The Girl Who Dreamt of Dolphins (4 page)

‘
Come away, come away’ he called. ‘They’re
dangerous!’

Reluctantly, Spirit turned away from the diver and swum slowly
away. He turned back to look one more time. The diver seemed to be
making a gesture with his hand.

‘
I think he’s saying goodbye to me’ Spirit said. The diver went
back inside the rusting hulk on the seabed.

Spirit sped up to the surface in a rush of excitement and
leaped high out of the sea before slicing back through the water to
where Dancer was.

‘
That was amazing!’ he said. ‘You haven’t lived till you’ve
swum with a human!’

‘
I don’t know’ said Dancer hesitantly. ‘I just don’t know. What
if it tried to grab you or something?’

‘
Don’t be silly’ laughed Spirit in reply. ‘They’re not water
creatures. They don’t know what they’re doing. There’s no way they
could outsmart us.’

They sped back home to the pod. All the way, Spirit was aware
of this strange sense of elation, of recognition, as though he’d
known humans all his life, but had only just remembered
them.

In the sea, although they may be a long way from each other,
dolphins are able to call between one another and come together as
a group. Within half an hour or so, they found Summer, Moonlight,
Storm, Chaser and Breeze. The dolphins rolled on the waves and
relaxed, warmed by the sunshine. Dancer soon told them all they had
seen at the wreck.

Spirit thought that Storm might be angry at him for what he
had done, but the older dolphin’s reaction was not what he
expected.

‘
Remember Spirit’ said Storm sternly, ‘humans might seem cute
and friendly and sometimes you can play with them, but they are not
dolphins and they can be unpredictable animals. You may think that
you know a human, you may think they are smiling at you, but they
are just wild animals really. You always need to take
care.’

Moonlight, though, had no such qualms and gushed excitedly
about the humans she had encountered in her life. She said that
they were always so friendly and that once they had thrown her fish
to eat. She said it was fun to ride at the bow of a ship and, if
you did so, all the humans would come out to look at you. She said
that they were mostly pink in the face, but sometimes brown and
that they had furry stuff on their head, like the tentacles of sea
anemones which would blow in the wind. She said they always seemed
to have a casing of stuff on their bodies when they were on boats,
but that sometimes when they went into the water they were all pink
or brown, except for something dark around their middle. She said
that they screeched and splashed a lot in the water and that they
were so clumsy that they were very funny to look at.

‘
What could be more harmless than a human?’ asked Moonlight,
echoing Spirit’s words to Dancer earlier.

Just then, a plastic bag floated past Spirit on the current.
Spirit was old enough now to know that plastic bags were not good
to eat. When he was younger though, he’d taken a bite and almost
choked on it.

Storm had been listening to Moonlight’s excited talk of
humans, preferring to say nothing. Now he spoke up.

‘
You see that white thing, floating in the water. Humans put
that there.’ Spirit looked at the plastic bag.

‘
But those things are dangerous’ said Spirit, remembering his
own close escape two summers before. ‘Why would they do
that?’

‘
Humans are careless’ replied Storm. ‘They don’t think. They’re
just like children really. They put lots of other stuff into the
water too, especially near the coast. If you’re near humans, you
never know what you might swim into.’

Dancer lost interest and spying a turtle ploughing slowly
through the current, decided to play with it. Dancer nudged it, but
the turtle, a very old creature if its look was anything to go by,
was unperturbed and continued with its steady progress
eastwards.

‘
Leave the poor creature alone’ called Breeze to Dancer, ‘and
show a little more respect to your elders and betters’ he added,
laughing. ‘Have a go at catching some fish instead.’

The pod moved off. They needed to eat. When on the search for
food, the dolphins worked as a group and were careful to follow the
lead of the more senior dolphin. Often that was Storm, but Storm
knew that Chaser had a real gift for second guessing the moves of
fish.

Using sonar detection by rapid clicking, Chaser had spotted a
group of squid swimming about a quarter of a mile away and quickly
whistled the pod into order. If there was one thing that Spirit
hated eating, it was squid. The tough, rubbery taste made him gag,
but Chaser and the others absolutely loved them and were delighted
at the prospect of such a tasty treat. Spirit hung back. He’d
rather go hungry than eat squid. Chaser led the charge and plunged
in amongst the shoal.

‘
Come on Spirit, you don’t know what you’re missing!’ Chaser
called out between gulps.

‘
Oh you go on, I’m not hungry. Really!’ replied Spirit. Chaser
glanced back.

‘
Oh come on Spirit, squid are really very tasty’ joked Chaser.
Spirit gave him a withering look. The other dolphins continued to
eat.

The sun was going down and soon it would be night. The day had
passed so quickly he thought, thinking back to the encounter with
the diver. Eating squid seemed hardly worth bothering about when
there had been so many other impressions to take in that
day.

Later, once the sun had gone down and the sea had turned to
inky blackness, the dolphins swam closer together. Storm swam
slowly next to Moonlight. With a worried look he spoke quietly to
his companions.

‘
I have a bad feeling about young Spirit. You know that
sometimes I have the gift of knowing things that have not yet
happened. I cannot say I know, but I have a feeling ….yes I have a
feeling.’

One by one, the dolphins slipped into their waking
sleep.

Chapter Three
:

Through the swirling mass of images that dominated Lucy’s
troubled sleep that night, she had a recurring vision of a small,
lone dolphin, a long way off in the deep blue void, calling out for
help. She swam towards the dolphin, furiously striking out with
arms and legs, but for all her effort the dolphin seemed ever
further away. The dolphin was distressed, but as she tried to get
closer it was gradually swallowed up into the depths of the ocean
blues. She knew she must come to the little dolphin’s aid, but she
simply did not know how to do so.

