Between Sea And Sky

Chapter 3: Through Human Eyes

Eva adjusted her glasses for the third time that night, but it did little to chase away the image haunting her thoughts.

The golden glow.

The impossible figure in the water.

The fleeting eyes that had locked with hers before vanishing into the sea.

She told herself it was nothing but a trick of moonlight, the exhaustion of too many late nights at the newsroom, or worse, her overactive imagination playing cruel games. And yet… she couldn’t shake it. The shimmer had felt too real, too alive.

Eva had always been like this.

Even as a child, when other girls played with dolls or sang along to pop songs, she was the one crouched by the riverbank, notebook in hand, trying to sketch out stories no one believed. Her father used to laugh and call her his little detective, while her mother fretted over scraped knees and mud-stained shoes. But Eva never minded. The world was full of secrets, and she was determined to find them all.

By the time she was a teenager, that curiosity had sharpened into determination. She devoured newspapers while others read romance novels, circled names in headlines, and dreamed of uncovering stories that mattered. While her classmates worried about dates and dresses, Eva was writing letters to editors, begging them to give her a chance.

She got it, eventually. Not because anyone thought she was special, but because she refused to give up.

Her first article was a small piece on local fishermen protesting pollution along the coast. It barely made a ripple in the paper, tucked between advertisements and weather reports, but Eva had clipped it out and pinned it above her desk. Proof. She could do this. She was meant for this.

Years later, she was still chasing stories and not just stories but bigger ones now, harder ones but the hunger had not changed. Journalism wasn’t just a job. It was the only way she knew how to exist. To question. To push. To uncover the truths everyone else ignored.

But even the fiercest journalist had her doubts.

Her editor, Mr. Dawson, often reminded her that “mysteries don’t sell answers do.” And Eva, though she smiled and nodded, had always believed the opposite. Mysteries were what kept people awake at night. Mysteries were what made life worth chasing.

And now, here she was, tangled in one herself.

She leaned back in her chair, staring at the notes she’d scribbled earlier. They were ridiculous: Shimmer in water. Golden? Shape human-like? Eyes? Even she wanted to laugh at herself. What kind of journalist chased after fairy tales? It was crazy to think of.

She sighed, brushing a strand of hair from her face. The hum of her small apartment pressed in leaky pipes, the faint rattle of neighbors’ voices through thin walls, the ever present city outside. For all her ambition, Eva’s life was still ordinary, grounded in coffee stains and deadlines. She should be focusing on her latest assignment, a political scandal that promised to make headlines if she could dig deep enough.

But her thoughts kept drifting back to the shore.

To the way her skin had prickled when the glow broke the surface. To the feeling, however fleeting, that someone had truly looked at her not past her, not through her, but at her. At her..

She shivered. No, it wasn’t possible. She was tired, that was all.

And yet…

Eva had learned long ago that sometimes the most unbelievable stories hid the deepest truths. Her mother used to say she was born stubborn, and maybe that was true, because even now logic screaming at hershe found herself pulling out a fresh page in her notebook.

Shoreline. Midnight. Investigate.

Her pen tapped against the paper. She told herself it was foolish, that she should shred the page before anyone else saw it. But her hand trembled with something she hadn’t felt in months.

Excitement.

She was chasing something unknown again, and it thrilled her to the bone.

Eva set the notebook aside and lay back on her bed, staring at the ceiling. Sleep would not come easily tonight. Because somewhere, deep down where she didn’t dare admit aloud, she wanted it to be real.

She wanted the glow to return.

She wanted those eyes to find hers again.

And if that made her foolish, then so be it.

Tomorrow night, she would return to the shore.

And this time, she would be ready.