It didn’t make any sense. It was simply a totally inappropriate and inconceivable waste of a life. This train of thought had been the foundation of Bill’s thinking for the past week. Now he sat, slumped on a park bench, staring out over the waters of the harbour. In the background drifted the happy sounds of children playing. Their laughter mingling with the sounds of other sunny Saturday afternoon park-goers who were enjoying the mild weather. What would normally have been a glorious spring day had been tainted by the depressing memories of Alan’s funeral.

The memorial service had taken place yesterday. All of Alan’s family and friends were understandably distraught over his death. As his best friend, Bill had been asked by Alan’s wife to give the eulogy. Throughout the service Bill had fought to hold back his tears. The congregation of family and friends were still struggling with the death of such a relatively young man. Alan had so much to live for, he was a successful businessman, happily married with two young children. Even though the coroner had established the cause of death as accidental drowning, the case was rife with rumours, all of which proved ultimately inconclusive.

The thought that Alan could have taken his own life didn’t make any sense. It didn’t make any sense. However on reflection of the last few months, Bill realised that Alan had wavered from his normal behaviour. Adding to this were the whispers inferring that Alan had gone off the deep end, literally. It was said that he hadn’t fallen but had leapt overboard during a recent, off-shore club yacht race.

There were two reasonably trustworthy eyewitnesses to the event, still the facts behind the accident were unclear. Alan had been a keen sailor and was always very safety conscious. His yacht had been on an upwind tack, with Alan at the helm, when suddenly the boat was quickly brought around, almost colliding with a downwind boat. Then Alan had apparently leapt forward, leaving the helm unattended. With no one at the helm the boat naturally rounded back up into the wind. In the ensuing tangle of flapping sails and sheets, Alan had gone overboard. No one had actually seen him disappear. It was only when the boat was back under control, with someone else at the helm, that he was noticed missing. His safety harness and line were still attached, though trailing along behind the again moving yacht. A safety harness is attached in such a way that Alan would’ve had to physically un-clip the harness for it to come away. Which he may have done but was highly unlikely. When the sequence of events was retold at the coroner’s inquest there were strong pointers that his death may have been suicide. Although in the end it was ruled a tragic accident.

These and many other unanswered questions still bothered Bill. If Alan had been in a state of mind to leap to his death, as a friend, Bill felt he should have noticed. And maybe, just maybe, he might’ve been able to prevent a waste of a life. Without answers to his numerous questions, these thoughts kept plaguing him in waves. Bill spent his nights tossing and turning the recent events over in his mind. His eyes were now rimmed with dark circles and reddened by the tears which kept constantly welling up.

Now sitting on the park bench, Bill watches his own daughter play with Alan’s daughter. They are both around the same age. He notices how their joy of play seems untouched by the recent tragedy. Momentarily, their innocent play distracts him from a depressing reality. If he was only able to look at the world so naively.

Again he rolls the facts over in his mind, yet no matter how often he rehashes the circumstances leading up to his friend’s tragic death, it just does not make any sense.

Alan had everything. He was fit and active. He’d only just turned thirty eight. He was a passionate sailor and a devoted father with two young girls. He, like Bill, was a successful executive moving rapidly up the corporate ladder. Both had met at university and as long as Bill had known him, Alan was in total control of the direction his life took. All that had changed in an instant. His distraught widow now lay heavily sedated in their large, North Shore home. Alan had achieved the respect, position and material possessions that they had both aimed for, while studying together at University. They had both planned their lives, and Alan was the first to realise those goals.

Bill began to recall that his friend had of late done some odd things. Occasionally he had acted out of the norm. During a recent board meeting with a Korean bank, one of the bankers had asked Alan a question. When the reply was not forthcoming Bill looked across the table and noticed that Alan’s eyes seemed unfocused. He was staring out of the window rhythmically tapping his pencil on the table. Then the rest of the table turned, as the Korean businessman repeated the question. Alan then turned to stare at them blankly before jumping up and rushing at the window. Then with a strange yelp he rushed out the door.

It took some talking by the rest of the board to pacify the bewildered Koreans. Bill lied saying Alan must have had an urgent call to make. Later, when confronted about his actions, Alan seemed aware of what he had done. At the time Bill thought it odd, but now he began to see that it was part of a pattern that had been developing over the last two months.

