What Matters

by M.D. Smith

The sun hurts. I never knew it could.

It presses down like a heavy hand, squeezing the moisture from my skin, searing where there was once cool salt. I miss the sea. The soft embrace of current. The lull of waves. Down there, I knew where I was.

Now, all I know is the sand—coarse, dry, clinging in all the wrong places. My limbs are stiff—heavy. I try to move, but the grains scrape and suck at me. I am marooned.

It happened fast. A wave larger than usual tossed me upward, far beyond the reach of the tide. I thought it would come back, reclaim me. It always did before. But not this time. This time, the sea left me.

Around me, others lie still, scattered like forgotten thoughts across the beach. Some are smaller. Some, larger. None move or speak. We are quiet in our suffering, though our silence screams.

A fiddler crab scurries by and I sense his sympathy, but there’s no way he can help.

Above, gulls circle. One swoops low. I curl what I can of myself inward, bracing. But the bird veers away. Not hungry yet, perhaps. Or maybe waiting. I can wait, too. Not forever, but a little longer.

I remember the reef—shadows of passing fish and the glittering shimmer of sunlight through water. I remember the tug of the moon in the waves and the comfort of the ocean floor beneath me.

The sun climbs higher. My skin tightens. If I could scream, I would.

Then—footsteps.

Soft, rapid thumps in the sand. Human voices. Not the deep thunder of the adults that sometimes stomp through here with their careless boots, but lighter, quicker tones. Two of them. A boy and a girl.

“Look at all of them!” the boy says. “They’re everywhere!”

“I told you,” the girl answers, her voice edged with something that feels like sorrow. “The tide was rough last night.”

They walk carefully, weaving between my stranded kin. I feel their shadow fall over me. The sun fades a little. My skin sighs relief.

The boy crouches. A fingertip touches me—warm, soft, curious.

“What are they?”

“Starfish,” the girl says. “They got washed up and stranded. If they don’t get back to the water soon, they’ll die.”

I want to scream again, but now from hope. She knows. She understands.

The boy frowns. “There’s too many. Hundreds. We can’t save them all.”

“No,” she says, reaching down, “we can’t.”

I feel her fingers close around me, lifting me from the scorching sand. The air brushes against me, cooler now. I dangle for a breathless moment. The sea is there, just ahead—shimmering, alive. I can hear its gentle calling as small waves splash on the sand.

Then the boy speaks again, hesitant. “But what’s the point? I mean, there’s just too many. How can it matter to throw just a few back?”

And the girl pauses.

I hang like a prayer.

Then she steps forward and flings me gently, lovingly, into the surf. The water greets me like an old friend. It folds around me, welcomes me back into its cool arms.

As I sink and settle, I hear her voice behind me, faint but clear.

“Well… it matters to this starfish.”

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M.D. Smith of Huntsville, AL, writer of over 350 flash stories, has published digitally in Frontier Times, Flash Fiction Magazine, Bewilderingstories.com and many more. Retired from running a television station, he lives with his wife of 64 years and three cats. Web Page