The Shore

1. The Shore

The lighthouse. Seonghwa needed to go to the lighthouse.

Seonghwa awoke on a beach of black sand. As he lifted his head groggily, some grains stubbornly stuck to his cheek and hair. The rushing of shallow waves nearby him reached his ears. It brushed his eardrums and the back of his mind to clear his befuddled thoughts. Lost, he looked around.

Right beneath his body, where he had rested just a few moments ago, laid some shells halfway buried in the sand. Both the waves lapping at the shoreline and Seonghwa's heavy body had shaped the grains to their will as the heavier and mightier beings. As if swallowed up by forces it couldn't resist, the shell barely peeked out of the cool bed. Its edges stretched towards the air as if it tried to breathe before getting drowned completely. With careful fingers, Seonghwa pulled the object free and shook the sand from it. Pearly white and accented by pink hues, the pretty souvenir rested in his palm.

A bunch of leaves and pieces of bamboo that Seonghwa couldn't quite place laid nearby. However, when he rose his head to look around, his eyes only skipped over large black boulders and rocky cliffs. As if the land had decided to create a wall between itself and Seonghwa's disoriented form, it allowed him to sit up and breathe on the beach, but not to come closer. An invisible wall kept him at bay.

Go back into the water; it seemed to whisper. Back where you came from. Did Seonghwa come from the water? He turned his head to check.

A stranded boat had kissed the sandbar to his right. The metal of the little hooker still looked new safe for the large leak that the hull had suffered. Water entered the ship effortlessly and tilted it as if the ocean planned to drown it in its deadly embrace. Every gentle brush of water licked on the exposed barnacles at the bottom.

Had Seonghwa come here with this? He couldn't remember. When he searched his head for a memory of his arrival, only echoing emptiness answered him.

"Am I... stranded?" As if it held the answers to his puzzlement, Seonghwa glanced at the shell. Unsuspecting, it rested in his hands. Seonghwa saw the scars on his arms from his pet long ago. Purrsephone had always been quick to announce her discontent with any mistakes in the schedule he executed when he picked her up. Not after dinner, never when his hands were wet. And got forbid if he had petted a dog before he tried. The long healed wounds on his left forearm were numerous, and the times she had slipped off there and clawed at him had left many silvery paintings in his skin. He brushed over the protruding lines fondly. In this time of uncertainty, he clung to the fond memory of his cat especially.

Some of his scratches were fresh, but he assumed those to be from his crash. Naturally, it seemed as if he had suffered wreckage, and the shock clouded his memories. The thoughts about his old and grumpy but oh so lovely cat at least soothed his puzzled brain.

Once more, Seonghwa looked out over the ocean. Stormy grey and light blue, the surface resembled the clouds, but its calm waves lulled him in the sense of security. For now, no danger came from the sea, but he should move from this place as soon as possible. The chilly winds from the ocean pulled on his hair and brought tears to his eyes that he blinked away strained. When he got to his feet, his hips were stiff, as if he had spent too much time lying in the sand. His cold and partly numb body responded cheerfully to the idea of movement. Movement meant warmth.

Shivering, Seonghwa rolled down his sleeves. He set the shell in his hand down next to a few others that had collected on a rock as if a whole family of crabs or snails had moved together there. The image made him smile as he started to walk along the shore. His feet sunk into the sand at his every step, and the distant call of seagulls mixed with the constant rush of the waves. The ambience was calm and soothing on his confused and tense nerves, despite the ominous clouds and harsh winds that pulled on his clothes.