Echoes in the Clan Jetty

“Don’t touch that box,” whispered a voice – only there was no one there.

Ling froze, her fingers inches from the dusty music box she’d found wedged beneath a loose floorboard in her grandmother’s attic. The voice had been soft, like wind through reeds, but clear as rainwater. She looked around. Outside the window, the wooden stilts of Chew Jetty stretched into the misty morning, their reflections shimmering in the still water below. Her best friend Eddy was already knocking at the ladder door, calling up, “Ling! You’re gonna miss tide school again!”

But Ling couldn’t move. The box was old – carved with sea turtles and moonflowers, its brass latch green with age. And somehow, she knew it was meant for her.

Against the whisper’s warning, she lifted the lid.

A tinkling melody began to play – soft, haunting, like a lullaby sung underwater. But no one else heard it. Eddy bounded up the steps, grinning, but stopped short. “Whoa. What’s that smell?”

Ling hadn’t noticed before – the scent of salted plums and damp silk, like her grandmother’s long-lost shawl. But now it filled the room. And then… the whispers started.

Not from the house. From below .

Tiny voices, rising from between the pilings: “She remembers… she can hear…”

Eddy scratched his head. “Hear what? I don’t hear anything.”

Ling crouched by the edge of the floor, peering down through the cracks. “They’re talking,” she breathed. “The water people.”

Eddy laughed. “You’ve been reading too many grandma tales. There’s no such thing as – ”

A ripple passed under the jetty. A shadow, long and graceful, slipped beneath the house. Then another. And another.

That night, Ling crept back to the attic. She wound the music box again. This time, the tune changed – slower, sadder. And the whispers grew louder.

“She left the song behind…”
“She promised to return…”
“We’ve waited…”

Ling’s heart pounded. She remembered her grandmother’s stories – of the Merrow Sisters who once danced on the waves during full moons, singing songs that made fish glow and storms calm. But after a great flood, they vanished. The elders said it was just legend. But Ling wasn’t so sure.

The next day, she told Anna and Lily X at tide school, where kids balanced on floating desks and wrote lessons in sand trays. “I think the music box is calling them back,” Ling said.

Anna, ever practical, frowned. “Maybe it’s broken. Or haunted.”

But Lily X’s eyes sparkled. “Or maybe you’re the only one who can help them.”

That evening, Ling gathered her friends: Eddy, Anna, Lily X, quiet Bell, curious Emma, quick-thinking Hyuga, playful Pye, and brave Alexis. They sat in a circle on the dock, the music box glowing faintly in the moonlight.

“What if we play it together?” suggested Emma.

Hyuga adjusted his glasses. “If sound travels farther in water, maybe the song needs more voices.”

So they sang. Not the exact notes – none could hear the melody except Ling – but they hummed, clapped, tapped the wood, adding their own rhythm to the ancient tune. Pye banged a pot. Bell whispered a lullaby her mother taught her. Alexis played a bamboo flute.

And then – the water moved .

From the deep, shapes rose – not frightening, not ghostly, but beautiful. Figures with hair like kelp and eyes like moonstones floated just below the surface. One reached up, and Ling saw a hand – half-human, half-fish – brush the dock.

The eldest Merrow smiled. “You remembered us.”

Ling’s eyes filled with tears. “I didn’t know I was supposed to.”

“You are granddaughter of Mei-Lan,” the Merrow said gently. “She was our friend. When the flood came, she saved our song by hiding it in the box. But she never told anyone… until now.”

The music box chimed one last time – and then fell silent. Its job was done.

The Merrows dipped beneath the waves, but not before leaving a gift: tiny shells that glowed like stars, scattered across the jetty. From that night on, whenever children placed a glowing shell to their ear, they could hear a soft hum – a reminder that some stories never truly end.

And Ling? She kept the music box on her windowsill, not to open again, but to remember: even the quietest voice can echo across time.