Chapter 3
Workers pulled crate after crate off the vans. They looked like regular dog crates, but each one held one or two or three oiled pelicans.
Dad had been glued to his phone the whole time we were talking to Mr. Hauser, and now I realized why—already people were pulling up in the parking lot. I recognized some of our regular volunteers in the crowd, but there were new people too.
“Volunteers! Inside the washing tent, please!” Mom shouted from the doorway of the temporary building. She was juggling a stack of papers, her hair flying in her face, and seemed flustered. “Abby will lead a training on washing techniques.” She turned to the workers unloading the crates. “Put the pelican crates in a line by the admission pens,” she said. “Mr. Hauser, I need you in here, please.”
With that, she disappeared into the building. Olivia and I looked at each other, then rushed after her. We found her inside, muttering to herself, her face flushed.
Mom looked up as we entered. “We really cannot do this all ourselves. The Department of Wildlife and Fisheries said they’ll send more volunteers in the morning—trained in bird-washing—but in the meantime, we’ll have to make do with this first batch. Girls, I want you to help transfer the oiled birds into the holding pens.”
Olivia nodded. I swallowed hard. I hated to see sick animals, and these birds were very, very sick. Still, I had to be brave—we both did. These pelicans had no one else to depend on.
We opened the door to the first cage. A pelican sat toward the back, blinking at us in the sudden light. He was brown all over, just like the pelican on the beach. He didn’t move as I reached in and gently scooped him toward me. A healthy bird would be squawking and flapping all over the place, trying to get away. It seemed like he was being gentle, but his quietness was a sign of how sick he really was.
Suddenly I stopped. The pelican had a chunk missing from the web of his right foot. “Olivia! It’s the pelican from the beach—the one we first saw!”
Olivia gasped and looked at him more closely. “You’re right. I’m so glad they picked him up.”
“You’re going to be OK, buddy,” I murmured to him.
Olivia helped me carry the bird to the holding pens. We sometimes had pelicans at Seaside Sanctuary, so we knew how to hold one. Adults could carry the birds by themselves, but we were smaller, so we had to do it together. One of us gently held his beak closed, so he wouldn’t snap at us, and the other held him firmly under one arm, his wings folded against his body. We didn’t want him flapping around and hurting himself—or us.
We carried him to the row of admission pens. I could smell the oil on him. Normally pelicans mostly smell like fish, but this guy smelled sharp and chemical—like no animal should smell.
We placed him in the pen, where he waddled to the back and then just stood there, looking miserable. Gently, I closed the door behind him and latched it.
“I don’t think I can do another one,” I said. Before I could stop them, tears were spilling down my cheeks. Olivia hugged me. She was crying too. “It’s just so awful seeing them this way,” I sobbed.
She nodded and snuffled, wiping her nose. “But we have to keep going. They need us. They’ll die without our help,” she said.
I took a deep, wobbly breath and tried to stop crying. “I know.” Suddenly anger swept over me, as fresh as the tears had been. “Who’s responsible for this? That’s what I want to know! These pelicans were just living their lives, swimming and fishing and flying, and all of a sudden, they’re poisoned. Who did it? Who?”
By the end, I was practically yelling. I didn’t know why I was shouting at Olivia. It wasn’t her fault. She just happened to be standing there.
“It was two tankers that crashed into each other,” Olivia said. “You remember what Mr. Hauser said.”
“Yeah, but somebody owns those tankers. We should find out whose fault it was,” I said. “Companies pay to clean up oil after spills. Whoever did it this time is going to pay to help these birds and the beach and all the other animals they’ve hurt or killed.”
Olivia nodded. “I know. I feel the same way. But that will have to wait. There are more birds coming off the vans. Come on.”
* * *
The rest of the day was a blur of oiled pelicans, dog crates, bird bands, plywood, chain-link, buckets of fish, buckets of soap, and hoses. Mom and Dad and Abby and Mr. Hauser were everywhere, directing volunteers, showing vans where to park, banding birds as they were brought in.
Quietly, volunteers started a pile at the very edge of the property, behind the office: birds that had died on the journey from the beach. They had to be examined and counted too. All the numbers needed to be reported to the state Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.
By early afternoon our hands were greasy and stained brown. My hair was a mess, and Olivia had brown streaks on her cheeks from where she’d pushed her hair back. But we didn’t stop working. We couldn’t stop—there were too many birds. I kept walking past the pen where we’d put that very first pelican. I was already thinking of him as ours.
“Olivia,” I said, when we both stopped to rest outside his pen for a minute. “I think this guy deserves a name.”
“You know what Abby always says …” Olivia began.
“I know, I know! ‘Don’t name them, you’ll get too attached, they’re wild animals, not pets,’” I repeated, quoting Abby. “But …”
I crouched down by the wire mesh and looked at the pelican. Abby had banded him number 563. He gazed back at me calmly. Birds can’t show distress on their face, like mammals. They don’t have facial expressions. But I could feel his desperation anyway.
“Pellie,” Olivia said suddenly.
“What?” I looked up at her.
“Pellie. His name is Pellie.” She stared at him. “And I don’t care if we get attached. I want to get attached.”
I nodded. “I like that. Pellie it is.”
Finally the rush of birds slowed. As the sun was setting in a blaze of rose and gold, the last van slammed its doors and drove off, its taillights glinting as it disappeared up the driveway.The volunteers would all be back, bright and early, but the first day was finished.
“Whew.” Mom exhaled as she sank down on an overturned bucket. She leaned over and rubbed her face. “What a day.”
We all sat around her, covered in feathers and oil. The birds were quiet in their pens, a true sign of how sick they were. If they’d been healthy they would have been causing quite a ruckus, I knew. No one said much of anything. I felt flattened by the sight of all the sick birds and hopeless at the thought of how many more were still out there.
“Come on, everyone!” a cheerful voice interrupted. I looked up to see Mr. Hauser holding a tray with six steaming mugs balanced on it. “I hope you don’t mind me taking over your kitchen briefly. I didn’t want to disturb you.” He handed around the mugs.
“Mmm,” Mom inhaled. “Sassafras tea! Where did you get it? It’s not from around here.”
“No indeed.” Mr. Hauser took a noisy sip of his. “I’m not from Charleston originally. My family is from West Virginia, and my mother regularly sends me packets of roots she’s collected around our house. Ginseng too.”
I inhaled the sweet, licorice-smelling steam and took a long sip. The scalding liquid burned a little path of fire right to my belly. “Mmm,” I echoed.
“I thought we could all use a little pick-me-up,” Mr. Hauser continued. “I know the first day after a spill is hard. You can’t help but feel knocked down. I always do. But I’ve seen a lot of spills, folks. These first few days are critical. And we’re making progress. We saved dozens of birds today, and we’ll save more tomorrow. We can be proud of that.”
I looked around at Mom, Dad, Abby, and Olivia, all sipping their mugs of hot tea, resting, getting strong for tomorrow, and I saw small smiles creeping over their faces too. Mr. Hauser was right. We couldn’t let ourselves get discouraged yet. Not when we’d done so much—and there was still so much left to do.