Fluke

8: Plotting Data and Death

Perhaps Logan's project wasn't nearly as boring as I had originally thought. There was a herd of seals that rested upon the rocky shore, as well as another herd in the water that poked their heads to the surface for oxygen and to alleviate their curiosity.

They appeared for a moment, then went back to the unknown, and Logan had to count as many of the resurfacings as he could. Each sighting counted as a separate seal, which seemed like nothing but a great way to skew the data, but it wasn't my project. He had made it known that my help wasn't wanted, and I was just there to ease the workload.

I ended up taking one half of the allotted sampling area, and there was little time for talking when seals had to be counted.

Three hundred and fifty-four seals poked their heads out of the water in the hour, and that was just based on the inaccurate counting on my side.

He compiled the numbers, and although I wasn't sure what exactly the point of his project was, he smiled and nodded. "Thank you. This was fun."

I blinked a couple times. "We counted seals for an hour."

"You didn't enjoy it?"

"Of course I did. I just—" I thought for a moment. "Well, I really should have been trying to identify my whale."

"Ah, okay. That explains why the kitchen is clean."

"I'm sorry. I really did enjoy your company."

Logan shook his head. "You don't have to lie to me. I'm not as stupid as you think." He handed the notebook over to me. "Will you carry this back to the house for me?"

I nodded. "Yeah, sure."

I didn't mean to hurt his feelings, but there were times that I just wasn't thoughtful enough. I probably sounded cold and heartless, and he probably didn't want to be my friendly acquaintance anymore.

There was no way I could let him think that I had no soul. I dealt with that stereotype way too much as a ginger.

"Do you need any help this evening? I'd love to learn more about what you're doing," I said.

"You're lying again," he said as he climbed back down to the ground.

"I'm serious. I don't really know that much about seals, except that they're mammals, their basic anatomy, their habitat, and that they're really cute."

"The last one is the most important, for sure. That's all you need to know about anything."

"Everything and everyone is cute if you just give them a chance unless it's a spider." I shook my head. "Those just freak me out."

He laughed. "Sounds like you've got life all figured out."

"I wish." I smiled. "So can I join you for the next seal watch?"

"I guess I'll seal you then, pun completely fucking intended."

Poor Logan had to do that all alone for two hours every day, since my project wasn't a daily thing, it couldn't hurt to help him out while keeping myself entertained.

We headed back to the house, and Jia and Carter both sat in the living room, my laptop on the table in front of them.

"We figured it out," Carter said.

Figured what out?

"Well, Carter solved the mystery of the strangely similar whales. I just recruited him," Jia added.

Oh, that made sense.

"Really? Which whale was it?" I asked.

"All four of the whales were the exact same one. There are exactly zero differences," Jia said.