A Fever

 Early morning.

The sun came up.

It does this reliably.

   We had paddled out into the dark, as is our want. This time of year the water is beautiful and warm. A fresh westerly blew across the sea, giving us a minor chill which disappeared immediately as soon as we got in the water. We had struck out into the night, and navigated our way forward to the point, there where the waves rolling in from the open ocean first meet the unwavering land, the obstacle that forces the water up onto its heels, causing it to rear up like a brumby, bend its head in a graceful arc, and bow, break and crash into perfect peelers that run the length of our bay.

   There had been just four of us out, partners in crime, catching waves in companionable solitude. No one, it seems, is insane enough to surf when the only light to work by is the stars. Dunno why, I’m sure. Once the sun sticks up its head and brings warmth and light into the world, the second shift can be seen doing their stretches and warm-ups on the beach, casting envious glances at us in the distance, riding waves by ourselves.

   They wave at us.

   We give them the finger.

   A few blokes paddle out. One of them is Ciderman, so named for his curious physical resemblance to a cider bottle: skinny head, big gut, fat arse. Depending on the swell he can often be seen to go a deep, glassy green in the face, due to his susceptibility to seasickness. This is an unfortunate drawback for a surfer. There’s not many that will spew up just riding their board up and down at the point. It has been pointed out that the fetching green colour that comes over him at those times greatly complements his overall similarity to a cider bottle, although not, it has to be said, when he’s around, or, at least, not when he doesn’t have his head under the water trying not to be sick.

   We take it in turns, all in good spirits of sharing and sharing alike. Ciderman, not unduly put out today by the rocking of the swell, paddles onto a wave, jumps up and rides it out. He is, in spite of his obvious handicap, an excellent surfer.

   I’m next in line. We bob up and down, I eye off the heaving and growing of the ocean, and when I judge the building wall in front of us to be sufficiently to my liking to warrant going for, and, if I don’t get it, to put up with losing my spot in the line-up, I spin around and pull my arms hard through the water. I feel the tell-tale dropping away of the slope beneath me, hear and see the rushing water of the bending slope under and next to me, and jump up. Land it beautifully, hook a bottom turn and face straight down the line.

   And freeze in mid-move.

   There’s something in the water.

   In front of me.

   Moving fast, and heading straight towards me, in a beeline.

   The rising sun is right behind me, casting a shadow on the water. I get up on my toes on my board, not a recommended manoeuvre, and stick my head out as far as I can without losing my balance and stacking it.

   The thing heading towards me is huge. Humongous. It is at least 15 metres wide and 30 metres long. I shake my head in disbelief. There’s no such thing alive in the ocean. Moby Dick? The Bunyip? I blink hard, once, twice, and look again. And, finally, notice that it is not, in fact, one creature, but a whole swarm of them. Forty, fifty, all lined up in formation, moving in perfect unison. Diamond shaped, russet brown with darker leopard spots. Each one about half a metre across, or more. Edges of their shapes flapping up and down in slow motion, like birds on a breeze. Tails, streamlined and black, flowing out behind them.

    Tails with potentially lethal barbs.

   My brain finally catches up with my eyes, and I snap my mouth shut.

   It’s a massive pack of stingrays, rushing straight at me. Like a mob of roos, or a herd of cattle. A flock of geese, or a murder of crows.

   What do you call a pack of stingrays?

   I don’t stop to think about it. The sight of all these creatures, moving as one straight towards me, directly up the line, against the grain of the unfurling wave, is breathtaking. Out of this world. I start whooping out loud to myself, look up, and right there, about fifteen or so metres in front of me, is Ciderman, paddling back up after his wave. And my first thought is to share the moment. So I yell out to him.

   ‘Oi! Ciderman!’

   He looks up, blinks myopically, doesn’t see me.

   ‘Oi! Overhere, you blind mongrel!’

   He looks in front of him now, and sees me. Gives a friendly wave, and a puzzled look.

   ‘There’s stingrays! Just here!’ I point to the stretch of water between him and me, where the stingrays are now thrashing close to the surface. ‘Shitloads of them! Stacks!’

   ‘What?’

   ‘Stingrays! Just there!’

   ‘What? Where?’ He looks up at the sky, does a 360 with his cider head. Looks left, looks right. Looks behind him, looks at me. Looks everywhere but down below his feet.

   ‘Stingraaaaaayyyyys!!’ I scream, as I fly past him, diamonds of spotted brown flashing underneath me like a submarine highway. I look down at the beating wings and swirling tails streaming away just half a metre below my board, and it finally dawns on me that right now would not be a great time to stack it. It would be a bit like getting a massage from an echidna, and then some. Visions of Steve Irwin swim unbidden into the back of my mind. I push them away.

   Then the moment is gone.

   I’ve reached the end of the caravan of rays, they’ve gone up the line, and I’ve gone down the line. I finish my ride, and paddle back up again. Pull up next to Ciderman.

   ‘What was all that about?’ he frowns.

   I stare at him in disbelief. ‘Mate, there was about fifty stingrays in the water, between you and  me, just there.’ I wave my arm expansively in the general direction of where they were. ‘Didn’t you see them?’

   He looks sheepish. ‘Nah. Didn’t see a thing. Musta been lookin’ in the wrong spot, mebbe, ey.’

   Yes. You’re not wrong there.

   So what do you call a collection of stingrays? Is it a mob, a group, a herd, a flock, or a school; or a pod, swarm, hive, pack or troop?

   I thought it would have to be A Storm. A Storm of Stingrays, sounds good to me.

   Turns out it’s A Fever.

   A Fever of Stingrays.

 


 

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