“Of course, Maggie,” Mommy says. “Just don’t go too far!”
Mommy smiles at Dad, talking softly and eating pancakes on the porch of our summer beach house.
The sun is just barely above the horizon, shooting stripes of bright color across the sky, blue, purple, and orange. The dawn is beginning to warm the cold morning breeze coming off the ocean. The breeze becomes wind, whipping through my hair as I run towards the blue and green waves, long golden curls streaming out behind me.
The cool sand tries to grab at my feet, pulling and slowing me down, so I run faster to escape the tiny grains. White sprays of the water hit my face as the waves break on the beach and make me laugh with delight in the cool of the water and warmth of the sun.
I slow down a little as sand become mud, making sure not to stop and let my feet sink too deeply. I lean down to touch the rocks, smoothed down by the crashing waves. The wet rocks shine in the rising sun, but something glitters in a hole between the big boulders up the beach.
I scramble over the rocks, and peer into the little pool of water, green with life. Moss and seaweed grow from the bottom, and a giant yellow starfish sits in the warmth of the sun. And there, nestled in the corner, the most beautiful shell I have ever seen glitters in the light of the dawn. My little fingers slip as I try to grasp the shell, and I grab, careful not to crush my delicate treasure. The sun catches the sides just right, making the shell sparkle like a diamond.
I ever so carefully climb back down to the ground, and sit down on the sand against a rock. More colors than I have ever seen cover the shell in swirls and dots. I caress the lines of the shell softly, forgetting the sea and the wind and Mommy and Dad. The shell is so smooth against my cheek, I could just feel it forever.
I carefully check inside the hole of the shell to make sure there is no crab hiding (it’s empty), then gently lift it to my ear - surely a shell so beautiful must have an ocean inside.
The wind stirs around me, but I barely notice as the most beautiful music I have ever heard fills my ears, my heart. My own words are not enough to describe it, somehow like the lightest crystal and the richest chocolate cake at the same time. The sounds, harmonies reminds me of tiny dew droplets on a spider’s web, making rainbows in each other at dawn, and of green moss between my toes, and thousands of stars surrounding me.
I hardly notice as the shell steals my breath away, and the sea takes my hand; of course I’ll go and glide with the currents, float with the tides, play on the foam. I do not see the water anymore, just an ocean coursing with life, with energy, with peace, with music, with freedom, with happiness - it embraces me as I plunge into its fiery, watery depths. The song of the shell lifts me and carries me away in a serene whirlwind, a whirlwind of harmonies lifting me to the clouds. I dance with the sparkling sunbeams and laugh with the babbling brooks, free as a bird without mortal care.
My spirit flies free, away from the little body, still on the seashore.
For a second, I pause, I look back, to see a crown of gold arrayed on the sand around a child’s face I almost recognize. Her eyes are closed, with a smile on her lips. That face has so much joy and peace, I almost want to go see it, feel it, be one with it again. The waves gently tug at her feet, and her fingers just barely touch a glint of stardust in the sand.
As I turn back to the stars and the birds, I hear calls on the wind, a sob, I feel the sweet salty tears falling so smoothly against the wind, but the wind caresses and calls me and I float and fly away, laughing, all because of a shell that sang so sweetly.
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