Sarah Lean - The Sand Dog

‘Uncle, you know and I know that Grandfather is coming back,’ I said. In the dizzy tempest of the sizzling kitchen Uncle’s arm touched a boiling-hot pan and he jumped away but I carried on. ‘I only want to know when .’

‘He’s a drunk old fool and he’s not coming back!’ Uncle yelled. ‘Not ever.’

Stunned, I dropped the metal ladle and it hit the floor, clang-clanging as it bounced. All of the movement and noise of the kitchen stopped, except for the fiery breath of the oven.

‘Now get back to work,’ Uncle said uncomfortably, and the bustle erupted again.

Maria swooped over, picked up the ladle and led me out to the stairs to the flat. ‘Take no notice of Uncle. It’s one of the busiest days ever and we’re a bit pushed, that’s all,’ she said. ‘He thinks the world of you, Azi.’

I wasn’t going to ask Uncle about Grandfather again. Now that Uncle had exploded and told me what he thought, it reminded me that I’d also been hiding my deepest secret in the dark. It was my fault that Grandfather had left.

The next day, when I went to the quay, I saw that the dog was following a little way behind me, head down, trotting slowly with stiff old legs. He lay in the shadow under a bench with his head on his paws but didn’t close his eyes while all the passengers got off the ferries.

When everyone had gone to find B&Bs, shops, beaches and restaurants, all that was left was me, the dog and a small dark-red booklet that had been dropped on the quayside. I went over and picked it up. It was a British passport, and inside was a photograph of a girl called Beth Saunders who had been born in London.

Could this be the third sign from the sea? The girl that the passport belonged to was from exactly the same place that Uncle had said that Grandfather had gone – London. What could it mean? And then I knew what I had to do. I had to go and get him. I had to go to where he was staying and bring him back.

‘THAT’S TWICE THIS WEEK you’ve been in here, Azi,’ Mrs Halimeda said, irritated again on Thursday, looking at me like she always did, as if I smelled of rotting fish. ‘Yes, I’ve seen Uncle’s menu, and, no, I’ve still nothing for you.’ She looked over my shoulder to see who was next.

‘Can I have a passport?’ I said.

She squinted and took ages to reply. ‘What do you need a passport for?’

I knew not to tell Mrs Halimeda anything she could gossip about, so I mumbled something about a possible school trip in the future.

She frowned. ‘You need a form.’ She swivelled her chair to look in the shallow shelves behind her, selected a piece of paper, swivelled back and stared at me hard, narrowing her eyes. ‘You’ll have to give it to Uncle to fill out and sign.’

I assured her I would do that. ‘Also, I found a passport.’ I held up the one I’d found at the quay and she told me to take it to the lost-property office instead.

‘Let that boy bother someone else for a change,’ I heard her mutter to the next customer. It stung but I just kept thinking of Grandfather, of belonging with him again.

The dog was sitting outside the post office and watched with interest as I tucked the passport form inside my shorts and under my T-shirt.

‘I’ve got to be with Grandfather, nobody else knows me like he does,’ I said to him.

I didn’t go to the lost-property office, though. I thought I might hang on to the passport in case it helped me to answer any questions on the form.

As I was going along the road I heard someone shout, ‘Oi! Aqua boy!’

I turned to see Chris coming up the street with Dimi.

They came and stood by me. Chris was carrying his basketball. I was expecting them to ask me to play again, but they didn’t this time.

‘What are you doing?’ Chris asked, bouncing his ball.

Dimi rolled his eyes, obviously knowing what my answer would be.

Grandfather and I had both liked it when nobody was there at the cove with us, and there was nothing but the sand and the sea. It had been a long time since anybody had been there with me.

‘Do you want to see a turtle nest?’ I said.

Chris said no first of all, but Dimi nudged him and said, ‘Yeah, we might.’

‘Show us,’ Chris said.

We roamed along the shoreline where tourists speckled the sand with sunhats and towels, sunbeds and umbrellas, some paddling in the sea, their voices babbling in the distance. I told Chris and Dimi they wouldn’t be able to see any turtles yet but I could show them the nest and we could keep watch over the summer. But all they wanted to do was push and shove, kicking at the sand, slamming the ball at each other’s back. I saw the dog nearby, walking along stiffly, his head down.

‘The nest is in the cove over the other side of the rocks,’ I said, pointing in the direction of where the turtle had been. ‘I’ve put a fence round it so nobody touches it. By the end of August the eggs will hatch.’

Chris and Dimi looked over to where I pointed but they were not interested any more and just ran off in the opposite direction when they saw some of the other boys over by the jet-ski school, laughing and shouting back at me, ‘Forget it, turtle boy.’

I sighed. Who needed them anyway? The dog came over and sat down beside me at the cove. I didn’t know why he kept following me around.

‘You still lost your owner?’ I said. ‘Or maybe you want to come swimming with me instead.’

Grandfather was never fearful about me in the water so I had never felt like I should be afraid, not even of the deep-sea monsters that he’d told tall tales about. All the stories of the battles between sea monsters and men were won in the end.

‘What’s out there?’ I’d said, looking out to where the sea seemed endless.

‘Nothing you need to be afraid of,’ he’d say. ‘There are no monsters that we can’t overcome.’

As I thought about his words I waded out until the soft, cool water became my skin. It felt as if I disappeared when I dived under the surface; everything became a silent world of blue, including me. When I came up again the dog had waded into the sea after me. I showed the dog how not to be afraid of the water, staying near him, watching him, putting a hand under his belly when his feet left the ground. He was a natural. He made long doggy-paddle strokes, his nose up high, his body level in the water, graceful and calm, his stiffness all eased out. He seemed to like it too. As the dog circled me, I floated on my back with my arms out, held up by the water like driftwood, going wherever the sea took me. Before long, it pushed me back to the same shore.

The girl’s passport wasn’t much help in filling out the form. I wrote my name, address at Uncle’s (I started to write Grandfather’s but Mrs Halimeda would have something to say about that), and date of birth. I wrote in pencil first, trying to make my letters a bit slanted but neat, like an adult, before going over it slowly with a pen. Some of the questions were long and needed boxes ticking. At the end, there was a list of things I needed to send with it once it was signed, including a birth certificate and two photos.

People had told me for as long as I could remember that I didn’t belong on the island but when I had asked Grandfather why he had just teased me that it was because I had come from the sea. You were born in the breaking waves, Azi, like a mermaid child. He’d put his hand round the back of my head, pull me towards him and push the hair away to look behind my ears for gills. He’d beckon me to put my leg up on his knee, slipping off my flip-flop and rubbing the dust away.