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Show Fair Forever ^ I shake my head and look back at my house. "I haven't told her,"T mutter. "She'd freak out, big time. Anyway, she's watching this morning. She's hiding behind the screens on the porch, but I know she's watching. She's always watching." We sit quiet in our boats, rolling with the swells. I'm lulled by the movement, calmed, hypnotized. He continues to carve, content to wait, patient with his wood, patient with me. He knows, somehow, that I'll speak again. And I do, finally. "Do you ever see any sea turtles?" I ask. "Yes," he confirms. He eyes my shirt, a cotton tee with a screened picture of hatchling turtles, racing to the ocean. "Some big ones, too. Right here in the bay." I try to contain my excitement but it comes out in my voice, loud as a shout. "Right here? In the bay? When? How big?" The old man smiles and thinks hard. "You're asking because of the girl." "Amanda," I repeat. "Her name was Amanda." I want him to say her name. It's important, and he knows. "Amanda," he echoes. "She asked about turtles, too. She was wearing a shirt like yours-with a picture of turtles racing to the sea. I told her all I knew-which wasn't much, but I told her." "What?. What did you tell her?" "I told her the Great Turtles laid their eggs down the coast a ways. I said they were good swimmers, if slow, and that they migrated thousands of miles, across the ocean and back, year after year. I said they were the old men of the sea-that, except for |
