Not Here For The Fish And Chips

People said all sorts about the shark that supposedly turned up somewhere along the coast of Devon, England. “Circling Devil’s Point,” they said, “looking for a meal.” It was a great white, it was a bull shark, it was a dinosaur; the rumours twisted and grew and spread as far as Cornwall, where the summer season was just beginning and the tourist industry really didn’t need Jaws keeping wealthy Londoners from spending their big city money on overpriced ice-creams. Patient zero of the rumour seemed to be a fisherman local to Plymouth who drew a small crowd of mildly interested middle-aged men with his energised account of a very interesting day at work.

“It was nothing like… it was nothing like what I’ve seen, I’ll tell you… I’ll tell you, it was like nothing…”

Seamus – early thirties, tousled hair and weathered skin of a much older man – was from a long line of fishermen in the region and has never heard of a shark popping up before. His feverish energy was exacerbated by a regional accent that grew much stronger and harder to understand the more pints of ale he ordered. “A fish… big fish… shark, like in National Geographic, I used to read it as a boy…” His claim, met with raised eyebrows all around the pub, was that a huge shark – “a great white, had to be” – breached the waves just before his boat and Seamus, the only fisherman on deck, had just a moment to appreciate the glorious sight of a beast of the primeval Earth rippling and shining, suspended in the air, a thousand droplets of sea cascading from the grey body, clutching in a mouth dripping with teeth a tangled load of black seaweed, before it crashed back into the ocean.

“Must have made for a disappointing meal!” chuckled Seamus, four pints in. “You’re out sharking for a five star mouthful of England’s finest seal and you go home with rotten weeds in your teeth!”

“It doesn’t make sense.” Someone shaking their head at the bar. “Great whites don’t come to England.”

Seamus didn’t hear this. Someone bought him another pint. The accuser repeated his accusation. Seamus wheeled.

“I think you’ll find, mate,” he tilted his glass at a violent angle into his mouth, coming up frothing, “that they do now!”.

Just then things got nasty. Voices were raised, heads were shook, and Google was consulted. “No!” proclaimed the accuser, “You see, it just doesn’t happen.”

“Hasn’t happened,” corrected Seamus with a lopsided smile. “Yet. Look, you may know all this about diet and habitat and all this internet rubbish, but I know the sea! And I know fish! And you know, all this climate change nonsense? Seas warming, rising… Maybe the sharks have had enough. They’re expanding.”

His opponent snorted. Seamus received his sixth pint. “Like a gang?”

“No.” Seamus shook his head, suddenly with the weary demeanour of a very wise man. “Like an empire. We’ll be underwater soon and then the rest of the millennium will be the sharks’ for the taking. Trust me, no-one else is running the world once we walk the plank.”

His opponent smiled and bought another drink. “Maybe you’re right. We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

By the time Seamus was back in work on Monday, clutching the edge of his boat hard as his stared wide-eyed and nervous for another encounter, another sighting had been reported further down the coast by an anxious mother who immediately warned of a “terrifying black shape underwater” on social media. The post generated a degree of hysteria among equally anxious mothers who immediately pursued and shared the most horrific news stories from South Africa, Australia and the US about shark attacks as grounds for stopping their children from swimming on the first hot day of the summer – 24 degrees Celsius, tropical weather for England. More surprising, however, was the response of certain more reactionary elements of the online parenting community who outright denied the existence of any sort of shark and demanded that they and their extended families all march down to the beach to enjoy a lovely full day swimming and splashing about like a seal without any sort of fear whatsoever. “It’s our right,” announced father of three Martin, standing proudly with his trousers rolled up in the shallows as his children watched from way out in the bay, treading water and waiting to be told to come back in.

Bored with the unfulfilled theories and rising tensions of the land I decided to have a look for this shark myself, and set off into the water with a brisk breast stroke. It didn’t take long – the English Channel is very small – and soon the prophetic beast rose in the water next to me, intrigued I’m sure by my swift swimming technique. “You’re quick,” he said to me, barely opening his caving mouth to speak. “You could almost be one of us.”

“Yes,” I replied, not even out of breath. “I had a tremendous swimming teacher. What are you doing here?”

I sensed a trace of embarrassment behind the dead eyes. “We were hoping some of this might be underwater by now. Seems we might have to wait a while.”

“Yes,” I replied, “Though not as long as you might think. They’re far too busy back there to stop it. Just stick around for a while, and for God’s sake stay out of sight.”

“Right,” said the shark, “Cheers. I’ll tell the others.”

We swam in silence for a few seconds. “I’ll better be back, then,” he said.

“Yes,” I replied. “Just don’t make your move too quickly, mind. If they get an inkling that they might be on the way out, they’ll shoot you all and burn the rest of the ocean alive. Have some patience, and then the Earth is yours for a long time.”

“Cheers,” the shark repeated. “I’ll tell the others not to eat you.”

“Don’t worry about it.” I turned quickly and began heading back towards land. “If it came down to it, I wouldn’t mind giving something back.”