Island and sea conversation: an original dusk fantasy

Island and sea conversation is an original fantasy set at one invented dusk. The little island and its surrounding sea can speak, pause and choose their movements because they belong to this fiction. Their exchange is no account of an actual place and offers no explanation of echoes, tides, geology or weather.

A sentence around the shore

The island had been trying to finish a sentence since afternoon. It began whenever the sea drew away from the western stones, continued around the point, and lost its ending beneath the next wash of water. By dusk the island had forgotten how it began. A small pale pebble lay in a hollow near its highest rock. The island had been looking at it between attempts.

“I was saying,” the island began again.

“You have been saying that for a long while,” said the sea. Its voice arrived from several sides. Near the eastern slope it sounded amused. Beyond the low point, where the last light made a narrow mark, it sounded occupied with something else. The island disliked having to decide which part to answer. It had only one highest rock and had begun to use that as its speaking place.

“I would like to hear the end of my sentence.”

The sea came closer to the stones, then drew back. “I haven't heard the beginning.” The island said that was because the sea had been talking. The sea considered this while making a small fold beside the western slope. It had indeed been talking. It was trying to describe a colour it remembered from earlier in the day, before the island had begun asking to be heard.

“It was almost green,” the sea said. “But I used that word already.” The island looked at the dark water nearest its rocks. There was no green in it now. It said so. The sea replied that this was why it was telling the island about the earlier colour. The argument had reached a familiar shape. Neither wanted to begin the whole afternoon again.

The highest rock

The island had no visitors that evening. No boat waited beyond its point, and no light had been placed on the highest rock. In the low hollow lay the pale pebble, a few darker ones, and a narrow piece of the island's own shadow. The island watched that shadow shorten as the dusk changed. It had been watching such small alterations all afternoon without finding a way to mention them.

“Could you stop for a moment?” it asked.

“Here?” said the sea, making a fold by the western slope.

“Everywhere I can hear you.” The sea began to answer from the east and interrupted itself from the west. It seemed to be collecting the parts of its voice. A little curl of water held its shape beside the point. Farther out, another line waited behind it. The sea held those movements while deciding what to say next.

The island had expected to be pleased immediately. Instead it became aware of the sentence it could no longer remember. A beginning had been enough while the sea prevented an ending. Now there would be room for the whole thing. It looked down at its western stones, where the water had become smooth. The edge of the island continued beneath it, visible for a short distance and then lost in blue.

“You needn't hold yourself like that,” the island said.

“You asked me to.” The reply came from the smooth water nearest the point. The waiting curl did not move. The island wanted to explain that the request had sounded smaller while the sea was still noisy. It had meant an ordinary moment in which to finish speaking. It had not imagined the line of water looking as though somebody had left it halfway through an action.

The small sound

The sea fell silent. For the first time that evening, the island heard the little sound made when it shifted the pale pebble. It had been nudging it within the hollow while trying to recall its sentence. The pebble touched another stone, then settled. It had been moving the pebble without noticing the small contact.

It tried the movement once more, gently. The sound was shorter than anything it had been preparing to say. There was a dry contact, a pause, then another contact when the pebble returned. The island left it where it had begun. The sea waited. Its smooth surface reflected a little of the highest rock, though the island could not look directly down at the whole reflection.

“Was that the sentence?” the sea asked.

“No,” said the island. “That was something I've been doing.” It had no reason to be embarrassed by a pebble, but it felt that it had interrupted the sea's colour description for a smaller result than it intended. The highest rock had become dark against the remaining sky. The island could see the pebble because it was pale, not because the hollow had any light of its own.

The sea asked whether the island wanted to try speaking now. The island said it did. Then it waited, listening to the still place around it. A small piece of its western edge had always looked like a step from this side. It wondered why it had never mentioned that. The sea had seen the edge from below and might have described it differently. The island began with the step.

