Leap

I am on the path, walking to the Golden Beach of the Birett. The rough sand shifts under my feet, slowing my stride and reminding me of the containers of tiny beads in my mother’s old shop. She used to sit me down behind the register and let me play with the bright colored spheres. I would plunge my hands into the bowls and wiggle my fingers, pretending they were Birett, swimming languid and mysterious in the sea.

The fisherman walks past me, swinging his bucket.  I peer in, looking for whatever strange oddity he’s pulled from the sea today.  Empty.

“Nothing bite today?” I ask, keeping my voice light. His catch feeds his family.

“The sea is mourning.” He nods and keeps walking. 

My breath catches in my throat.  I wonder if he knows what day this is, then realize of course he does.  The whole town knew my mother.

The towering brambles on both sides of the path are heavy with summer fruit, and a smell of tangy sweetness sneaks into the back of my throat. The bushes were planted generations ago to keep people on the path. Sometimes the morning fog gets heavy, and you can’t see your own hand in front of your face. The plants keep us on track.  It’s a bright, sunny morning and my feet find the way without thought.  I walk slowly.  I dread the sea now. I don’t like putting my feet in the water.

I used to come to this beach every day, with my mother.  We would sit on the tumbled heap of stones, called the Gift Rocks, and watch the Birett, graceful and glowing in the sea. Today is one year since she died.  One year since we brought her body to the cliffs and performed the ceremony that let her soul Leap. I’m not sure if there is such a thing as a soul. If there is, my mother was more than just that. She was endless discussions about what it meant to live, awake and alive, in our small village. Her hands were always warm and full of intricate movements.  A memory swims in as I walk.  I was at our store, holding up a bracelet I had just finished, pleased with my skill, eager for her encouragement. She had smiled and put it in the glass case to be sold. Such a sense of worth had flooded through me. My shoulders straighten as I remember.

The ceremony on the cliffs last year was part of the old ways.  The village gathered, bare heads, bare feet, and bore witness as my mother’s body tumbled into the sea. Bearing witness was the only gift we had left to give her.  She wanted for nothing while she lived, mostly because she created everything she wanted.  My mother’s body arched out and down, splashing finally far below as we stood on the cliff, toes gripping the soil.  I looked out at the Birett glowing in the sea.  White and gold, diamond shaped, slowly flapping through the calm, deep blue water.   

After my mother’s Leap, the villagers danced, turning and circling right there on the edge of the cliff.  I’d never seen the steps before and was clumsy.  I stood off to the side and watched people I’d known my whole life dance patterns I didn’t know were inside them.   I was supposed to come to the beach every day for two weeks afterwards, to pray and help usher my mother’s soul upward as high as possible.  I didn’t.  That’s one of the good things about the old ways.  They leave room for everyone to be a part of things, or not be a part of things.  The Leap, as the tossing of the dead is called, was as much as I could do.

I stand on the golden sand, feet dug in to brace against the wind and cold spray, smiling and weeping at the same time.  The fisherman was right.  The water is wracked with grief, slamming waves against the beach.  The sea shares my sorrow.

I’ve brought a wooden bowl filled with bright beads.  They rattle around and a gust of wind tilts the bowl, spilling bits of color onto the sand. I make my way to the Gift Rocks.  The climb to the top of the stones leaves me breathless and chilled.  The wind is stronger up here.  The bowl is only half full of beads now, but I scatter them anyway among the stones.  I imagine my mother smiling at the whimsy of it.

I sit down and look at the ocean.  I miss my mother.  Sea spray dashes into my face and the wind echoes and howls. I blink tears out of my eyes and spot the silvery glow that means the Birett are gathering. At least a dozen of them are out there, coming to the surface then flipping down out of sight.   I lean my back against the cold rocks.  This is as close as I can get to my mother now.

The Birett come near, riding the crests of the waves.  They flow forward, then dart back under before the curl crashes down.  A huge wave comes, sweeping up the Birett.  They ride it, tangled together, and then slide under the water at the last moment.  One of them doesn’t make it under.  It’s hurled onto the beach and slammed into the sand. I feel my throat catch. I leap to my feet.

I scurry down the rocks, scraping my hands against the rough stones, racing to the Birett. It’s immobile, stretched out flat against the sand.  It’s bigger than I thought, wide and white with gills like slashes down each side.   I’m babbling, telling it everything’s okay, that we’ll get it back in the water.  I don’t know if it can hear me. 

Grabbing its tail, I try to pull it towards the sea, but it’s too heavy and my grip isn’t strong enough.  The wind gusts sand at us and I shield the Birett as best I can, worried that grit will get into its gills.  It smells like brine. I lean over it, looking for injuries and doing my best to shelter it from the wind.  Under its left side, I find the wound, deep and pale.  I look at the Birett with fresh eyes.  I see its motionless gills and the stillness of its tail.  It’s dead.  It was dead before it hit the beach. 

I stand and look out to sea.  The Birett are still gathered there, turning and circling, dancing just at the edge of the waves.

Though she’s been writing non-fiction for decades, Pamela Zero finally ventured into creating science fiction in 2019.  Her trilogy, the Visitor Series, follows the lives of people pulled hundreds of thousands of years into the future. She is a member of several writing groups, has won several awards for her short stories, and is currently editing her second novel, Ose, in the Visitor Series. Pamela is based in Ventura, California, and spends her time writing and editing. Now and then she travels, gardens, cooks, and genuinely tries.