The sun was beginning to set, the water in the bay had a green hue. Seagulls squawked and dove, but it was Ella’s eyes who caught a lone pelican. She stood near the wooden railings of a pier and her fingers grasped onto them.
Ella, you okay?” Ben called out from behind her. He approached with slow steps holding two cups of bubbling hot cocoa. “How you doing?”
“Fine,” her voice said something different than what she meant. Though she tried to hide it there was no way to escape it: life had been hard since dad died.
Ben gave her a cup and leaned on the railing beside her. “He loved this place,” he glanced over at the bird which now sat perched on a post closer to that side and stared into the water.
“Remember the stories he used to tell us?” Ella asked quietly, still watching the pelican with half-closed lids.“About how pirates buried their treasures somewhere near here?”
Ben laughed slightly. “That was when he told us about hidden maps in attics that we went searching for all summer.”
“We wasted an entire summer on nothing but old newspapers,” she smiled back at him softly as they both remembered those days together while looking at each other. The memory brought warmth even though it was tinged with sadness towards Ella’s heart.
The pelican extended its wings and flew away, swooping gracefully over the water. Ella looked on yearningly. “You think it ever gets lonely out there?” she asked to herself almost quietly than she did to Ben.
“It knows where exactly it should be,” Ben replied after a while, staring at the bird as it flew. “Like us. We’ve got to find our way through even if sometimes it’s difficult.”
Ella nodded and took a sip of her hot chocolate. The warmth spread, comforting her as always.”I miss him every day Ben.”
“Yeah me too,” Ben confessed in a barely audible voice. “Only he wouldn’t want us to be sad but find adventures for ourselves, look for our own treasures.”
They stood in silence for sometime listening only to the soft waves that hit against walls of the pier.
“We’ll be okay,” Ella said finally with more confidence in her voice now than before. “We will make new memories like he wanted.”
“Yes we shall,” agreed Ben putting his hand on her shoulder reassuringly. “We will be fine.”
