Behind him, the coconut shell filled with rainwater. A seed split its side.
When the tide rose that afternoon, the sea reached the tent’s entrance. It did not take him. It simply washed the salt from his lips and left him sleeping.
The plants showed him their memory of him: a brief disturbance, a footprint that rain would erase. They were not angry. They were patient. They had watched empires drown and return to sand.
Inside, a man. Not dead. Just undone.
His name was no longer important. He had walked for two days without water, following a mirage of a map drawn in his own delirium. When he found the coconut, half-buried near the ruins of a fire pit, he didn't think. He smashed it against a rusted anchor, drank the thin milk, and let the flesh fall apart in his mouth like forgiveness.