by B.M. Green
Chapter 5
Holidee awoke with a headache. She sat up, holding her head, and looked around the room. It was quiet. How long had she been out? Sunlight shone through the cracks in the shutters. Holidee threw off the blankets that were covering her and swung her feet over the side of the bed. The wood floors were cold to her bare feet. She walked over to the window and opened the shutters. Sunlight poured over her skin and filled her with warmth. Her headache was annoying. She put her hand to her head again and closed her eyes. Soon the headache went away. Then she opened her eyes and peered down at the ocean and the beach. Crix was sitting on the sand with his legs stretched out in front of him. The sun was shining on his hair, making it look golden. He turned around and looked at Holidee in the window. Then he waved and stood up. She waved back with a big smile on her face. He ran across the beach to the stairs and took them two at a time. Then he ran across the grass and to the house. He ran up the stairs and knocked on her door. She shook her head while smiling and opened the door.
“I have something to show you,” he said to her breathlessly. She followed him as he ran down the stairs and into a room she guessed had been used as a study. Crix turned around abruptly. “Close your eyes.” She obeyed and he led her into the dark room. She saw the lights switch on. Light peeked through her eyelids. She could hear Crix’ footsteps walking around the room. Then she heard a splash of water. “Okay. You can open your eyes.”
She opened her eyes and saw an immense tank of salt water in front of her. The tank was a little shorter than her and about eight feet wide. It sat on the wooden floor, with no stand. So it had to be about four and a half feet tall. It was big. It was filled about halfway up with foggy water. Then the top half of the tank had a little platform on one side with smooth rocks scattered on it. This is awesome. She knelt down next to it ad peered through the glass. Her hands could feel the cool water through the glass. Crix stood behind her smiling. Holidee thought it was amazing, but she didn’t know why Crix had done this. Then, out of the water, popped a tiny head. The baby sea otter smiled at Holidee through the glass and then dove back beneath the water. Holidee smiled as she watched the little mammal swim in the water. It twisted and turned its spine rhythmically in the water. He was a born swimmer. Then he crawled onto the little platform and laid down to rest. Holidee stood up and reached her arm into the tank and stroked the otter for a few minutes. Then she turned around and looked at Crix.
“This is incredible! Why’d you do this?” Crix shrugged his shoulders.
“I thought the little guy needed a bigger place to live and plus,” he said smiling, “you’ll need a big tank to take care of all the animals you’re gonna save.”
“Thanks.” Holidee said smiling. “For everything.” Crix smiled back and turned to leave, but Holidee stopped him. “How long was I out?” Crix didn’t turn around. He just twisted his head to the side.
“About three days.” Then he turned his head and walked out of the room. Three days? Holidee could hardly believe it. Had she really been asleep for three days? She pushed it out of her mind and focused back on the sea otter. It was so cute and so helpless. It needed to eat. But what do sea otters eat? she thought. She remembered the book she had gotten for her birthday. She ran upstairs to get it. Once there, she grabbed the book and ran back down the stairs. There, in the study, she flipped through the book until she reached sea otters. Clams and oysters, mainly. How was she going to get clams and oysters? Then she had an idea. She said good-bye to the sea otter and ran out of the room and out of the house. She ran down to the beach and to the water’s edge. Fye! she thought. She put her hands over the water and closed her eyes to concentrate. She was going to do the trick that Crix taught her a few days earlier. When she opened her eyes, she saw Fye. Holidee called Fye to her and not even minutes later Fye popped her head up out of the water.
“Fye,” Holidee said petting the dolphin. “I need your help. I need you to show me where I can find clams and oysters for Micrip,” then she added, “the baby sea otter you helped me save.” Fye nodded and dove underwater. “No, no, no. not now. Uh…how about tomorrow? Tomorrow would be better. When the sun rises? I’ll meet you down here.” Fye nodded and Holidee patted her back before she left. Then Holidee walked back up to the house. Crix was painting the unfinished porch.
“Hey!” he called as Holidee approached. “What’re you doing? You seem pretty busy.” He set down his paintbrush and wiped his forehead with his arm. Sweat dripped down his bare chest. He may have been in his early forties, and he may have been a schoolteacher, but he was built very well. His chest muscles were firm and glistening from the sweat and sun. His abs were well defined. Holidee counted six well-defined abs. His arms were big. Every muscle in them flexed and relaxed as he wiped his head. A button-up shirt was tied around his waist loosely, and his jeans were loose fit. No wonder Mer likes him, Holidee thought. “Holidee?” Holidee came back to reality and looked at Crix’ eyes. His eyes were shining too. Gray was an unusual color for eyes, but it seemed so perfect for him.
“Yeah? I’m sorry. What did you say?” Crix laughed.
“I asked what you were doing and in such a hurry?”
“Oh, you know, just stuff.” She said shrugging her arms.
“No, I don’t know.” Crix smiled and crossed his arms in a mischievous way. “What kind of stuff?”
Holidee looked at Crix. He looked like a little schoolboy. His eyes twinkled and his smile glistened. Holidee laughed to herself and crossed her arms, mocking Crix.
“When’s Mer coming?”
“Oh no! Don’t try n’ change the subject. I asked you a question.”
Holidee squinted her eyes at him. “Alright. I was talking to Fye. I needed her help with something.”
