0 - Prologue
"Rosie...do you like the sound you hear when the waves clash on each other.“, Asks Daniel in a low and calm voice. Rosie relies, "Hmm...“.
The two are sitting on a bench on the Galle Face beach, facing the sea...
Daniel, 21 years old, an undergraduate in some government university, while Rosie, the same age as him, and an undergraduate from the same university. Actually speaking they aren’t lovers, but just classmates. Ok we got it wrong there too...they aren’t just classmates either... the two have a quite long and interesting history together.
The two were born to normal Sri Lankan middle class families. You may be wondering why the two got foreign names. Neither do I. The names may have looked suiting enough for their parents so they may have named so and so. The two are neighbors (their houses are in front of each other). Oh I almost forgot, the two were born on the same day too. The two went to the same kindergarten, the same school, and now the same university too. Ya you figured it out, they’re best friends.
Now Rosie had not seen the sea until her 12th birthday. Actually speaking she hadn’t even gone out of the district she lives in. The main reason for this is that she live in Anuradhapura, and if you are Sri Lankan you know what I mean. Now you may ask, “so it’s not like we are living in the stone age, we’ve got transportation!”. Now you see her fathers was working abroad, and as you have already guessed they didn’t have quality family time together, so no family trips either, and her mom didn’t care the least. Obviously she has seen the see on the internet or some program on TV.
You also may be wondering to how lame her life was. Now don’t you get ahead of your self, the situation was completely different from what you are thinking. Rosie was enjoying her kiddy times with Daniel for the fullest. They had many friends in the village. They played catch, hop scotch, fake houses, vaddas, fishing (in the canal next to the paddy field), flying kites, and many more that you and I have done when we were kids. Normally Daniel got into fights with Rosie, and some fights went too serious that the both didn’t even talk with each other for weeks.
How ever every time they saw or heard of the sea their moods changed, cause the two loved to see the sea so much. Sadly they were yet unable to convince their moms to go on a trip to see the sea. Once Rosie had cried while the teacher was doing a lesson about the sea. How ever if you went into her room it would have felt like entering a gallery filled with drawings of the sea, fish, mermaids, etc… Rosie was a big believer in mermaids too, and guess what her favorite story was The Little Mermaid’s Tale.
Now our boy Daniel had actually seen the sea once when he had gone for a badminton tournament in some School located close to the sea in Colombo. The coach had taken the kids for a small walk in the Galle F
ace beach. This was the first time Daniel saw the sea with his own eyes. He loved the sound of waves clashing on each other. Not to say, he remembered Rosie a lot. So he had taken back a small collection of sea shells as a gift to Rosie. She loved it (She even gave Daniel a kiss that left the poor boy blushing and embarrassed for a whole week.), and kept it in her own private collection in her room.
Now that was two years earlier when the two were in 8th grade. But not yet has the favor to sea the sea gone away in Rosie’s mind, neither for Daniel to see if for a second time.
