It was big and black, and it appeared and then was gone.
I stopped paddling. I bobbed on the waves, afraid to move or splash or breathe. I scanned the water. There was nothing but water. I must have imagined it. If it was a shark, it was the size of a submarine. And I was sitting in a thin piece of fiberglass.
The fin reappeared. It looked a lot smaller and, thank goodness, was moving away. It disappeared under the water again. Should I just wait until it left, or should I spin around and paddle like crazy in the other direction? Before I could decide, another fin broke through the surface near me, and then another and another! They were much closer now, between me and the shore. They came up out of the water and then disappeared beneath again.
My brain raced, trying to make sense through the fear. Not sharks. Sharks didn’t travel together. And then I remembered that a shark’s dorsal fin has a straight edge. A dolphin’s curves toward its tail. These were dolphins. It was a bunch…um, a herd…no, that was wrong. Dolphins were like fish, so it must be a school. I was seeing a school of dolphins.
Just then a gigantic fin rose very close to my kayak. Below it I saw a black back and a flash of white and then a head. It wasn’t a dolphin—it was a killer whale, and it was looking right at me! It slid back under the water, and a second one breached right beside it. It was enormous—or was it just closer to me than the last one? There was a loud sound, like breathing, and I spun around. There was another one on the other side of my kayak. I was in the middle of them.
I sat there, stunned and shocked and scared. The fins kept popping up and out of the water on both sides of me and then in front of me. I bobbed along as they moved forward. Soon they were all in front of me. I tried to count them, but it was impossible as they moved in and out, up and down. Let’s just say there were a lot of them. They were moving quickly, and I watched as they got smaller and farther away. Finally they disappeared.
My whole body shuddered. I took a deep breath. That had been amazing. Just amazing. I found myself wishing they would reappear and come back. But more than anything I wanted to get land under my feet. I started paddling back to the cove.
Left, right, left, right, I paddled. I kept glancing over my shoulder for dorsal fins that never appeared. I was disappointed. And relieved.
Some time later, back at the cabin, I was startled by the front door opening. I looked up from the table. My grandfather had an easel over his shoulder and a canvas in his other hand. I had thought he was quietly working away in his studio. He nodded his head slightly. I was going to add that to our word count for the day. I was now ahead one to nothing.
He leaned the easel against the wall, put down the canvas and removed his coat. Underneath was a white knit sweater that was stained with paint. The stains weren’t new. He wore this sweater all the time.
He came over and looked at the books scattered in front of me. “You’re interested in orcas?”
I could have just said “yep” and stayed four words ahead, but I didn’t.
“I saw a school of them today. When I was kayaking.”
I had just put him in the lead.
He nodded. “A group of whales is called a pod. You found the kayaks in the shed.”
“Yeah, I cleaned one of them up.”
“And you were out kayaking when you saw the pod?” he asked.
“They sort of surrounded me.”
“Were there about ten of them?”
“I think so. It was hard to tell. Fins just kept popping up and then disappearing.”
“Come and I’ll show you something.”
He walked toward his studio. I got up and followed. The door to his studio was sticking a bit too. Maybe the next time he went out, I’d try to fix it.
He was fumbling around, searching through a series of stacked canvases. He found one and pulled it out. The painting was a side view of six or seven dorsal fins. Two of the whales had their backs out of the water. In the background was the cove.
“Do you recognize any of them?” he asked.
How was I supposed to answer a question that stupid?
“It’s not as stupid as it sounds,” he said.
Had he read my expression?
“They have distinct dorsal fins. Do you see this one?” he asked, pointing at the painting. “He has a notch close to the bottom of his fin, and the white patch around his eye is—”
“I saw him!” I exclaimed. “He came up close to the surface and turned to look at me.”
“I’m not surprised. He’s the youngster in our resident pod.”
“I don’t know what that means,” I said.
“We have a pod that lives around here. I can recognize them all. In the late summer, when the salmon are running, we often get a superpod, as other pods come for the feast.”
“So this is a fish-eating pod instead of one that hunts and kills seals or other mammals.”
“You know about orcas?”
“I know some,” I said. What I knew was what I had just read.
I looked at the painting again. It was so realistic. So good.
“I did a series of paintings about this pod. But I haven’t been out on the water for a while…years, in fact.”
“I got the other kayak out of the rafters. I could clean it up and we could go out together,” I said.
Judging from his expression, he seemed as surprised by what I’d said as I had been when the words came out of my mouth.
“I have to finish up a painting tomorrow.”
“Sure,” I said. Why did I think he would want to do anything with me?
“But how about if we go out the day after that?”
“Yeah, sure. I guess that’s okay.”