He took a deep breath as their fishing boat approaches the shore.
The cool breeze that touches his face tells him that they are still early.
He gave a glance on the right side of the sea but pays little attention to other fishermen going the same direction.
His red-brown complexion can tell that the sea has been his second dwelling place next to their old little house since he was a child.
His name is Neziah.
Even from their distance, he can see a number of traders waiting eagerly for them to arrive.
They are the kind of people who will fight their way to position themselves in front of wet big baskets so they can pick the best fish to purchase.
The traders deliver it in the central towns and sell them in much higher prices.
As soon as his father’s boat touches the shore, he jumped into the sand holding a rope; make his way through the number of people approaching their boat and run towards a rope- marked tree to tie their vessel.
He stood for a moment and looked at the sea.
Although the traders’ voices resound in the brown- sanded shore, it seems that Neziah found a way to detach himself from the noisy place and concentrate on the beauty in front of him.
It was such a peaceful sight and he stand in awe seeing the red- orange sky with the touch of white- paled colored clouds. He removed his sandals and feels the edges of the tiny grain of sands kissing his feet. He threw his arms wide open and received the cool salty breeze from the green and blue colored sea.
Neziah said to himself
“If people will only look deeper in this wonderful creation that God has made, they would see a love too great to understand but so near to touch.”
“Son, come here and help me!”
His father’s demanding voice suddenly brings him back to reality.
He climbed back to the boat to help his father pull- out their big basket that is full of catch from the night’s battling with the waves.
As soon as they put down the basket in the sand, the traders muscled their way closer so that they can buy their finest catch.
After a little while, all that was left were seven pieces of small fishes.
“Ahh, these will be for us,” his father said smiling.
They clean their nets and their boat as soon as the noisy traders went off their way.
“Father?” Neziah asked
“Can we visit mother this afternoon? I was thinking about her last night. I think she already misses us even we just been there the other day”.
“Sure!” His father said in reply.
“I also want to go and visit her.”
“Actually, I want to visit her everyday…”- he said in a voice only he could hear.
“You know,” he continued in an audible voice.
“When she’s not here, our family seems incomplete. For me, without her presence our home has a piece of loneliness.
Without her smile there is an empty space in our hearts that nothing in this world could replace.”
Neziah nod in agreement as he hides his teary eyes and jumped to the water to clean the side of the boat.
While he was wiping the boat he asked another question to his father whose still in a state of remembering the past.
“Father, how much do you love mother?” the boy asked with sincerity as he squinted to his father while tying the sail and waiting for the old man to answer.
“How much do I love her?”
His father repeated his son’s question knowing that his answer will be etched to the young man’s heart forever.
“I always wrote love letter to your mother ever since we were young. I think those letters alone could speak how much I love her.”
“What is the content of your first letter?” Neziah asked while smiling sheepishly.
“Oh, that first letter…” His father eyes brightened.
“That first letter I gave to her made her cry as she read it in front of me.”
He raised his right hand as if delivering a phrase in an important gathering.
The voices of the other fishermen and the sound of the waves touching the shore seems to be like an orchestra backing up his words as he open his mouth to answer the question.
“I love you when you frown what more if you smile. I love you when you are angry what more if you are calm. I love you when you lie, what more if you speak the truth. When you are in your worst, I will decide to love you at my best.”
Neziah smiled while looking at his father with great admiration.
He swayed back and forth in the knee- deep water, grasping the wet rag close to his left cheek and stroke it with the back of his right hand fingers as if with his lady in a dance and said
“Someday, I will also love someone like how you loved mother...” as he continue swaying in the water like a tree swaying in the sweet serenade of the wind.
“Oh!”
Neziah suddenly stops as he remembers one important question he wanted to ask his father since a week ago.
“But tell me father, how did you know it was with mother that you want to spend the rest of your life?"
His father responded with a smile as if he knew the question was coming. He stretched out his hand to Neziah and nod at him as a sign for his son to come up the boat.
When Neziah was standing right in front of him, he hold his son’s both shoulders, looked directly to Neziah’s eyes and said...
“Son, when you decide to love the person even if sometimes there is no romantic emotion rushing from your heart, that’s the time that you truly love. That’s what made me knew that it was her- I decided.”
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