Her skin was old and grey, wrinkled like wet paper. Her hair was a startling white, her eyes a deep ocean blue. She was short and thin, bent over and hunched. As she sat in the old creaking
chair she asked for my help, giving me her hand. I sat beside her, pulling up a chair from the other side of the white porch. I looked at her expectantly, hoping for answers.
She spoke, her voice dry and coarse. "I was fifteen years old, in the summer of 1865. My family was poor, barely eating enough to live. I still remember the feeling of my ribs protruding from
my stomach. The fish had gone, and our house by the beach became of no use to us. At the beginning of June, I think it was, my father went to the city for work. Three months later, my
mother figured out he wasn't coming back." The woman took a shuddering breath, smoothing down her blue dress.
"At the end of August, I met him. I was swimming one day by the shore, it was quite a scandalous thing to do, you know. Eventually I heard a man scream. A rip tide was taking him out to
sea, and he could not swim well. The waves were choppy that day, and the sky was full of dark clouds. I called out to him, telling him to swim diagonally out of the current. He couldn't hear
what I was saying, and eventually I reached him. He saw me and I suppose he was dumbstruck. A skinny little girl swimming in the ocean offering him help." She stopped and chuckled,
smiling at the memory to reveal old yellow teeth. "With me screaming above the waves he eventually got the idea, and with my help we reached the shore. For a while we just lied there
panting, feeling the sand and staring at the sky. I looked over to him, and I fell in love."
"He was only a couple of years older than me, and almost as skinny as I was. He had dark red hair, cut short above his ears. He was tan and wiry from working in the sun, and his nose was
crooked from being broken. He had a long, jagged scar on his forearm winding down to his thumb, and I remember seeing a cross hanging from his neck. The man, or rather the boy, finally
looked over at me with wide blue eyes. Of course, I can only imagine what he saw. Plain brown hair, long and dead straight that reached down to cover my body. Well, I was not covered
enough; I realized this and dived straight into the water. He called out to me and looked, but I swam away along the beach back to my house. I turned around to watch him go though, and I
feared I would never see him again."
She stopped talking, reaching for a drink of water. I watched patiently as she drank, waiting for her to start again. Once again I looked at her expectantly. "I went out every day after that
looking for him, hoping he would venture down to the beach from the town I guessed he was from. For three weeks I stared down the beach, collecting shells and riding waves. I remember
wanting to do whatever it took to be able to go up to the town, but mother would never allow it and I was scared to disobey. I often simply sat on the rocks, dreaming that I would see him
again.
Soon summer became autumn, and autumn became winter. I forgot about the boy, and for a long cold winter I simply struggled to survive. My mother, tired and frail, died at the end of
January from some sickness. Left on my own in the world, I realized I needed to go the town by the beach to look for a job. I had no idea how, I never knew anyone who had gone to town. I
paced along the beach for hours, and soon I just lied down in the sun. My skin became patchy and dry from the sand, my lips cracked and my hair became knotted and rough. All of the
sudden, after lying out in the sun for a day, the pain began.
I felt dull pain at first, then sharp, stinging needles all along my hips. It hurt to breathe, to move, but still the pain went on. Terrible, pathetic, searing pain along my waist and down. I was
spasming, writhing, reaching out with my hands to no one. I screamed, and no one heard. I felt a tearing, what seemed like hours of splitting skin and shuddering muscles. Eventually it
stopped, long after the sun had gone down. I had no idea what had happened, and for the longest time I just lied down crying.
I cried until the sun rose, and a man came down from the beach. It was the boy I had rescued, but he had become a man, taller and muscular. He stared at me in amazement, and ran down
to me. His eyes ran over my body, back up to my face and cradled me in his arms. He held me, and told me his name and that I was going to be alright. His name was Thomas. He said 'I
remember you.'" She laughed then, throwing her head back and smiling at me. "He said, 'I seem to remember you having fins.' He bent towards me and kissed my forehead, and held my
hand like I was a porcelain doll. And I went to live with him in the village, we married, and hadchildren, and grew old. Thomas died three years ago." She smiled sadly, reaching out to grip my
hand. She turned to the sea, her blue eyes searching the horizon. I bent my head, kissed her frail forehead and let knelt in front of her. "Thank you for telling me about grandfather." There
we stayed, watching the sea rise and fall against the setting sun.