V : The mourning 2 - The past

Sleep wouldn’t come.

Understandably so—after all that had happened that day.

I got up, left the hut, and headed down to the beach, hoping to calm my mind.

The dirt path was cool beneath my feet. When I reached the shore, the waves gently kissed the sand.

Across the sea, lights from the village on the neighboring island twinkled softly.

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“I wonder… Did they know what happened here today?” I thought.

That’s when I noticed a figure standing still near the rocks at the edge of the beach.

I approached slowly.

It was Sandra—Sergio and Juan’s mother.

She turned her gaze to me and said:

“You know… what happened today wasn’t just coincidence.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, confused by her expression.

She looked at me, her eyes full of something ancient—grief, yes, but something else too.

Longing.

“Years ago, the Atlantic Ocean was my home… and I was not human.

I was the daughter of the King of the Merfolk.

One day, the Great White Sharks attacked our realm…

and wiped out much of my people.”

I opened my mouth to interrupt her—to say this was madness, that she needed to rest, that the trauma was playing tricks on her…

But something in her eyes stopped me.

A strange calmness, laced with sorrow, rooted in a time long forgotten.

So I stayed quiet.

And I listened.