A Collection of Sunken Objects
By Ashley Farrelly
April 15, 2024
April 15, 2024
The items are laid out in front of me on the small table that I bring down to the shore when it’s time for one of my investigations. On the left, there is a bottle. It’s mostly broken, but the once jagged edges have now been smoothed by the ocean’s force and the sand’s guiding hand. In the middle, there’s a shoe, which is one of the things I find most often. I collect them because I think it would be a great accomplishment to find a pair. I have plenty of room in the shed to hold them all. Most of them I toss into a big crate, but some of the stranger ones I display on a shelf, like the ballet slipper I found in 2018.
This one is interesting though. A woman’s tennis shoe, white, size eight, with the sticker still on it - and do you know what it says? It says they cost six hundred dollars!
If it wasn’t for my other finding, I would consider spending the rest of my day on the tennis shoe, but the item on the right is the real treasure. I’m already calling it my tesoro, something I heard my neighbour call her toddler when he fell face first into the shallow water and she rushed to pull him up, his face mudded and angry.
The item is a small suitcase, one foot by two feet. It’s locked, but the lock is rusted and barely hanging on. When I first found it, I thought it was old-timey luggage from the early twentieth century, but it was only made to look that way. Vintage style. The two straps that go around the case are glued on and the dimpled leather look is just that, a look.
I found it over in the rubble by the retaining wall that leads onto my property, so I consider it unquestionably mine. Not that I couldn’t lie, of course. There wasn’t anyone around when I found it. Early mornings here are empty, just me and sometimes that mother with her boy.
I hesitate to open it because I like the possibility. It’s the same reason I buy lotto tickets, not because I’ll win, but because until they draw the numbers I’m in a world where I already have, and I like living in that world for a few days.
The rusted little wheelbarrow creaks as I walk back up the wooden planks to my cottage, my loot packed with care. The cottage is plain, but it’s just me here and I rarely get visitors. It’s a good spot on an outcropping and away from the shops, so beachgoers only wander over during peak times, once the main section becomes overpopulated. Partly, it’s because the sand here isn’t as nice as it is on the main beach, it’s hard, slick and grey looking, like mud.
There are few cottages like this one left. Near town, it’s all big boxy buildings with glass windows built for people who are only here a few weeks each year. Or, properties meant to imitate something you might find in Maine or Rhode Island, with big porches and navy blue panelling. I find it all very un-Canadian. Gone are the small bungalows like mine, with yellow siding that’s been warped and discoloured from the wind and the seasons. Windows with latches that don’t line up, and floorboards that creak louder than conversations. You won’t find this yard either, with such a unique collection of items. It’s all hot tubs and big fancy patios.
I try my best to keep it nice, but I’m not much of a painter or landscaper. I'm a salesman (was a salesman), so those weren’t the type of skills I picked up, and to be honest, I like that it looks the way it always has, like it did when my kids were little.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had offers though, for double, once triple, what I paid for it. It was when the young people were moving out of the city for more space and silence, but it takes a special type to like the quiet in the winter. You have to feel like you deserve it. And it doesn’t matter anyway, because I’ll never give this place up. Sure, the money would be nice, but say I sell it for all that money, where would I go? A condo? Closer to my kids? Nah, I can make do here. It’s cheap, and my pension is enough, for now.
The suitcase is on a plastic chair across from me as if I'm about to interrogate it. It’s waterlogged and pungent smelling, but it’s a stench I like, of decaying things and salted jelly. It could be anything. A young woman’s clothes. Photo albums. A million dollars. Collectible figurines. Pornography. Notebooks full of old recipes. Knitting yarn. Cocaine.
Beyond money, I don’t hope for much, though the stranger the better I suppose. Last year I found a piece of fuselage on the beach. Probably my most impressive find ever. It was a panel, four feet long. I wanted to display it on my property as a museum exhibit dedicated to the downed plane or mysterious missing flight I was sure it came from. I was going to charge a small fee for people to see it, but I was foolish and called around about it and some officials came and took it away. Turns out it was from a small propeller plane that crash-landed in the water. Everybody made it out fine.
