Grade 7 Humanities: More Tales From The Deep
The Life of an Oyster
by Maia Kovaleski
I feel a slight vibration from the rocks beneath me. I can feel the rumble of the small waves above me, tirelessly slamming against the coral around me. The cool, crisp water swirls around me, trying to lift me away, but the circle of pebbles and dust that has settled and built up around me over the years protects me from that fate. The simple, silent, and the endless blackness of my life brings an ever satisfying feeling of peace. I feel calmed knowing that nothing dark looms over me, waiting to strike.
I heard the rythmic sound of something plunging into the water repeatedly as I feel the sun being blocked by a dark shadow gliding over, until it stops. With a terrific splash, something sinks down into the water and begins making its way around the coral surrounding me. This isn’t a surprising or unusual practice to be done here, but it only happens occasionally, so I’m intrigued by this. I listen tentatively, waiting to find out what the thing will do next.
I hear it come closer to me but it’s rummaging around the rocks below me. Suddenly, the sound stops and I felt a something strange, like the thing is staring at me. As quick as lighting it grabbed me tightly and clutched me tightly as I felt myself rise upwards. We stopped moving and I heard the thing gasp and it throw me up into the air. I landed on something hard. I didn’t think I was in the water anymore. I felt colder, and strangely like there was nothing surrounding me. No water, no rocks, nothing.
With a muffled grunt, the thing climbs onto this vessel and lands, sending a small wave of the comforting familiarity of water. This sensation was short lived. I lay still, helpless and frightened. I can hear muffled voices but I can’t understand anything. I suddenly hear the strange thing start picking up fellow oysters, and in a split second, drops them to the floor. I know they’re dead. One by one they go, but after the fifth oyster, the noise stops and I know they are looking at me. I hear a muffled whisper and I’m quickly grabbed. The creature’s hand is warm and soft against my shell, but I’m horrified as the creature begins to roll me around in its fingers, stopping when the crack of my shell is facing it.
Something shields the light through the crack of my shell. It pierces me and I am knocked over by a overwhelming wave of agonizing pain and anguish. I tighten myself, trying to do something, anything, to stop it, but with a flick, the object slices through me, making me see sparks and fire. And, finally, just as quickly as it started, it was over. Everything was over. I was over.