When the Cape Henlopen lighthouse collapsed on April 13, 1926, many local residents went to the site to collect the crumbled stone for their fireplaces and chimneys. Built in 1765, the structure was the second oldest lighthouse in the country at the time of its collapse. Upon completion, the tower stood on a shallow foundation atop a sand dune at a comfortable distance from the sea. But over time it became clear that the lighthouse would be no match for the encroaching ocean which slowly eroded that ever-fragile shoreline upon which it trusted its stability. Efforts were made to try and preserve the guiding light, none of which were any match for that persistent sea. And so it fell, and the townsfolk took small pieces of it as keepsakes in their home, memories of a lighthouse they all had grown to love so much. He was only 12, but he was the kind of 12-year-old with a timeless quality that made him seem much older. His grandmother realized this and knew that he was a special child, but she always reminded herself that every grandparent believed that their own precious grandchildren were the special ones. But that was alright. She would go on believing that because really he was special. She lived in a small house that backed up to a small bay that drained into the ocean. Her grandson couldn't wait to sleep over on most weekends. The boy had confided in his grandmother late one night that coming over to her house always felt like coming home, and this had brought silent tears of joy to her eyes. His parents were good parents, and he knew that. He just also knew that his beloved grandmother understood him in a way that his parents did not. Although many years their senior, his grandmother still talked about dreams and monsters and painting and storytelling; his parents seemed to have forgotten the charm and joy these things brought them a long while ago. “Got a new share?” he asked his grandmother as he walked in from the back door, covered in sand. This was their little way of asking each other if they came up with any good stories lately. She shook her head and smiled. “You're the young one, your mind is a lot faster than mine these days. So how about you? Do you have a new share for me maybe? Maybe one about what you were doing down there for all those hours?” The boy giggled and explained to her that he was finding treasures again. In their secret shared language, this meant that he was collecting shells. “But I'll tell you if I think of one.” He began to look excited. “What smells so good?” “Just your favorite cookies,” his grandmother said with that same smile. And so they sat and had tea and shared cookies and played board games, all while the wind picked up outside and the windows drummed with the sound of rain as the house groaned with each strong gust from the storm. After many hours of games they decided to call it a night. The boy got ready for bed and trudged to his usual favorite sleeping spot on his grandmother's cozy living room couch. It sat next to the wood burning stove, which was currently radiating a wonderful heat, the kind of heat that makes even the stormiest of nights feel warm. As his grandmother tucked him in, a ferocious gust of wind pounded the house. The dishes rattled in the cabinet, the fire roared to an even brighter light, and an old picture frame fell off the mantle, bringing the rock that sat next to it down as well. “Woah what was that?” the boy asked, shaken. “Just the wind messing up one of my most prized possessions,” his grandmother said, leaning down to pick up the broken frame. In it was an old piece of paper with finely-printed lettering, the kind of printing that was so small that it could only belong to a newspaper. The rock stood atop broken glass from the frame. “What is that?” the boy asked, at the frame in his grandmother’s hands. “It's an article about the Cape Henlopen lighthouse. It used to stand tall and guide ships through the water during stormy nights just like this one. And this,” she bent down and picked up the rock, “this is most special of all. It’s a piece from the original lighthouse that I scavenged the day after it collapsed. A sad day that was. I loved that light.” She looked with love at the small rock in her hand as she thought about how that beautiful structure was reduced to this small rock. “Where was it?” the boy asked. Just a few short minutes ago he was half asleep, but now he was wide awake, engaged and curious. “Only a mile up the road,” his grandmother answered. “Not far at all.” “Wow,” the boy said, now looking at the newspaper. “It's sad to think something so beautiful could fall, that it could not be saved before it was too late. I wish I could’ve seen its light”. “And I wish I could show it to you,” she said with sadness. “But you can hang onto this if you would like. I guess you could call it a piece of the past. Still pretty neat though isn't it, thinking that it once helped hold up one of the tallest lighthouses ever built.” His grandmother held the rock out to the boy. “Wow… thank you grandma!” the boy said, grabbing onto the rock and inspecting it closely. “Now go to sleep, we can talk about lighthouses and things of the past tomorrow. Maybe dream up a new share for me over breakfast, what do you think? “Okay,” the boy said smiling, and hugged her goodnight. And despite this short detour, sleep did come, quite quickly indeed for both of them. The boy dreamed of sand and the water and the lighthouse. He dreamed about all of these wonderful things until suddenly he was startled awake by a loud noise. He jolted up and saw the rock stirring on the floor. I