Seals

Seals

They had rented a house on the coast for a week.    

    She was looking through some of the leaflets the owner had left and  announced “Oh look! There are seals at the nature reserve.” She had made up her mind to see them. 

    Her husband, two children, and Mischa the golden spaniel, trudged after her. It was their anniversary after all, she thought defiantly, and only a short walk along the beach and up into the dunes, beyond which they were said to be basking along a sandbank.

    She had been only slightly disappointed that her husband seemed to have forgotten what day it was. She’d tried to convince herself there might be something waiting for her this evening, some beautifully wrapped trinket on her pillow which he would bashfully nod towards as they went to bed, a surprise he’d slyly concealed all along. 

    However, by the time she’d finished her coffee at the breakfast table she understood there would be nothing. In any case she would have got over it by elevenses and life would go on undamaged. This far into a marriage it would need something catastrophic to register on their Richter scale of emotion. They loved each other, but where it used to be aflame there was now a low but steady glow. And that was just fine. It was a love born out of comfort and ease, and that was no small thing. She was fine with a life lived down on the plains rather than astride a mountaintop. She didn’t have the energy for a roller coaster ride.

    Later that morning they had driven out to the nature reserve. She made the decision for them all as their lethargy was driving her nuts. Even Mischa seemed to be indifferent and had to be coaxed into the car. It was slightly chilly for an August day, but she would not let that keep her indoors, so they had no choice.

    “What’s the big deal, Mum? Seals? Really?” Chloe asked.

    “Yeah, big deal,” Alex mumbled sarcastically.

    “The big deal, as you put it, is seals in the wild. Not on TV or TikTok or whatever. And I want to see them, okay?”

    “If there really are any,” her husband griped. It really was too much to ask, then, for them to simply go along with something she wanted to do for a change. 

    The reserve had been some kind of defensive fortification during the war, and here and there were traces of gun turrets, look-out posts and sea defences. Land had been reclaimed from the sea over the years and it was now primarily a bird sanctuary. In the estuary a few boats were moored - or perhaps stranded on muddy beds. None of this seemed to be of any interest to anyone but her, and she had to work hard to maintain her good mood. 

    “Come on,” she snapped and marched off like a schoolmistress leading her reluctant class.

    “Mum!” The kids groaned in unison. 

    “Come on kids,” her husband muttered. “Let’s do this for mum.” 

She sighed to herself and kept walking.

    Beyond the ridge of sea lavender she could see the sandbank off in the distance. A rivulet of brown water rippled in the sunlight, and barely visible but there nonetheless, the lumpen forms of basking seals, looking more like sandbags than living creatures.

    “Look!” She called back over her shoulder. The family slowly joined her. She pointed. “See?”

    “Not really,” Chloe said, shading her eyes.

    “Where?” Her husband asked, not really looking.

    “Over there, by the stream, look.” They all looked intently for a moment, following her finger.

    “But they’re not doing anything!” Alex yawned.

    “Yes,” she said quietly but triumphantly. “Exactly.”