Waves

• Veronica Perez-torres, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2017

The boat rocks violently, walls of foam crashing against its sides. I crouch between a group of unfamiliar people, hands slipping off the rails, salty water drowning my clothes. All around me, people cough and wail. We’re all going to die. I know it. Everyone knows it. There is nothing to hope for now.
Memories flash past me in the form of blurred images. I think of my family, of my ma and papa, of Neko and Isaac. I reach out to wrap my arms around them, but they are too far. A lifetime of ocean between us. I will never see them again.

The boat creaks loudly and we hear a crack. Water seeps in. It soaks the only things we have left, the only reminders that we once had a family, a life. The box my father gave me is flung overboard. I watch it tumble through the storm and disappear under the waves, and my eye catches something else through my tears.
It is another boat. A bigger one. Red lights flashing through the rain. People start crying, but this time it is of happiness. It is a boat from Australia- we are saved. A man next to me cheers. Then others start yelling. ‘We have children!’ They yell. ‘We have women! Help us!’ The boat comes closer. It bangs against the side of our boat. I can see people on board, so they must be able to see us. A hopeless huddle of rags, desperate, hopeful. I stretch out my hands to a person on board so that they see me.
A man reaches out in response, his hands inches from mine. I think of how good the Australian people are. But before I can grasp his fingers, he pulls back, turning away quickly and disappearing from view. We hear a voice cutting through the mist.
‘Go back!’ The voice says. ‘You are not wanted. Go back.’
My arms slump to the side, I hear women wailing behind me. People clinging to each other with a last thought of hope, though they must surely know that we are lost, that there is no hope. That no one will ever help us.

I close my eyes and let the sea take me into its arms.