Secrets of Selkie Bay (13 page)

“I know, I'll go check on her. You deal with Neevy's diaper.”

“I think Neevy should go without a diaper,” said Ione. “If the seals can figure out where to do their business, so can she. Besides, we don't have many left.”

“Whatever,” I mumbled, not really listening. I was worried about how I was going to get my sisters and myself off this island. And I was worried about the seal. She looked weaker, with her eyes only halfway open. And I didn't want to scare Ione, but when the seal had barked at Henry, it didn't sound good and strong. It sounded just the opposite.

For her part, Ione was having the time of her life. She was playing house with a bunch of seals, and she believed her mum had returned and was lazing about on the beach, watching over her children, her nieces, and her nephews. The part of my plan that involved Ione seeing that the island had no selkies and giving up on the crazy story that I had started was failing splendidly.

“Good morning … uh … Mum,” I said softly as I bent down next to the seal. “You don't look very good.” She rolled over toward me as if to show me her wound, which was no better. “How did this happen to you?”

She looked at me with pain in her black eyes.

“Don't worry. I'll figure something out. Remember yesterday when you got up and swam and caught some fish? That made you feel better, didn't it?”

I rose and started down the beach. “Come on, Mum. Come on. Let's go get the fish!”

A shout from the cave interrupted my attempts to get the seal to the sea.

“Mum is not a dog, Cordie. You shouldn't treat her like one!”

I said something under my breath, something unkind, and the seal glared at me.

“Oh, don't even look at me like you understood that, Mum. You are just a seal. And you are not my mum, you know. I am just calling you that so Ione will stop bugging me. Now, I appreciate you getting us here and all, so why don't you be a good girl and go into the ocean and clean that thing off?” I pointed to the gaping cut on her shoulder.

But she just put her head down and gazed forlornly at the ocean.

This was not good.

I gathered some blackberry leaves, remembering how Mum would gather them from our yard, mash them up, and use them as a salve when we skinned our knees. Maybe, if I could place them on the seal's shoulder, it would give her a bit of ease.

 

A Daughter's Tale

There, there. That's better, right?

And if you are wondering if I think that the fact that there are blackberries here on the island and blackberries in our garden at home is a little coincidental, well the answer is yes. I do.

I can tell you that mashing the leaves up into a paste was not as easy as I thought it would be. Ione tried chewing them into a nice mash, but then her tongue got numb.

But I want to tell you things. Things while you sleep and maybe they will help you dream and maybe they will help you heal.

I am not sure which, but I would settle for either.

Once there were three sisters. One was older than the other two, much older. And then a sad thing happened. Well, before the sad thing, you should know that this family was very happy once. There was a mother with magical fingers who worked in a salon, and a father who repaired boats. They weren't rich, but the family was happy. And their three children were, too. Well, two of the children were. The last one was only a baby when the sad thing happened.

You see, their mother went away. And nobody knew where she went.

I bet you didn't know this, but when something bad like that happens to a kid, the other kids at school get all weird about it. None of them know what to say, so most of them don't say anything at all. It's like you have the plague. So all the friends the girls had kind of disappeared like fog does, so slightly at first that you don't notice, but then suddenly, it's just gone.

It made Ione angry and sad. She stopped even trying much at school. She'd never had an easy time with reading, but it got worse when her mum left.

And the baby, Neevy. She got strange fevers that came and went. And Da didn't think the oldest one knew how much it cost to go to a doctor. But she knew.

She knew that someone had to step forward and take care of everyone, so she did. Now, don't think that Da didn't do his part. He did. But he didn't make a lot of money, and the oldest daughter, well, she could tell that his heart was broken.

Maybe
shattered
is a better word. All the pieces were probably there, but in such tiny bits that you couldn't even see how they might fit against each other again.

You can't put something that broken back together. You just can't.

So, slowly this family started to crumble, too.

But that oldest girl, well, she wasn't going to let this happen. She worked hard and got a job cleaning a store for a crusty old man. She didn't want to do it, but if that was what it took to make things better, then that was what she'd do.

I didn't tell you, yet, about the letter. The oldest girl found a note from her mum, stuffed in an old book about selkies. The letter made the girl feel better at first, because she could tell that her mum didn't really want to leave. Because you see, when people leave without saying goodbye, it's kind of hard to tell. The girl tried hard not to be mad at her mum. Very hard. But sometimes she couldn't help it. Mums shouldn't leave their children.

Even seals know that.

But here comes the bad part, because the girl made up a lie and told her sister that her mum was really a selkie and that was why she left.

Her sister believed her.

And here comes the weird part. See, the oldest girl does not believe her mum is a seal. It would be stupid and ridiculous if she did.

But she wants to. Really badly.

She wants to believe that inside of the seal, somewhere deep inside, is her mum. And if she could only find a way to reverse whatever magic caused her mum to turn into the seal in the first place, then she could finally fix it all.

She couldn't do it, though. Fix people. But maybe she could fix the other problem, the one with money. Folks know it's not polite to talk about money, especially not having any, but the girl was smart and figured out where to find a treasure. A treasure would make lots of things better. Maybe then Da wouldn't have to work as hard and then he could help the girls find their mum.

Someone else wants the treasure, though, and that would be an old lobster-face of a man named Mr. Doyle. But he's just a crazy old man. He believes Mum is a selkie, too. And I bet if someone asked him, he would say he believes the moon is a piece of goat cheese on a fine china plate that a selkie stole from him long ago and tossed up into the night sky as well.

That kind of crazy.

But not as crazy as when the seal showed up in Selkie Bay, convincing the sister that she was right. Mum was trapped in a sealskin.