After that discovery, I upped my search schedule. It had given me a jolt of energy up my spine, a surge I imagine archaeologists or detectives walk around with all the time. Before the wing, I was only out exploring two to three times a week. The rest of the time I was moping around the house, mourning the losses all old people mourn. Now, I’m out every morning, which means at least once a week I'm finding something worth spending my time on, like this suitcase.
The rusted lock breaks easily, as do the clasps, but the lid requires some force to open. It’s suctioned to the bottom and takes two screwdrivers to separate, but it finally comes apart with a slurp.
The expanding file folder inside still has a bit of spring to it when I lift it from the case. It fans open like a peacock’s tail, right down to the royal blue velvet liners that I open to their maximum width. The wet velvet smells god awful. My head bobs backward each time a new wave hits me. It smells so bad and unfamiliar I wonder if I am going to find a severed body part (it would have to be fingers!) inside.
Between the dividers are thick plastic envelopes the size of magazine pages. I open one, but there’s paper mush at the bottom, so I open another, and another, until I find one that feels different. The seal on it is tighter and has protected whatever is inside. I pull out a piece of canvas that's dry as a bone.
On the canvas is a painting of a woman who is draped over a chair with her back exposed. Behind her, is another woman next to a wash basin looking up at the first. It is difficult to discern anything else in the room because of the dark palette and broad strokes, but the detail on the first woman’s skin is impressive, even to someone like me, who doesn’t know a lick about art. The canvas looks wet, but when I touch it the hardened strokes bounce my fingertips up like braille.
I hold the painting to my chest carefully as I move inside the cottage, mostly to get away from the smell. The suitcase is nothing now, and the velvet will be trashed. The painting, however, is precious, I know it somehow. Imagine the headline - Local Man Finds Painting from the Renaissance Worth Two Million Dollars.
“How do you know it’s worth anything?” Laura asks.
“How do you know it’s not?” I respond. I’m defensive, but it’s frustrating for me when people don’t see the possibility. “Listen, I’m a sales guy. I have a knack for these things. Don’t you remember when you were ten, and I took you out on one of my sales calls and that guy tried to trade me an old clock? I took one look at it and said to him ‘If it’s as old as you say it is I doubt it would have Made in China stamped on the bottom’. Don’t you remember his face?”
A quiet “uh-huh,” slips out of the phone. She’s heard me tell that story before, but she used to listen to me. Now, she isn’t interested in anything I have to say, but I keep going. “Could be worth thousands, half a million maybe,” I say. “I told you this would pay off. I’m not just some sorry old man combing the beach for nickels.”
“I never said you were,” she says.
All these years of Val whispering in her ear has done something to her, but it’s not her fault. I suppose I was a bad father back then, at least an absent one, but at some point you have to let it go. I want them to see that. I mean, would they have rather had a boring dad who worked the same old job for thirty years? At some point a kid grows up and sees their parents as people. Maybe it's when they become parents, or have to make hard choices, but Laura never did. She never got past the selfish stage.
“You know what I’ve always said, right? If I ever won the lottery I would split it with you - you, and your sister. I’d help you out. Well, that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to help you with your house once I cash in.”
Laura is quiet for a long time. Something rubs against the phone, like she's brushing the receiver with her finger. She used to do that with her hair, wind it around her finger till it ran out.
“Dad, we sold the house,” she says. “We did it last year when we thought we had our best chance. We’re in an apartment now in Nanaimo. Jamie likes it. He has kids to play with.”
I don’t say anything, so she continues. “It was a good move for us. Prices went up and it’s kept us afloat. It’s not like where you are, on the exposed side of the outcropping, where stuff sits for ages.”
She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. “I wish you told me. I could have helped you move,” I say.
“I know. You’re always the first one to help with that stuff.”
For a moment I forget what’s in my hand.
“But you gotta’ come see this thing,” I finally say. “I think it’s the real deal. It looks old. It might be a theft. Oh, but that wouldn’t be good. Can’t get much if it’s a theft, we’d have to turn it in.”
“Mm-hmm,” she says. Her voice feels further away than it was before.
