Mary stood poised at the shallow edge of the sea shore and closed her eyes. The sun was warm against her porcelain skin, pale despite the days she had spent relaxing on the beach. She smiled contentedly as the tranquil sounds of gentle waves unfurling upon the wet sand transported her to another, more peaceful place. A place unfettered with the stresses of modern living. Here, there was no ring tones or deadlines. For a moment, Mary was free of mortgage repayments, bills, parking tickets, advertising and family. Now it was just her, the sun, and the ocean. After an idyllic minute daydreaming, the sound of a child laughing broke the meditative spell, and Mary resumed her place in the world. She took a sip from a bottle of water and surveyed the sparkling ocean, as still as a sheet of glass. The water was cool between her toes and slowly she resumed her walk along the tranquil beach.
Mary had loved the sea ever since she was a child, and found that as an adult she could never be far away from the coastline. The love affair had begun with family holidays to Dorset, the yearly excursions with her parents affording her endless lazy days by the sea. That they were teachers meant that Mary had the whole summer to indulge her passion for the water, doing little but swimming or playing at the waters edge with only herself to keep her company. With her pale skin and auburn hair Mary had appeared an awkward child, the freckles and sunburn only confirming this to those who watched the happy little girl building sand castles in the sunshine. But as the summers passed Mary matured, and the awkward girl became a curvy young lady who filled her bikini nicely. Like the flowers in the garden, she had blossomed. Now she strode confidently across the sand in her two piece bikini and straw hat, her shock of red hair pulled away from her pretty face and the scent of sun-screen strong on her polished, pale skin. Mary had always loved this particular beach, not just for the memories of those family holidays of her youth, but because it was here that she had seen the boy on the rock.
She had been sixteen when she had encountered him. At first she thought it was her imagination playing tricks on her, sunstroke perhaps, that had made her think she had seen a boy sat on a rock a short distance out from the cool lip of the ocean. Mary had wandered off by herself as her Mum and Dad were busy packing away the beach things at the cusp of the evening. It was still warm, and being adventurous and ditzy, Mary soon found herself walking alone along the near-empty beach. Sometime soon she came upon a gathering of rocks where the shoreline gently curved and here, amongst the seclusion of the of the giant stones, was where she first saw him.
He sat silently on a rock that protruded from the water some fifteen meters from the shore. He was carefully surveying the adjacent shoreline expectantly, as if he was looking for something. When Mary came into view climbing upon the smooth rocks the boy's eyes widened in amazement and he became agitated. It took a few moments for Mary to notice the boy but when she finally did she stopped dead in her tracks and her small mouth fell open wide in disbelief. For he was devastating, the prettiest boy she had ever seen. Mary figured he too was about sixteen, and more beautiful than she thought humanly possible. He had thick, curly brown hair and a slim muscular body that Mary thought must have been developed from a life spent in the water. A swimmer, like herself. Droplets of water ran along his naked torso like falling tears, and Mary's heart skipped a beat. She found she was unable to move or speak, which was a nuisance when the boy finally called out to Mary.
"Hello!" he shouted, waving earnestly to Mary. Mary looked around her. She was all alone, save the boy. He was talking to her.
"Hello" Mary replied eventually. She was feeling a bit odd, talking to a boy far out on a rock. "What are you doing?"
The boy grinned.
"Waiting."
Mary stood stock still, not knowing what to say or do. She frowned curiously.
"What for?"
The boy laughed, as if Mary should know the answer already.
"Why, for you of course, Mary."
Mary arched her eyebrows incredulously.
"For me?" Mary asked, amazed. "But how do you know me? How do you know my name?"
The boy fixed Mary with a warm smile.
"Because I've seen you here every summer for the past couple of years and knew you would find me, eventually."
Mary was confused.
"But I've never seen you before," she said.
The boy nodded.
"Alas, that is true. But I have watched you from afar, out here in the deep ocean, whenever you came into the sea or played on the beach."
"So why did you never approach me before now?" Mary asked reasonably.
"Because you were never alone. You were always with your parents, or there were other swimmers in the sea with you."
Mary was still confused.
"But why did that matter? Why could you not have come up to say hello?"
"Because I have something that makes people afraid of me."
Mary took a step back.
"Have you a disease or something?" she asked nervously.
The boy laughed.
"No, nothing like that. But I have something I want to tell you."
Mary paused, waiting.
"Well, what is it then that you have to tell me?" she asked.
The boy smiled, softly now.
"That I love you."
