The Dock
The waves pound the hardened wood of the dock, playing a frantic beat, like the heart of a boxer fresh from the ring. The splintered old beams hold, calm and unmoving. The old man walks alone on this dark dismal day. The clouds overhead churn and spit, pregnant with rain. His footsteps keep time with the waves. The old man pauses and sighs, takes the last drag of the cigarette in his right hand and exhales smoke into the heavy damp air. An old letter hangs from his left hand, yellowed and creased from years of wear.
The old man turns toward the ocean and leans over the edge of the dock, leaning against the splintery hand rail, the thin plank separating him from the restless waves. As he peers over the rising swells, memories of this place, of love and pain, of anger and laughter, flash just behind his stone hard face. His cold eyes glisten with tears, and his wrinkled forehead furrows with the years burden he carries. He rubs his eyes, turns back, and walks farther down the dock.
The faded yellow rubber of his rain jacket crinkles as he sits down on a familiar wooden bench at the end of the dock, like an old friend supporting his weight. The dead body of a seagull, covered in grime and flies, lays rotting on the planks before him, staining the aged wood with bile and gore. He wrinkles his nose at the sight of it and pulls out a fresh cigarette. The waves continue to pound the dock, taunting and threatening the old man with cold sprays of salty water. He lights his cigarette, and the tiny ember at the tip glows defiantly in spite of the suffocating damp that surrounds it. It hangs between his lips, quivering softly, like a beaten dog still faithful to his master.
The old man unfolds his letter, like he has done countless times before and begins to read it. He knows all of those delicate inked words by heart, each elegantly penned letter carved on the surface of his soul. It was the last letter he had received from his wife, years ago. She had died while he had been away, working at sea.
As his eyes scan the letter, he can still hear her soft angelic voice whispering her words in his ear, he can still feel her warm breath on his rough cheek. She had wanted him home, wanted him to be there to witness the changing of their lives together, to see the birth of his child.. He still cannot, will not forgive himself for missing her last moments, for not being the one to hold her hand when she finally gave up her fight, slipped away and gave her life to the blood soaked leach in the doctor’s gloved hands. The child had died less than a year later, wasting the life its mother had given it.
The old man drags deeply from his cigarette and exhales, craving the relief that just will not come. He struggles to keep his composure, and his weathered face soon contorts, tears escape and roll down his cheeks. He cries. Painful agonizing sobs escape his throat, audible over the thundering drums.
A behemoth of a wave hits the dock, breaking and sending seawater up and over the wooden edge. The old mans cries drown as water assaults him. And as he defiantly raises his hands above his head, the wind and water work together to steal the letter from his hands. The soggy paper, the old man’s most valued treasure, skirts by the body of the seagull and right over the other side of the dock. With rivulets of seawater running down his yellow jacket the man hurries to the other side of the dock, as fast as his stiff cold limbs will take him. He reaches the hand rail just in time to see the letter being carried away, and dragged down..
His wrinkled face is stuck in a new emotion, something between anger and amazement. He sits down again on the splintered wood of the bench, arms folded for warmth over his wet chest. The cigarette between his lips is out, wet and hanging limply. Without thinking he tries to take a drag, and spits with disgust at the stale smokey water he sucks into his mouth. The clouds overhead crack, and soon shower the old man with clean crisp rain. The drops are warmer than the seawater.
He flicks the butt over the rail into the water into the water and stares blankly ahead, at the dead body of the seagull. The wave has cleaned off the flies and dirt, its fluids leaking fresh into the puddle it lays in. The old man sighs and looks down at his feet, his own puddle forming from the soggy drips of his clothes. His expression softens and a tear slides invisibly from his eye, following an already sopping trail down his face.
The man stands up and gives his old yellow coat a good shake, dislodging showers of salty drips. His dry eyes glance one more time at the endless sea before he turns and begins to walk back to shore. The thudding sounds of his boots against the dock ring in his ears, but other than that the world is quiet. He doesn’t hear the waves.
