"The Whale Graveyard" by Marta Camps-Gonzalez '23

Sweat ran down Petra Finch’s neck as sharp gains of sand dug into her skin and stuck anywhere they found a surface. The sweltering heat grasped its arid hand around her throat and in the burning grip Petra coughed dryly. She was exhausted and thirsty but at least the worst heat of the day was passing. Glancing toward Lewis Maxwell she saw her colleague had set the shovel aside and was gulping down the remaining drops of their water. Irritation boiled inside of her at this and she left the excavation she was working on, kicking up a cloud of sand in her wake.

“Hey Lewis, you realize that’s the only bottle left, right?” She managed to gasp out when Petra reached him.

“Oh, well I guess we better head back now.” Lewis said as he held the bottle upside down and a single drop splattered on the ground. Petra frowned in frustration at his foolishness since anyone who’s been to the desert knows you can never be without water.

Pushing back the strands of hair that had stuck to the side of her head, she made her way back to the area she’d been working on to collect her tools. As she did this methodically, Petra’s mind wandered to her little apartment in the hot city where she’d go later and find her computer just like she’d left it- with the email open. On her simple wooden table, it would sit patiently for her to return and finally face it. Petra would leave that room every day and take the van with Lewis and the rest of the group to this scorching patch of land they were digging up. Every day she would take her weathered notebook and scribble down the date and measurements of that day’s excavation but below her feetthe ground only offered empty -handed, miniature, and itchy rock particles.

In an instant she was brought back to that email. She’d read it so many times Petra knew exactly what it offered: a fulltime principal investigator archeologist job opportunity in Chile that paid triple what she earned now and included all expenses. Her head spun with the idea of going there, or was it just the heat?

The yellow and orange tones of fire that sprawled across the landscape started to blend with the sky’s blue as night approached. Petra finished clearing up and headed toward Lewis and the rest of the group who were waiting for the van to arrive. But an unusually large and irregular pebble caught her eye. With her last strength, she bent over to pick it up while still holding on to the tools and papers in the other hand. It felt strange in her hand and kind of reminded her of her long days of lab work at university. She flipped it over and thought the spongey texture was strange for a rock. Then her trained eyes locked on the giveaway pores that indicated it wasn’t a rock, it was a bone.

Without thinking twice, she dropped to her knees and let the things she’d been holding scatter around her. Petra instinctively examined it thoroughly and found it was some animal’s back bone, possibly a vertebra. When she was about to call the group over another slightly tinted white bone stood out in the dusty ground. She checked her watch quickly confirming that she still had twenty minutes before they left. So, although her training told her not to, she went over to the next piece of bone and picked it up. After a while, she found another not a long way off and gradually collected more and more, each bone she found bigger than the last.

Petra had, in a matter of moments, followed a trail of bones and her mind raced to file through ideas of what it could be. Then she reached a part of the ground that rose up in a small hill, so she rounded it carefully. What appeared to be the top of a much larger rock peeked over the heaps of sand. She began brushing the grains downward to reveal more of the top of that yellowish rock the trail of bones had led to. When most of it had been cleared, she took a step back; catching her breath but then the adrenaline of uncovering something unknown drove her forward.

Taking a better look at the now uncovered rock, the pieces clicked together. It was a giant skull. And the odd, uneven line of bones she’d followed was a spine, but it was too long because a land animal with that backbone couldn’t possibly have such an enormous skull. A whirlwind of questions knocked into Petra, forcing her to sit back abruptly. What animal could this be? Was it more than one? How did it get here? Swatting away a fly, Petra came closer to the skull, sat cross-legged beside it, and laid her palm flat over the gentle curve.

Despite the suffocating heat, Petra was suddenly flooded by a cooling sense that transported her to another place. While her limbs scorched under the sun, her mind was immersed underwater, thousands of miles away. Sounds were muffled out and all she could see was the vast blue ocean. Although it should have sent her into a panic, Petra floated there immobile, at peace. In the distance, a figure started to take shape and Petra strained to get a better look. It grew as it approached her probably more than a hundred times larger than her. When the outline of it came into focus Petra made out a long and thick body with two wide fins that swam forward slowly, then at the end of it, the creature’s body split into two points forming a tail. A whale. Unhurried, the features became clear marking every wrinkle and barnacle that spread across it. As it came to her side, Petra held her breath in astonishment gazing into its bright, wise eyes. The gentle creature moved with grace swiping the water aside and brushing its tail in swooping motions. The greatness of it held Petra in a trance, while miniature bubbles encompassed them both. The bubbles danced around the ancient whale giving it a supernatural appearance and leaving Petra to wonder where the ocean really ended, and the whale began.

All too soon, the sun’s rays evaporated any sense of water and the whale vanished with it. Petra found herself laying on her side while her fingers brushed the skull. The whale’s skull. She realized someone was shouting at her from afar but all she could think about was the whale. Sure that what she had witnessed was real, Petra knew she’d never see something like it ever again especially if she stayed in this monotone life of helplessly scraping at sand. Knowing more certainly than ever that there was more out there for her, she made up her mind about the email.