A Paper Sailboat

Anelise ran her fingers across the film of the cool water, distorting her reflection with the soft tip of her index finger. The world around her swirled in a million abstract puzzle pieces in the new ripples of the pond. She lay by the embankment, watching the smooth waves of distortion extend across the surface, pushing the paper sailboat towards the center of the water. A warm sunlight covered her body, intermingling with the fabric of her soft cream sundress. She swathed her pale bronze legs in the mint and daisy summer air as she lay on her chest, the soles of her feet browned by the loose earth she so delicately had displaced in her elegant stride. She took in the subtle flavors of the oak and maple trees, the brown sugar sweetness of the sap as it ran down the limbs of welcoming branches. Anelise darkened the world with the shut of her eyelids, and lay still, listening to the sounds of beautifully blackened nature, invisible, and untouchable. She could hear the chorus of cricks and clicks as the woods creaked with the breeze of the wind and the insects, hidden among the grasses and greens, chirped out their concertos in unison.

The water, cool to the touch, carried the little white paper sailboat out among the reeds in the center of the shallow pond. In the boat's minuscule dimensions, it was amid a vast and immense jungle of enormous trees, half submerged in a great flood from ages past. Anelise imagined she was aboard the vessel, now a graceful Spanish Galleon full of treasures of Ivory and gold, at the helm she stood noticing the tops of the towering reeds almost imperceptible against the glorious web of sails encrusted with the royal seal of the Anelisian Cross and the heavens far above.

The crew of the ship stood forward and aft, standing in awe of the incomprehensible enormity of the jungle foliage while she, Anelise, deftly commanded the vessel through the obstacles. Each reed a towering wall, humbling the fearful crew, but she, Captain, braved the way. She felt the shudder of the rudder with each rotation of the wheel, her hands gripped the circumference with poise and aptitude. Anelise inhaled the thick and moist air that blew through the massive sunken trees and caught in the sails, she smiled keenly to the wind in gratitude of its grace. The crew stared out at the looming black silhouettes nearing ever so slowly between the trees, as if it were closing in, a trap of impassable lumbering giants. The crew looked to the helm, fearful and uncertain of the dangers, only to see the captain grinning, boldly handling the vessel with proud and dignified repose. They took comfort in her demeanor and bravery, acknowledging her profound navigational qualities.

Anelise spun the wheel to the starboard sliding past a broken giant, more than almost submerged in the water, a dark and ominous shadow beneath the surface. Where the crew in their tenuous superstitions saw sea monsters, she saw only shadow and sea. But within those shadows and watery graves of sunken ships and drowning trees, she felt the treasures of civilizations lost, just fathoms beneath her. Anelise looked upon her maps, plotted her course and barked out her orders to the loyal crew. They, the crew, did as they were told, for she was unique in her ambition and legendary in her treasure hunting. "X" marks the spot.

Not five meters away, within the bustle of overgrown vines and branches of olive and dirt stain, a skeleton, suspended by a rusted cutlass through the sternum, hung motionless from a giant tree. From the color or lack of from the bones, and the blacks and tattered greys of what used to be a cavaliers hat, an early 16th to 17th century sailors hat made from the felt of a beaver, she could tell that the fallen privateer had been marking the spot for an epoch. Anelise grinned widely, she found it, the crew cheered and threw grog from the mizzen and main, dousing the sailors below with a hearty portion of celebratory ale. Anelise found the marker, the last and only marker to the sunken treasure of Joc Tar. She shared her knowledge with her second mate, a cheerful and stout mate with a beard of snow, she called him Claus, for his roaring laugh. She told him of the chest full of rubies, diamonds and gold, the casks of fine and fermented red wines and the barrels of Dutch lager, fit for five and twenty kings that sank in the depths of the forgotten jungle.

All about the ship lay the bowsprits and forecastles of other unfortunate treasure seeking ships, all shattered and lifeless on the wrecks of those that came before them. Anelise looked around to the port side of the ship and in a circle looked to every corner of her gallant vessel, suddenly feeling very concerned at the unknown cause of the wrecks beneath her bow. Quiet, pure and uninterrupted quiet fell heavily upon the decks of her ship. All souls aboard looked around in quick and fearful succession, noticing shadows in the water that moved as ghosts; too deep for recognition too close for peace of mind. Suddenly and without cause the galleon listed to the starboard and all hands except Anelise screamed in fear. A curse, they screamed, the curse of the Joc Tar treasure had come to pay visit to the trespass of another violating party. For shame they screamed, stay calm she said. What now, they urged, be still she warned.

The shadows beneath the ship came to the surface, a rapid rise of bubbles and tormented water, to form shape and substance. The water frothed and boiled as the ship shuddered and shook violently, harmfully. The sounds of wood tearing and snapping while some unholy manifestation visited wrath and vengeance upon the crew and its fragile structure. The crew members who weren't flung into the distant trees or dragged beneath the surface of suffering water, knelt in prayer to the gods and to the captain who stood erect, motionless at her wheel while she cursed the destruction. It was a cacophony of unrecognizable noise with the battering of the ship, the screams of the crew and the unearthly howl of the cursed being pulling the dying Galleon and its humans to the darkness of the ghostly jungle deep. As the ship neared the bottom of the deadly sea, a glow and a billion sparkles began to shimmer through the clouded fathoms. If any eyes still remained alive aboard the Anelisian vessel as it neared the eerily bright bottom, the amber glow of a thousand sunken treasures permeated the darkness as the remaining light shone off a never-ending horizon of sunken gold and precious stones.

Anelise ran her fingers across the film of the cool water, watching the little paper sailboat finally sink into the shallow pond against the reeds.