must’ve fallen asleep with it in my hand, he thought as a log popped in the fire. He reached for the rock, and as his fingers grasped it, he heard a small pecking sound coming from the window next to the fireplace. He grabbed the rock and traipsed over to the window. He wondered if it was another one of those little birds that sometimes sat on the flower box outside of his grandmother’s window in hopes of finding the seeds that she sometimes left out there. I hope it’s alright in the storm, he thought. Carefully, he pulled back the curtain. As he did this a weird sensation overtook him. There was something there alright, and oh it had a beak indeed but it certainly was not one of the songbirds that sometimes sat on his grandmother's window. This thing's beak was bigger than him, and its eyes were the size of large bowling balls. He stared right into those bowling balls. I am dreaming, he thought. That's all. I am dreaming. He continued looking into those bowling balls as he blinked his eyes, yet still the thing stood there, staring right back at him. He pinched himself, he walked away and walked back. And there it remained, staring. But… its eyes, was it love in the thing’s eyes? This thing that should have scared him, but for some reason didn't scare him in the least. It pecked the window, louder this time and the first scary thought he had since the rock fell was that it would wake up his grandmother, who, despite all her sweetness, did not appreciate being woken up in the middle of the night. She had explained to him once that old people don't fall back asleep so easily like children do. He walked to the door. I'm dreaming, he thought again. It doesn't matter anyway because I am dreaming. He opened the door, and there was no more storm. Just stars and the moon, a beautiful waning moon, and a cool ocean breeze and a creature the size of a house standing there on his grandmother's lawn. He walked closer to it, moving slowly, still thinking about how this was all some dream, it all just had to be some dream. “You have something I need,” the creature with the huge beak said, and that did startle the boy a bit. “What–” he started but the creature with the kind eyes continued. “You have something I need and I have something you need. So let's walk and have a share”. He turned and started towards the water. The boy ran to catch up to this giant creature, but when he did the boy was speechless. Had he said a share? Like him and his grandmother said to one another when they had a good story to tell? “Okay, so what is your share?” the boy said shakily, still very much convinced this was a dream. “I am Fifer. I am a great auk. Do you know what a great auk is?” As the boy shook his head he saw a tinge of sadness in the creature’s giant eyes. “I am a large bird, but I cannot fly. I used to roam these very waters, but I can do that no longer. One time, I was trying to find my way home, and I got very lost and disoriented. It was a stormy night, similar to the storm that passed by earlier tonight. I could not find my way through the rain and wind. I fell into the ocean, and as I mentioned I do not fly. I was tossed and turned and pulled under and I thought I would surely drown.” The boy felt scared, but he saw no fear in the bird’s eyes. Fifer continued, “And then I saw a light, a beautiful light that shone through the storm. And I swam, I swam with all my might toward the light and it felt like forever but I finally made it out of the water and saw the light standing right in front of me. I ran up to the light and hugged it and all at once, the ground below the tall light began to crumble and she began to shake, and I stepped back and watched as she fell, slowly and quickly all at once, somehow falling as gracefully as she stood. And I cried, oh yes I cried for her, because she was so beautiful and she had saved me. I whispered a promise to her that night that I would make sure she lived on, that she wasn't forgotten.” The boy looked up at Fifer, feeling equally awestruck and sad. “I'm sorry to hear she fell down like that. Is there really nothing anyone could have done to save her?” “Maybe, maybe not. Sometimes beautiful things can be saved, and sometimes they can't, but they can always be lessons. That's the important thing to remember. Lessons about how we can be better next time, and something that we have done differently to prevent similar beautiful things from being destroyed. Maybe just a small something, but perhaps even a small something could change everything.” They walked for a moment in silence, and the boy watched the sand beneath his moving feet as he walked. “It's like me,” Fifer said finally, stopping to look at the boy. “I was once a great auk, a flightless bird that called the Atlantic my home, but I am gone, I am extinct, I am a ghost.” The boy recognized fear in Fifer’s voice, and he thought that maybe Fifer was worried that the boy would be scared to think of him as a ghost. But he felt the opposite. The more Fifer talked, the more endeared the boy became. “How can I see you then?” the boy asked slowly, raising his eyes to meet the bird’s. “I don’t know. But I knew that you could because you have before. You remember, don’t you?” The boy shook his head. “You were diving in the water and I was swimming below the surface and came face to face with you. I always do this whenever I see a person because I know that they can’t see me and I like to look at them. But you were different. You looked right at me, right into my eyes, and swam to the surface. As I came up I heard you yelling to your grandmother about the huge bird that