The Sea

Q. What could lead such sincere and thoughtful young adults to become violent?

A. That they were sincere and thoughtful.

 

Boats creaked and tugged at their chains like desperate, neglected prisoners. Clotted sea waste swarmed round an orange plastic ball, bobbing on the ocean froth, and tapping at the stained green steps of the harbour. Here we met to conspire under the stars, and allow our minds to fornicate in the rampant evening chaos whilst sea-salt hardened our hair. In the darkness, where lines are vague, we seemed to expand out of our own skin; our eyes and a vapour glow looming out of the black matter. Occasional glints of manic grins and fast pulses. Sometimes I’d begin to shake.

By this particular stretch of night and sea, a group of adults meet to fire their thoughts hissing and screeching in to the torpid air.