Tracy sat perched on the sun baked stone wall overlooking the harbor as the ocean breeze toyed with his hair. A blank sheet of paper sat beside him, held down by an empty wine bottle. The ocean breathed her endless kiss upon the rocky shoreline, so peaceful and gentle. Like a mother's love, forever present unaware and unwary of the continents constant clash adjacent to her realm of pacifism. In and out, her breast rose and fell; her wake was endless like the sun's embers.

For the past year Tracy came down to the waterfront every week to write letters to his love. She was far away, in a desolate and unwelcoming land. Yet, she was doing her duty, just another business trip, Tracy always told himself. Safe and sound beneath the same stars; the same sunset.

And so he began to write. He wrote of the rainy west coast days, and the beautiful day this one turned out to be, in contrast. He wrote of the fire downtown and of the latest gossip. He wrote of the talk at the bar, about his ignorant students and their petty highschool drama. Lastly he signed it "With love, the sun burns for you, and only you." like he always did as darkness overtook dusk. Tracy flipped over the sheet and addressed it to "the moon" With grace and care he rolled it up and fit it into the wine bottle.

The wind was picking up from the water. Closing his eyes, Tracy let the breeze play with his curly hair and zephyr calmness upon his face. He sighed, and let his breath fall in harmony with the Pacific melody. The ocean is my heart, you are with me this night.

For nearly half and hour he lived in this trance, something his shrink had taught him to do when his emotions began to take over him. It became his drug, a narcotic, Novocain, life support. In his peace he was an atheist holding hands with an angel; he clenched the glass intensely. Finally, a car drove by the waterfront blowing its horn. Tracy slowly re-entered reality. Before he opened his eyes, he let out a deep, longing sigh with finality.

The moon was high in the night sky this time of year. A crescent moon. Stars were alighting as the man's eyes grew accustomed to the darkness. He hopped off his seat and soberly made his way down to the shore. With the bottle, held with a lover's grip- uncorked- Tracy watched as the tide played games with the round, smooth rocks and drift wood. Suddenly, as a wave crashed down heavily on the star lit beach something inside him, some wall he had built- a dam with a years worth of pressure and denial built up collapsed under the stress. Tears streamed from his eyes; the Garden and all of God's kingdom was flooded.

She was gone- his love, his wife, his only one- and could never return to his side. All this time, how could I have just let myself lie and wait for her to be reborn, and I knew she would be. How could I let myself fall away from reality, yet sleep with no shame? I am greedy, I am envious and spiteful. I am a disgrace, I'm a freak- a mental case. I'm a shame. Still... She can't really be gone. She couldn't do that to herself- not with me- it's not the sort of thing she'd do. I know it, but she's still gone.

Tracy raged to the top of the sloped beach, where sand had been placed, and shoved handfuls of the shining particles down the wine bottle's mouth 'til there was room for but the cork which he pushed in harshly with a loud, malevolent grunt. And with a sickening scream he thrust the message in a bottle into Puget Sound. The waves were becoming as violent as the wind, storm clouds had rolled in overhead. "Sink you son of a b****!" Tracy cried hoarsely- his voice betrayed by his tears. "Drown just like her! Drown like you want to! Drown like she wanted to! Drown!" The bottle splashed into the sea and sank. The man was on his knees, as if pleading with a God he had never loved.

The glass bottle sank to the harbor's floor. It sank to the sand the way a woman in the Navy had done thirteen months ago in a harbor along the Persian Gulf.

Regaining himself, Tracy stepped back from the water's edge and turned his back to the sound making his way to his Ford. Turning the keys he drove back to his lonesome apartment quickly; he still had papers to grade.