A Sea of Unspoken Things

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of graphic violence and death.

James, a woman in her late thirties, is driving on a narrow road through the Six Rivers National Forest in California. After living in San Francisco for around 20 years, she is traveling back to the family home that she left at 18. She is still grieving the death of her twin brother Johnny, and she does not want to return. She thinks that Six Rivers has many secrets that she wants to leave buried. 

Unlike James, Johnny had stayed in Six Rivers and remained connected to nature. He was a solitary individual and found comfort in places that other people deemed lonely. He loved the outdoors and was working as a nature photographer when he was fatally wounded by a hunter’s errant bullet. James physically felt the bullet that killed her brother, though she was far away, and at that moment, she also sensed what he was feeling: He was afraid. This is why she is sure that his death was not really an accident.

James arrives back at the cabin where she and Johnny grew up. Their mother became pregnant only a few months out of high school, and she soon left them with their father and moved away.