So the oldest girl, she did something she probably shouldn't have. But it was brave and courageous. It was the kind of thing her mum would have done, she thought. She took the family boat and … well, you know the rest.

I left out the part where you got hurt. I don't know how it happened, but I am very sorry it did.

And I'm not sure why you stayed with us, or how you saved us, but I really want you to get better. Because I bet a lot of those little seals will miss you if you go away. They need you.

*   *   *

We need you, too.

 

The End of the Camp

I
DREAMED I WAS IN A WHITE ROOM
with wires and tubes and silent machines. There was a window with white curtains, the sheer kind that are almost useless because they don't keep any light out. They just make the light fuzzy. But under the fake drapes are blinds that can be pulled and when they are, all the light is blocked out.

But in my dream, they were open and the fuzzy light filled the room. It was a bedroom of sorts, for there were a couple of beds with white sheets. I thought there was someone in the bed, but before I could be sure, I woke up.

The seal, whom I had been napping next to, still slept soundly.

“You used to curl up next to Mum in her bed, just the same way, and I'd get in on the other side. Don't you remember, Cordie?”

I remembered.

I remembered the way Mum changed her breath so it matched mine and how I could feel her heartbeat as I lay against her. And for just one minute, I let myself pretend that maybe I was there, snuggled next to Mum in her bed.

And it felt like home.

I put my arm around the seal and a little voice inside of me said, before I could catch it,
I miss you so much, Mum.

“Don't cry, Cordie. Mum is looking better,” Ione said bending down next to me. “Well, a little better, anyway.”

“I wasn't crying,” I said. “Just got some sand in my eyes. That's what I get for taking a nap on the beach.” I hadn't meant to fall asleep so early in the day, but it was much easier to sleep on this strange little island during the light of day than in the black of night. I had never seen as many dark shadows as I had last night. But I had to get up now and figure out things—like a way to repair the boat, how to find some treasure, and what to do about that seal.

The sky, which had been a patchwork of white fog and beautiful blue just yesterday, was now the color of pavement this afternoon. Dark, gray, and menacing.

“I don't like the look of this,” I said, standing up, dusting the sand from my bum, and pointing to the forming clouds.

“Well, I don't like the look of this,” Ione said, holding the empty diaper bag upside down. The food, the bottled water, and the diapers were running out at about the same rate.

“I guess it is blackberries again,” I said. Ione made a face.

Some of the medium-sized seals brought fish to the beach, but I didn't have it in me to gut a fish, let alone build a fire and cook it up. And I didn't have a knife, either. But at least we could feed the fish to the large seal. Neevy, who was still snoring lightly in Ione's arms, was going to have to learn to like berries, and fast. Or raw fish.

“Maybe we ought to explore the island,” I said. “We might find something else to eat. If blackberries grow here, maybe something else does, too.”

“And we should decide where to start digging. I am sure there is lots of buried treasure here. Remember? If I were a selkie, I would definitely bury my treasures here. Do you think we should leave Mum?” Ione continued. “She might be worried about us if we aren't here when she wakes up.”

“Well, why don't you wake her up and tell her, then?”

“Mum? Mum?” Ione said, kneeling next to the seal. She shook her a bit. “Mum, wake up.”

But the seal didn't move.

“Cordie, Mum won't wake up.”

I fell to my knees and felt the seal's chest to see if she was still breathing. She was, though they were light, small, slow breaths.

“She needs her rest, that's all.”

“I don't like the way she's breathing. It's like she's not breathing at all.”

I swallowed, feeling for the fib that would see me through this one. “Seals, I mean selkies, can hold their breath for a long time, so don't worry. Let's just let her sleep.”

I brushed my fingertips against her head.
Please be okay … Mum.

I prayed the tide would come up and carry her out to sea while we were gone and that the sea would heal her.

And if the sea wasn't willing to make her well again, I hoped it would still take her so that at least she wouldn't have to die alone, beached on an old island. Maybe it would be better if we stayed with her, but I couldn't chance it. One look into Ione's eyes told me what she needed was hope. She'd already been abandoned by one mum. I didn't think she deserved to be left by two.

*   *   *

I gathered up Neevy as Ione said a proper good day to each of the selkie cousins, telling them that we were going to check out the rest of the island and asking them to keep an eye on Mum.

“Get her whatever she needs,” she commanded.

Henry followed us as we trudged through the sand toward the caves.

“Go. Shoo,” I said.

“Oogh,” said Neevy.

“Don't shoo him, Cordie. He wants to come with us, can't you see? Come on, Henry.” She bent down and he tried to jump into her arms, as if he was a puppy! He knocked her completely flat on her back, planting himself on her stomach.

“What? You've never seen a girl carry her cousin around?” She grunted.

I laughed and shook my head. Ione looked ridiculous. Laughing felt strange, seeing as we were nearly out of food, the sky was getting darker, and the air smelled like rain. And I was horribly worried about … Mum. Mum who left us months ago and Mum who lay injured on the beach. The two of them swirled around in my mind, coming together and floating apart until I didn't know what I really believed anymore. So I tried not to think about it. Instead, I let the laughter burble out, skipping happily past the angry box, which remained securely closed.

*   *   *

Past the three caves was another small opening.

“I wonder if we can fit through,” Ione said, nudging Henry, who scampered on the ground in front of us. “Here, you try.” She gave him another gentle poke with her foot.

Henry went inside the small opening. We waited.

“I am going to crawl in after him. Maybe that's where they keep the extra sealskins. You know, the ones for us.” Ione sank to her hands and knees.