The Attack: Seashell Island

Chapter One

The sky was clear and the sun beamed down on me as I walked. A cool breeze drifted through the salty, sea, air. My nose knew the scent well. My eyes wondered toward the waves as they crashed against the cliffs below me. The blue waves collapsed against the cliff face with a great echoing roar together with the resounding hiss as the foam on the waves as the bubbles seemed to melt away. It was the fourth anniversary of my dads' supposed death and I had been busy doing chores for my mother. As I walked up the slope toward the lighthouse I reminded myself that mum had remarried now. But I didn't want to believe that my dad was gone.

It had been a week before my tenth birthday; I was excited because my parents had promised to get me a new bike. Then dad had walked in and said he would have to take a boat trip for a few weeks. Meaning he would miss my birthday, completely. I'd begged him to stay I had even said, I didn't have to have a bike I would have rather have dad stay for my birthday. I couldn't understand why he had to go, apparently a cargo ship had broken down and my dad was going to help fix it. I got so mad I didn't see him off. I didn't even say goodbye.

But dad never reached the ship.

Some say he hit a huge storm and drowned, then his boat had washed ashore a few weeks after we had been told he had apparently died. Sure the mast had been split, the hull had a massive puncture in it and everything was drenched with seawater, but I refused to believe it and every day I would look out along the jagged cliffs searching along the soft colours of the sunset on the horizon.

One day when I was out on the cliffs looking out along the sea line a usual mum walked out from the lighthouse and stood by me in the cool afternoon wind on the dark ragged precipices.

"Darling, I don't think... he's coming back," mum had whispered ever so softly.

Her lip had trembled and I thought she was going to cry. But she didn't.

She had let him go.

It's been four years now.

I looked down at my scuffed shoes. The laces were stained badly with mud and the sole of the shoe was ripping apart. The lighthouse was looming ahead. The main tower had traditional red and white stripes wrapping around it. The lighthouse could use a new coat of paint but there's no money. The main house was situated in front of the tower. By the side of the tower are rose bushes that are so old the thorns have become so thick they're like knives sticking out ready to slice some unsuspecting victim. Apparently the old lighthouse keeper had planted them when he was a boy. There isn't much in the way of a lawn as the salt in the air usually kills it off. Then behind the shed is our small but productive vegetable patch. We grow all sorts of things, but mostly potatoes, lettuce and tomatoes. It took my father years to get the soil rich enough to grow things. I was almost up the last stretch of the hill when I stole a quick glance at the ocean. Hoping that there would be a ship or something, that dad would be coming back to us. But there was nothing.

Mum and I still run the lighthouse, even though dad has well, he's gone. It's home and it always has been. However two years after dad had died Mum remarried Mr Henry Winston. He is a tough looking guy with broad shoulders, he never smiles and after he and mum were married he let his beard grow long, he looked okay when we first met him, but now he looks like a criminal. I have never liked him, he always sneered at me behind mum's back. The lighthouse is on the top of the North Cliffs of Seashell Island. You probably haven't heard of the place because it's somewhere in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. (My geography isn't that good.) It's apparently only eighty square kilometres. It has nice sandy beaches along most of the east side, with the harbour situated near the southeast that stretches along to the southwest. Then there's a short beach along the west and then near the northwest the cliffs stand. A huge thick forest takes up about sixty per cent of the island. The lighthouse is very secluded as the main village is on the other side with the forest separating the cliffs from the main villages. The village is made up of a few shops, a post office, the hospital, the police station, a hotel and of course the villagers houses.