Manolin (The Old Man and the Sea Project)
He was a young boy who had fished in the Gulf Stream with an old man for as long as he could remember. He had had no fishing experience before meeting him, yet the old man was wise on the fishing front, and the boy learned quickly. Sometimes they caught a lot. Sometimes none for a long time.
The boy hadn't really thought much about their misfortune during those times, mainly because he just enjoyed being around the old man. Almost like they were best friends without a worry in the world.
The first time he had paid a cynical consideration to it all was when his parents had brought it up that one day.
Empty-handed on the fortieth day of another no-fish streak, the boy had come home with a tad bit of uneasiness. It was almost like the feeling tangible, drifting in the air like dust, invisible to the human eye until it entered the body to inflict irritation.
"Mama!" he called, "Papa! I'm home!"
Immediately his sense of discomfort rose at the sound of tense voices in the other room. His parents' voices. They fell silent in a minute and his father's voice called, "We're in the sitting room."
The boy translated this time: "Come in here, we need to talk" by the tone of voice alone. Gulping, he walked into the room, followed closely by anxiety and worry hunkering down on him. Like the time the boy had come home from a game of futbol with his boy friends to discover his had had lost his job and the family was short on money, the boy prepared himself for the worst.
What life changing had happened now? He wondered. He looked into the eyes of his parents, the brown pupils he had inherited looking at him, troubled. One could've assumed the three of them to be siblings instead of father, mother, and son; same chocolately skin, same sleek black hair cut short, same slender stature, not counting his father's muscular look. The boy was just the smallest of the three, noting him the youngest.
"What is it?" he asked.
His father's eyes fell to the boy's vacant hands. "I see you've caught nothing today."
"Yes."
Is that a problem? The boy questioned, though not out loud. You see, dear reader, the boy was just a boy, making him not justified enough to speak his thoughts aloud. Especially, especially, if they were against his parents' ruling.
So then, there was a sigh. It was his father.
"I still haven't found a job," he stated, "And you can't earn money from the fish you don't catch. It's more vital than ever that we get money in however way we can. And Santiago is not helping in this case."
Santiago, if you don't know, was the old man's name.
"Your mama and I have heard the rumors," the boy's father continued. "Yes, we know, rumors are false, but not this one. There's proof this time around. Forty days without even a tug on the line? That's truthfully unlucky. Santiago has had his days, but he's used up his good fortune. He's now and definitely and finally salao. It's catching onto you and you're mama and I have agreed that we can't allow this to continue."
"What do you mean?"
Oh, the boy knew what his father meant. He knew what was coming next, but his mind began to question, began to stir with mystification. Salao? The old man wasn't that unfortunate. Then again, was bobbing up and in down in a small skiff without catching any fish close enough to even be considered well?
Nonetheless, the boy was silent. The boy was only a boy, so he did not protest.
His father wasn't finished. "We've found a new boat for you to go on, with Julian's crew, tomorrow. They've got a lucky boat that can catch several fish in a week, and they tend to be the ones that pool the most money. Now, won't that be better?"
The boy nodded and asked to dismissed, trying to mask the anger and agitation in his voice.
((((()()()()()()()))))
The first day on Julian's boat the boy caught his first fish - a large bass he knew would sell well and please his parents. Regardless, he didn't feel even remotely happy. The feeling of guilt rose when he passed up the old man docking his skiff on the rough hillside near his worn-out cabin. The boy looked at the sail, furled around the mast and patched with old flour sacks. It was like the physical being of his emotions, defeated and damaged.
Silently praying that the old man didn't see him, the boy stepped forward, trying to see if there were any fish in the boat.
None.
He felt his hopes crush under the weight of reality. Salao? This man was the true definition of it. At least, in everyone else's eyes, but the boy's as well?
There's been better times, the boy had to remind himself. The old man isn't "definitely and finally" salao. Maybe he is now. Just for now. It'll end eventually. His luck hasn't run out like his father had said. Things'll become better.
But not everyone thinks so.
The jolt of guilt stuck him like a sharp blade in his chest at the sight of the old man struggling to untangle some tied ropes. It was sickening to see Santiago attempt and fail ruefully all alone. Salao?
There should be something he should do. And there was, the boy realized. It wouldn't minimize the old man's luck, nor would it drive out the boy's feelings completely, but it would at least endow the situation.
Clearing his face of negativity, the boy began approaching the man, doing his best not to look sad. But the man spotted the boy first, his sea blue eyes gleefully trained on him, and called out the boy's name.
His name was Manolin.
And he was confused.
((((()()()()()()()))))
Santiago's eyes haunted Manolin ever since, especially after the old man vanished. His misfortune hadn't escalated in the subsequent days even the slightest, unlike the boy's feelings, even though the man still hadn't caught anything. The man, however, still had the victorious and happy look in his eyes he had given Manolin that fortieth day. He still couldn't comprehend why it had maintained for so long. Even the day before his disappearance, when the two were drinking out by the Terrance and others had insulted him. The boy wanted to jump up and wrestle them to the ground, but the man had stayed silent.
