Tidal Movements
Steve Coel
Walking across the field that afternoon the man and his daughter had come upon the young man picking mushrooms. Greeting him simply, as was their way, they commented about the chill, damp day and continued on their walk. The younger man returned to his now shattered day dreaming while the man and his daughter concluded a queer conversation about the animals they had been carefully placing on the opposite side of the valley that morning.
Later that week, in the local newspaper, the man and his daughter spotted a picture of the same young man and a short report about his tragic accident at sea. They smiled at each other with relief, recalling precisely the words they'd spoken to him. They also spoke briefly and secretly about his sad ending, and then continued constructing their models for the valley.
