A getaway island

He had researched for months before he started planning everything.  In a deeply inter-connected world where anything and anyone can be traced in light-speed, it was literally very difficult to get lost. Especially when half of the world’s police organisations had you on their most-wanted list.

Henry lived a more or less normal life. As normal as one’s life can be, that is. He found it to be as boring as his name.

But then, on that last summer day, something inside of him snapped. He decided to do something completely out of character. Something precisely no one expected him to do.

He quit his job of 15 years without due notice, told his girlfriend he felt too constrained to commit to her, gave out most of his belongings to charity organisations, and then robbed a bank.

He had seen it done so many times in films, TV series, even on the news. It wasn’t that complicated after all.

The getting away part was the tricky aspect.

He had researched for an island to get lost to, for months before he had snapped. It came in handy now. But little did he know then, that even searching for an escape was the pretext and sign of something going wrong.

He had a storm building inside his head and once it expressed itself, it became a hurricane and a tsunami all in one.

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The island of a king

There is a legend that a King was born on the little island.

It was an island without inhabitants. Found between glaciers, where a couple in love found refuge from their warring families who so hated each other they would not allow the youth to join. It was there that their young descendant came to life. In the heart of nature, with only his parents to witness his arrival.

It was there where he sought shelter from life’s pain, from the strife among his family’s relatives, from the bullying among his peers, from everything he thought he couldn’t handle. But it was also on that very island where his life changed. Where he found a papyrus only he could read and which sealed his fate.

It was on that very island that Arthur became King.

Captain James’ Journal, day 134

I woke up to a stormy sea today. I almost fell out of bed and my back is so sore. I feel as if I’ve been carrying the weight of the entire boat on my shoulders. It’s cloudy outside and the sun can barely shine its rays past the thick cover of cotton surrounding it. As I climbed onto the dock I realized the whole crew was gone. They weren’t missing because they were still in bed. They were simply gone. They had preferred to jump overboard and be swallowed up by the raging waves, than stay onboard and fight through them.

It’s hard when you lose hope like that. When you simply surrender. It’s as if you’re giving up your entire life and everything that matters, simply because you have no more energy to fight.

I’m still struggling.

There are moments where I too wish a tidal wave would just gulp me and my ship away. But then I dream of something so much better. Of reaching a land as peaceful and as prosperous as I imagine it. And as I lay on my hammock, enjoying an exotic cocktail, a slim, elegant figure would approach. I would only be able to see her shadow as she would be standing right in front of the sun, her dark hair waving in the wind. I would be mesmerized from the first moment I laid my eyes on her. And as she came closer, I would be able to distinguish her stunning features. Her emerald green eyes, deep as the ocean itself. Her diamond smile that could bring light to even the darkest of nights. And that voice of an angel. I could stare at her for hours, days even. How fortunate I would be to have such a woman on my side. We would talk, flirt and laugh. And when night came we would salsa on the beach at the sounds of a live band. And hot as we were with excitement we would continue the interaction elsewhere. And sunrise would find us wrapped in each other’s arms, with only a white sheet for cover.

I think of this and regain some element of hope. Because without that there is nothing keeping me from walking the plank – even if I don’t see any sharks waiting for me on the other side. At least not yet.