Strong Like the Sea, стр. 41
“So, what? Everyone can.”
“Not everyone.” He raises a finger. “Most people would never look at a line of colored rocks bordering a flower bed and understand it was a code. To the rest of the world, it’s just pretty rocks. But to you, it’s a message. You understand there’s more to this world than what’s on the surface.”
“So, Mom showed me how to look for things. Malia’s family taught her to surf, Jack’s dad showed him how to lay bricks. It’s nothing special. We just learned different stuff.” Maybe I was a little better at figuring things out than others, but that’s no biggie.
“Exactly. You learned to see hidden messages in a land above water, but I’ve spent my life studying things most can’t see below the water.” Uncle steps down into the pool and faces me. “What if I told you the ocean speaks in code?”
“The ocean can’t read.” I know I’m a kid, but come on.
“I never said it could read. I said it speaks to us in code.” He folds his arms, and I fold mine. I can play the waiting game too. If he wants to say something that makes sense, I’m listening.
“I can prove it to you.” He points at the schools of silver fish swirling between him and the bridge. “Those fish move in perfect unison. How do they know to turn at the same time?”
“Maybe they see the one next to them turn and then they copy each other?”
“It’s more precise than that. Each fish can feel the vibrations of the fish around it. They can tell from the vibrations what they need to do even before they can see it. They school together, creating a bubble of safety that confuses predators and increases their chances for survival—all because they communicate in ways no one can see.”
I frown at the school of fish. “Okay. But that’s not really a code.”
“Not to you, maybe,” Uncle agrees. “But it sends a message to the fish throughout the school. The purpose of a message is to communicate. And they do.
“So, you know there’s vibrations, but marine life can use colors too. Octupi and squid use bright or even flashing colors to warn predators off or attract mates. But unless you know the code for which colors mean what, you won’t understand. Let’s say you saw a cuttlefish with zebra stripes; what is it trying to say?”
“You’re teasing. How can a cuttlefish know what a zebra looks like?”
“It doesn’t know, but a cuttlefish does change his colors to black and white stripes that look a lot like zebra stripes when he wants rivals to know how tough he is. Vibrations, colors, sounds, shapes, even chemicals.” He tilts his head to the far side of the pool. “In fact, there’s a hermit crab right over there using chemicals now.”
“A hermit crab?” How would it know what to do with chemicals?
“Better hold that scroll higher.”
I jerk it up by my chest to check for any damage, but it seems okay. “Why?”
“I’ll show you.” Uncle reaches for my hand and I grasp it without thinking. Next thing I know, he’s tugged me splashing across the pool to a shallow patch of sand where a hermit crab creeps between rocks below the surface.
Note to self: never take Uncle’s hand near water. Too sneaky. The way he ignores my jerky shudder when water sloshes up to my knees, I almost believe he did it on accident . . . almost.
“See how the antennae and mouth parts move?” He grabs a reed from the bank and dips it near the crab. The tiny antennae move faster and the crab inches away from Uncle’s stick. “They’re constantly tasting for chemical signals to tell them if there are predators or food sources nearby. It communicates a message, same as your codes do.”
He tugs me toward the bridge. “What say we look for the code your mom left for us? You think it’s under here?” Ducking under the edge of the bridge, he pulls me behind him into the gloom.
My gaze darts from one side of the bridge to the other, ready for shadowy eels to rush at us any second, but nothing does.
“Check the corners on that side. Do you see anything?” Uncle lets go of my hand, and I think about bolting out of there, but I’m already in the water and he seems so relaxed . . .
I dip under each support beam and peer into dark corners, paying special attention to the graffiti in case Mom left a clue there. Other than some swears and things scrawled across the cement, there are no real messages that I can see. I guess I should have known that she would never vandalize anything—not even the underside of a bridge.
“Step into the light. Let’s have another look.” Uncle holds a hand out for my scroll box and shows me the bridge drawing. “The dotted line goes under the bridge and on through to the other side. Whatever we’re looking for must be farther on.”
With tall cement walls on either side of the wash, there’s only one way we can go: makai, toward the ocean. Round rubber-and-glass floats hang from trees in someone’s yard, where they’ve arranged them over a stinky noni bush with its white fruit scattered on the ground and reeking worse than rotten cheese. Shaped like lumpy, rotten potatoes, the smell makes my stomach churn. “Oh, gosh. That’s awful.”
“This?” Uncle wafts the smell toward his face. “You get used to it. It’s good for tea.” He taps a disgusting fruit. “They say this is good for many things in the body—and it keeps fleas away.”
“So you drink stinky noni tea on purpose so you don’t get fleas?” I don’t have fleas either. But I sure don’t drink that.
He gives me a flat look. “The flea deterrent is for Sarge. Lower blood pressure for