Lawrence awoke sharply from a deep sleep. Every day he rose long before the sun did, because his work required little light but much time.

There was a stiff pain in his back where the springs in his old mattress had lost their bounce. He knew he should replace the old thing, but it seemed every spare dollar he had was spent on his mistress. He loved her dearly and couldn’t bear to see her go a day wanting for anything.

He rubbed his eyes briefly and then sprung out of bed. He wasn’t old and he was not young, but he was certainly spry for his age. He stepped quickly to the fireplace in the corner of his room and threw a log onto the embers that had warmed him all night long. As the log began to burn, he walked outside to fetch some water.

The moment he opened the door he felt life burst across his face and he smiled as he said “hello old friend!” He spoke not to neighbor or friend, rather it was the ocean’s breeze that had delighted him, as it had for so many sunless mornings before.

He walked to the stream about a hundred yards from his cabin and filled a bucket with its running water. He loved this stream too, almost as much as the ocean. “You are small but mighty, like your older brother across the sand” he said as he looked at the stream before turning back to his shack. He had learned of its might years before, when a great storm turned the gentle creek into a rushing river. For days he had to wrestle its winding body as it tried to devour his home. Thinking upon it now, it brought no anger or frustration to him. After all, it was the wild and unpredictable ways of both the stream and the sea that made him love them so dearly. A man could live a hundred years on the land and see little more than the changing of the seasons, but on the water each day was sure to be different than the last.

Back in the cabin he poured the water into a kettle hanging above the fire and waited for it to boil. He turned and opened his lone cupboard to grab a dented tin can of coffee from the top shelf and set the can next to the fire. Next, he was back across the room to his wardrobe where he kept his clothes and boots. In moments he was dressed and with a freshly poured cup of coffee in his hand he stepped out into the dark morning.

A narrow path led from his shack down to the water. As he walked along it he sipped his drink and listened to the waves break along the shore. After a short while he reached the top of a small hill from which the ocean was now clearly visible. Here he paused for a moment to look. Before him lay all that he had ever wanted in life, and he looked up to thank the God that let him leave so near it.

He took another sip of his coffee then paused. He stared again, this time at the shore.

There was a massive dark heap lying on the beach, and as he looked more closely he noticed that it was moving up and down slowly. It was breathing.

He dumped out his cup and walked quickly towards it. As he drew closer his suspicions were confirmed. It was breathing, slowly.

He walked up and knelt beside what was a massive dolphin. He had already guessed what it was when he first saw it from the hill, but its size had confused him. Lawrence had heard old men claim they had seen spotted dolphin as large as an orca, but he never believed them. This one was not that big, but it was certainly larger than anything he had ever seen before. He stepped back and stretched his arms out to guess it size. “Fifteen, no twenty feet I think” he said aloud.

His first thought was that it must be an ancient fish. That certainly explained its size. But a closer inspection revealed that this was quite wrong. Rippling young muscles stretched tightly across every inch of his body. “This dolphin should be in its prime” he said confusedly. As he spoke the fish’s eyes looked at him defiantly, a look never seen on a creature succumbing to age.

Lawrence did not understand it, and so he stood up to inspect the other half of its body. He peered across the beast’s tale and what he saw nearly made him lose his breath. The carnage on the dolphin’s lower portions explained everything. A shark, most likely, had managed to get the better of him and the miserable creature had only been able to escape immediate death by trading it for the slow and lonely fate of being beached. He stared a moment still in slight astonishment. He rarely saw sharks hunting dolphin, much less one of this size.

Lawrence patted its long snout and told the whale goodbye. He felt callous for leaving it, but he knew there was nothing he could do. It was not the first time residents of the sea had washed up on his shore, and it was sure to not be the last. He took one last look at the mighty creature and then nodded a final farewell.

Lawrence turned from the spot and set off down the shore line. It would still be some time till the sun rose, and a fog began to roll in from the water and across the sand. “Now to see my mistress” he said out loud, and as though his saying it reminded him of where he was going, he quickened his pace as he strode into the mist.

~The Author