The Fires Beneath the Sea ebook by Lydia Millet (best beach reads .TXT) 📕

seaweed clinging to her ankles … what struck her was that the otter didn’t seem to be afraid of her at all. The eyes were so dark … it lay on its back and the eyes, she could swear, were like a person’s: they were intently fixed on her own. Beady because they had purpose, but also soft and deep.

She’d never been so close to a wild animal. It didn’t make sense; the otter should already be long gone.

“How come you aren’t afraid of me?” she whispered.

It was stupid to talk to an otter, but she didn’t know what else to try. The fur was beautiful, the face so light it was almost white, with a dark triangle of nose, and the paws a dark brown. She wanted to touch those handlike paws, posed thoughtfully together almost as if the otter was thinking. She could reach out easily; it was so near.

She treaded water a bit closer, a bit closer—their eyes were still locked together, it seemed to her—and then her cold, pruney fingertips were reaching out, almost without her planning it. For just a second they touched the rough black pad of a paw.

In that second it was like someone had shuffled the world away—all of it forgotten except for the feeling she was having. It was as if the sky and sea disappeared, the beach and the cliffs faded. She felt dizzy and almost sick but also curiously warm.

She felt exhilarated.

And then it streamed through her:

TAKE CARE OF THEM FOR ME TAKE CARE OF THEM FOR ME TAKE CARE OF THEM

“Cara! Hey Cara! You coming out any time soon?”

It was Hayley, calling from shore. She sounded so far away, though. Cara’s eyes were open again, the sea was there, the beach, the different blues and browns of normal life, the scene of ocean and sky. She found herself shaking her head—had those been her own thoughts?

But it didn’t feel like it; it didn’t feel like she’d chosen to think those things, and the words left a trail behind them in her mood, a kind of glittering hope … and then the otter was flipping over so quickly she couldn’t follow the movement, and it was gone.

She stared at where it had been. Nothing but water.

She shook her head, dazed. She felt a bizarre glow, like a line of silver through the middle of her body.

It lingered.

Finally, not knowing what else to do, she swam slowly for the beach, then waded out and ran, tossing up sand, to where Hayley was lying on her towel flipping magazine pages.

“Did you see that?” she asked, breathless. “Did you see what was right next to me?”

“You’re totally dripping, Car! And there’s sand on my back now!”

“Sorry, but didn’t you—”

“Wait. Wait. Listen. Accessorize for fall with shades of oxblood and burgundy,” read Hayley. “There’s an actual color called oxblood? Barfo. Hey. What’s the difference between lime and chartreuse?”

“But—there was an animal! An otter! I swear, Hay. Can you believe that?”

“Otters. Uh-huh.”

Hayley nodded distractedly and turned her magazine to look at something from a different angle. It seemed to be a picture of a model’s thin wrist wearing 8,000 bangles.

Cara couldn’t pay attention to anything but that silver trace she still felt in herself, her whole being that tingled with the fleeting touch of something unknown.

“Hayley, listen. Do you realize how weird that is? We don’t have otters in the ocean here. At least, I’ve never heard of one.”

“Maybe the little guy got lost,” mused Hayley and looked up. “But they can swim, right? Is there an otter-rescue deal, like there is for beached whales?”

Cara stared at her for a second, then sighed and settled down on her own towel. Sometimes Hay could be a little clueless.

But sea otters, Cara was almost certain, lived on the West Coast. In the Pacific. Not in the Atlantic at all. It was really kind of impossible. She made a mental note to ask Jax about it. Jax or her dad.

And then, on top of that, it was as though it had talked to her without opening its mouth—as though, let’s face it, it was delivering a message.

She lay there for a minute, tuning out completely while Hayley chattered on about some movie star who’d had an operation to make her lips fat. After a while she turned on her side and slipped her cell out of her bag to glance at its clock. It was already time to go; she had to get home for dinner.

“Man. I wish I could take off too, but I have to wait for my mom,” said Hayley apologetically. “Otherwise I’d totally go with you. Sorry. She’s coming after work, she’s all, ‘I have to get in my tan time!’ Even though it’ll be, like, five-thirty. It’s so humiliating, she has one of those retro silver screens from the eighties? And she holds it under her chin to get more sun on her face? I go, ‘Haven’t you ever heard of skin cancer? Gross gnarly skin wrinkles?’ I’m serious, she’s gonna look like one of those orange Florida ladies.”

“My mom’s the opposite,” said Cara. “She always makes us wear sunscreen. Even when it’s gray out …”

She trailed off. Because clearly her mother wasn’t around to give advice.

Hayley shot her a look, then said, more gently than usual, “Is there—do they have any, like, new info? About what might have happened?”

Cara shook her head, her eyes downcast.

There was a lump in her throat.

And a good possibility, she added to herself, that she was experiencing some kind of hallucinations.

After a minute Hayley filled the silence.

“Yeah. Well. My mom just doesn’t get it. When I tell her she’s getting a rhino hide she just goes, ‘You have to suffer to be beautiful, Hayley.’ ”

Cara nodded and tried on a quick, tight smile.

Hayley reached over and grabbed her hand, squeezing it. After a few seconds, Cara moved her hand away, blinking.

“So anyway,” said Hayley. “Sorry I can’t ride home with you.”

“No problem,” said Cara