Was he crazy?
Then, on the eighty-forth day, the old man had gone out like normal. What wasn't normal was the fact he didn't come back.
Many people had looked for him, all the way up to the coastguard and airplanes scanning the ocean, only coming up short of even a remote clue of the old man's whereabouts. Almost like his bad luck was preventing him from being found.
It was going to kill him.
Manolin was sitting on the beach early one morning, five days since the man disappeared. He stared out at the crystal blue waters, reminded of the old man's eyes, wondering if they still looked determined and blissful with him now in the middle of nowhere. Was he starving or thirsting to death? Did a sea creature kill him? Was he dead?
The boy shook his head, but the thoughts kept coming. With his luck Santiago should be gone for good.
But he didn't want that. He didn't want Santiago dead. If anything, he just wanted him back, safe and sound.
What made people so lucky anyhow? What drains that luck and makes them unlucky? What determines a man salao? What is luck, as a matter of factly?
No one would answer those questions. Because there was no answer. Manolin couldn't think of one, so who could?
The hell with luck, he thought. It doesn't control us. Not me. Not the old man.
So where is he?
Manolin stood up, ready to get going, but not before sparing another glimpse at the ocean. How it reminded him of Santiago, he wasn't sure. Maybe it was the way the waters resembled his eyes in color – the gentle blue. Or maybe it was the way both were fierce, in their own way.
Fierce? The old man fierce? Manolin laughed at the thought. How was the old man fierce like the sea? The sea manifested terrifying creatures to devour victims, or flooded the landmasses, or generated unpredictable storms to wreak havoc on the people's structures, like hurricanes. Sometimes it even drowned humans itself into its watery depths or made them lost in the endless seas, like in the old man's case. The sea had a destructive and devastating fierceness to it. It was beautiful and cruel, like a venus fly trap. The exact opposite of the old man.
Was he? Manolin couldn't think of a time Santiago caused any sort of wreckage; he was just too gentle. Unless you count harpooning the occasional, once-in-what-feels-like-a-lifetime big fish, he was harmless.
Harmless…
But now the old man was out in the middle of nowhere, more likely struggling to stay alive at this point. He had so little resources, it would be impossible even strive with them for a full twenty-four hours, much less four days. But he had to. Manolin didn't want the old man to be dead. He couldn't be.
He can't be… because he's fierce enough to stay alive?
His undefeated eyes returned to the boy. Santiago had to be alive since… since he wouldn't give up that easily. He even arm-wrestled a black man for nearly a couple days, where he could've given up the battle no matter how tired he got, but he didn't. In payment he won. Salao or not, the old man had strived over eighty days without catching a single fish. In comparison to being lost in the middle of the ocean, that was nothing, but still, the boy felt it was practice for the old man. It was his rehearsal, to find victory in defeat. Now he's facing a true competition.
Was he winning?
The boy hadn't realized he was moving until he saw the cabin. His eyes met the royal palm budshields that made up the old man's shack. He knew what was inside, having been going in there more often than usual ever since Santiago vanished; one lonely chair beside a lonely chair near a lonely bed. An empty bed, Manolin somberly realized. Some lay-way charcoal on the ground for cooking. All of that was on a dirt floor. It was a place of pity. A place to snivel up in memory of the long gone man that may never come back.
Don't think that, the boy had to remind himself. Still, he hesitated when he put his hand on the door. A tear had begun to form under his eyelids. Don't think that. Santiago is still out there, fighting the fierce ocean. He's strong enough. He's tough enough.
But the tears kept coming. They blurred his vision, which may've been why he missed the skiff and the mauled marlin on the rocky hillside. The boy was too focused on the possible emptiness on the other side of the shack's door.
Why had it become so hard? Or better said, when?
Maybe if I imagine him, Manolin told him, then maybe Santiago will be back.
It was a wisp of a thought, a tiny form of comfort, but enough to make the tears stop coming.
He thought of the old man's thin and bony build. He thought of his skin, how wrinkled it was, how many dark blotches covered his face thanks to skin cancer. The aged scars, especially the profound ones on his hands from the cords holding weighty fish. Best of all, he thought of the sea blue eyes, the way they never failed to look defeated or miserable in even the worse of times.
The mental imaged of his elderly friend made Manolin smile. He could almost see him on the other side of the door, waiting for him. His friend.
So, at last, he pushed open the unlocked door, not prepared for what was waiting on that not-so-empty bed after all.
A/N: And that's a wrap! This was a school project I wrote in August yet never posted it until now because I lost the file. But here it is! Hope you enjoyed!
-PL