“So, are you going to come see it?” I ask.
“I’ll think about it, okay? But I have to go now, or I’ll be late for work.”
“Okay, honey. I’ll talk to you soon.”
“Bye Dad.”
“Laura?”
“Yes.”
“This could be life-changing, for all of us.”
Her breath is quiet, but present. I think she gets what I’m saying, but she’s always been that type of kid, one you have to lead right up to the idea to make her see it.
“Don’t call Angie, okay? Don’t promise her anything. She needs some space.”
I love Laura, but she doesn’t have the spirit her sister does. Angie got it from me, we see the possibilities. Namely, the power of knowing that you can’t change who you are. I have a drive that’s not easy to let go of, which means I’m never going to be a docile old grandpa who sits around talking about the weather. That’s not me. Dull young men age into dull old men, and boring young women age into boring old women. The seeds for everything are right there from the start. There are no surprises, so what's the sense in getting upset about it? You have to look for the possibility instead.
I pour myself a glass of wine because it feels right. Families are setting up on the beach for the day, and the neighbour boy's voice sounds like it's right outside my door. Thank God I went when I did. I would have been gutted if someone else found it. I would have had to sit on my porch and watch as someone else's life changed.
I spend the rest of my day researching. Googling search strings like: Woman. Chair. Wash basin painting. Famous. Missing, but nothing comes up. I search through old newspapers for references of boats capsizing. I drive the coast scanning telephone poles for missing item posters or reward notices, but it’s as I suspected, a mystery.
By the time it’s evening, I have drunk two bottles of wine and have examined the painting a hundred times. I don’t drink much, but it’s a momentous occasion. I’ve set an appointment with an art appraiser I found online for next week. She was skeptical at first, which is a good thing–a good quality to have in an art appraiser.
The beach is empty now that it’s getting dark. It’s a perfect time to take my canoe out. I want to feel the sharp wind that cuts over this part of the water. I want to talk to it, because tomorrow I am not going to be the person I am today.
I go as far as it’s safe to go, a few hundred metres or so. It takes me a long time to get there, but I do it. I’m strong for an old guy. I swam when I was younger, and I was good.
The canoe drifts, and I lean my body back against the seat and pull the painting from my waistband. I wish Laura had been more excited. You might think bad people can't truly be happy (that’s probably how the world should work), but it’s not always true. You just have to hold two things in your head at once - that you have a past and you have a future, and those two things aren't always connected. Maybe it's not called happiness, but it’s certainly not called regret.
In the moonlight I examine the woman’s rolls and her fine silky hair. Her expression is sly, but triumphant. But, it’s the woman by the washbasin I keep seeing anew. At first, she looked angry (for being kept in the shadows?), but now I’m not so sure. Her eyes are looking off to the side instead of at the woman in the centre as I first thought. It’s the first time I think of the other walls in the room. The things not painted.
A strong wave knocks the side of the canoe and I release the painting to steady myself. I fumble for it from between my feet, find it quickly, and tuck it back in my waistband.
I’m drunk and acting careless. I should have put the painting in a safe, or hidden it under the floorboards, but the alcohol is up inside my head, letting the loose thoughts stream out like fish flowing through broken netting.
My arms are aching from keeping myself steady. They never had that swimmers’ muscle memory. There - are you happy?
Back at shore, I stumble out of the canoe, twisting over myself and landing in the water with a slap. I gag on the liquid and curse at someone unseen, but it hurts deep in my lungs and the words are gargled.
I’m embarrassed by how my body contorts and heaves as I try to stand, but knowing the painting is still there, pressed against my stomach, is the only thing that matters.
I stare into the sea waiting for the strength to return to my body. The water should be dark, but it’s not, I see lots of things. Sparkling shapeless items stick out of the sand like half buried monuments. Are they forgotten items from the beach that have been swept into the sea? Maybe buried treasure shaken loose? No, these items are much more precious.
This one is interesting though. A woman’s tennis shoe, white, size eight, with the sticker still on it - and do you know what it says? It says they cost six hundred dollars!
