Never Been To Sea

Every student at Saltwater Academy had been to sea. This was known. This was assumed. This was written in the prospectus in very small letters that Mara's papa had not read carefully enough.

Mara had been to: The library. Her grandmother's house. A rather disappointing aquarium where the sharks were smaller than expected and separated from her by a considerable amount of glass.

The sea: Not yet.

Saltwater Academy was built on a ship. An enormous ship. A ship that had been everywhere worth going and some places not worth going and had opinions about the difference.

Mara stood on the dock. Looking up at it. The ship looked back.

The other students were already aboard. They had arrived the way people arrive when they know where they're going — with confidence and appropriate footwear and the specific ease of children who had grown up on the water and considered it ordinary.

Mara's footwear was not appropriate. This became clear on the gangplank.

Inside: A classroom that tilted slightly. Twenty students who all knew each other or acted like they did which amounted to the same thing for someone standing at the door who didn't know anyone.

The teacher was Captain Sable. Captain Sable had a voice like a foghorn that had learned to be patient. Silver hair. Fourteen years at sea minimum written in every line of her face.

"New students," said Captain Sable. "Introduce yourselves. Tell us your sea experience."

One by one: I sailed the North Atlantic. I grew up on a fishing boat. I've crossed the Pacific twice. My family runs a harbour in the Azores.

Then Mara.

The classroom tilted slightly. The ship breathed. Twenty students waited.

"I've never been to sea," said Mara. Silence. "I've been to an aquarium," she added. "The sharks were smaller than expected."

Someone laughed. Not meanly. Just — surprised.

Captain Sable looked at Mara. The way she looked at things she was deciding about. "Why pirate school?" said Captain Sable. Mara thought about it. "Because I want to know what I don't know yet," said Mara. "And I don't know the sea."

Captain Sable said nothing. Then: "Sit down."

The first lesson was knots. Everyone else's fingers knew what to do. Mara's fingers did not know what to do. Mara's fingers produced something that was technically a knot in the way that a disaster is technically an event.

The girl next to her watched. "You're crossing it wrong," she said. Not unkindly. Just factually. The way you say things when you've been doing them since you were small and can't remember not knowing. Her name was Cove.

Cove showed Mara the crossing. Mara did it again. Better. Not right. Better.

The second lesson was navigation. Stars and charts and the language of the sea written in lines Mara couldn't read yet. But wanted to. That was the thing. She couldn't read it yet and wanted to which is the beginning of everything.

The third lesson was the sea itself.

Captain Sable took them to the deck. The ship had moved while they were inside. Quietly. Without asking. The way ships do.

The dock was gone. The city was gone. In every direction: water.

Mara stood at the railing. The sea was: Enormous. Moving. The colour of something that didn't have a name yet or had too many names to choose from. It smelled like: Salt. Distance. The specific freshness of air that has been a long way and carries it.

It was nothing like the aquarium.

It was better than everything she had imagined on the walk to the dock that morning in the wrong footwear.

Cove stood next to her. "First time?" "Yes," said Mara. Cove looked at the water. "Everyone has a first time," she said. "Mine was before I could walk. Doesn't mean yours counts less."

Mara looked at the sea. The sea looked back. Enormous and old and entirely unbothered by Mara's lack of experience. The sea had time. The sea was patient. The sea had been here before any of them and would be here after.

It could wait for Mara to learn its language.

Mara held the railing. The ship moved under her feet. Not steady. Not unsteady. Just — moving. The way things move when they're alive.

Her feet found it. Not immediately. Not perfectly. But something shifted — small and certain — in the soles of her shoes that were wrong for the ship but learning.

Captain Sable appeared beside her. Looked at the sea. "Well?" she said.

Mara looked at the water. At the horizon where the sea met the sky in a line that went on in both directions further than she could follow.

"I have questions," said Mara. Captain Sable smiled. The smile of someone who has been waiting for exactly this. "Good," said Captain Sable. "That's where we start."

The ship went on. The sea went on. Mara held the railing with both hands and watched the horizon and thought of every question she had about every part of everything out there — which was quite a lot — which was exactly right.