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Dad tugged the engine once more. It coughed and spluttered and fell silent. “How is it broken? We’ve only been using it for a couple of hours.” “I know, the engine just- it just cut out.” I reclined in my seat and let him get on with it. Mum was leaning over the side of the boat, trying to read the company’s phone number that was printed on the hull. Anna, my sister, was filming the whole ordeal. As I lay, cradled by the sea, I gazed deeply into the sky, looking for something, but there was nothing. Only blue. I knew what was up there – an atmosphere that stretched for hundreds of miles and a universe that stretched for millions more. Yet, all I could see was a flat screen of blue. Oh, what’s that? A cloud – a singular cloud – shoo. It wafted across my view and exited my periphery. Only blue. “Hello?” “Hell- oh,” I sat up and realised Mum was addressing the boat company on the phone. We were drifting down a channel, encompassed by chalky white cliffs, dusted with greenery on top. Had this been another time, the cliffs might have been more foreboding. I imagined that this was the route by which Odysseus returned home and these rocks were where the Sirens waited for him. I peeked into the water to try and spot one but the glassy surface only revealed the silvery pebbles on the seabed. The boat wandered idly into a cove and (thank god) clumsily bumped into some rocks on the edge of the bay. We were still quite far from the beach but we held onto those rocks and refused to let go. As Dad moored our feeble vessel to a crag, Mum explained the plan of action: “We’ll put everything into a backpack – no phones in pockets in case they fall out. Then we’ll climb these rocks to shore, get lunch at that restaurant over there and call the boat hire to pick us up. Oh, and watch out for sea urchins.” The most difficult part was making the leap from the boat to the rocks. I tentatively stretched out a leg, clawing at the boulders with my toes. My foot was about to touchdown but when you’re balancing on a puny motorboat, the waves feel bigger and the distance to solid land feels further. “Yes!” My foot slapped down happily on the boulder. “No!” It slid right off, dragging the rest of me underwater with it. I resurfaced as a rag doll which had been thrown in the washing machine. (Now I'm a Siren... Or one of its victims.) “Oh my gosh, darling, are you okay? Did you step on a sea urchin?” “No, Mum, I did not step on a sea urchin.” On our journey up the bay, we hugged the cliff face closely. It was dry and secure but the rocks below us were slimy and tricky. The lapping of the tepid waves tickled my feet and, looking down at the playful water, I noticed a crevasse in a rock. It was a pure black, as if it opened up to an empty void. It was starkly black in a world which was blue and white and green. I leaned in, entranced. (Lured in). On closer examination, the void wasn’t black but a deep purple. And spiky. Sea urchins. I scooted away on the slippery rocks as fast as my alarmed – but still cautious – mind would let me. My grip tightened on the cliffs as I realised the three-inch spines would easily penetrate my flip-flops and probably my entire foot. Death by Siren started to seem more appealing. (I’m sure the singing would be nice.) Land. Awkwardly wobbling on the painfully pebbly beaches had never felt so comfortable. We excitedly hopped along the shore to the lone restaurant sitting on the seafront. It was a simple, battered beach hut with plastic chairs and tables but we embraced it as if it were home. Just as Odysseus finally arrived at Ithaca, so had we. (But Odysseus still had to fight off a hundred men when he came home.) Then came the bees.