THE SUN RACED THE CLOUDS across the sky, and too quickly it was heading toward the horizon. But the boy remained on the beach.
“Still think some knight’s out looking for you?”
“Someone will come. You’ll see.”
He hoped he was right. The sun would soon leave him. And if he hadn’t been found by then, he’d be alone. In the dark. Where any monster could see.
He glanced at the Green Wall. Light twinkled like eyes in the brush. Perhaps it was the birds, terrible or small. Perhaps it was the hissing thing. Or perhaps it was the other monster the boy knew hid behind the leaves, the half bear, half wolf that waited to eat him.
The ocean had swelled too. Rolling waves paced off the coast like they were searching for the right moment to strike. The moment when they could drag the boy down to the biggest monster of all . . .
watching . . .
waiting . . .
patient.
As the sun crept lower, the boy looked out for his rescue. But the beach held nothing except sand and rocks, sand and rocks.
Until he saw it. Something else, something new. Something small and gray bobbed up and down at the edge of the water.
He couldn’t make out what it was. A hurt animal, maybe? It was moving. Sometimes it was short and fat, like it was trying to hide; then it would be hit by a wave and stretch long and skinny, as though it was reaching for the sand, reaching for safety.
The boy stepped closer, but not too close. Maybe the monster under the sea was trying to seize the gray thing too. His stomach twisted—for him and the thing.
“Stay with me.” Words filled the air around the boy, and the pain in his head suddenly pulsed white hot. He clasped it with his hands as he whirled to see who spoke, but he couldn’t spy another person. This voice wasn’t the bully in his head. It was older, softer. A woman. It had felt warm and familiar, and the boy wanted to catch it and hold it close.
“Hello?” he called.
But the voice didn’t respond. Had it come from the thing in the water? The boy peered closer.
“Don’t go.” The woman’s words returned, dancing around him. “Stay with me.”
“Who are you?”
Again no answer came, and no one else was on the beach. Except the gray thing.
The pain in his head dissipated, and the boy straightened. “Did you say that?” he called out, but the thing didn’t reply, just shifted and curled in the tide. Maybe the voice had wanted him to help.
“You can’t help that thing.” Laughter tinged the bully’s words.
“I might.”
“The water will get you.”
The boy gulped. The bully had a point, but if the gray thing needed his help, he couldn’t ignore it. It was small; it needed protection.
Those words grew up from deep within his bones. Familiar and strong. The smaller something is, the more it needs protection.
How did he know that?
He couldn’t say, but he knew he had to protect the gray thing before the monster in the sea ate it. If he was quick, ran lightning fast, maybe he could rescue it without getting pulled below. “I have to try.”
The boy stepped closer, keeping his toes away from the greedy ocean. The gray thing drifted onto the edge of the sand, then was pulled back out again. In. Out. In. Out. Each time, it reached a little farther inland, then was sucked back out to sea.
“Let it go!” the boy shouted. “It doesn’t want to be with you. It wants to be here with me. Leave it alone!”
The ocean carried the thing into shore—closer, closer.
“Yes! Come on!” The boy jumped up and down, waving the thing toward him.
But the water was just teasing. The thing began to float back out.
“No!” The boy stepped into the tide and felt the tug on his toes.
“You’ll get dragged in.”
“But it’s so close.” He took a deep breath, then lunged, grabbing a piece of the gray thing in his hand.
“I’ve got it!” he cried, and turned to escape back up to dry sand.
His foot stepped on a piece of slippery seaweed and slid out from under him. He tried to stay upright, but the water jerked his other leg away. He landed flat on his back in the wet sand.
The low tide crashed over his face.
“Hold on!” he screamed to himself before the ocean filled his mouth.
The water receded, yanking on the boy’s wrists and feet. The sand under him slinked away, and he felt himself begin to sink. Fear crawled back into his chest. He was caught. Stuck! He had to get away.
With his fist still clamped around the gray thing, the boy gulped air and closed his eyes. He held his breath as water rushed over him again.
“Trust me. Jump!” The voice floated to the boy, watery and distant. It wasn’t the bully or the woman, but someone else—someone angry.
The boy opened his eyes. He wasn’t holding the gray thing anymore. His hand was clasped around a metal bar. And instead of sand, he was surrounded by pink rectangular tiles.
“Come on,” said the voice. It sounded deep, impatient. “Jump.”
A wave beat against him and he gasped, choking in a mouthful of sand. He was back on the beach, stuck in the tide. No more metal bar or pink tiles, just sand and water. And the water tugged at him, the long arms of the monster from the deep pulling the boy into its depths. He couldn’t let it take him.
The boy clawed his way out of the tide, dragging the gray thing behind him. Finally free, he ran back to his favorite spot in the sand. Dry and safe. He lay on his back, his arms and legs sprawled out, soaking in the last rays of the welcoming sun.
He breathed deeply. He had done it. The ocean had tried to take him, tried to suck him down. But he had escaped . . . this time.
He didn’t ever want to go near the water again.
He shivered, thinking of its grip on him. And the voice. The angry voice. The pink tiles and the metal bar. Where had they come from? He searched what he could remember, in case it was a memory like the refrigerator, but he couldn’t coax more out. Was it something to do with the gray thing?
The boy sat up and pulled the thing onto his lap. “Are you all right?” he asked, straightening the edges, then he frowned. It wasn’t an animal at all. He was staring down at a ragged blanket.
“A blanket!” The bully laughed. “You did all that for a blanket?”
“I like the blanket.”
“You would, baby.”
The boy ignored the bully’s taunt. The blanket didn’t give him a clue about the pink tiles, but it still pleased him. “Maybe I have one back home,” he said.
“Aww. A little baby with his blanket.”
“I’m not a baby. You’re just jealous because you can’t have it.”
“Ha! Yeah, that’s what it is.”
The boy shook his head and focused on his prize.
The blanket was soggy and frayed but not gray, like he had first thought. It was a very pale blue, like the sky early in the morning before the clouds settled in. The color was masked in places by stains, big purple and brown splotches, like the blanket had been beaten by something much bigger. One corner was torn, another had a great gash, and threads peeled away at the edges. If the boy pulled one, the whole blanket might come apart. He was careful not to pull any.
The cold, wet material was soft between his fingertips, harder in the stained areas. Its smoothness felt familiar; it stirred his heart, but he didn’t know why.
All he knew was the blanket comforted him, and for that, he loved it.