1.

The sand was wet from the rain last night. That is what she said, I hadn't taken my shoes off nor had I sat. The low tide had left strewn behind a coterie of clams, shells and shankhs. A bat of swollen dead wood lay at the edge of the water, one end lodged in a mound and the other zig-zagging over the surface water that came along with the waves. It was a little to the left of where we were, threatening with every lash of the sea liquid to break free from the heavy wet sand and become driftwood. But it didn't, and it gave her something to fix her gaze at. She had twisted and turned herself in such a manner that I was left standing next to her, a bit to her back, away from where she was facing. She must have wanted me to sit down by her and shut up, but I adamantly stood and told my story. She must have wished me to stop my endless barrage of over-zealous squealing. The sea was lost on me.

Last night, she had turned seventeen and I had gone to see my first cricket match.