The scent of a coming dawn is revealed with the hum of the wind blowing subtly, while the sound of the waves is the melody that awakens the desires of a man, a fisherman who every morning goes out to his appointment with the sea, an invitation that he has loyally carried out for many, many years by following the occupation he once learned from his father and that today has become his legacy.
An old harpooner's boat lies tied up on the shores of the harbor, right in front of his house that has always been his abode, and next to it his wife and son, who by now at the age of a teenager has become the ideal companion for all his adventures on the high seas. Living on an island, this beautiful family lives from fishing and from what the mother manages to make by mending the nets of other fishermen who live in the same place.
The smell of wet wood from a boat as old as it is special is perceived from the first moment you board the ship. The nets from one side to the other are tied by the boy while his father adjusts the last details to leave before the first ray of sunshine casts itself over the wide sea. "You always know how we are going to leave, but you never know what we are going to return with" is the slogan with which the fisherman says goodbye to his wife, leaving her a warm and strong embrace that anchors his feelings to the heart of that woman.
The fisherman and his son head for what for a long time has become the ideal place to fish, a place they know by heart and where the largest quantity of fish in the whole area abounds: tuna, cod, hake, swordfish, anchovies, sharks... Sharks? Well, yes, and although the place seems to be a fish mine, it also has a large shoal of sharks with which fishermen have been able to coexist in total harmony for years, maintaining the balance of that ecosystem in which both man and sharks could be in peace. And so, between the morning sun and the sunset, the fisherman and his son returned home with what they needed to live and share with the other inhabitants of the island.
One night a terrible storm lashed the island in such a way that it seemed to rock a small piece of clay inside a large container of water. The waves pounded with great force and the wind swept away everything that was not firmly held to the surface. Between lightning and thunder, the roof of the fisherman's house practically blew off, but this ingenious man found a way to keep his family safe throughout the night. The hours went on forever until the storm finally dissipated. Already exhausted from the hard work, the early morning announced it was time to go fishing, but this man simply succumbed to fatigue and sleep as he lay back in his chair for a few seconds.
When he woke up in the morning, the fisherman felt bad for not having been able to go to work, until his wife said to him:
- "Don't worry, our son has gone to do some fishing and he will be back soon."
Those words worried the fisherman at first, but then he felt calm because he was confident that his son had already learned enough in the art of fishing to defend himself and be able to succeed with the task. Even so, the man sat on the shore of the port, with his eyes fixed on the horizon where he anxiously awaited the arrival of the boat manned by his son. Time went by and with it came the restlessness and despair of the man and his wife who did not see their son return.
Before sunset, the fisherman decided to go out to look for his son, and so he asked one of his neighbors to lend him his boat to go out to meet him. The man, together with other friends, set sail with all speed, bound for the place everyone already knew. What nobody imagined was the commotion and turmoil that those waters would bring when, in the distance, the shoal of sharks surrounded the body of a person, precisely that of the fisherman's son.
The desperation and pain of the father was so great that he threw himself into the sea in search of his son, regardless of the number of sharks in the area. He made his way among them, and with the help of the others he managed to pull up his son, who was already dead. "Why did the sharks attack that young man?" That was the question most muttered by the spectators of that fatal event. And the fisherman's helplessness was so great that he could not stop crying, and when he looked out to sea he could still see the sharks, even with a certain look of tranquility.
-"This is not going to stay like this" Said the fisherman with his voice and tears mixed together.
The fisherman went on a rampage against the sharks, and began throwing spears and harpoons at them to finish them off. He managed to graze one of the big sharks on the upper part of its fin, leaving a mark similar to a zeta. Before such an attack, the sharks began to move away quickly, but not before seeing how the fisherman hit one of the smaller sharks with an accurate blow, and with this, the blood that mixed with the salty water of the sea seemed to break the peace pact between men and sharks in that place.
Those were the darkest days for the fisherman and his wife, who were still waiting to wake up from that sad nightmare and see their son alive. In the midst of the pain, they had to do the paperwork to determine the cause of that tragedy, something that would take time and with which the mother had to deal, since the fisherman had only one thing on his mind: to continue to avenge the death of his son. Although that day he also managed to kill one of the sharks, the man considered that the life of his little boy was worth more than that.
For many weeks the fisherman continued to come to this place, but not with the intention of fishing, but to kill more sharks, who decided never to return, because if they did, they would have to face the fisherman's fury. And so time went by, and every afternoon a wounded father looked out to sea, searching for an answer that would help him understand the reason for his misfortune. But that answer would come not from the sea, but in the envelope of a letter.
It was from the coroner who examined his son, and who determined the cause of his death. The fisherman now wept with astonishment at such a note, which in capital letters read: "CAUSE OF DEATH: POISONING" "MEDUSA ATTACK WITH MULTIPLE STINGS".
Something in the fisherman's heart seemed to thunder with indignation, seeing that his son had died from the attack of a jellyfish and not a shark. The man felt more pain than he already had because his reaction had been as unfair as it was cruel. Now the fisherman set sail for the place where he used to fish, looking for the peace that once existed and that was dissipated by his discomfort. But it was too late, the sharks had already migrated to other waters.
Every day the fisherman did not stop feeling guilty, and every night he asked for forgiveness to God, to the sea, to the sharks and to everything he destroyed for not knowing what really happened to his son, but nothing seemed to respond to his pleas that with tears he did not stop expressing. Everything went on like that until one morning, while he was in the middle of fishing, the man remembered his son, and when he was about to give in to his tears, he felt that one of the nets had gotten stuck on something, and when he tried to unhook it, the same net pulled him into the sea.
Like all fishermen, the man was a skilled swimmer, but the thing was that he was not alone: in seconds, a swarm of jellyfish had him surrounded and ready for an end similar to that of his son, until suddenly, a huge shadow fell over them all. "Is it a storm?" Well no, rather it was a huge shark that had returned to the place, and with a quick and fleeting movement managed to drive away all the jellyfish, managing to dissipate the danger and in a matter of seconds return that peace that seemed lost.
And while the fisherman surfaced, stunned and astonished by the presence of that marine giant, it passed by his side with the same serenity of times of yore, and with such proximity the fisherman could notice that that surprising savior had a mark in the shape of a zeta on the upper part of its fin. It is said that since then, many wounds were left under the sea, and the harmony between man and sharks returned to reign in that place.
THE END.