He’d gotten about ten yards away, when, as if sensing someone was watching her, the girl spun and looked around her wildly before locking eyes with him. She beckoned him over with quick, fluttery fingers.

“Look!” she said hurriedly, seemingly unsurprised to see him and jabbing her finger excitedly at a point somewhere on the horizon. “Quick! You’ll miss it.”

She grabbed Rio’s shoulder and twisted him around to face the ocean. There was the taste of excitement in the air, so alive he could almost touch it, but no matter how hard he stared into the distance to where the sea merged into the sky, he couldn’t see anything apart from a sailing boat, its white sails flapping in the breeze. “There!” she cried. “The tail!”

Rio squinted harder. And then. So quick. He almost missed it. The most majestic, ginormous, dark-slicked tail gliding up out of the water and then sliding back under the surface.

“A whale!”

10

Marina

Rio rubbed his eyes in disbelief. He had just spotted a whale. A real-life whale in the wild! Even though it was far away, it was the most incredible thing he had ever seen.

“Was that a gray whale?” he asked excitedly, unable to believe his luck. He’d only just come up with the plan, and now look!

The girl nodded. “You can tell by the shape and size of their fluke—that’s their tail. The gray has a much rounder tail than other whales.”

“You can tell the difference even from here?!” Rio spun around to face her incredulously.

“You can if you watch them as much as I do,” she replied, jotting something down in her notebook, which was full of columns of numbers and strange, indecipherable squiggles. “I’m Marina,” she said, snapping shut the notebook and slipping it back into one of her pockets. “Marina Silver.”

“Rio,” he said shyly, holding out his hand. “Rio Turner.”

Marina studied his outstretched hand, as if she’d never come across a handshake before. Perhaps she hadn’t. Just as Rio was thinking he had made some huge embarrassing mistake, she reached her own out. Her clasp felt warm and surprisingly rough.

He probably ought to have been heading back to the museum. But somehow, his feet didn’t move. Instead, he leaned closer.

“Are you whale watching?” he whispered. He’d never met a whale watcher before. He wasn’t even sure what they looked like. But if he could have imagined one, it probably would have looked like this girl with her wild, sea-spun hair and eyes the color of a mermaid’s tail.

Marina nodded. “I watch lots of whales, but grays are my favorite.”

Just like Mum! Rio almost said. But then stopped himself. He didn’t like talking about his mother to anyone. Not since the time he’d spoken about her to Billy Jenkins at school, who he thought was his friend. But then Billy had told everyone else and they’d all avoided him for weeks, as if there was something wrong with him too. “Wh-wh-why do you like the gray whale the best?”