Tide

    He is constantly pacing; his feet have pounded out a wide, well-worn ring upon his floor.  The room in which he resides is large.  No, to say that it is large is a sad understatement.  The room in which he resides is immense.  As he circles, he passes a total of thirty large windows, with a full day’s walking between each of them.
    He thinks chiefly of himself as he paces, and is a man of many faces.  If you were to walk parallel to him on the other side of the wall of his remarkable living space and follow him from one window to the next, you would be able to see on his face how his thoughts had changed throughout the day.  Sometimes he wears a look of longing, sometimes of resignation, but most often he looks fearful.
    He has only one thing to fear, but it occupies most of his thoughts.  You see, there are inevitable shadows in certain spots along his path which he must pass through.  He knows that they’re coming far before he reaches them, and remembers them long afterward.  He fears them for the darkness that he knows will slowly consume him, tainting his entire being as he passes through but, more, as it passes through him.
    In the beginning (though that is so long ago now that no one really remembers it), he would make a great effort to stop his feet before he reached the shadows, but has long since resigned himself to the endless cycles of his endless pacing.  As he begins to feel the darkness seeping into him, he turns to look out the window at the sea.  He wants nothing now but for the cool waves to come and wash away the horrible dark mass which he is constantly forced to allow to overtake him by his own pacing feet.
    The sea strains to meet his call, but has never yet reached him, and the same, ever pacing feet which lead him so consistently into the darkness invariably lead him back out again.