The storm dissipated with the rising of the sun. Monstrous waves had swept over the island all night leaving the sandy beaches smooth.
Slowly crawling out from under a rock, an orange hermit crab scuttled into the sun. His shell was cracked, and it was time to find a new one.
Maybe something useful washed ashore. The crab began to scuttle along the beach, using its claws to tap shells hoping to find a new home. A lot of strange things had washed up on the shore. The crab climbed over broken spars of wood, torn cloth wood, glass bottles, but nothing seemed to make a good shell. Finally, on a squishy yellow hill, it found shells on a string.
“Ow. Wait, where am I,” Rumbled the hill. The crab darted off the hill as it rose up. It wasn’t a hill after all, but a person.
“Whoa, my head hurts… I must have washed ashore.” The person looked down at the hermit crab. “Hello there. It’s ok little friend, I didn’t mean to startle you.”
He carefully scooped up the hermit crab and held it up to get a closer look. “You must be one of the locals. You wouldn’t happen to know where I am, would you?”
He stroked the crabs’ shell gently. “Oh, looks like you could use a new shell buddy. Here, try this.” He plucked the shell off his necklace and put both it and the crab on the sand. The hermit crab quickly moved out of his cracked shell into the new one.
I need to do something nice for this person who gave me a new shell. The crab quickly scuttled away, to the disappointment of the man, until he heard a rapid CLINK-ing sound behind some broken wood. Walking over to it, he was surprised to see the hermit crab, standing on a piece of paper, tapping a glass bottle.
“Of course! I can send a message in a bottle. What a clever little crab you are. Well, this calls for introductions. My name is Wilson, and I was shipwrecked by that terrible storm. And you… I’ll call you Chuck. I always wanted a friend named Chuck.”
Wilson began looking for something to write with, while Chuck watched. I think Wilson and I are going to be good friends.