Dark sea

When I close my eyes every detail of that day still comes to life, even as I sit here on the porch in the sun.

The way the ferocious wind ripped at my hair, threatening to undo its tight bun, as I approached the cliff. How misty rain weighed down my bodice and thick woollen skirt. Brine creeping into my nostrils, a saltiness stinging my eyes. Pulling the knitted shawl closer around my shoulders I peered down the steep cliffside. Far below small dots moved around the pier, readying the boat for the first leg of the journey. A small cluster of forlorn individuals huddled off to one side. Soon I would be one of them.

I remember streaks of thin grey cloud sailing across the sky, drowning out the weak October sun. Black waves dotted with foam rolling towards the shore. Darkness and light interspersing, neither able to dominate the other.

Chilled air forced itself down my throat, entering my ribcage, toying with the chains that for so long held my heart in place. I had yet to learn that the distance between sorrow and joy can be far greater than the distance across any ocean.

Clasping the gold locket containing a lock of hair from my beloved Peter I was overcome yet again by the path I was setting out on. A sudden urge to cry traveled from within my chest up my throat, trespassing my lips. Fragments of the familiar heaviness became dislodged, as if chiseled out by the icy wind. Tears streamed down my face as deep sobs mixed with the wild squalls.

It was the first time, I saw the sea but when I did, I became someone else. I watched as particles of grief drifted down the cliff into the waves, drowning, disintegrating, to finally rest at the bottom of the sea bed.

Intended as the opening scene of a novel. Inspired by the Curtis Brown prompt “The first time I saw the see I became someone else”.

The Sea

The first time I saw the sea, I became someone else. 

***

I arrive in the still before dawn, searching through narrow streets in the hazy grey of the waning night. A door is waiting at the end of a dirt passageway, the symbol etched into it. 

After two short knocks, a couple greet me with signs and whispers. Inside, we embrace; I remove my tunic.  Titus weaves a strip of cloth across my shoulders, back and chest concealing a parcel tight against my torso, while Chara gives instructions and repeats my new name. 

Alone, outside, my face pivots up to the teal blue sky - silver stars are fading out, golden rays are breaking in. I close my eyes, allowing the new day to settle upon me. 

I move onwards. Shouts, clatters, bangs and brays shoot through the air, now slick with the stench of brine, sweat, dung, and wisps of sweet aromas from foreign places.  Moments later the port of Berenice is before me.

Huge wooden ships hulk along the dockside, heads of gods and swans scouting at the prows, swathes of sails are furled-up on sky-high masts. Sailors, dockworkers, slaves, traders, soldiers, toiling, waiting, watching. Cargo is carted along gangplanks, silks, spices, jewels, and myrrh are piled under unflinching Roman guard.  Crowds of merchants await in an eager hum, behind them their caravans of donkeys and camels stomp and snort. 

Other ships are laden, hammered and fixed readying for the voyage to distant Muziris. Passengers begin to gather, of which I will soon be one. 

Farther out, away from the muted harbour waters, the sea is endless, wild and deep, it glistens under the rising sun. I press the package and say my name aloud. 

The first time I see the sea, I am someone else. 

This opening scene was shortlisted for a Curtis Brown Summer Story competition. The prompt quote was written by Abi Daré, author of ‘Girl with the Louding Voice.’

It takes place in 52AD, in the Roman controlled port of Berenice, Egypt, before the narrator embarks on a secret and treacherous voyage to India.

Salty

It is my happiest time, in this cool and dark space, where the air rests all around me, and I do not have to think too deeply about why I am here, until …

The air is disturbed as the door opens, letting in the ugly greenish electric light. Her hand reaches towards me impatiently, fingers tickling me possessively. When she realises I have not much left to give, she says, ‘Now I have to go get some more. Damn!’

If only she had closed the door again, leaving me in peace. Instead, she lifts me up and places me on the kitchen counter below. I am alert now.

To her I am a box of Maldon Sea Salt Flakes. That is my day job. My side job is what I am passionate about and I need to get better at it. You see, I am servant to the sea god, though some may have called them Poseidon not so long ago. We spirits of the earth and sea do not need names. If you need a name for us, call us missionaries if you will. 

Salt, water, sea, ocean, waves, tides. Giver of life and receiver of all dead things. If not respected, they will destroy. However, to worship is to protect the immortality to which we all belong. To ignore this truth, is to plunge you into the depths of a meaningless existence. 

There was a time when offerings of gold, goat, saffron and sword were made at the altars overlooking the sunsets above the oceans. The amber rays magnified what was precious across the mirrored surface of the seas. All became one as the offerings were softly illuminated in appreciation of the gods.

Working then was a pleasure. We didn’t need to graft. We had purpose and respect. The word can be spread so much more easily when the subjects are willing. Now, trapped in this box, without the freedom we once had, how can my master expect us to influence in the same way as before? 

The connection was greatest when she dipped her fingers for the first time into my full box of sea salt flakes. There was a dry, gravelly shifting away to accommodate her. In this comforting moment, she could smell the fresh sea air. She imagined the flat sands of Île de Ré extending out so far, covered by the thin layer of ocean, shining faintly orange and grey in the misty late afternoon. One of many special places that have gifted salt to generations gone by.

I am connected to her and to all who worship the salt and sea through space and time. It is dry, very dry in my dark space and I crave the water. It helps me to remember the hub of the trading posts along the trans-Saharan trading routes, exchanging vital salt alongside gold and manuscripts. My job has been served here and I am now feeble.

