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Back in the van Gethin and I start trying to peel Aiden’s wetsuit off, still lumbering about in our own.
‘Here, I’ve got your sleeve, just yank your arm out, there, no. Try again. Yes! Fuck!’ Gethin tumbles backwards with the counterforce of Aiden’s arm release, landing in my lap.
‘Jesus!’ I shift to the squeak of rubber on rubber. ‘Give me leather any day.’ I laugh at the idiot look Gethin pulls on his upside-down face while Aiden wrestles with his suit trousers.
I push Gethin off and tug at the ankle of Aiden’s suit. Gethin peels from the waist while Aiden takes the weight on his hands.
‘Aw, the smell’s enough to send you, isn’t it?’ Gethin sniffs at the dank scent of rotting seaweed with a hint of stale pee.
‘Aye, it’s pure perfume, man,’ Aiden says as we wrestle him down to his wet underpants. He looks skinned and exposed with his limbs glowing pale in the dim light.
‘Here,’ I grab a blanket from a pile in the corner, drape it over Aiden’s shoulders as he tugs it round him. His face peeps out. Ghostly white and thin.
‘Aw, I was just getting excited there.’ Gethin keeps on arsing about, pulling now at his own suit. Rolls over splayed out on the van floor.
‘You all right, Aiden?’ I ask, ignoring Gethin.
Aiden nods. ‘Aye, that was a bit of a shock, in the water.’
Gethin sits up. ‘Sorry, I’m being an idiot.’
‘Nah.’ Aiden tries a smile. ‘Just thinking it was worth risking getting nicked in Black’s to have you save me life and all?’
‘Don’t be daft, the other guy was there as well,’ Gethin says.
‘It was you pulled me out. We’ll call it quits, shall we?’
‘Sure.’ Gethin grins. ‘Which reminds me, something you said in Inverness, when I asked why you bothered helping me?’
‘I said I was superstitious.’
‘I reminded you of someone?’ Gethin wraps a blanket round his shoulders.
Aiden rocks like an old man in his wrappings. ‘Aye, you put me in mind of my brother who died. The way of your face, uncanny…?’
Gethin’s eyes widen. ‘Shit, sorry, I’d no idea.’
‘It seemed like bad luck not to help you. Softheaded bollocks, but then…?’
‘When did he, like, die?’ Gethin shifts to lean against the side of the van beside Aiden.
‘Five years ago. Stepped under a lorry. Eighteen years old, same as you, int it? No-one knows if it was an accident or…?’ Aiden pulls his blanket tighter.
‘Shit. That’s terrible, did you hear that Jez?’
I nod, pull my knees to my chin. Hug the cold rubber around my clammy body. The talk of death freezes my brain around the image of the whale on the beach. I need to move.
‘Would you boys give me a bit of privacy getting this skin off?’ I ask eventually.
They jump to, gather their clothes, and pull on their jeans. Leave me to struggle alone.
It’s a trip on the boat herding the twenty or so whales out of the Kyle. The rescue team up to their chests in water pushing them to turn in the right direction while the boats contain them. I sit at the front, my hair wet with the salt spray. The sun glints on the black fins bobbing forward. Whales still whistling their distress. We edge to the bend in the Kyle and the open sea, beckoning its creatures to safety.
Gethin’s in his element, gesticulating at the whales heading out. Even Aiden’s lost his hard-boy edge with his straight-lined smile. Leaving me, arms held tight round my churning guts, wanting to howl out loud as I battle the flashing images of death. Alice’s haunted face. Ken zipped in his black bag. Aiden’s brother splattered under the lorry. And the whale I left stranded on the beach. Those great eyes watching without hope.
Light and Shade – Pat
Dappled shadow across the brickwork. The bricks a sooty kiln-red, shining pale violet from the chalky deposit near the bottom, echoing the pot of pansies with their deep orange centres. My hand moving pastel across paper, smudge of indigo where the pointing has gone.