If it wasn’t for my other finding, I would consider spending the rest of my day on the tennis shoe, but the item on the right is the real treasure. I’m already calling it my tesoro, something I heard my neighbour call her toddler when he fell face first into the shallow water and she rushed to pull him up, his face mudded and angry.
The item is a small suitcase, one foot by two feet. It’s locked, but the lock is rusted and barely hanging on. When I first found it, I thought it was old-timey luggage from the early twentieth century, but it was only made to look that way. Vintage style. The two straps that go around the case are glued on and the dimpled leather look is just that, a look.
I found it over in the rubble by the retaining wall that leads onto my property, so I consider it unquestionably mine. Not that I couldn’t lie, of course. There wasn’t anyone around when I found it. Early mornings here are empty, just me and sometimes that mother with her boy.
I hesitate to open it because I like the possibility. It’s the same reason I buy lotto tickets, not because I’ll win, but because until they draw the numbers I’m in a world where I already have, and I like living in that world for a few days.
The rusted little wheelbarrow creaks as I walk back up the wooden planks to my cottage, my loot packed with care. The cottage is plain, but it’s just me here and I rarely get visitors. It’s a good spot on an outcropping and away from the shops, so beachgoers only wander over during peak times, once the main section becomes overpopulated. Partly, it’s because the sand here isn’t as nice as it is on the main beach, it’s hard, slick and grey looking, like mud.
There are few cottages like this one left. Near town, it’s all big boxy buildings with glass windows built for people who are only here a few weeks each year. Or, properties meant to imitate something you might find in Maine or Rhode Island, with big porches and navy blue panelling. I find it all very un-Canadian. Gone are the small bungalows like mine, with yellow siding that’s been warped and discoloured from the wind and the seasons. Windows with latches that don’t line up, and floorboards that creak louder than conversations. You won’t find this yard either, with such a unique collection of items. It’s all hot tubs and big fancy patios.
I try my best to keep it nice, but I’m not much of a painter or landscaper. I'm a salesman (was a salesman), so those weren’t the type of skills I picked up, and to be honest, I like that it looks the way it always has, like it did when my kids were little.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had offers though, for double, once triple, what I paid for it. It was when the young people were moving out of the city for more space and silence, but it takes a special type to like the quiet in the winter. You have to feel like you deserve it. And it doesn’t matter anyway, because I’ll never give this place up. Sure, the money would be nice, but say I sell it for all that money, where would I go? A condo? Closer to my kids? Nah, I can make do here. It’s cheap, and my pension is enough, for now.
The suitcase is on a plastic chair across from me as if I'm about to interrogate it. It’s waterlogged and pungent smelling, but it’s a stench I like, of decaying things and salted jelly. It could be anything. A young woman’s clothes. Photo albums. A million dollars. Collectible figurines. Pornography. Notebooks full of old recipes. Knitting yarn. Cocaine.
Beyond money, I don’t hope for much, though the stranger the better I suppose. Last year I found a piece of fuselage on the beach. Probably my most impressive find ever. It was a panel, four feet long. I wanted to display it on my property as a museum exhibit dedicated to the downed plane or mysterious missing flight I was sure it came from. I was going to charge a small fee for people to see it, but I was foolish and called around about it and some officials came and took it away. Turns out it was from a small propeller plane that crash-landed in the water. Everybody made it out fine.
After that discovery, I upped my search schedule. It had given me a jolt of energy up my spine, a surge I imagine archaeologists or detectives walk around with all the time. Before the wing, I was only out exploring two to three times a week. The rest of the time I was moping around the house, mourning the losses all old people mourn. Now, I’m out every morning, which means at least once a week I'm finding something worth spending my time on, like this suitcase.
The rusted lock breaks easily, as do the clasps, but the lid requires some force to open. It’s suctioned to the bottom and takes two screwdrivers to separate, but it finally comes apart with a slurp.
The expanding file folder inside still has a bit of spring to it when I lift it from the case. It fans open like a peacock’s tail, right down to the royal blue velvet liners that I open to their maximum width. The wet velvet smells god awful. My head bobs backward each time a new wave hits me. It smells so bad and unfamiliar I wonder if I am going to find a severed body part (it would have to be fingers!) inside.
