Excerpt: Summertime Blues

Chapter 1

Weedy scorpionfish (Rhinopias aphanes):
disguises itself as seaweed and
waves in the current, waiting
to snag any unsuspecting prey
that might float by

Ardella wondered if brides or mothers-to-be felt this unbearable combination of sheer, unadulterated panic and mindblowing joy. And if they did, she couldn’t understand how so many of them managed to make it down the aisle or give birth without bolting.

She could barely walk. Her legs felt like limp spaghetti and her ankles and knees didn’t want to support her. If she’d been behind the wheel of a car, she’d have killed someone. Nothing, not a single thing over the difficult years, had made Ardella feel this way.

She was a coper – she coped with illness, with bureaucracy, without her dreams. She could do anything. Really.

Except maybe not this.

Her heart pounded – a deep, almost painful thumping – in time with her footsteps on the pavement. But all the stresses and strains of the past twenty years vanished in the joy of walking toward the employee entrance of the place that had been her true home for as long as she could remember

The aquarium had saved her sanity – and maybe even her life – and now she was going to work here. She skipped a little as she hurried down the path to the door and then skipped again when she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirrored windows. She wore the aquarium’s royal blue employee shirt with the logo – a white starfish and the name – over her left breast.

It wasn’t quite warm enough for her white walking shorts – not in Vancouver at the very beginning of June – but Ardella had worn them anyway.

She’d imagined wearing these exact clothes, imagined herself striding through the back passages of the aquarium, mistress of all she surveyed.

And now here she was.

Starting at the bottom of the heap.

But one day soon Ardella Simpson was going to be a force to be reckoned with. Every single one of those fish, and the mammals for that matter, would listen to her.

Twenty years ago she’d been on her way to a degree in marine biology when her mother got ill. Twenty years of home nursing, of cooking and cleaning and negotiating with healthcare providers and Ardella had wondered – sometimes still did wonder – if she might not be too old or too tired to start all over again.

Not that forty was old, she thought. After all, didn’t the magazines say that forty was the new thirty and surely thirty wasn’t old?

This summer as a volunteer was a test.

She missed her mother, had never once begrudged the time or energy spent caring for her, never regretted giving up her dream, but now it was time to see if it was possible.

She sold the condo to pay her debts and her tuition. She packed up her mother’s belongings and Ardella was on her way.

She wasn’t sure whether she actually felt twenty again but that’s what she was aiming for. Light-hearted yet committed to her future. Friendly and open instead of closed off. Willing to take risks.

That was going to be the hardest part of this experiment.

Ardella had spent the last twenty years – through no fault of her own – being extremely risk adverse. But if she wanted to become the woman she’d dreamed of being, she would have to take all kinds of risks. She squared her shoulders, smiled at the woman – in royal blue and white – reflected in the window and pressed the buzzer on the door. She was ready. At least she thought she was ready.

The flight instinct – once again - reared its ugly head, making her heart pound, her palms sweat and her face red. She took a step back from the door. And then another.

“Careful,” a voice said behind her. “You’re going to step on my brand new sneakers.

“Not,” the voice continued as if musing to herself, “that it really matters. They’ll have fish guts and slime all over them within a week. It doesn’t matter what detergent I use – and I’ve used them all – nothing gets that slime out. I don’t know why I bother, but I love the look and feel of new sneakers.

“I buy five or six pairs a year. Have to. It’s not so hard on your clothes – they wash better than runners. But the shoes? Two months, tops, and then they look like I’ve worn them for a two week vacation on the seventh level of hell.

“I’m Marney. Marney Kenner. I’ve worked here forever. You know, narrate the shows, talk to the kids, make sure they don’t fall into the water?”

Ardella, whose flight instinct had been suppressed by the outpouring of unrequested information, simply nodded, then feeling the nod not quite enough, said, “Yes. I’ve seen you, I think.”

She paused for a minute, checking out her heart, palms and face. All normal. Maybe the flight instinct had vanished, maybe she was going to be okay. She still wavered between turning around and heading for the exit or talking to Marney so she could get herself to walk in the door. Ardella chose the latter.

“I’m Ardella Simpson.”

“Your first day? I can tell by the look on your face, a lot nervous and a little excited. I remember,” Marney pushed open the door when the red light on the handle turned green, “my first day. I spent almost all of it trying not to puke.”

“Have you worked here long?” Ardella felt a bit nauseous herself as she hurried through the back corridors after Marney who never, not even for a moment, stopped talking.

“Ten years this summer. I volunteered during high school and college – my degree’s in communications – and just never left. There are lots of us like that. Not many like you, though. Not first timers.”

Ardella endured Marney’s careful perusal of her.

“You’re a little older,” Marney giggled, “than our usual new recruits.”

Ardella had to smile back at that carefully judged little. She expected she was a whole lot older than the rest of the new kids; she expected that kids was the operative word.

“Lunch room’s over there. Showers – not that they help, even with the soap we use, if you’re spending your days preparing breakfast, lunch and dinner for our inhabitants. Helps even less if you add cleaning tanks to your repertoire.”

“Do you do that?” Ardella leaned forward a little and sniffed. No fishy smell, just soap and shampoo.

“Not anymore. But I used to. My first couple of summers? The only people who’d come near me were the kids who were doing the same job. The only people I talked to those summers were people at the aquarium. I didn’t have a date for two whole summers and those were my prime dating years.”

Ardella smiled to herself at the thought of a date. She basically hadn’t had a serious one for almost twenty years. A slight exaggeration, maybe, but close to the truth.

She’s had dozens of first dates but as soon as those men found out that she might have to hurry home if her pager went off, she might as well have been gone already.

Years of being on call twenty-four hours a day had put a dent not only in her dating but in her friends. Missing out on them because she smelled like fish seemed like a step forward rather than back.

“I think,” Ardella said, taking a risk with her pride, “I’m going to be doing just that. Lowest of the low – cleaning tanks and preparing meals.” She smiled, mostly to herself. “Not much different than what I’ve been doing. Just in a much more beautiful place.”

Marney, towing her along behind, had just popped out of the windowless concrete corridors into the office space laid out above the aquarium’s great hall.

Ardella stopped in her tracks. She’d been here for her interview but had been too nervous to enjoy the view. Besides, it had been gray and raining all those weeks ago.

Now the sky was the pure, clear blue of a early June day, a few white fluffy clouds adding texture to its beauty. The sun shot sparks off the belugas’ pool and the tall cool green cedars in the background added depth.

Home, her heart said. You’re finally home.

And when one of the belugas surfaced – and soon, Ardella promised herself, she’d know which one it was at first glance – its head tilted as if to say hello. Ardella, for only the second time in her life, fell in love.

back to top