by Eric Walters
“A whale can’t be out of water for that long. It dries out. It gets sunburned.”
“There has to be something we can do.”
My grandfather didn’t answer.
“So we’re just going to stand here and watch it slowly die?” I couldn’t believe it. “That seems cruel.”
“It does. But that’s the way the world works.” He turned and started down the rocks. “C’mon. Let’s go back to the cabin, and I’ll radio it in.”
I remembered how slick and sharp the rocks were. I wanted to yell out, “Be careful!” but I didn’t.
I looked down at the whale. His name was Oreo. Somehow it made it even worse to know he had a name. His dorsal fin was moving up and down slightly. I could see him breathing. It almost looked like he was shuddering. He had to be terrified. Alone, nobody to help him, no way out, things only getting worse by the minute. I knew what that felt like. He cried out again, and I turned away. I ran to catch up to my grandfather.
Chapter Nine
My grandfather was on the radio. He had already called the coast guard. They had no ships in the area. He was speaking now with Captain Ken. I listened in on the conversation—I could hear both sides of it—and it didn’t sound encouraging. Captain Ken wasn’t close enough to help either, and they were talking about other boats that might be. He didn’t have any other suggestions.
There had to be something we could do. If we’d had internet access, I could just google “stranded whale.” I would have been sure to find some answers. Mr. Google always seemed to know things. Wait! We did have books!
I ran over to the table where I’d piled the books about whales that I’d been reading. There were four of them plus some old encyclopedias. There had to be something in them about stranded whales. I opened up the first book and started to scan. No, I should use the index! I flipped to the back and ran a finger down the listings. There it was—stranded. Pages 48–49. I flipped back and found the spread. I had started to read when a shadow fell across the pages. I looked up to see my grandfather standing over me.
“I’m reading about stranded whales and—”
I stopped talking when I realized he was holding a gun—a big gun.
“What are you doing…why do you have that?”
A tingle went through my whole body, because I was pretty sure I knew why.
“There’s no help coming,” he said. “It’s like you said. We can’t just stand there and watch him slowly die. That would be cruel.”
“So…you’re just going to kill him?”
“I don’t have much choice. What else can we do? Is it right to leave him there to suffer when we know he’s going to die?”
I didn’t have an answer.
“I think it’s better if you stay up here. There’s no point in you seeing this.”
I wanted to argue, but I didn’t want to be there. I didn’t want to be anywhere. I wondered if I’d hear the shot being fired.
My grandfather put a hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry. I wish there was another way.”
He let out a deep sigh and started for the door.
I couldn’t even bring myself to watch him go. I heard the door open and close as my eyes fell back to the pages. And then they focused.
There was a picture of a pod of whales stranded on a beach. They weren’t killer whales. The caption said they were pilot whales. The whales had been draped with sheets or towels or something. That had to be to protect them from the sun. And there were people carrying buckets, and one of them was dumping water onto the back of one of the whales. Isn’t that what my grandfather had said—that they had to be protected from the sun and kept from drying out?
I jumped up from the table, still carrying the book, and ran out the door. My grandfather was on the path, not far ahead.
“Wait!” I yelled.
He stopped and waited for me.
“These people are saving a herd, I mean a pod, of stranded whales,” I said as I reached his side. I held the picture up for him to see. “They’re stopping them from getting sunburned and drying out, the things you said would kill Oreo.”
“Those are pilot whales,” he said.
“But whales are whales. What difference does it make?”
“Those whales are on a beach. Not on sharp rock. There’s no telling how much damage has already been done.”
“We could look. We could get close enough to see.”
“You have to know that when whales strand, it’s often because something is wrong with them. They’re sick and going to die anyway.”
“Or maybe it’s because they’re inexperienced. You said it yourself. Teenagers do stupid things all the time,” I said.
He didn’t say anything for a while.
Finally he spoke. “We’d just be wasting our time.”
“Do you have someplace you’re supposed to be?”
“Of course not.”
“So why not try? And even if we can’t save him, we still wouldn’t have wasted our time. We’d know we had done everything we could.” I tapped my finger on the picture. “We have to try.”
Again he didn’t say anything. But he did look like he was thinking.
“Doesn’t everybody deserve a second chance?” I asked. “Isn’t it worth a try?”
“Probably,” my grandfather agreed, nodding. “Besides, I don’t think I could have done it.”
“Done what?”
“Pulled the trigger. I don’t think I could have done it. Let me have a look at that book.”
Chapter Ten
I stood beside the whale. I’d never been this close to a living thing that was so big. He had reacted when I’d climbed down beside him, wiggling around. Now he had calmed down but was still trying to follow me with his eyes. I was taking my grandfather’s advice and making sure I didn’t get near the whale’s mouth. It was slightly open, and I could see the teeth. They were huge and sharp. I wondered if they looked like what a T. rex’s teeth would have.
I knew that killer whales had never harmed a person in the wild, but I’d read about a couple of people who had been killed by captive ones. This whale wasn’t captive, but he was no longer free, and I didn’t want to take a chance.
“Do you see much bleeding?” my grandfather yelled down. He was on the rocks above us.
