Tide

Chapter 3

Soon after, some survivors were led to the hills, due to rumours of there being another wave. I couldn't bear the thought of it. The fear was still vivid - I could still taste the flooded ocean water which stretched across the area, and still had the feeling of my heart racing and panic rushing through my veins. It had only barely occurred to me recently that I wasn't just caught in a really long nightmare. The thought of another wave was something I didn't want to imagine.

The sun pressed its heat against my skin as my gaze roamed around the area. I paced around, slowly and carefully, unsure of where I was really going. A woman stopped me, asked me a few questions and then grabbed me by the hand, pulling me into another area. I sat down at a desk, where another lady interrogated me with even more questions.

"What's your full name?" she asked. I looked up at her. Her long black hair was pulled back into a loose braid that fell over her shoulder, her eyes a soft brown colour. She held a paper down on the desk, scribbling words down with an electric pink pen.

"Ava Grace Kato," I said.

She nodded and grabbed a small rectangular piece of paper, jotting down my name in bold.

"Okay, Ava. For now, you are going to have to stay here. We are going to try and do everything we can to find your family. Is that clear?" the lady said, taping the name tag to my shirt.

I nodded, feeling my throat tighten. She offered me a smile and then got up, stacking her papers neatly before leaving to greet a small child, who was wandering around aimlessly with tear-stained cheeks. 

I found a paper and pencil and sat by myself. I needed to distract myself - get rid of the scary emptiness and confusion I was feeling. I didn't understand what was going on. A woman earlier had told me there'd been a tsunami, but I still didn't seem to understand what that had meant. My mind felt bombarded with questions I didn't know how to find the answers to. 

So I started to draw. I let the pencil drag, marking dark grey traces and swirls against the blank sheet of paper, eventually sketching the outline of a beach. I felt a lump growing in my throat as I drew some more, a tear falling and moistening the paper. I used to draw a lot. Drawing now evoked memories from my past. I remembered drawing with my little brother, creating mini tales and reading them aloud with silly sketches to back up the stories. A little boy made his way towards me, tapping my shoulder and making me flinch. I looked over, catching sight at his freckled skin and cinnamon hair as he stood with a beam. 

"What are you drawing?" he asked.

Quickly, I dried my eyes and said, "I don't know."

He kept smiling, watching me draw for a minute, before asking, "How old are you?"

"Fifteen. Sixteen soon."

"Really? You look older."

A half-hearted laugh escaped my lips. The boy reminded me of my brother.

"I'm six," he said.

"Cool."

"Where are you from?" he asked.

"Canada."

"Oh, I've been to Canada before," he grinned. "I'm from the United States of America."

I smiled back. 

We spoke for a while, before a lady covered in gashes and bruises spotted him and ran towards him, hugging him tightly and crying. The boy asked his mother if she was okay, running his small hands across her wounds, and she smiled through her tears and said that she was okay now. I observed them, smiling to myself as the mother hugged her son once more, keeping him wrapped in her arms, safe and sound.

Once they were gone, I took a deep breath and looked around. I was surrounded by other children and teenagers, each of them sitting or standing at opposite corners of the room, each and every one of them acting differently. Some just sat and stared blankly, some cried silently, and some smiled. A little girl with golden locks of hair was colouring a paper with a dull pencil. A boy held a plastic truck in his hands, and rolled it across the table. 

It hadn't been long since the incident, yet a lot of the small children seemed unaffected. I thought, maybe they were in shock. Or, maybe they were too young to understand. Maybe they didn't know what was going on. But I couldn't blame them. I too, found myself barely understanding.