now walked out of the back door, long before May usually woke up, with two cups of steaming coffee; one black, the other with milk and one spoonful of sugar. He stepped with a steady foot through the sand to the edge of the water, and handed one of the cups to the woman he knew.

“Hello Tah,” he said with a reserved affection.

“Hello Con’,” she replied the same. He handed her the cup of the coffee, and she brought it close to her face, letting the steam wash over her.

“She’s so… talkative,” said the woman.

Connor laughed silently. “Don’t know where she got it from, but I can hardly get a moment of silence in the house when she’s home. I can’t wait for school to start again.”

“She seems happy.”

“I think so. She’s got friends, and she gets good grades, and she’s already much smarter than I am.”

“Seems like she’s got a good teacher,” the woman, Tara, looked at a man she hadn’t seen in almost eleven years. He had grown older; his blonde hair was flecked with gray. But he was still handsome, though his belly was a bit bigger than it used to be.

“Ms. April, yeah, she’s got her on this reading kick, which I appreciate, because it gives me some quiet at least, but it’s also making her grow up too fast, if that makes sense.”

“Yeah, Ms. April, huh?” She emphasized the name.

Connor laughed. “She’s definitely a little too talkative.” 

Tara smiled and stared out past the water.

They drank their coffee, cooled quickly by the early morning air, in silence for a while.

“She saw you, I didn’t send her out. Just so you know. If I had told her—” 

“I know,” Tara clinked a ring on her left hand against the coffee cup. Connor glanced down at the mug she held, her long slender fingers wrapped gently around it. “I was actually waiting for you to finally come talk to me, I should have thought...” a sigh escaped her lips. “But then when she was here, talking to me, I wasn’t upset. It was nice to meet her.”

“You could've come in.”

“No.”

“Are you back?”

“No, I just came to do a closing on the house.”

“Oh.” Connor rocked on his heels in the sand. “Are you still happy there then?”

“Yeah, it’s different. There’s just so many people. There’s so much to do. And sometimes I can just disappear, and sometimes I can watch them from far away, and sometimes I can join in. It’s so much louder there that I don’t have to hear anything in my own head if I don’t want. And I love it,” she looked back at the small cottage with the big bay window staring out at them. “Are you happy here?”

Connor was silent for a moment, his eyes twinkling out into the endless dark blue. “Yes,” was all he said.

“Alright then,” she reached over and squeezed his hand. They stood that way for a long time, until the sun had crested the water.

“She’ll be up soon,” said Connor.

 Without speaking, Tara handed him back a half drunk cup of coffee, kissed him on the cheek, and walked away down the beach.

Connor watched her go. He stayed outside for a while, listening to the waves. The breeze had picked back up just a notch and was airing out the familiar tune. The gulls were singing loudly, off key, but it was not unwelcome. And the waves, as always, provided the harmonies. He took a deep salty inhale, and began to hum.