Today, standing in front of the door to the beach, I realized that time is very unique. It speeds up life for the good times, but slows down the terrible experiences forever.
Fortunately, the good old days are not much different from the sea I now contemplate. I mean, they bathe me in joy, tranquility and hope for a future for which time cannot stifle me.
From here, I look at a 20 years ago Josh, full of smiles and holding my hand. It looks like he is about to take me back in time and make me see that summer day again.
"Josh, come on! There's no shark to eat you," shouted Seb, one of Josh's cousins, splashing contentedly on the beach.
"Yeah, you have to come play with us," Bob beckoned to his cousin Josh.
"Take advantage of the weather and debut this volleyball, cousin," said Mirka who was the most enthusiastic of all.
The beach and the weather were just perfect. The clouds accompanied a faint sapphire blue topped by golden sunbeams that brought clarity to the warm water and the mood of the players.
Josh hesitated at first because it was his first time without floaties, but the scene and his relatives were like a wave that pulled him into the fun.
Kids were in heaven. For much of the afternoon they played volleyball, tried swimming competitions and even shoulders war. The crystal clear water kept splashing to the rhythm of the cousins' fun.
It was only three hours later that the energy dropped, and Mirka began asking everyone how they had done in school.
"I flunked almost everything, but my dad paid for me to pass the grade," Bob said with a shrug.
"No wonder when I asked you to bring fish, you actually brought a can of sardines," Mirka revealed to everyone's amusement.
Seb also commented a couple of things about his last year in school and how to survive such a jail.
Josh just smiled listening to his cousins. However, the shyness of the smallest of the group was tackled by Mirka's extroversion.
"You can't possibly not have something to say!" rebuked Mirka to Josh in a joking tone several times.
"Well.." whispered Josh suddenly.
"Oh, the shy one spoke at last!" hugged Seb and Bob in surprise.
"I.. I kissed my teacher," confessed Josh crestfallen.
Such words left the cousins gasping, and for the first time in the whole afternoon there was no noise but the wind rushing past them.
"Guys, guys! I got everything to go scuba diving," shouted uncle Fred from the shore with several snorkels in his arms.
"...but if you don't get a pearl we'll tell your mom you kissed your teacher, Don Juan," Seb and Bob rubbed elbows seeing how embarrassed the 'quietest' of them all was.
"Are you serious, Josh? I still can't believe you kissed that slim, siren-faced woman," Mirka asked holding her little cousin by the shoulders.
"Yeah, I wanted to do like the actors in the soap operas mommy watches," replied Josh almost remembering a scene.
At such a moment, uncle Fred finished catching up with his nephews and not quite knowing what they were talking about, started handing them the snorkels.
"Over there, near the old dock," said uncle Fred cheerfully, "there's the coral reef I want you guys to see."
The excitement to see the mini marine garden was contagious, and after swimming about a hundred meters between pauses, laughter and uncle Fred's scolding, the five scuba divers arrived at the old pier.
The turquoise waters, already adorned by the golden colors of the sunset, gave a glimpse, along the corroded dock, full of shells, and the small waves that passed very softly, of a tropical spectacle with no match.
Sea anemones and corals surrounded an area that looked like fireworks in slow motion underwater, among which angelfish and crustaceans seemed to enjoy the quietest life.
Children tried to simulate the animals by imitating their evasive movements over and over again. A funny commotion between the underwater garden and the mini-humans who marveled at its textures, colors and inhabitants. Such a beautiful and peaceful place was mesmerizing even for someone who had seen it a thousand times before like uncle Fred.
Perhaps such harmony eased them that much, that the scuba divers never realized that behind that multicolored paradise, there was an invisible trap.
First it was Bob, then Mirka. Shortly after that, Seb, too. They all began to fight against something they could neither see nor counteract.
No matter how hard uncle Fred tried to bring them back, Josh's cousins were drifting further and further away from the reef, carried by an aggressive current that threatened to drown them.
From his fear, Josh watched transfixed as everything happened in a matter of seconds. In his short ten years of life he had never experienced such an emotional contrast.
Just as the sea was swirling his relatives, Josh was being carried by it to crash into the dock. When his body hit the saltwater-hollowed wood, he was finally able to react and remove his mask.
To see again through his own eyes, meant to contemplate the stark reality of the horizon combined between the sea and the sun taking his uncle and cousins forever.
Townspeople searched with all their might for the bodies in the water, but it was all in vain. The sea had claimed new victims and one even in a new way, because little Josh was left alive, but partly traumatized, inert.
It took years for the introverted and apprehensive Josh to return to the family's beach house.
On his first visits he would only gaze at the sea from the gate leading to the shore. His mind was always torn between whether swimming there again would be life and death.
It was only when he took his girlfriend Calypso to see the place that Josh dared to dip his feet in the sea foam that bubbled and tickled him endlessly.
"Don't be afraid, feline, I took a first aid course and I know how to give you mouth-to-mouth resuscitation properly," Calypso remarked with a wink to her boyfriend, before diving in like a mermaid.
"You think it's calm water, but you've never swum with a shark like me," Josh vociferated before swimming off after her.
The love that enveloped them both, made Josh stop associating the sea with terror and start imagining it more like the scenes in the soup operas his mother watched.
So much that Calypso and Josh soon had a baby boy they named Bay.
Whenever the three of them visited the beach house, much of the beauty and harmony of the water was minimized by those of the family. A sort of human reef filled with laughter, forehead kisses and long hugs.
This became a summer tradition. In fact, Josh, who had inherited a substantial sum of money from his father, remodeled the family beach house, bringing in little boats and even little slides for Bay and his friends.
Josh was at the height of his happiness, until the worst happened. In between going back and forth to bring building materials for the beach house, he was involved in a car accident that left him in serious condition.
Doctors soon reported his passing and all the beach house hype came to a halt.
But even associated with such bad memories, Calypso did not give up on finishing the fun house project that her boyfriend started and some time later saw it done.
Rumor has it that every summer, when his son Bay is about to pass through the door leading to the shore, the boy talks to his father, this believing it is himself as a child, as if asking him to accompany his little kid's adventures.
Nothing seems to have changed. I'm still a kid, it's summer and I'm about to play volleyball at the beach with my cousins. Hopefully this time it will last forever.