“Just a little on the tail.” Of course, I couldn’t see the underbelly. I wondered if I’d even caused some damage when I came down and scared Oreo.
“I’m lowering the bin!” my grandfather called.
I stumbled a bit as I looked up at the blue container being lowered by a rope. To steady myself, I put a hand on the whale. His skin felt like rubber—dry rubber. I quickly removed my hand and went to get the bin.
I put the bin on a flat spot. Inside it were sheets and towels. They were soaked in seawater and were cold and heavy. I pulled out the first sheet. It was a blue and green sheet from my grandfather’s bed.
I spread the sheet out, starting at the whale’s tail and pulling it toward the dorsal fin. The blood on the tail soaked into the sheet, making it blue and green and slightly reddish.
The whale cried out and shook a little bit. The feel of the sheet had to be terrifying. He opened and closed his mouth a couple of times. The teeth looked bigger than ever.
“It’s okay,” I said. “Don’t worry… Oreo.”
Calling him by name seemed to calm me. It seemed to calm Oreo as well, or maybe it was the sound of my voice. Anyway, I needed to keep talking.
“I’m going to put a second sheet on top of you,” I said. “I need to protect you from the sun.”
The sun was high in the sky now, and today of all days there was almost no cloud cover. It would have been so much better if it were raining.
I draped the second sheet over Oreo’s dorsal fin and pressed it against his top and sides. Because the sheet was wet, it stuck nicely. The two sheets covered most of the whale. I used soaked towels to cover the rest of him, leaving the breathing hole on the top of
his head open. I was also careful to avoid his mouth and eyes. I imagined it would be even scarier not to be able to see what was happening. The last thing this whale needed was to be more scared.
“You’re doing a good job, Dylan,” my grandfather called down. “Now you have to pour water over him!”
The sheets were wet, but they’d soon dry out in the sun. My grandfather had also told me about the dangers of the whale getting overheated. Pouring water would help to keep the whale cool, or at least cooler, as well as prevent him from drying out.
The bin was now empty. But it wasn’t going to be for long.
The tide had continued to go out, and even the spray from the waves crashing up on the rocks wasn’t reaching us anymore. What was left behind, though, was a large pool of water. I was going to use that pool.
I dipped the bin into the water and filled it to the halfway mark. Any more and it would be impossible to carry. As I picked it up, I realized it was already almost too heavy. I carried it over and tipped it, spilling the water over Oreo’s back. It rained down the whale’s side, pressing the sheets and towels even tighter against his skin.
“Does that feel better?” I asked.
Oreo answered by opening and closing his mouth and then blowing some air—and a little bit of water—through his blowhole.
“You have to keep moving!” my grandfather yelled. “You got him wet, but you need to get him cool.”
I took the bin back down to the pool. I tried to figure out how much water was here. Was it enough, or would I eventually have to get water from the ocean? That could be a problem, as the tide was still going out and the rocks now rose higher from the beach. But I couldn’t worry about that now.
I half-filled the bin again and lugged it back over the rocks. This time I went toward Oreo’s tail. I poured it along his back and then onto his tail. Oreo flicked his tail, and some of the water was thrown back onto me.
This was what I’d have to keep doing—for hours and hours and hours.
Chapter Eleven
The sun was now directly overhead. I had stripped off my coat and my sweater and was still working up a sweat. Oreo didn’t have a choice. I couldn’t strip any layers off him. He needed more water to keep his temperature down. My arms were sore from the ten million bins of water I’d dumped over the past few hours.
I stopped and bent down right beside his head. I needed to rest, but I thought Oreo could use some reassurance. Maybe I was just imagining it, but I thought his eyes looked more calm when I was talking to him.
“I’m just taking a bit of a break,” I explained. “You’re doing well. The tide will be coming back in soon.”
Soon meant in about an hour. But I’d still have to wait for high tide before there’d be any chance of Oreo getting free. As the sun got hotter and hotter, it was going to get harder and harder for me to get water. I’d pretty much used up all the water in the pool. Soon I’d have to climb down the rocks, dip the bin in the ocean and then muscle it back up, trying not to spill it or fall.
I was also getting very hungry. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and even then I hadn’t eaten much. My grandfather had gone off a while ago to get us both something to eat. I hoped he would be back soon. Not just because of the food—I wanted him here. I felt alone and a little scared.
Really, of course, I wasn’t alone. And it wasn’t just Oreo here with me. The entire pod was here, not far from the rocks, as close as they could come. Only the receding tide had forced them farther away. They still called out, and Oreo answered. He couldn’t see them, but he knew they were there from their calls.
I jumped off the rocks and onto the sand. With the tide out, there was more beach now. Blue bin in hand, I walked toward the water. I came up to the stick my grandfather had stuck into the sand to mark the water level. The fact that it was now a dozen paces from the water confirmed that the tide was still going out.
My grandfather came around the other side of the rocks. Now that the tide was out so far, he could make it here along the beach. He had a pack on his back and something over his shoulder. As he came closer, I realized it was a green garden hose.
“Sorry it took me so long,” he said. “But I got an idea.”
“The hose.”
“And this pump.”
