np_author
She first read of it in a book-the elusive silver abalone. It was a treasure found only in stories-in legends, never in New England-but Marina Hales didn't believe in the word never, and thus she spent summer after summer searching the grey-brown sand. As a girl she dreamed of the abalone, imagined how it must feel to run her fingers over its delicate surface, but years passed, and one summer she woke to find herself thirteen. Her mother warned that the day would soon come in which she must grow up, but Marina begged for one last summer, one last adventure. She knew she must soon leave her childhood-and the silver abalone-behind, but she still clung to the thread of hope that she might someday find the treasure of her childhood dreams, and perhaps this was the summer the legends would unfold at last.