I watch them jump off the boat and into the water. Just three of them. One young. One old. One oldest. They climb out, onto the deck, and put soap on their bare chests, legs, on there heads and behind their ears. They jump in and climb out all over again. They called themselves clean, though the water was salty, though the water was part of an ocean and they only had one soup bowl each of clean water to pour on themselves to take off all the salt.
They walk off to where the other adults are, very few children where milling the deck at this hour, and the man whose age deemed to be in the middle called out to a young girl, "Why follow us? Why hangout with us when you have other friends upon this boat?" His voice laced with annoyance. The girl hadn't stopped bothering them since she set foot on the damned boat. She had her hair in a braid, a feather sticking in behind her ear. Her skin seemed to be kissed by the sun.
She could have said, "Because I am weak and you make me feel strong" or "Because I want to be one of you! And sail through these waters, discovering what lays beyond this!" but instead all she said was "I don't know." She wanted to say so much more but she didn't want them to know that what he had said hurt her. She didn't want to cry. She thought that there was no reason for them to hate her so much.
"Well, go away Tiger Lilly." He joked. People had been calling her that ever since she put the feather behind her ear that morning and they knew she hated it. She told them to stop. It was not anything like Tiger Lilly.
"You are a jerk" Said the girl, "To everybody. Absolutely everybody." Then she ran off, and leaped down the main companion way throwing the feather into the soapy water that the men had just come from. She ran into her cabin and slamed the door. A single tear escaped her sorrow eyes as she flung herself up onto the bunk. Soon there were so much more tears that followed that single, lonesome tear.
The other people took pitty on her and knocked on the door, trying to get her to open up. "Go away!" Was all that they heard from the room.
Her sorrow tears fell from sorrow eyes until her well ran dry.
