The Voice

Jimmy ran after the bigger boys. They clambered down a bevy of great boulders thick with green, spongy moss and leaped onto the beach where they sprinted along the sand, getting further and further away.

Jimmy, not so lucky, nor as quick, saw the mammoth wave coming and could only kneel and cover his head as the wave exploded in a great spume of white water, drenching him to such a degree that for several long moments he was blinded and unable to breathe.

“Hank!” he called to his older brother, a last hope, knowing he would not be heard, sure that he was about to die as another wave even bigger then the last, built before his terrified eyes, freezing him on the rock as he bent lower, ducking his head and grasping hold of the moss for whatever minuscule purchase it could lend him as this wave rose higher and higher before him.

“You’ll never find it,” came a voice. It was only that--a voice--perhaps inside his head, perhaps from heaven.

“Find what?” Jimmy asked; out loud? Or did he only think the question?

“Help,” said the voice. It was not a loud voice, nor soft, but it was clear to Jimmy’s ears. “You must find your own way!” it said.

Jimmy rose from his crouch and in one motion jumped from the rock and landed on the sand just as the other boys had done moments, minutes, hours before, and the great wave crashed into the rocks behind him with a ferocious noise unlike any he had ever heard before.

“Well, don’t tell mom,” Hank said later after Jimmy told him about the voice from God.

Jimmy didn't tell his mom about the voice then, though years later, Father Jimmy told his Congregation about it quite often.

-300 Words-