Dolphin Child by James Carmody

themselves in a myriad
of ways; the way they swam, jumped or flicked a fin, or clicked and
whistled. Even though he knew he would never fully understand the
strange ways of humans, he was sure that Lucy really cared for him.
He felt the same way about her. Though they were so different from
each other in so many ways, he felt that somehow at a fundamental
level they were quite alike.
    ‘ Hi Spirit, hello Dancer’ she said. When she came to them as a
vision, they were able to communicate with each other without human
words or dolphin clicks and whistles. Spirit had spent many hours
trying to figure out how it worked, but he just couldn’t. Somehow
thoughts seemed to pass straight from her mind to his. All three of
them started to glide along through the water
companionably.
    ‘ Did you dream of us last night?’ Spirit asked. He often asked.
He’d had been enchanted to discover that Lucy had dreamt of him and
the rest of the pod almost every night since she was a little girl
and he was still a very young calf.
    ‘ Actually, I didn’t’ admitted Lucy ‘I sort of dreamt of
dolphins, but not any one in particular, I don’t think’. Spirit
quickly told Lucy about his own dream. He thought that she might
make a joke about it like Dancer did, but instead she seemed
surprised and startled. Spirit wondered whether she was going to
say something, but she seemed to hold back. Instead she changed the
subject.
    ‘ How did you feel about helping the little girl?’ she asked the
two dolphins.
    ‘ Oh, you know, when we saw her in trouble, we knew that we
simply couldn’t leave her until she was safe’ said Dancer. ‘But she
was scared of us, otherwise we might have been able to carry her to
safety. That’s when Spirit reached out to you with his
mind.’
    ‘ I’d never done that before’ said Spirit, wondering why Lucy
had changed the subject away from dreams and what it was that she
wasn’t telling them. ‘I didn’t think I knew how to do it. I had to
use all my mental energy to reach out to you. I was glad that I
could though. I don’t know how we’d have helped the little girl if
I hadn’t got through to you. I tried to swim up to the people
splashing in the water at the edge of the beach, but they didn’t
seem to understand.’
    ‘ It was amazing when you contacted me’ replied Lucy. ‘It was as
though an electric shock ran through my body. Every nerve stood to
attention.’
    ‘ Well I’m glad’ said Spirit modestly.
    ‘ You were a sensation at the beach’ continued Lucy. ‘Everyone’s
talking about the dolphins appearing there and hordes of people are
going there now to try to catch sight of you again. It’s even been
on the local TV.’
    ‘ Oh I’m not going there again’ laughed Spirit hurriedly. ‘It
was scary having all those arms and legs in the water around us,
trying to touch and grab at me. I’m not going to put myself through
that again unless I really have to.’
    ‘ Why do humans go in the water like that anyway Lucy?’ asked
Dancer. After all, humans are not sea creatures are
they?’
    It’s difficult to explain really’ Lucy said. ‘The sun makes us
feel healthy and happy and so does the sea. But we only like the
sea when it’s sunny, otherwise we get too cold.’
    ‘ You humans need a layer of fat round you to keep you warm’
joked Dancer.
    ‘ But it’s strange isn’t it’ said Spirit thoughtfully. ‘You
humans can’t really swim properly at all, well not like us anyway.
You should be afraid of the sea shouldn’t you, instead of being
attracted to it.’
    ‘ I know’ said Lucy turning slowly in the water, ‘maybe we’d all
secretly like to return to the sea again. You know scientists say
that all the animals on dry land evolved from sea creatures
millions of years ago. They say that whales and dolphins were
land-living mammals once which evolved to return back to the sea
again.’
    ‘ I don’t really understand that’ said Spirit. ‘Dolphins have
been the