Sand stuck to skin from sweat. I kicked up grains of sand onto the backs of my legs and arms during 100- and 200-meter sprints. I exercised along the beach then repeated it, walking—a personal workout routine to build my endurance. My breaths became heavy and I stood facing the ocean between my workout sets.

Moonlight shone on the ocean water like a strobelight of diamonds. They moved like magic in the palm, dancing with such rhythm. Such flow!

“Do you remember me?”

I was startled like a cardinal, moved with a quick shake and heart drop. I turned. A man slightly shorter and thinner than me stood before me. The darkness covered his face and he wore a dark colored hoodie, protecting him from the ocean breeze.

“Do you remember me?” he repeated in the same monotone. I attempted to stare into his face but the darkness made him unrecognizable, except with dreams forgotten. I didn’t remember him and it was too dark to see his features. I was unaware how he could see my features. I was unaware how he knew I was on the beach and if he really knew me.

“I know it’s you,” he started. “We saw the light in the sky together. Here. Last year. You saw it, remember? There was a white rectangle light with blue and green smaller lights around it…”

I remembered.

“Please,” he said. “Tell me you remember. . .It disappeared so fast and went east within seconds. My friends don’t believe me. No one else was here when we saw it, except you. I know I’m not crazy.”

“I remember,” I finally responded. “That’s why I’m here. I was just talking about it yesterday. . .” It was the truth. And, my friends didn’t believe me either. Momentarily, there was silence. Earth stopped rotating and I could hear his breaths match mine and we were calm. We breathed validation.

“So you remember?”

“Yeah, I can’t forget it. How could I?” I laughed nervously. I wanted to tell him of the experiences I had after we saw it and why I felt it was a UFO. I wanted to tell him how I’ve attempted to communicate and summon it to appear again with meditation, and how it worked. I wanted to tell him how I’m close to understanding the secrets of mankind and God and how the truth came to me the moment I saw the light in the sky. I wanted to tell him how I no longer hang in crowds because I somehow obtained qualities and absorb and understand too many feelings of others. I wanted to know if he had been given gifts. But I didn’t ask, because I knew the answer–he didn’t think it was a UFO.

“I don’t think it was a UFO. I think it was something else. . .Maybe military, I don’t know.”
The more he spoke, the more I understood that something else happened to him too. But he was trying to convince himself otherwise. Then suddenly his voice lowered, almost inaudible with the ocean waves, almost inaudible from the sound of the coqui, almost inaudible from my own thoughts attempting to read his thoughts (but I couldn’t) and he started to speak again. “We weren’t suppose to see it!” At that moment I could finally see his eyes, wide and wild like the ocean. “I need to go.” His voice drifted as he walked away fast.

His words and reactions chilled me.

I needed to go, too.

“