The Calling Tide

It yearns and beckons. With wet palms and whispers do the waves call, gently caressing my fingertips as I extend my arms. Soothing to the touch. What makes these waters so warm? A single thought turns into euphoria as my mind swims in the hopeful wishes to join the endless tide. How it coils around my body. There is no weight to the swirling mass that surrounds me. No hesitation.

One step. Another step. I wade deeper into the blue waters brightly reflecting the moon in the night sky. The cold sweeps through my skin. I close my eyes and sink further into the water’s open arms. This is it. This feeling… I sink deeper. It reaches my shoulders and I tremble in ecstasy. It draws up to my chin, my mouth, my nose… my eyes. I take one last look at the world above and then a sharp tug.

My eyes go wild. I look down. My breath escapes my mouth and I suck in a mouth of cold water. My lungs burn. I start to struggle, more water filling my mouth. Drowning out the last of my breath. Another tug. A grasp. Something’s latched onto my leg. A soundless shriek but I cannot speak. My body is drowned in pain. I start thrashing around. Helplessly grabbing onto waves. But there’s no escape. Strength leaves my body. My vision clouds. Closing my eyes, I let it take me. And I am no more.

I wrote this piece during the reboot of my passion for writing. The imagery and plot speak for itself: a bewildering love for a beautiful night scenery and a desire to become one with it. As the character slowly starts to embrace the scene, the character describes their ecstatic enjoyment as the waters of the moonlight waters start to surround them; as they sink deeper into the pool. Finally, in a small twist of fate, the waters or 'something' begins to drag them. We do not know what has caused this phenomenon (perhaps a cramped leg) but the calm is swept away and the character is tied up in an inescapable fate. Like the calm before the storm, the character is left thoughtless as what is only shown are their actions to escape. A solemn death that is coloured as if they made a decision, as they describe their last moments as deciding their fate.

The inspiration for this small piece were the thoughts I had during my period in depression. A mixture of doubt, anxiety and helplessness. This was also the time where I would feverishly write on a daily basis though mainly poetry, but they really showed how in disarray my mind was at that time. My poetry always depicted a sense of loss, wondering and solitude that was due to probably hormones, physical and mental abuse. People would describe me at this time as an extremely sensitive character that could breakdown and the soonest signs of hostility.

A good example of this was standing up to someone that I had started to bump into with my friends when we were playing or walking home from school. Only a few years older, he (and occasionally his friends when they were with him) would start to harass myself and friends. I would hold back my trembles with clenched fist which now reflecting back on it, might've made me appear as less of a target (that and I had a pretty nasty look on my face too). They also seemed to pick on others around me more so when singling out their 'prey.'

On what such day as any other, when I was walking with a few friends back to one of their houses to play games, we met the main culprit once more. He tried chatting to us in an almost friendly matter, but from my experience it was better to just ignore him and I advised my friends to do so too. This was when he started isolating us, seeing who was easier to pick on I presume. First Oz, as I'll call him in this. Oz did end up talking to him in two to three word sentences. Then as if uninterested moved onto Fish - my other, considerably much smaller friend - and started trying to talk to him. He started further isolating Fish, making him walk slower then me and Oz and when be both stopped to obviously close the gap, he barked at us to keep walking.

I remember that disgustingly tepid voice, "We're just talking, aren't we Fish?" and as both me and Oz kept walking, emotions of anxiety and anger started swirling inside my; boiling hate that he was doing this to my friends. It felt like minutes, but was only seconds but I made up my mind and marched back up to the thug and Fish.

Enough of the story-telling, but what ended up happening was I told the guy to stop defiantly with tears streaming down my eyes. I was that scared, but my fear was outweighed by anger and a firm desire to protect my friend Fish who was at a loss at what to do and seemed terrified. A fight breaks out where I hit first, as the bully starts cajoling me, saying villain things such as "What're you going to do about it?" and "Go on," after making a superior masculine move of chucking his bike down violently to show dominance. Less of a fight, and more of a push-and-pull scene where me and my friends try and restrain the guy, rather then making an effort to punch the guy, and the exact opposite for the man himself.

When the police came, I did say I hit first and as a result me and the bully were both taken to the police station and put in isolation cells. It was later after 6 hours that I was released and came to see my mum bawling her eyes out in the reception. I had also seen the bully's father angrily stride past my cell and shout the station down at his son. The memorable line, "He was 4 years younger than you!" is still embedded in my head. Fast forward 5 months of anxiety, of being told I would be going to court and it being cancelled as a result of lack of evidence, and apparently I wasn't the same anymore emotionally.

There are a lot more interesting details on the whole story, but I'm not sure whether anyone reading this would think it's too long. In the long run, at present I am mentally well but in terms of writing, two things haven't changed: I still write about dark/negative things as it feels almost natural, and I still have yet to write and complete a long piece of writing. A few years back, I tried attempting a novel but only got a few chapters in before mental issues and exams took rein of my life, again. But we move.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoyed my piece and a memory I shared.