A bicycle air pump was attached to the end of the hose, held in place by gray duct tape.
“I want you to take one end of the hose up to Oreo. I’m going to try to pump water up from the ocean,” he said.
“Do you think it’ll work?”
“I’m a painter not a plumber, but it should work. At least, I hope it does.”
“Not as much as I do. I was not looking forward to trying to lug this water up the cliff.”
“Let’s test it out. Take the end of the hose and the pack. There’s food in there.”
I dropped the bin to the sand, slipped on the pack and took the end of the hose. I uncoiled it in one direction. My grandfather unspooled it in the other as he headed for the water’s edge. I climbed up the rocks. They were becoming less dangerous and less slippery as they dried.
By the time I reached Oreo’s side, my grandfather was already standing in the ocean. I watched him pump the handle, up and down, up and down, up and down. He was working hard, but no water was coming out my end. It wasn’t working.
But suddenly I heard a gurgling sound in the hose. It got louder and louder, and then water came squirting out.
I aimed the hose toward Oreo, and water ran down his back and over his dorsal fin. I screamed at the top of my lungs and waved one hand in the air, trying to get my grandfather’s attention. My grandfather kept pumping, but he yelled back and gave a quick one-handed wave.
The water kept flowing, coming in little pulses. I ran it over Oreo’s tail, along his back, on his sides and all the way to his head. This was incredible!
Oreo started to react. His big tail went up and down, his mouth opened to reveal his giant teeth, and he called out. It was a different cry. It sounded hopeful. Maybe he had reason to be hopeful. Maybe we both did.
Chapter Twelve
I slumped down against the rocks and finished off the last bit of my granola bar. I realized that Oreo was watching me eat. One eye was almost always looking at me.
“Sorry I couldn’t share. You’ll have to wait until you get back in the water. It won’t be long now.”
It wouldn’t be long. I’d watched as the water got closer and closer to the marker. It was like a magic trick. Little by little, as the tide came in, the water crept up the beach. Finally the marker had been knocked over and washed away.
My grandfather had pumped up water every thirty minutes for the last five hours. He’d had to move several times as the beach disappeared under the rising water. Oreo was covered, wet and, I hoped, cool. I knew I was feeling cool. The sun had swung around, and now we were shaded by the rock overhang. I’d even had to put my sweater and jacket back on.
I stood up and looked out over the ocean. I caught sight of dorsal fins. This entire time the pod had stayed close. They seemed to be watching and waiting.
Just then there was a series of calls from the pod. Oreo replied. I figured the whales were checking in on him to make sure he was okay. Both sides sounded calm.
I wished that I could call out too. Not to my grandfather but to my mother. It would be so good to know she was doing okay. To let her know I was doing okay. To tell her all about today’s adventure.
Somehow telling her would have made it all seem more real. It was strange that it didn’t feel that way, when I’d been here doing this for the past nine hours. I was on these rocks, taking care of a stranded killer whale, and soon the tide would be back in and the whale would be free. He would rejoin his family, and everything would be all right again. At least, I hoped it would be. What if the tide didn’t come in far enough, or the water wasn’t high enough? Or what if Oreo was too injured to swim away? What then? I got to my feet. I couldn’t allow myself to think that way. It
was going to work. It had to.
“How are you doing?” my grandfather called down. He was above me again, on the top of the cliff.
“We’re both doing fine.”
My grandfather had stopped pumping water when there was no longer a safe place in the water for him to stand. The waves now pounded against the rocks, shooting spray up into the air.
“You’re going to have to come up soon,” he yelled down.
“I know.”
I sat down right beside Oreo’s head so we could look at each other. I was amazed that an animal this big had such a small eye. It wasn’t much bigger than mine. And it didn’t seem much different from mine either. There was a thoughtfulness in that eye—the whale was thinking. I was sure he knew I was trying to help, but did he think of me as a friend? No way to know for sure.
“Hey, Oreo, the next time I’m out there in the ocean in my kayak, I expect you to come up and say hello, okay? We’re friends now. Actually, you’re probably the only friend I have out here.”
Oreo didn’t answer, but I thought it looked like he understood.
“It’s probably time to take off the covers,” my grandfather yelled.
He was right. I started to peel away the sheet that covered Oreo’s tail. I hesitated, wondering what I would find—had the bleeding stopped? I kept going. There was nothing underneath but black. Oreo lifted up his tail, almost like he was waving.
“It won’t be long now,” I said. “Soon that tail will push you through the water, back to your family.”
I threw the sheet into the blue bin. I removed the second sheet and then the towels, one by one, until all of Oreo’s body was revealed. His skin was slick and black, wet and shiny. I didn’t know what his underside looked like. There might be cuts or scrapes or bruises, but what I could see of him looked good. As good as I could hope for.
Chapter Thirteen
My grandfather had already hauled up the blue bin. The tide was coming in quickly now. The waves were splashing up and over Oreo’s back and onto the rocks behind him. It was making the rocks slick, and I used the rope that had lowered the bin to help steady my climb. When I reached the rock lip, my grandfather gave me a hand and pulled me to the top. We stood there, gazing down on Oreo.