Unsuspecting Dreamer

Chapter 6 A Chance Encounter

One day, June 2nd I drive by a beach right outside of San Francisco. It is too perfect to resist, before this trip I had never seen an ocean in person before. I park on a whim and get out, walking straight for the shoreline. The sun is setting but my eyes are locked on the ocean. The second I step in I squeal with glee. It feels so good. I think about how I am connected to every part of the world right now. I let out a yell of complete happiness.

'I may be all alone now,' I think, 'but I will be heard. I won't always be invisible.' I hear giggling behind me, I turn. A little girl around 10 stands off to my left on the beach.
"First time?" she calls. I smile and give her a thumbs up, wading back to the shore.

"And you?" I ask.

"Oh, I live just across the way." She points.

"Cool, you are so lucky," I say with emphasis, totally meaning it.

"Thanks, um... wanna help me build a sand castle?"

I accept her offer and we get to work. We fall into light conversation. I am struck at the similarities that exist between me and this little girl, and yet our backgrounds are so different.

"... so at school I'm like, a total loser. Nobody likes me," she rambles.

"People are stupid," I state. "That's how it was for me, but don't worry, one day you get to leave it all behind."

"I've never been outside of California. I'm never going to live anywhere but here." She sighs as we pack wet sand into the molds she provided.

"No, you'll go places. You'll make a great architect." I gesture to the almost finished castle. She laughs and rolls her eyes.

My phone starts playing 'Light Me Up' and I wipe the sand off of my hand to fish it out of my pocket. I look at the screen. It's mom's investment banker, my investment banker.
I took enough money out of the account to pay off all of my debt, buy the van, and finance this trip. I left the rest in the investor's capable hands, with the instructions to buy into low risk, low gain endeavors. But with the insane amount of money I have, it doesn't matter how slow I gain, it still totals up quickly.

"Just a second," I tell the girl. I stand up and walk a ways away, answering. The next 5 minutes I listen while Mr. Palmer fills my head with facts, figures, and terms I don't understand. I am relieved when we finally hang up.
"Was that your boyfriend?" The girl asks as I walk back to where she sits on the sand.

I outright laugh, Mr. Palmer is the most straight faced, serious man in the world. "No it was most definitely not."

"Do you have a boyfriend?"

"No." She is so innocent, so straight forward. I can't help but admire her.

"I have a boyfriend," she announces. "His name is Rob.:

"Is he nice?'

"Yes, I love him," she nods. "We even have a song."

"Oh really," I say lightly, concentrating hard on finishing the moat so I don't laugh outrageously at her declaration.

"Yep, it's the song on your phone."

I look up in surprise, "that's nice."

She draws a heart near the castle with her finger, writing 'Sarah + Rob' I watch her. She is so young, so confident. Her frizzy, wild, red hair and piercingly green eyes. I can't understand why people would like her. Why they wouldn't want to be her friend.

Finally we are done. In the last flecks of the day's light we stand back and look at our handiwork.

"Oh, I'm Sarah," she says, extending her hand in a very mature fashion.

"Nice to meet you. I'm..." my voice catches. 'Who am I?' I think. Not Lizzie; she's gone along with my mom. I've never been crazy about my full name. "Ellie," I finish, accepting her handshake.

"Hey," I notice. "It looks like we built too close to the water, it's going to get washed away."

"Yeah, I know. I like how it looks when it's disintegrating, like it's melting," her voice sounds so wise for such a young person. "So you like Hunter Hayes?" She asks, changing the subject.

"Yes, I love his voice, his songs. You must like him too."

"Yeah, he's going to be at the Santa Rosa Fair on June 13th and I really want to go, but mom says no."

"Oh, that's too bad," I tell her, filing away that information for later.

"I know, and it's only an hour away." She has a slight whine in her voice, which makes her sound like the little girl she is.

I'm ready with a consoling reply when a voice echos through the empty beach. "Sarah! Sarah!"

"That's my mom, she hates it when I go to the beach by myself, but at least she knows where to find me," Sarah informs me. "Coming mom!" She calls.

We start to walk toward the sound of the voice. "You know, I met Hunter once," I say, trying to sound cool.

"No way!" She jumps with excitement. "What was it like? When? Was he nice?"

I laugh and relate the story, in a bit less detail than when I told my mom. She sucks in every bit though. We finally are in sight of a lady that must be Sarah's mom. She is standing under a streetlight, calling into the night.

When she sees us she breaks out for us in a run, scooping Sarah up in her arms. I stand off to the side, watching, missing my mother to the point of physical pain.

"Don't do that to me Sarah, you know how scared I get. You could get hurt or be taken and I couldn't do anything about it!" She exclaims.

"Sorry mom, it's just you and dad were fighting..."

Her mom looks over at me, cutting Sarah off mid sentence. "Shh, it's okay honey. I'm just glad to see you're safe."

"Hi," I jump in, "sorry, I didn't know she wasn't supposed to be out." I smile, trying to calm the lady down, showing her I am not a crazy psycho.

"Mom, this is Ellie. She's never been to the beach before, and we built a sand castle, and Hunter Hayes and her are friends," Sarah's animation and speech speed up. I used to talk to my mom like that when I was her age.

"Very interesting." She looks up at me. "Thank you for watching out for my daughter."

"It was fun- a perfect first visit to the beach."

"Come on Sarah, It's past your bedtime."

"Aww, mom!" Sarah moans. "I'm not even tired."

"I've got to get going anyway," I say, bending down to Sarah's level. "Thank you for such a fun time, I won't ever forget you... And you'd better invite me to your and Rob's wedding," I whisper the last part and wink. She returns it with a smile.

"Can I switch addresses with you? I wanna write to you and send you an invitation."

I look over her head at her mom for permission. I receive a slight nod.

"Okay," I say. "Write yours down here." I pull one of my notebooks out of my backpack. "I'm in the process of moving right now, and I'm not sure of my exact address." I choose my words carefully, aware of how crazy I would sound to an adult if I said what I was really doing.

She hands back the book, a bright light shinning in her eyes. We part ways, I am dead- tired, but it will take me at least an hour to find a place to stay. After my evening on the beach I need to do some writing. If I don't base a character on her in my next story I wouldn't feel right telling people I'm a writer.