At that moment Bill’s reverie is broken by a distant sound. One that seems to drift across the water with the breeze. The wind and the ripples on the harbour begin to increase. So does the volume of the peculiarly eerie and strangely alluring sound. The cacophony of sounds from the park fade till there is only the one single haunting melody. As the modulation increases, Bill begins to notice the colours in the sky intensify.

The surrounding trees and flowers began to glow and radiate, the greyish sky turns the most beautiful opalescent white. Magically every sad thought fades from Bill’s mind. The vibrant colours of the scene before him continue to increase. Until the beauty of the world reaches a sense of almost unbearable ecstasy. The sound, like a song, has filled his heart and mind to bursting. The universe seems to become totally one and everything glows with a powerful radiance. Bill wishes the moment to last forever, yet he begins to hear a small discordant note, cracking the all-pervading bliss.

Then he feels a tiny tug on his shirt sleeve, gently pulling him back. His mind for a moment distracted, Bill looks down to see the face of his daughter mouthing words. With an inward smile he focuses on trying to hear what she is saying. In a blinding instant the bright sound that had infused everything disappears. Like switching channels, reality clicks back into place. He then clearly hears his daughter calling, “Daddy! Daddy!”. The small hand tugging at his sleeve pulls him back into a world that is now duller and heavier. A wave of coldness wraps around his legs. Looking down he sees that he is standing in the water up to his knees on the edge of the harbour.

The radiance had faded completely and everything returns as it was. Bill feels that in comparison to that moment all of the rest of life will always pale.
He also realises that he needs to resolve Alan’s death, not just for any other reason than his own peace of mind. For ultimately he needs to expunge the guilt he feels at not being there when his friend had needed him most. Part of Bill’s reasoning is because he too is on a similar path. One that could be seemingly lead him to a similar fatal end.

As the executor of Alan’s estate, one morning, a week or more later Bill sits in Alan’s study sorting through all the documents which had remained untouched since the day of the yacht race. The steam rises into the still air from the cup of tea that Alan’s wife has made him. Watching the steam drift Bill sits mulling over the questions surrounding the events of the past few months more than concentrating on the task at hand. He finds that the centre drawer in the desk is locked. After a fruitless search to find the key he prises the drawer open with a screwdriver. Inside he discovers Alan’s private journal. Flipping through the pages, reading snippets here and there a whole raft of Alan’s inner secrets are revealed. Ones that Alan had kept hidden from his both family and his friends.

Bill reads that Alan no longer felt his life was his own. That it was a life made for others, for his family, his peers, society and even his friend Bill. The journal reveals Alan’s deep frustration at living a life he never truly wanted.

Bill reads of Alan’s resentment of not living how he wanted to live. Alan felt trapped and there seemed to be no escape. In many ways he felt dead long before the accident. Bill reads that Alan too has heard the song of the siren. It is then Bill realises that maybe it was she who had called Alan to his death.

It is then that Bill realises that we all have secrets, some of them deeply hidden deep – some so deep that even we cannot find them ourselves. While that inner voice, the voice of the siren, is the sound of our hearts seeking the truth. That as Alan tried to re-capture that moment of bliss, in the process of searching he began to destroy his marriage, his career and eventually took his own life. He wrote that only at that moment when he could live forever with the song of the siren would he finally be free.

Through the window a gentle breeze is blowing. Bringing with it a sweet, salty fragrance of the sea. It is then Bill realises it carries with it a faint calling of the siren. She sings to Bill, beckoning him to join her. Tempted as he is Bill, ultimately resists. He realises that unlike Alan he is happy with his life. The voice of the siren is luring him to a place where he doesn’t want to go.

Yet the song haunts Bill, the more he tries to turn away from it, the greater his conviction grows that the moment of bliss is not worth the heartache.

Several months later Bill stands at the grave side of another friend’s funeral. Waverley cemetery is well placed on the cliff edge with expansive views of the ocean. Bill now realises that Ken must have also heard the siren’s song and the lure for him was too much. Ken gave himself to the sea. He had gone on one of his regular early one morning swims and his body was found a week later with a beautific smile on his face, as though he had died happy.