Between the dividers are thick plastic envelopes the size of magazine pages. I open one, but there’s paper mush at the bottom, so I open another, and another, until I find one that feels different. The seal on it is tighter and has protected whatever is inside. I pull out a piece of canvas that's dry as a bone.
On the canvas is a painting of a woman who is draped over a chair with her back exposed. Behind her, is another woman next to a wash basin looking up at the first. It is difficult to discern anything else in the room because of the dark palette and broad strokes, but the detail on the first woman’s skin is impressive, even to someone like me, who doesn’t know a lick about art. The canvas looks wet, but when I touch it the hardened strokes bounce my fingertips up like braille.
I hold the painting to my chest carefully as I move inside the cottage, mostly to get away from the smell. The suitcase is nothing now, and the velvet will be trashed. The painting, however, is precious, I know it somehow. Imagine the headline - Local Man Finds Painting from the Renaissance Worth Two Million Dollars.
“How do you know it’s worth anything?” Laura asks.
“How do you know it’s not?” I respond. I’m defensive, but it’s frustrating for me when people don’t see the possibility. “Listen, I’m a sales guy. I have a knack for these things. Don’t you remember when you were ten, and I took you out on one of my sales calls and that guy tried to trade me an old clock? I took one look at it and said to him ‘If it’s as old as you say it is I doubt it would have Made in China stamped on the bottom’. Don’t you remember his face?”
A quiet “uh-huh,” slips out of the phone. She’s heard me tell that story before, but she used to listen to me. Now, she isn’t interested in anything I have to say, but I keep going. “Could be worth thousands, half a million maybe,” I say. “I told you this would pay off. I’m not just some sorry old man combing the beach for nickels.”
“I never said you were,” she says.
All these years of Val whispering in her ear has done something to her, but it’s not her fault. I suppose I was a bad father back then, at least an absent one, but at some point you have to let it go. I want them to see that. I mean, would they have rather had a boring dad who worked the same old job for thirty years? At some point a kid grows up and sees their parents as people. Maybe it's when they become parents, or have to make hard choices, but Laura never did. She never got past the selfish stage.
“You know what I’ve always said, right? If I ever won the lottery I would split it with you - you, and your sister. I’d help you out. Well, that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to help you with your house once I cash in.”
Laura is quiet for a long time. Something rubs against the phone, like she's brushing the receiver with her finger. She used to do that with her hair, wind it around her finger till it ran out.
“Dad, we sold the house,” she says. “We did it last year when we thought we had our best chance. We’re in an apartment now in Nanaimo. Jamie likes it. He has kids to play with.”
I don’t say anything, so she continues. “It was a good move for us. Prices went up and it’s kept us afloat. It’s not like where you are, on the exposed side of the outcropping, where stuff sits for ages.”
She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. “I wish you told me. I could have helped you move,” I say.
“I know. You’re always the first one to help with that stuff.”
For a moment I forget what’s in my hand.
“But you gotta’ come see this thing,” I finally say. “I think it’s the real deal. It looks old. It might be a theft. Oh, but that wouldn’t be good. Can’t get much if it’s a theft, we’d have to turn it in.”
“Mm-hmm,” she says. Her voice feels further away than it was before.
“So, are you going to come see it?” I ask.
“I’ll think about it, okay? But I have to go now, or I’ll be late for work.”
“Okay, honey. I’ll talk to you soon.”
“Bye Dad.”
“Laura?”
“Yes.”
“This could be life-changing, for all of us.”
Her breath is quiet, but present. I think she gets what I’m saying, but she’s always been that type of kid, one you have to lead right up to the idea to make her see it.
“Don’t call Angie, okay? Don’t promise her anything. She needs some space.”
I love Laura, but she doesn’t have the spirit her sister does. Angie got it from me, we see the possibilities. Namely, the power of knowing that you can’t change who you are. I have a drive that’s not easy to let go of, which means I’m never going to be a docile old grandpa who sits around talking about the weather. That’s not me. Dull young men age into dull old men, and boring young women age into boring old women. The seeds for everything are right there from the start. There are no surprises, so what's the sense in getting upset about it? You have to look for the possibility instead.