you saw in the water. She told you I was just a seal, but you insisted. She just laughed and entertained what she thought was your imagination.” The boy looked up, considering this deeply now as a hazy flutter of a memory came back to him. “But that… What was that, like, five years ago?” “Yes, exactly that. Five years and two months ago.” the bird answered. “And after that I followed you and her back to that house. I looked through the window and saw you drawing.” Fifer looked into the boy’s eyes and continued. “You are an amazing artist and I know you will only get better and better. You will be great because you care. I have seen you care for the small bugs, the ugly toads and the frivolous minnows by the water’s edge. I have seen you care for the small creatures and the large ones too. You see them, you really see them, the way that I wish all humans, especially the grown up ones would see them, because maybe then they would be better. Better to us all. And better to each other.” Fifer paused to consider this before he swiftly changed the topic. “But anyway, may I have what you have been holding?” The boy looked puzzled, and then looked down in his hand. He had totally forgotten that he was still holding the rock. Without words he handed it to the bird, who took it with a little bow of thanks. Carrying the rock now, Fifer turned from the boy and began walking. Not wanting to leave this magnificent creature, the boy continued after him. They walked on, and soon they came to a lighthouse, and not just any lighthouse. The boy knew this lighthouse, because didn't they walk about a mile, and wasn't it just as it had looked in that newspaper that sat back at his grandmother’s home in that broken frame? And something more, wasn’t it made of the same rock that he had had in his hand, that rock that jolted him from his sleep tonight and in doing so set him on this incredible journey? Almost as if he knew what the boy was thinking, Fifer explained, “I have been collecting all the pieces, and storing them behind the dunes. I have waited until I could gather every last piece that was taken, and although it is not as it once was, it is enough.” The bird said this last part as he pushed the rock that the boy gave him into the largest of the remaining cracks. As the rock settled into the crack a light burst in front of them, it burst strong and bright and the boy had to close his eyes to avoid being blinded. Fifer turned to the boy and handed him a small book. “Here, this is my end of the bargain,” he said, and handed him what appeared to be a sketchbook and a pencil. Then he looked at the boy with apprehension. “I need to ask one more favor of you, but I promise this one will bring you happiness too in the end. I need you to draw her. You are the only one who can do it because you are the only one who can see her. None of this exists in your world anymore, not even the lighthouse not even its light but I know you can see it because you can see me and I can see her. Without any hesitation, the boy smiled and opened his new book. “Thank you,” Fifer said, tears of joy now filling his eyes. “I know that someday, you will be making work that will hang in galleries and museums and people will come see it and ask you questions and connect with it. And she too will be there, hanging on those walls and in all of her beauty she will live on. All I want is for you to sketch her as you see her tonight, and to someday use that sketch as the reference to draw her. For you to draw her and share her, and maybe she can be a reminder of what once was. Because she guided me on a rough night when I was lost.” “I will,” the boy said, looking up at his new friend. “But now I have a request. I will draw her for you, but only if I can draw you with her too. I want to draw you, as you were, as a reminder of the past. I want to draw you with the light you love so much. Please?” Fifer could see the passion in the boy’s eyes and more tears came rushing. “Really?” he said, brushing the sand off his bottom and standing straight. “Absolutely!” the boy responded, and opened the book. “Stand with her. Try to just be with her in this moment and remember how much she meant to you all those nights ago. Because the same way she guided you through the dark, you guided me. I wanted to be an artist, and if someone as special as you believes in me I know I can do it. I was lost too, not in a storm as you were but in life. I always felt funny for the fact that I would rather stay home and draw pictures than go out with all of the other kids. And that desire, that yearning, that need to create, I never felt it stronger than I do right now, seeing you standing next to your lighthouse. Thank you for reminding me of my purpose.” And so the creature stood with his lighthouse, and the boy sketched and sketched. The boy, Davey his name was, would indeed go on to create a fully rendered drawing of this piece, and he would invite his grandmother to his gallery show on opening night, the show where this one would hang proudly on that gallery wall, capturing a moment in time shared between a lighthouse and a gigantic great auk. With a knowing wisdom in her eyes, Davey’s grandmother would ask him where he got that strange idea for the piece with the bird and the lighthouse, and David would laugh, saying “Well, I think I can share that.” A good share, a good story. And he started to tell it, starting at the beginning, when he was a young boy and a bird the size of a house made him want to be an artist. He did share his story, the real story, with the only person who maybe, just maybe, believed it.