Something vague.

I observe the audience's rapt attention, study their shining faces lit by the searing overhead beam as I announce, "Now, my comrades, hear this story."

The story has no beginning and no end. There is no plot, no gradual escalation, climax, nor a decline. It is simply a state of being. You will understand.

All my life, I have been haunted by a wall. I live on a deserted beach, which hosts a small expanse of forest and enclosed by a massive, imposing, intimidating steel wall. This is the biggest wall you have and will ever hear of. The tallest, thickest, most seemingly impenetrable wall your imagination can muster. Most days, it blocks the sun from gracing the island, from filtering down through the trees to make pretty green patterns on the damp forest floor; it is always dark, always cold. As I bleakly wade to my knees in the little bit of shore provided between the beach and the wall, I let my mind wander sadly to the sea, something I had read about but never seen. I press my palms to the wall and know that something infinitely larger exists just a few meters short of my fingertips, and this knowledge pains me. 

Dark, ominous clouds hover menacingly atop the wall, coating the island in permanent shadow, polluting the air with their foulness. I would scream at them to summon winds to blow down this blasted fortress, my prison guard, but their earth-shaking roars crippled my fruitless cries. Whenever this occurred, I found most comfort in retreating to the forest, enjoyed the large, sheltering leaves embracing me. Oftentimes, my protests began deep in my stomach with promises of power and strength, only to catch in my chest and feebly wither to nothing. The words ceased to come.

I was desolate. I yearned with all my being for the forbidden openness of the sea. The wall simply looked down disdainfully from its cavernous altitude. 

One day, while exploring the shallow expanses of shore, I discovered in the wall a gap. Under the water, there were holes in the wall, barred off of course, to allow the beach water to circulate, to flow. Every day I tugged, pushed, kicked, wiggled the same bar in the same hole, hoping with all of my soul that it would eventually come free.

That day came on a dismally gray morning. 

I stared at the dislodged metal bar in my calloused hand as my heart pounded and almost escaped out my mouth. This was my chance. Excited as I'd never been, my body oozed gracefully, almost liquidly through the gap, like it was meant to all along. My head broke the salted water, I surfaced, and the sight was enough to blind me. 

I had never seen such an open expanse. A mighty ocean, lapping me gently with its ebb and flow, stretching as wide as the earth itself. I lay on my back and swam leisurely backwards, still shell-shocked, into the open welcoming cerulean. The clear, warm, friendly sky winked down at me, leaving the ugly black clouds to grimace scarily at my retreating frame. 

Suddenly, before I could truly savour this new reality, the sea's gentle lapping ceased to be, and was replaced with a deadly calm. The skies darkened. I was a pinpoint, surrounded by miles upon miles of black sheets of glass. I inhaled sharply; the calm before the storm. No sooner had this realization come to me, that I felt the winds pick up. The gentle island breeze had whipped up into a frenzy, the whistling escalating to a scream. I was swept up in ice cold currents which flung me, tore and tugged at my body this way and that. I was struggling to stay afloat, my head disappearing under the surface every few seconds, my breaths coming in gurgling gasps - smothering. I thought this was the end. Before I closed my eyes to accept the finality of my death, I caught in my peripheral vision something big approaching me. Bigger than the walls, bigger than I could ever fathom. I turned and my lungs failed me as I saw the biggest wave you shall ever read about, hundreds of feet tall, reaching high, up, up, over my head. So very high. 

At this moment, for reasons unknown, I was struck with deja vu. Somehow, I know exactly what to do. As the wave reached its colossal peak and broke, I took one spluttering, shuddering breath and dove into the wave. Into the deep, to the bottom of the black, now silent sea that absorbed me so easily. Enveloped me completely. A great black veil. It was freezing, but I was calm. I knew that no harm could come to me here. Down in the deep, I was in my element. I felt a monstrous lurch as the thing passed over me in one huge motion. However, I felt it numbly, for I was in a different reality. I calmly, gratefully savored this underwater peace for what seemed an eternity. 

Finally, when my lungs screamed out for my mercy, I regretfully let my body rise to the surface. All was calm again, the sea was rippled, sparkling, the sky once again smiling its wide-toothed grin, but now somehow with a deceitful air that was not present before. I would come to resent this smile more and more each day, but I didn't know it at the time. I came to find that every night, the sea repeats its storm. The more distance I placed between myself and the walls which had caged me in for so long, the more the sea seemed intent on bringing me back. 

I am still swimming out here.

I am quite alone and have been swimming for a very long time. 

Every night I dive to my calm place, my secret kingdom which only I inhabit. I am the only creature in this sea. 

I am naturally one to put up a fight, so I never thought I would say that I'd be one to dive down to calmer waters rather than brave the storm on the surface. But I find solace in the silence. Its dark, peaceful surroundings comfort me, much like a mother's soft hand, as I wait for the storm to pass. I am not afraid. 

I do not know how long I have been out here, nor how long I shall be. The story has no beginning and no end. I simply know that the tide is taking me somewhere. Will take me somewhere. 

I wait at the bottom of the sea.