A Wish Fulfilled

Thunder howled not from the dark cloudy sky, but from the gigantic, deformed catfish in the water beating and thrashing the cliffs with its human hands. Angry and tired, the six-foot monster cried with a human’s voice, “Why won’t you bring her back to me? I don’t deserve this. I have waited far too long. I need my wife. I am lost without her.” The large black rocks in response to the unhappy attacker did not reply. They had no power to overcome death. They were merely the guardians of the siren’s grave. The monster cried and slowly slipped back into the ocean.

A group of more than a hundred tourists stared in disbelief. Some of the people had already run up the stairs leading down to the rocks of the cliff that touched the unsettled water. Some of the tourists were hitting the video on their smartphones to record the unnatural wonder, only to discover later, that the monster fish was not there. A few of the people from Canada were calling the park ranger’s office and reporting what they had seen.

Most of the park rangers ignored the stories they heard about the gigantic catfish. They believed that the tourists were a bit delusional from being out in the weather all day. Perhaps, they had not carried water with them. Or the other possibility was a few of the tourists were playing practical jokes on them. 

As the sun went down, the waves receded. The tourists had all left the park and in the dark, the stars lit up the cove.  Small silver fishes jumped. A bird dived down and caught one and took off to a neighboring cliff and ate it for his meal. -A lighthouse off another cliff not far away beamed its light over the ocean warning any traveler by boat that something unsafe was underneath the slow currents.

A violin could be heard somewhere in the distance. An old man was playing it inside his cabin. He was staring at a picture of a beautiful redhead. She was surrounded by a group of musicians. She was smiling. He was remembering the many years he had spent with her. The places they had traveled. Their family together. She had always looked after him. Where he was weak, she was strong. As the old man finished, he put down his violin and turned out the light and went to bed. He slept a long time, but when he finally did wake up much later in the day, he found a small puddle near his bed, that he had no clue where it had come from. His coat was also soaked, so he hung it up to dry and on the clothesline outside his cabin.

Earlier in the morning while the old man supposedly slept, the gigantic catfish had reappeared. He angrily beat his fists upon the rocky cliffs. “Let her out! I demand you release her spirit!” he screamed. For hours, he continued his attack on the cliffs. Water crashed over the rocks, flying in the air, back and forth between the shore and the ocean, never letting up, until he felt defeated and crawled back into the ocean. There were no tourists that day to see the odd sight, as the park was closed for maintenance.

The sky grew dark, fir trees stood tall in the forest, and the violin again began to play. The old man was lonely and tired. His love was gone. The pain he felt was unbearable. He put the instrument down. He remembered his coat and went outside to retrieve it. He had just grabbed it off the line when he saw a falling star.  He made a wish. “Oh, maker of all that is good and wise and wonderful in the universe, please, oh please, let me see my dear wife again. I miss her so.” After which, he went back inside the cabin, laid the coat at the foot of the bed, and crawled into his bed and fell fast asleep.

The old man dreamed of a siren, that sang beautiful folk tales of long ago. Her red hair ran long past her shoulders.  She sat on a rock. “Come to me,” she beckoned to him with her lovely hand. “Her I am.” The old man’s white beard suddenly stuck out straight from his face, like a cat’s whiskers in different directions. His excitement and awe gave him motivation to make the three-hour journey on foot. He put on his jacket and walked out of his cabin down a rocky trail leading him to the cliffs where he had lost her long ago. Along the way, the twists and turns of the path sometimes grew narrow, and there were small rocks he clumsily had a hard time stepping over. Sometimes, the path changed, and it ran uphill. He would have a hard time catching his breath. He would rest for a minute and then continue his way. The breeze coming off the ocean was pleasant. Just when he was about to give up, and the fog started to roll in, he saw her.

“Here I am,” he said. His wife smiled and laughed. Her eyes sparkled in the night. Her legs dipped over the edge of the rock she sat upon and rested beneath the surface of the water. It seemed like she had temporarily turned into a mermaid. The old fish was overcome by the joy he felt in the presence of the love of his life. He reached out to her and took her hand. She smiled at him. He hugged her and kissed her one last time, as the siren disappeared.

The sun was rising. The wife, the singer’s words could be heard floating across the water. “It’s okay, my love, don’t be angry. I am always watching over you. Life moves quickly, when this day is done, I’ll be with you again.”

The next morning, the water was calm. It did not beat upon the shore. Not far away, the old man woke up in his cabin. A new puddle was on the floor, and his jacket was mysteriously wet again, but he was calm and in a happy mood instead of being depressed. He went outside to the small porch and read a book. Happily humming to himself, he looked out at the inlet that was down the hill from where he lived and knew tomorrow and the tomorrows after that were going to be okay. 

 No monster was found, but the lone wolf park ranger, that believed the opposite of all his coworkers had finally solved a mystery that he had been trying to solve for years. He had once seen the fish but had never realized it was really an old man until he stayed up one night, not being able to sleep himself and went to check out the cliffs where the monster always appeared according to the tourists. He sat in the dark. He saw the old man approaching. The old man’s eyes closed. He was sleepwalking. He watched the old man, turn into a fish, and then back into himself. He appeared to be talking to someone else that he loved very much, but the park ranger could not see who.  He saw the old man’s gestures towards something sitting near him. He did hear the siren’s words to her husband though floating across the wind. Instead of telling everyone about his discovery, he buried the truth. Its light would keep him warm during the rest of the long nights, especially in winter, in the wilderness in Maine.