Lucy woke from her fretful sleep with a start. She lay there,
staring up at the ceiling, her heart skipping with anxiety. The
words of Bethany and Dad flooded back into her mind from the night
before.

Lucy wasn’t only curious to find out exactly what they had
been speaking about; she felt a kind of fear; as though she were
looking over the edge of a cliff, knowing that if she did so she
would have an irresistible urge to fall. She thought of her dolphin
dream again. Normally they were so comforting and just so nice, but
this morning her dreams merely added to her vague sense of unease.
In school, her English Teacher Mrs Penhaligon said that sometimes
emotions were like the tumble cycle of a washing machine; churning
feelings around, tossing them this way and that, while all you
could do was look in helplessly from the outside. That was how Lucy
felt this morning.

Lucy dragged herself out of bed and washed and dressed
quickly. She went downstairs to face the day. Bethany had slept on
the sofa-bed that night, but was already dressed, the sofa-bed
folded up again and the sheets and duvet stacked haphazardly on a
nearby chair.

‘
Hey Kiddo’ she said, ‘how did you sleep? You look half dead to
the world this morning.’

‘
I could have slept better’ Lucy admitted, yawning. ‘How about
you?’

‘
Well I have to tell you the springs in that sofa-bed have seen
better days’ joked Bethany. ‘Your Dad should take a look at it when
he can. In the middle of the night it started folding up with me in
it!’ Lucy smiled, but she could not put her whole heart into it as
she had the evening before. Bethany seemed to sense how she felt
and pulled her niece to her for a brief hug.

‘
When do you leave for school Kiddo?’ she asked. ‘I thought
maybe I could walk you in.’

‘
But I thought you said you had to be off early’ Dad broke in,
appearing from the kitchen. ‘You said you needed to get on the road
as soon as you could to miss the heavy traffic.’

Bethany half smiled and half shrugged in Lucy’s
direction.

‘
Are you leaving so soon Bethany?’ she asked. ‘You’ve only just
got here.’

‘
I know, I know’ said Bethany, ‘but I’ve got roads to travel,
people to see. You’re right John’ she continued, addressing Dad, ‘I
suppose I had better get going soon.’

‘
Lucy always walks in with Amy anyway’ added Dad, ‘don’t you
Luce.’

Lucy sighed inwardly. It felt like she’d had barely any time
at all with Bethany. She was half scared and half eager to find out
what they’d been talking about the night before, but now she
wouldn’t be able to at all. She felt awkward and
deflated.

Lucy poured out her cereals and took a grim crunch. Bethany
was already racing around the room, pulling together a few
scattered garments and thrusting them hurriedly into her hold-all.
Bethany tried throwing Lucy a winning smile, but Lucy wasn’t
impressed and glanced away.

‘
Please don’t go. Stay here another night’ she pleaded. She
almost thought that Bethany would waiver, but Dad quickly
answered.

‘
You know Bethany has to go Luce’ he said firmly. ‘You’ll see
her again soon enough.’

‘
Will I?’ asked Lucy, despondently. It seemed like Dad just
wanted Bethany out of the door and somehow she got the impression
that she wouldn’t be seeing her aunt again anytime too soon. She
glanced across at the photo of Lucy, Mum and Dad on the window
sill. Already she couldn’t quite remember what Mum’s voice sounded
like. She felt a pang of loneliness and looked back at Bethany
imploringly.

Bethany was already standing, bag in hand, coat in the other,
ready to go.

‘
Come here’ she said. Lucy stood, feeling sad and small.
Bethany gave her a great hug, bag and coat and all.

‘
Au revoir, auf wiedersehen and arrivederci’ she mumbled into
Lucy’s ear as they hugged. ‘I’ll see you before you know it Kiddo.’
Bethany always said she felt that it was easier to say goodbye in
another language.

She pulled away and nodded to Lucy’s Dad.

‘
Bye then John, see you soon.’ She turned and headed towards
the door. It seemed to Lucy that Bethany might be hiding a tear as
she did so, but maybe she was just imagining it. Lucy ran to the
door and waved as Bethany pulled away from the curb in her rusting
Land-rover.

‘
Bye bye Bethany’ she called, ‘Auf Wiedersehen!’ The old car
turned the corner. Lucy closed the door and returned to her
breakfast, sullenly determined not to look Dad in the eye. She
crunched her cereals moodily.

Dad was off to work a few minutes later and so was Lucy,
walking wearily to school with the weight of the world on her
shoulders.

‘
Cheer up Lucy’ called Amy, crossing the road to join her. ‘You
look miserable this morning.’ Lucy told Amy all about the night
before.

‘
Well that’s pretty weird’ said Amy sympathetically. ‘What do
you think that was all about then?’

‘
I wish I knew, but really I have no idea’ said Lucy ‘It was
like Dad couldn’t wait to get Bethany out of the house this
morning.’ They turned the corner to walk through the school gate
and into the crush of children in the playground. The bell sounded
and they streamed into class for another school day.

Lucy had swimming practice again that lunchtime and ploughed
up and down the pool, slicing decisively through the water, turning
quickly with a practiced elegance at each end, oblivious to the
other children splashing around in the other lanes. She swam longer
than she meant to and rushed to Mrs Penhaligon’s class
breathlessly, coming in through the door two minutes after the
bell, just as the other children were opening their
books.