A place the sea already knew

“There is a flat stone on my west side,” it said. “Just beneath the rock with the split top.” The sea answered that it knew the stone. The island asked whether it looked like a step from the water. “From here it looks like the underside of a flat stone,” said the sea. The island considered this answer while the held curl remained beside the point.

“From above,” the island said, “it looks as though somebody has nearly reached the top of a staircase.” There was nobody on that imagined staircase. The island had supplied the figure to explain the shape, then found itself wanting the figure to go away. It told the sea that only the flat stone mattered. The sea said it could leave the staircase unfinished if the island preferred.

The island liked the phrase unfinished staircase more than it liked the figure. It looked along the western slope. There were several uneven stones below the flat one, none arranged in a deliberate line. It wanted the sea to know which particular stone had occupied its afternoon.

“That was probably what I meant to say,” it said.

“Probably?” The sea's voice came from farther out this time. “You can say it now even if it wasn't.” The island told it about the shadow that had passed over the hollow, and about the pale pebble that seemed brighter after the shadow moved. It did not try to recover the lost first sentence. It had several new ones to finish while the sea listened.

When the island stopped, the sea waited a little longer. The western stone remained visible through the smooth water. The island could have gone on describing its own edge, following each roughness down toward the point. Instead it asked about the almost green colour. The question surprised the sea enough that the waiting curl trembled, then held itself again. The island told it that it could move.

The wave that had been waiting

The curl folded against the point. A small white line appeared and disappeared. The farther line came after it. The sea had not forgotten its earlier colour, though it had forgotten which part of the description the island had heard. It began with a patch of water beyond the point, where the light had once been narrow enough to seem like a strip laid across the surface.

The island remembered seeing something bright there and asked the sea to describe the edges of the patch. They had been ragged, the sea said, always losing a little of their shape. It had watched the colour narrow beside a darker fold until only a thin green mark remained. The island listened while the water returned around its western stones.

“I wasn't trying to tell you about all of it,” the sea said. “Only that little place.” The island said it understood the wish to describe one stone. The sea asked which stone. The island pointed to the flat one by moving its shadow. The sea washed beneath the indicated edge and said it was there.

By then the island could no longer see the whole hollow. The pale pebble stood out near its darker companions. It left the pebble alone. The sea continued around the point, and the island listened until the colour description came to an end. There was no longer enough light to compare the described patch with the water before them. The sea did not try to reproduce it.

After the last strip of light

The island asked whether the sea wanted another quiet moment. “Not yet,” said the sea. It was following the edge of the flat stone with a thin moving line. The island had never watched that particular line with such attention. It lost it beneath the split rock, found it near the point, and waited for it to reach the western hollow. It did not reach that high.

“I'm going to move the pebble again,” the island said. The sea answered from the east. The island nudged it once. Beneath the water's return, the little contact was difficult to distinguish. It remembered the sound it had heard during the pause and let the pebble settle against its darker neighbour. There was no need to ask the sea to stop again just then.

The highest rock was now a shape against a darker sky. Near its foot, the stone that looked like a step had disappeared beneath the evening's blue. The island began telling the sea about another small hollow on its eastern side. This time it waited between sentences for the water to return. The sea answered each one from whichever side it happened to be speaking.

Actual bookend accounts outside the fantasy

The Thinker Brown and White bookend account has a sole gallery showing two seated abstract figures and staged books. The book-spine text is not a maker or model label, and the books are not established supplies. No heavy-book, material, waterproof, corrosion or environmental performance is verified here.

The armillary and telescope decorative bookend account shows two sculptural forms with integral fauxbooks, globe, telescope, quill and inkpot decorations. These establish no independently supplied working telescope or stationery. No measured size, material, nonslip or load result is adopted. Neither offer supplies the island or sea.

Other invented speaking characters

The chess piece microfiction guide compares opposing aims over a map and includes alternative scenes. The island and sea have one complete conversation without a writing exercise, courier or contested object.

The cinema character after the credits story crosses an impossible screen boundary. This fantasy begins with two speaking entities already sharing their invented world; neither crosses into another represented place.

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