The ocean washes all sorts of oddities onto our beaches, this we call certainty, eventuality and unavoidable. From the corpses of unidentifiable creatures to the remains of rockets (successful and otherwise), we remain forever mystified at what the sea brings back to us.
Mam says the sea has a way of returning anything we've lost but then again she also said that dad took my brothers to the shops. That was fifteen years ago and while she hid the posters well, it never stopped my classmates from asking if he'd killed them, never stopped me from wondering if he had or if he'd just abandoned us or if they'd all been killed by someone or something else.
I liked to pretend they had gotten lost along the main road between us and the rest of the country. It floods twice a day and we've nearly been caught out by it before, debating whether it was too deep to drive across and waiting for someone else to try only to see them bob off into the distance. For me, it was easier to picture them floating away, my brothers laughing at dad's mistake, never realising the danger.
Yesterday I was called by the police and asked to identify a vehicle. Despite the way the sea had coated it in rust, past all the barnacles, weed and mud I saw that bumper sticker I begged dad to buy me for my fifth birthday. They had the nerve to thank me, as if they couldn't have read the license plate and tracked back to who the last owner was.
No mater how many times I ask they won't tell me if they found any bodies in the car, specifically a man and three young boys. All I got in reply was that "the investigation is still underway" which makes no sense. They are either alive or dead and I saw that they'd recently cut the seat belts (to which their explanation was that they were "testing the age of the vehicle").
What they don't realise is that I saw more than they wanted when I asked to see the interior and check for the things I remembered about my dad's old car. It was a blatant lie that thankfully they didn't see straight through and gave me the chance to snoop about right under their noses.
Mam always said I had eyes too sharp for my own good and she was right. I saw claw marks that had carved the bottom of the car right up, bits of flesh embedded around the edges and a piece of wool that looked like it could have been on my brother's favourite jumper. It's such a hideous shade of yellow but he loved it and he wore it the day dad took them all away.
After fifteen years they have to be dead but the police have no plans to close the case any time soon.
Mam says the sea has a way of returning anything we've lost but then again she also said that dad took my brothers to the shops. That was fifteen years ago and while she hid the posters well, it never stopped my classmates from asking if he'd killed them, never stopped me from wondering if he had or if he'd just abandoned us or if they'd all been killed by someone or something else.
I liked to pretend they had gotten lost along the main road between us and the rest of the country. It floods twice a day and we've nearly been caught out by it before, debating whether it was too deep to drive across and waiting for someone else to try only to see them bob off into the distance. For me, it was easier to picture them floating away, my brothers laughing at dad's mistake, never realising the danger.
Yesterday I was called by the police and asked to identify a vehicle. Despite the way the sea had coated it in rust, past all the barnacles, weed and mud I saw that bumper sticker I begged dad to buy me for my fifth birthday. They had the nerve to thank me, as if they couldn't have read the license plate and tracked back to who the last owner was.
No mater how many times I ask they won't tell me if they found any bodies in the car, specifically a man and three young boys. All I got in reply was that "the investigation is still underway" which makes no sense. They are either alive or dead and I saw that they'd recently cut the seat belts (to which their explanation was that they were "testing the age of the vehicle").
What they don't realise is that I saw more than they wanted when I asked to see the interior and check for the things I remembered about my dad's old car. It was a blatant lie that thankfully they didn't see straight through and gave me the chance to snoop about right under their noses.
Mam always said I had eyes too sharp for my own good and she was right. I saw claw marks that had carved the bottom of the car right up, bits of flesh embedded around the edges and a piece of wool that looked like it could have been on my brother's favourite jumper. It's such a hideous shade of yellow but he loved it and he wore it the day dad took them all away.
After fifteen years they have to be dead but the police have no plans to close the case any time soon.
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