How to Speak Dolphin by Ginny Rorby

Author:Ginny Rorby
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scholastic Inc.
Published: 2015-06-11T16:00:00+00:00

Suzanne said yes to joining us on Saturday at the Oceanarium, and will take Adam to see the manatees until Don and the vet finish their meeting. That means Zoe and I are free to go watch the dolphin show.

Don drops us at the front entrance, where we’re to wait for an escort to take us in. While we’re waiting, two school buses pull up and unload about a hundred screaming kids. Adam claps his hands over his ears and screws up his face. Before he has a chance to lose it, Suzanne picks him up and carries him away.

One of the girls from the bus notices Zoe’s cane and grabs a friend’s arm to point her out. I glare at her even though I know Zoe doesn’t care that people stare. I did exactly the same thing the first time I saw her.

I wonder if we’d get bored with staring at obvious differences if all our physical and emotional losses were in plain sight. I could get motherless tattooed on my forehead, or start a line of T-shirts.

A sullen-looking Oceanarium employee comes out of the exit gate, looks at the crowd of teenagers, and rolls his eyes. The shirt I’d make for him would say, I hate this job.

I take Zoe’s arm and signal Suzanne, then we follow him to the front of the line past all those kids. “They’re comps,” he says to the ticket-taker.

She inspects us with a disapproving glare.

Once inside, he walks away without a word, but stops about ten yards ahead and turns to stare at Zoe.

“I love how boys can’t take their eyes off me.”

I laugh. “How’d you know?” Boys see right through me, so I wonder if Zoe really does like them looking at her or is creeped out because she can’t see them. When I know her better, I’ll ask.

She grins. “He’s wearing eau de fish and his sneakers squeak.”

He realizes we’re talking about him, blushes, and walks away. His shoes do squeak. I hadn’t noticed.

Adam makes a beeline for a kiosk selling hideous pink-and-blue inflatable dolphins. He stares up at them twisting in the breeze, flaps his hands, and makes raspberries. Suzanne picks him up and carries him toward the entrance. She puts him down when he starts to buck, and jogs after him, holding tight to his Kid Keeper leash.

When we catch up, Adam is hugging the tail of a bronze dolphin, one of a pair, both of which are about nine feet tall. I get Zoe to stand beside him, and I take a picture with my cell phone.

Everything looks the same as when Mom and I were here three years ago. We enter through a pair of giant shark jaws. Straight ahead is a bank of windows with an underwater view of dolphins in a tank. One of them seems to be scratching its face on a huge pipe. Another glides by the window.

I don’t get a chance to describe any of this to Zoe before a blaring announcement for the upper-deck dolphin show crackles over the speakers.

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