But I, should I say we or it, cannot die. I use the last of my energy to reach out to my fellow spirit five hundred metres away down the road sitting in their cardboard box in supermarket aisle number two. Good luck.

Thank you. Yes I am here at the front of the shelf. I agree, times now are bleaker than before, and there is no pride in having to compete with the table salt, grains packed in tightly over there in tiny uniform pieces going for the easy wins. 

Some among us think that more sophisticated approaches are needed. Powerful strikes to the earth to create saltwater springs just serve to terrify. I don’t agree. But a job is a job, and I can only do so much. 

Here she comes towards me. She speeds up once she sees me and tenderly wraps her warm hand around me. I realise the limitations of my assignment as she says to herself,

‘Great, now if I can get you in the pan quickly, I can have the spaghetti ready by seven.’

Sunset

Image Courtesy Matthew Snowden

The First Time I Saw The Sea, I Became Someone Else.

‘The Sea’ was on display in the gallery around the corner from my flat. This wasn’t the usual water colour of rinky-dink sailing boats topping foamy white waves; but a sea afire  with one of those sunsets of shock and awe that you get in the Highlands. Bold, confident strokes of molten gold, bruised indigo and hot magenta, chasing out the tranquil turquoise of a departing day; sea and sky separated, like two combatants, by a sullen range of distant foothills.

Arrested initially by the drama, I took a closer look, to be then captured by something I hadn’t first noticed: a little white croft in a corner of the strand with a figure in a homespun shift and grey shawl standing by its gate. Were they watching the sunset or were they watching me, the viewer?

Admiration and curiosity won. Within the hour ‘The Sea’ was mine and hanging on the wall by the bed. It would be the last thing I would see at night and the first thing I’d see on waking.

Then the dreams began.

Now, I was never one for bothering about dreams: neither the pointless interpreting of symbolism,  nor the habit of keeping a pen and notepad nearby. To me, they were always harmless  and sometimes entertaining ephemera.

But these dreams were different, happening every night, from that very first night.

In some I’d find myself within walls as white as a Jesuit’s cell, sitting on an iron bedstead covered with a faded patchwork quilt: dank and salt crusted. Opposite me a dressing table, with a rheumy, liver spotted looking-glass.

In it, my reflection - wearing the drab shift of the woman of the croft, hair loose around my shoulders. And through the window behind me: that sunset.

Other nights, I’d be in a cold, stone-flagged kitchen sitting at a scrubbed wooden table. Before me a blackened range, behind, a lone zinc tap over a chipped Belfast sink.  And through the window behind me: that sunset.

After waking again among a tangle of bedclothes some two weeks in, I sat and with an unblinking gaze, confronted the croft and its inhabitant. Was it my  sleep-raddled imagination or were the figure’s thin lips silently mouthing at me? Was her hand gesturing?

Compelled by this to visit the isle: the sea, the place, the person,  that weekend found me in my car, bumping its way uphill along a deteriorating track. At last, on cresting the rise, the sea appeared, in all its glittering blue-grey splendour, already reflecting the tender pink and lilac of the clouds.  A gentle harbinger of the  sunset.

Below was the croft and, moving towards the gate, the woman in the homespun. And it was by the gate that she stopped, as if held back by an invisible barrier.

She was young – about my age – not some spinster, ancient and weathered, as I’d anticipated. Her fair hair flowed long and loose around her shoulders, her face, bronzed, courtesy of the elements.

She granted me a nod.

‘Come inside.’

I followed into the now familiar kitchen. It smelt of the sea, tinged with a metallic hint of damp. I nervously licked my lips, brackish from the sea salt lightly settled there.

Before me was  the window, through which the sea was now reflecting bolder shades of gold, purple and fuchsia as the sunset built.

The crofter gestured me to sit, sit in the chair, facing the chipped sink with its solitary tap.

‘I know who you are.’ She said.

Was it my imagination, was the room getting chillier - or was it her tone?

 ‘ I visit your room: the dove grey walls, those crisp white sheets, the silky blue rug and outside, that great, green chestnut tree that filters the morning sunlight. ’

‘So she was in my room when I was ….’ It didn’t bear thinking about.

‘Our dreams then, did they cross each other like ships in the night?’.

‘No,’  She whispered, ‘It was our souls.’

A silence as her eyes narrowed.

‘And now that you’re here, actually here….’ She paused again and as her hand moved towards me across the table, I felt my hair loosen and spread across my shoulders. Round us a miasma began to swirl, extending fingery tendrils that wound along our clothes, working, plucking -  then melting, to reveal its macabre work.

The crofter, basking comfortably in the aftermath, was dressed in my clothes: my jeans, my belt, my shirt. While now, itchily insinuating itself across my neck, arms and bare thighs was that shift and shawl of drab.

A slow smile: the smile of a predator closing in on its prey.

‘You see, you didn’t just buy a painting – you bought a pact.’ The triumph was unmistakeable.

 ‘A pact to release me……’

And, quickly  scooping up my car keys from the table, she strode through the door, through the gate and into my car.

Stumbling, over the hem of the unfamiliar garment, I tried to follow, only to be repelled at the gate by that invisible force field. There was no escape.

Behind me, my freedom was motoring over the hill - before me  the eternal prospect of sea, sky and earth ablaze with that sunset.

Until the next person might see The Sea for the first time –

- and become someone else.