Life’s a Beach
Alex saw the crab first. It was on its back, deposited on
the pebbles by a rolling wave, eight legs flailing in the air, claws grasping
at nothing. Before Alex could get there to right the poor thing, there was a
crackling of pinions over his head and a massive black-backed gull descended,
its wingtips brushing his face. That was the end of the crab.
He sat down on one of the wooden posts on the breakwater and
pulled out his phone. Still no message from Cally. Three days and nothing from
her, had she lost her phone again, or was she ghosting him? Alex decided he
didn’t care. He was only really going out with her because you had to have a
girl, or the guys in the class would mock you. He knew this from experience.
Alex wasn’t especially interested in Cally, or any of the
girls round here. Maybe if he could get into one of those London art colleges,
the girls would be better, somehow.
He tried skimming a few stones, but that wasn’t something he
was good at, any more than he was good at dating girls. His first stone bounced
a couple of times before it sank. The next few were no better.
The monster gull had finished eating the crab, it flew off,
ignoring Alex. The crab shell was lying empty on the stones, picked clean by
the gull. Although its beak looked huge the bird knew how to use it with
precision, to completely eviscerate a crab. Alex turned the shell over with the
toe of his trainer. Now the crab looked whole again. He photographed it, then
piled random stones over the body and arranged alternate black and chalk-white
stones in a circle around the pile. A cairn for a crab, he photographed his
work and posted it.
The wind was getting up, Alex had decided to abandon the
beach when a guy in a dark wetsuit walked past, carrying a huge board. His dark
hair was whipped by the wind and his face looked full of joy. Alex watched as
he assembled a windsurf board and sail, the guy’s movements were skilled and
lithe, he was fit.
Before he launched, the guy turned and waved to Alex, then
he launched and almost before the board hit the waves, the wind caught the brightly
coloured sail and he was off.
Alex sat on the pebbles and watched the wind-surfer hurtling
across the waves, almost flying. He took out his phone to take a photo, then
stopped. He stuffed the device back in his pocket and rummaged in his backpack.
His sketchbook and pens were right at the bottom, he hadn’t used them for
weeks. He began to draw the man in the dark wetsuit as he conquered the waves
with his rainbow sail.
