The Man with the Suitcase Full of Shells

By Kiana McCrackin

Fletcher had never seen the sea, but, blood flowed from his heart, to his heart, from his heart, to  his heart; a series of waves. Ocean is mother of blood and of hearts.  

Lanie had told him: Oh, you must see it. And when you do, lie in it. On your back. And look up at  the stars. The stars are the best part of the ocean you know. Well, apart from the moon, of course,  of course. 

Fletcher was looking for Lanie, or for her memory, or for himself, or for home, so he looked for  the ocean.  

He hitched a ride from the Alaskan wilds to Anchorage, told the trucker: I’m going to Kodiak.  Going to be a fisherman. Going to catch some fish. The trucker told him he must be crazy, must  be out of his mind. Fletcher didn’t ask why. Fletcher didn’t want to know.  

Fletcher’s mother has always had a little blue candle in her living room labeled Sea Spray but the  air hanging around him, invading him, didn’t smell like that at all. Rotting fish and sweat;  Kodiak’s ocean scent. He sat for hours, watching boats come in, watching boats go out. He  needed a beard. He needed to be illegible, like the men on the boats. He reads the painted names:  Georgia, The Sonoma, The Blissful Typhoon. 

Fish live in the water. Home to those who don’t need air like Fletcher needed air. His village  didn’t have a pool, the river moved too fast to swim in. And though hunting the river waters was  a tradition for as long as Fletcher’s ancestors’ had memories, Fletcher didn’t know how to swim,  or fish. 

The first step to learning this ocean fishing was to learn to float. The first step to learning to float  was remembering to breathe even while the ocean watched him.  

He started slow, walks on the beach. Walking up down, up down, up down, beach. Bending  sometimes, reaching into the silt and rocks to gather the prettiest shells. Birds walked with him,  taking their findings up into the air, dropping them on rocks, diving back down to eat the innards 

exposed for them. Fletcher filled his pockets the way they filled their bellies. By the end of the  day he was closer to floating because his pockets were full of 13 of the most perfect shells.  

When people ask him, at the bar, he tells them: I’m a fisherman. On The Sonoma. What do you fish? 

All of it. 

Day 17: He has lots of shells.  

The water raises every part of him; his heartbeat, the hairs on his arms, his senses. It is so cold on  the tips of his toes. Progress is wet toes. 

Day 57: Fletcher still has not floated. Fletcher still has not fished. It is late enough in the season  that though there are no stars and no darkness, still there could at least be the idea of stars and  darkness. So, it is time to float. But the water, it is cold, freezing, numbing. Why hadn’t she told  him about this? About how every part of his skin that touched the water would prickle. He juts  his foot into the water. And the breathing he has been working so hard on leaves him in one sharp  gasp. Lungs swallowed by a black hole, a black ocean. The next foot plummets and it is not  better.  

He thinks of her. He thinks of the way she asked why he kept a dream catcher above his bed.  What would he do if he caught a dream? He wouldn’t ever chase it. No, no, no. Dreamcatchers  are not for those kinds of dreams. Good dreams slip through. It protects him, from the darkness  that chases him in his sleep, those are the dreams it catches. 

And she was wrong, here he is, chasing.  

But chasing isn’t enough. So he catches, he dives. Underneath there is no reason to remember  about the breathing. All the darkness that his Grandmother’s dream catcher caught is here. Now  it isn’t just his lungs that have been sucked in the black hole, but all of him.  

Seconds pass. He discovers the earth is right there, he stands.  

The next ferry back to Anchorage leaves in 2 hours. Fletcher empties everything he once owned 

from his suitcase, fills it with what he now has: Shells, shells, shells. A shell for every time he  thought about trying to catch.  

He carries his suitcase of shells onto the ferry and off the ferry. He carries it onto the semi that is  going by way of his home.  

What were you doing in Anchorage? 

I learned to breathe. 

What are you talking about, man? 

I was in Kodak, actually, fishing. I was a fisherman on The Sonoma. 

He thought of Lanie. Maybe he would let her pick out a shell. How amazed she will be, that he  caught a dream.  

When he opened the suitcase, back home, on his bed, he found inside a pile of tiny, white pieces.  A suitcase full of broken shells. 

Kiana McCrackin is a writer, a photographer (with a BFA from The Brooks Institute of Photography), a cloud gazer, and a mama. Kiana is eternally inspired by the emotions of the human experience and the landscapes she has called home; Alaska, California, and Washington. She currently resides in South Dakota where she is learning what the wind has to say and translating what the trees tell her.