Mary went to make a stunned reply, but before Mary could speak she heard the concerned voices of her parents calling her name anxiously. The boy looked startled in the direction of the shouting, then looked back at Mary one last time before slipping silently off the rock and into the ocean. Mary was aghast, unable to believe what she had seen. She was still wide eyed when the boy resurfaced for one last look at Mary, and again when he ducked back beneath the sea. For when he flipped into the water Mary thought she saw a tail where legs should have been.
As Mary digested the unbelievable thing she had seen the frantic shouting of her family became ever closer, and Mary then felt two strong arms sweep her off her feet.
"Mary!" her Father exclaimed. "Don't ever put us through that again. We thought we had lost you."
"Sorry, Dad," Mary replied. "I was distracted."
As she and her Father hugged, Mary looked out at the ocean and saw a ripple from near the rock where the boy had sat. Again, she thought that she saw a large fish-tail turn in the water. Mary stared sadly at the water as the ripples subsided and her hopes of seeing the beautiful boy again dissolved with them.
Walking back to the car, Mary had a multitude of questions spinning in her brain. Who was the mysterious boy who had been sat on the rock only minutes earlier? Was he really not human, or had she only imagined the tail that she thought she saw protruding from his waist? Had she imagined the whole thing, so desperate was she for a friend? Mary could not find the answers she sought, but she did know one thing. Sadly, she did not know his name.
Worse was yet to come. That blissful holiday was cut short the very next day. Her father's mother had taken ill, so that meant the end of this particular excursion. Mary cried all the way back to London, her parents naturally assuming her tears were shed for her grandmother. When Mary told them why she was upset, that she had met a boy with a tail whom she would never see again, they were patient at first, thinking that what she had seen was the product of a vibrant imagination. But as Mary progressed with her discourse on the boy they grew less patient and more angry. What about the grandmother? Where were the tears for her? Soon their anger shifted to mockery, and they teased Mary about "her boyfriend." So Mary, being a girl afraid of confrontation, kept quiet about the boy from that moment forward and never mentioned him again. And so it was that over the next eleven years Mary eventually forgot all about that summer, and the boy, and it was not until the year that her parents both passed away that she finally returned to that Dorset beach, aged twenty seven, and strolled along the quiet shoreline until she came upon a collection of large rocks.
They were nestled at a point where the sandy beach began to arc in a near-perfect curvature, and it was at the sight of those cumbersome stones that Mary finally remembered the boy.
The thought of him upon the rock took Mary by surprise. It was as if she had been dealt a blow to the chest. She inhaled loudly, but was soon short of breath as her heart raced. Mary was so overcome at the thought of the boy that she found she was gently weeping. Still shaking, Mary climbed onto the rocks and clambered over them to the small, secluded beach where she had seen him all those years ago.
The beach had changed little. The rocks were still as she remembered them, smooth slabs pocked with tiny white shells and green seaweed, with water pools nestled in the spaces between each rock. The small beach seemed smaller still now Mary was a grown woman, but other than that her memory of it was as she saw it now; a pretty half circle of sand and soft pebbles on a slight gradient perfectly hidden from the main beach. It was a private little sanctuary amidst the bustle of the vibrant coastline.
Mary sat down upon the sand and hugged her knees beneath her chin. She looked out toward the distant vistas on the horizon and was soon lulled by the heat and the cawing of circling seagulls up above in the faultless sky. It was a beautiful day, as it had been when the boy and entranced her years before. She thought of him again, his pretty face and the soft way in which he spoke. Suddenly, a slight movement out in the water roused her senses. Then she heard a voice call her name. A soft voice, yet manly. Mary could not believe what she saw when she looked in the direction of the voice. It was the boy.
Mary leapt to her feet, shocked and strangely afraid. He couldn't be real. Surely she had imagined the boy all those years ago?
"Hello, Mary," the boy said as Mary looked on aghast. He laughed at the distress Mary was in.
"What's the matter?" he continued. "Have you seen a ghost?"
Mary stood trembling.
"It's you!" she exclaimed, eventually. "But, I thought.."
The boy smiled.
"Thought what? That I wasn't real? That I had forgotten you?"
Mary nodded.
"Yes."
With that, the boy slipped off the rock and began to swim toward the shoreline. As he swam toward Mary, she saw that the boy was no longer that. Like her, he had grown. Still muscular and slim, still oh so beautiful, but the face was rugged and defined where once his features had been smooth. He looks like a male model, Mary thought, as the boy-man slid onto the sand, his waist discreetly hidden in the surf. It was this that made Mary remember the tail. Was he hiding it from her now? Was this why he was content to lie in the water like some beautiful castaway? She would get to that later, Mary thought. Instead she was content just to look at that sculpted, hairless torso. Perfection, Mary thought. Just perfect. She could have looked at him forever, but the man wanted to talk.