“Fye? Oh! Your dolphin friend. What kind of help did ya need?”
“Just some small stuff.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Nothing big.”
“Sure. With you, nothing’s small. I learned that a while ago.” He laughed and picked his paintbrush back up. He turned his back to Holidee and started making long, strong strokes with the paintbrush. White paint streaked across the wooden porch with each stroke. Crix’ back muscles flexed with each curving motion. He was very well built.
Holidee started to walk towards the door.
“One week.”
Holidee turned around and looked at Crix. “Huh?”
“One week. Mer will be here in one week.”
Holidee smiled and wanted to tease Crix a little. “How many hours?”
“Now, you better watch it or else some of this white paint might accidentally end up on you,” he said shaking his wet paintbrush. White paint dripped onto the lush green grass. Holidee smiled and Crix returned the smile. Then he went back to work as she grabbed for the door handle.
“Tomorrow at sunrise I’ll be down at the beach. Maybe even in the ocean.” Crix turned around and looked at her. “Fye is going to help me find clams and oysters for Micrip…the sea otter.”
“Okay. Then today we need to work a little more on your skills. Yeah?” Holidee nodded, and Crix returned to his work. Holidee walked into the house to change. She put on one of her bathing suits and then some jeans and a tank. Then she walked back outside.
“Ready.”
Crix looked at her. “That was quick. Here.” He tossed her a paintbrush. Holidee looked at it and then stepped up next to Crix, dipped the brush into the paint can, and started painting the porch.
“Well,” Crix said after a moment of silence. “since you know how to communicate with the marine life-“
“I do?”
“You said it yourself. You talked to Fye. If you can talk to Fye, then you can talk to any marine animal.”
“But she only nodded. She didn’t speak to me.”
“You probably know how to talk to her and any animal for that matter. You just haven’t tried yet. Tomorrow when you meet with Fye, try talking to her. Don’t actu
ally talk to her. She understands you, yes, but you can talk with her if you don’t actually talk. Just concentrate and talk with your mind. It’s kind of like sending messages with brainwaves. Talk to her inside your head. She’ll answer. Just try it tomorrow.”
Holidee didn’t quite believe Crix, but she knew not to doubt him completely because he had proven her wrong many times already.
“But, now, I will tell you how you can grow marine plants, mix cures for the sick and stuff like that. It’s quite simple. All you do is gather the right ingredients and mix them together in the right order at the right time. There’s really nothing else. You’ll memorize the recipes soon enough.”
“Is there a book or something I can study from?”
“No.”
“Then how am I gonna know what to mix and when?”
“You’ll learn.”
“How?”
Crix smiled and looked at Holidee. “Every Oceain has a special skill that he or she does best. Long ago when the Oceain race was rich in life, each Oceain had a specific job. Some were in charge of the medicines, some controlled the ocean currents, some watched the storms, and some talked to the marine life. No one had all of the jobs. Only one. You, however, have to learn every one so that you can teach others and strengthen our kind.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“You’re right!” laughed Crix. “I didn’t. All of the powers of our ancestors have been passed down to you. You have all of their knowledge. You just have to strengthen your mind and believe with all of your heart. It’ll all come to you. It may take some time…and practice…but it’ll come. You’ll see.”
“So what skill is your best one?”
Crix painted a little slower and was thinking. “Healing.”
“Healing?”
“Yes. I have always been very good at taking the sickness out of animals, plants, and even people. I can make them well. Sometimes, depending on what it is, I can bring something back to life after it had died. People, though, are much more difficult to give life and even heal, for that matter.”
Holidee thought for a moment and then asked, “What was my father’s best skill?”
Crix’ paintbrush stopped, and Crix stood still for a few minutes. “He was always very talented in talking with the animals.” Crix smiled and continued painting. “He would always have long conversations with them. He was a Babbler.”
“A what?”
“A Babbler. He could talk to marine animals.”
“What was my mom’s best skill?”
“She was an amazing Mother.”
“Well, I know she was a mother. What was her skill?”
“Her title was a Mother. She grew life. She nourished plants and animals and people. She was a Mother. She could cover a seed with her hands and make it grow instantly into a beautiful flower or anything else. She could grow marine plants effortlessly. She had always been very good at it too.” Both of them were quiet after that until Holidee spoke up again.
“Crix? Why are your eyes gray and mine are blue?”
“I would have thought you would have figured that out. I’m only half Oceain. My father wasn’t an Oceain, but my mother was. She was very beautiful. She had eyes like yours. Half Oceains, and any other impure Oceains for that matter, do not have blue eyes like yours. They do not have blue eyes period. Half Oceains have misty gray eyes. One-fourth Oceains have lighter gray eyes and so on.”
“But your eyes turn blue after you do a skill.” Crix laughed again.
“You’re right! You’re very observant.”
“I have to be, don’t I?”
“I guess so. My mother’s blood runs strong in me, so I am a little stronger than most half-breeds. All Oceains’s eyes, no matter their blood, become the ocean when they perform skills.”
“Oh.” Crix and Holidee continued painting the porch. Slowly, the porch became a clean white masterpiece.
The sun began to set and the light slowly faded away. The air became cooler. Everything began to get quiet. All was getting ready to settle down into Night’s sleep.