More Than Mere Bones

Like the waters of the deep, the shark exhibition was lit only by shadowy, wavery light that rippled across the blue obsidian walls and floors. Even so, the shapes of the sharks could not be made to look any livelier, for they were merely bones – dead bones in a room alive with dappling lights and, today, a class full of children.

“Do you see this funny-looking bar across the front of this shark’s face?” The tour guide was standing proudly in front of the school of young learners, content that most were listening and happily ignorant of the ones who were staring off somewhere else or talking amongst each other. “Well, it might look a bit funny, but it actually helped these sharks to detect their prey both above and beneath them while they swam through…”

It may be known that children are often some of the most talented pretentious listeners – that is, giving the impression that they are one hundred percent attentive while actually focusing on something entirely different. In most cases, this is due to their active and vivid imaginations, which allow them to daydream so effectively, but little Eida was sure she wasn’t imagining this time.

Her ocean-coloured eyes gazed up in wonder at the reconstructed hammerhead – yes, the same one that the guide and the rest of her class were standing in front of – only she never scrutinised a single bone apart from the rest. Instead, she was looking at the shape of the curious animal that once roamed the seas, wondering what sort of life it led all that time ago when it was more than mere bones.

The first thing she noticed were the dopey eyes that looked into her own from either side of it’s hammer-shaped head, then its mouth dropping open as though to utter a silent greeting. Most children would have been frightened out of their wits, but not Eida; Eida simply beamed with delight (an expression which the tour guide took no shame in thinking this was in response to her incredibly entertaining presentation). The hammerhead had a full body now and propelled himself off the pedestal to glide around the watery-light-filled room.

Eida followed his every movement across underwater deserts, through seaweed forests, in and out of shoals of stingray and other creatures Eida had never the seen the likes of. She held her breath as he began his hunt, gasped in fearful awe when he came away with a victim, giggled when tiny fishes teased him, sighed when he nudged his face against his mate, then covered her mouth when a great big net fell from a dark shape above and wrapped itself around him, dragging him back down to the pedestal where he looked at her one last time before disintegrating back to his bones.

“Actually, Miss,” Harriet spoke up beside her, stopping the tour guide mid-sentence. “My friend, Eida, told me that this shark preferred the little sting-rays over the big ones because they were yummier, he thought. And he was actually a boy shark, too, and he liked being alone to think sometimes – his favourite place to do that was in the open ocean because he could let his thoughts stretch as far as he could see. The seaweed scared him a bit because he was so used to being able to so much, he didn’t like how things could hide from him in there. Also, he told the other sharks that the little fishes annoyed him, but he secretly liked their playfulness. Oh, and… he got caught by a fishing net, so he never saw his wife again, so he never had any kids of his own and now he’s here.”

The tour guide certainly took several seconds of dumbfounded frowning and blinking before she could make any response, but compared to Eida’s astonishment, the former could hardly be said to have reacted at all. Eida had grown paler with every word that came out of Harriet’s mouth, nor had she blinked for the entire duration of her friend’s explanation. In fact, if it were not for her pounding heart and skin – however ghostly it had become – one could have been forgiven for mistaking her for just another reconstruction of bones in the exhibit.

“I don’t know.” Why Harriet’s voice was penetrating her consciousness and no one else’s, Eida hardly had the strength to ponder. “She just started whispering it all to me while she looked around the room. Oh, the shark’s name is Haara, too, isn’t Eida?”

Eida simply gulped and nodded. It was true. It was all true. She just hadn’t known it to be true until Harriet repeated it back to her… and hadn’t known she had told Harriet any of it in the first place. Finally, she gained the courage to look up at the tour guide. At least, she was smiling.

“You have an incredible imagination, Eida,” she said. “Sometimes, I like to look at the sharks and wonder about their lives, too. Let’s all move on to the next shark, shall we? It used to be called the Great White!”

Eida’s class all shuffled along to the next skeleton, and she breathed in relief. She had gotten out of that one easier than she expected, but just when she was on the brink of lifting her leaded feet in the direction of everyone else, she felt a hand touch her shoulder gently, sending her paler still as she flinched in fright.

“Just me, Eida.” It was the tour guide. “Brort is up next, and I’ll think you’ll like him. He might manage to scare you at the start but wait ‘til he shows you why he used to be so fascinated by us.” Then, she winked at Eida with a grin and made her way to the front of the class.

Eida didn’t quite know whether to be excited or afraid, but she raised her eyes to Brort, nevertheless.