I pour myself a glass of wine because it feels right. Families are setting up on the beach for the day, and the neighbour boy's voice sounds like it's right outside my door. Thank God I went when I did. I would have been gutted if someone else found it. I would have had to sit on my porch and watch as someone else's life changed.
I spend the rest of my day researching. Googling search strings like: Woman. Chair. Wash basin painting. Famous. Missing, but nothing comes up. I search through old newspapers for references of boats capsizing. I drive the coast scanning telephone poles for missing item posters or reward notices, but it’s as I suspected, a mystery.
By the time it’s evening, I have drunk two bottles of wine and have examined the painting a hundred times. I don’t drink much, but it’s a momentous occasion. I’ve set an appointment with an art appraiser I found online for next week. She was skeptical at first, which is a good thing–a good quality to have in an art appraiser.
The beach is empty now that it’s getting dark. It’s a perfect time to take my canoe out. I want to feel the sharp wind that cuts over this part of the water. I want to talk to it, because tomorrow I am not going to be the person I am today.
I go as far as it’s safe to go, a few hundred metres or so. It takes me a long time to get there, but I do it. I’m strong for an old guy. I swam when I was younger, and I was good.
The canoe drifts, and I lean my body back against the seat and pull the painting from my waistband. I wish Laura had been more excited. You might think bad people can't truly be happy (that’s probably how the world should work), but it’s not always true. You just have to hold two things in your head at once - that you have a past and you have a future, and those two things aren't always connected. Maybe it's not called happiness, but it’s certainly not called regret.
In the moonlight I examine the woman’s rolls and her fine silky hair. Her expression is sly, but triumphant. But, it’s the woman by the washbasin I keep seeing anew. At first, she looked angry (for being kept in the shadows?), but now I’m not so sure. Her eyes are looking off to the side instead of at the woman in the centre as I first thought. It’s the first time I think of the other walls in the room. The things not painted.
A strong wave knocks the side of the canoe and I release the painting to steady myself. I fumble for it from between my feet, find it quickly, and tuck it back in my waistband.
I’m drunk and acting careless. I should have put the painting in a safe, or hidden it under the floorboards, but the alcohol is up inside my head, letting the loose thoughts stream out like fish flowing through broken netting.
My arms are aching from keeping myself steady. They never had that swimmers’ muscle memory. There - are you happy?
Back at shore, I stumble out of the canoe, twisting over myself and landing in the water with a slap. I gag on the liquid and curse at someone unseen, but it hurts deep in my lungs and the words are gargled.
I’m embarrassed by how my body contorts and heaves as I try to stand, but knowing the painting is still there, pressed against my stomach, is the only thing that matters.
I stare into the sea waiting for the strength to return to my body. The water should be dark, but it’s not, I see lots of things. Sparkling shapeless items stick out of the sand like half buried monuments. Are they forgotten items from the beach that have been swept into the sea? Maybe buried treasure shaken loose? No, these items are much more precious.
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Ashley Farrelly lives in Calgary, Alberta, where she can see the mountains every day if she squints a little. She works in health care to reduce burnout in front-line workers and likes to write at night in her favourite green chair. Her work most recently appears in the Temz Review.
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Author's Note:
I started working on this piece while thinking about the phrase “life lessons” and expressions such as “you can’t please everyone” or “you need to live in the moment.” I thought it would be interesting to write a main character who takes those wise (mostly cliche) things we are supposed to learn from experience and warps them to preserve the image he has of himself.
He lives in those brief moments of hope while treasure hunting (essentially finding Schrodinger’s painting or tennis shoe), choosing not to learn over and over again. The painting is priceless if he wants it to be, and his life is always about to change for the better as long as he never steps out of his patterns.
He lives in those brief moments of hope while treasure hunting (essentially finding Schrodinger’s painting or tennis shoe), choosing not to learn over and over again. The painting is priceless if he wants it to be, and his life is always about to change for the better as long as he never steps out of his patterns.