Educating Gil

Untitled Part 4

                                                                                      Chapter Four

                                                                                   The First Meeting

The young girl was eleven -year-old Lidia Simmons who lived with her father in the small fishing Village of Como on the North East coast of Florida USA. On her return from her two week rest at her Mother's home, Lidia's first thought was of getting to the harbour to watch for the Dolphin Boy, as she now called him. She was determined to prove to herself that it had not been a dream. Acting on this, at 7 pm on the evening of her return she was standing at the beginning of a foot path which extended along the edge of a rock face used by local fisher men, who would spend the day, casting their lines, eating their packed lunches and drinking coffee from their thermos flasks. At the end of the path was a deep cave where Lidia and her father would often go for an evening swim in the warm, calm rock pool. On the eighth evening of walking backwards and forwards on the harbour Lidia was resigning herself to the whole thing being a dream, but as she rose from the bench where she had been sitting almost in tears for the past fifteen minutes she heard the squeaking sound that she heard on that day. Up on her tiptoes Lidia scanned the horizon, and there he was bobbing up and down not sixty yards from the shore. She gestured to him to come closer, but he was either frightened or did not understand. This continued for the next four nights, each time Lidia would walk further down the path towards the cave, and each time the boy would come a little closer to the shore. On the evening of the fifth day Lidia walked along the path and deep into the cave, and perching herself on a rock at the water's edge, she waited. Twenty minutes had passed when suddenly she could see the silhouette of something swimming deep in the water just below her feet. Lidia watched as it came to the surface, and there he was the mysterious boy who had saved her life.

For a few moments they just stared at one another not knowing what to do. Lidia stretched out her hand in a gesture to pull him from the water, there was no response, he just made some clicking noises as his eyes followed her every move, he was totally confused, as was Lidia but at least she realised that he was a human being.

Following a short spell of silence and staring, the boy slowly climbed from the water and sat on a rock near to where Lidia was now standing. The first two things that struck her were (one) he was completely naked forcing her to stand almost with her back to him, (two) he did not breath as she did, taking gulps of air and holding his breath for long periods. This itself would make it hard for him to speak, even if he could. Lidia repeated the word water while splashing with her hand, at all time avoiding contact with this naked boy. The boy did the same but only because it was fun. She smoothed her cheeks with her hands repeating the word Lidia, Lidia, she had seen this on TV but still no response. Suddenly there was a movement in the water and as if from nowhere two dolphins appeared, one with a visible scar on it's head staying very still, the other clicking and squeaking as if it was a life threatening situation. The boy responded to this and like a sea lion slid from the rock into the water and was gone.

Lidia walked home, she pondered whether to tell her father and wondered what his response would be. He would probably laugh saying, "you have a very vivid imagination young lady, but this is not a bad thing"

"I will get to know the Boy Dolphin a little better before I tell my father" thought Lidia.

The next few nights were similar to the first, although by now as her first priority she had introduced him to a pair of shorts, once again he thought this was fun. although the boy did not pick up the water gesture Lidia did manage to teach him to breathe a little slower by first putting his hand on her tummy and breathing in and out at a human pace, followed by placing her hand on his tummy and repeating the motion. At first eye contact each evening Lidia would place her right arm over her chest, this was a gesture of friendship and signaled that it was safe to come closer, she had also seen this on TV, carried out by the Indians in a film she had watched with her father.

After two weeks Lidia was able to get into the water and swim around with the boy and his Dolphin friends. She was now calling the grumpy one Scar Face and the calmer one Smiler these appeared to be the boy's adopted parents. Never the less they would take her on trips out to sea just as the Sun was going down, Lidia never had so much fun.

Deep down Lidia knew it was time to involve her Father, but what would he say!