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Nora had one job before the harbor office closed : repaint the line on the stone wall that marked high water . The old paint was a tired white streak , and people in town had started to argue about it . Some said the water came higher than it used to . Some said it was the same sea and a louder story . Nora did not want to win that argument . She wanted a line she could stand next to without feeling foolish . Her uncle Tomas met her with a can of paint and a folded notebook from the office . The wind was pushing the sea up the stones . A dark wet edge already sat above the old paint . A man on the path pointed at it . " Paint there . You can see the truth from where you are standing . " Nora looked . The water was high because the wind was shoving it . Wind can lift a tide for an afternoon and then let it fall . If she painted that wet edge , the line would remember one rough hour and call it the sea . She opened the notebook . Years of plain notes filled it : the height of ordinary high water , written by whoever was on duty . The early pages belonged lower on the wall . The later pages belonged higher . Not every year . Not every tide . Over a long time , the notes climbed . Tomas tapped a page . " Warmer water can sit higher , and ice that melts on land can add to the sea . A large part of the extra warmth we are keeping in comes from burning coal , oil , and gas . But do not paint that speech . Paint what these notes show on this wall . " Nora measured from the notebook , from the usual height in the recent pages , not from the splash at her shoes . The new line came out above the old one . It also came out below the water the wind had pushed up that afternoon . Her arm ached by the time the paint was even . She did not mind . An even line was the whole point . When she finished , the wind was easing and the water was slipping back down the stones . The fresh paint stayed dry . The man on the path had waited . " So it is not higher , " he said . " Not this hour , " Nora said . " The line is not about this hour . " She wiped the brush and closed the can . Tomas took the notebook back . The man stayed a moment longer , then walked on toward the boats .
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