After a week’s worth of waiting, it’s here on the front porch—a short, long box that feels like it could be empty when I bring it inside and put it on the coffee table. A minute later, I’m back with scissors, but you’re already tearing off the packing tape, so I just watch while you drop strips of tape to the floor then unfold the cardboard flaps and pull out layer after layer of light-blocking foil, finally getting to what looks like sheets black of fabric.
We each take one, flapping it out and laying the impossibly thin material on the floor. Then we step back and look at our summer shadows—yours a bear, mine the dolphin that you gave me a hard time about when I chose it from the catalog because you wanted us to match like last year when our shadows were two horses trotting and galloping on the sidewalks of our neighborhood.
The first thing you say about our new shadows is, “You should have gotten the bear too,” still giving me a hard time even now. “Look at how cool the ears and claws are!”
Though I’m not so sure about the claws, the ears do look cool. But the dolphin is so sleek, and I can’t wait to see it swimming down the streets and across the schoolyard. This will be a summer when land and sea meet.
Pleased with these silhouettes, we cast our shadows over them and contort ourselves until our shadows fit inside. Then our shadows separate from us the way summer shadows always do, unanchoring from our feet and drifting a few inches away. Fully ready now for summer’s heat and long days, we turn to one another and smile, the excitement thrumming in us also pulsing through our shadows. And, of course, we have to go outside.
With the sun high in the clear sky, the bear and dolphin are small and close to us, crisp and inky on the driveway—so dark it’s hard to believe that they’ll have faded to nothing by summer’s end, leaving us with our usual shadows. Predictably, you swipe at the air to see the claws in action. Satisfied by how they slash across the pavement, you turn your head to the side so the sun casts the bear shadow in profile, then you open your mouth, getting the shadow’s teeth to show, your eyes turning wild with delight.
Since both bears and dolphins eat fish, we set off for the river to cast our new shadows on its swift currents from the old pier. On our way down the gravel path through the meadow, we watch our shadows as they follow alongside us—the bear lumbering on all fours, the dolphin undulating with its tail going up and down rhythmically.
Before the path takes us into the woods, you stop to straighten up and raise your arms, getting the bear to stand on its hind legs and hold up its front paws. Then you swat at the air, and the bear swings its paws as though to maul someone.
“So cool,” you say.
On the other side of the woods, the river is already lively, like we’re late to a party. In the water, people are fishing and windsurfing. Down the rocky bank from us, some kids from school are skipping stones. You tell me that you want to check out their summer shadows, but I’m sure that what you really want is to show off yours.
“I’ll stay here and wade in the water,” I decide. “I’m hot from the walk,” I add—which is true, but mainly I want to spend time with my summer shadow.
So you go on without me, and I take off my sandals then step into the river. Once I’m up to my shins in the cool water, my shadow darkens a patch of the rocky riverbed. I stare at the slender shape, imagining the currents caressing a dolphin sunning herself in these shallows. Maybe she’s here taking a break from the vastness of the ocean. Or maybe she’s a river dolphin.
When I hear the crunch of pebbles behind me, I turn around, expecting you—but instead lock eyes with a girl standing on the riverbank.
“Nice dolphin,” she says cheerily.
“Thanks,” I reply.
I want to return the compliment, but her shadow is bent over some gnarly driftwood beside her, and I can only tell that it’s also shaped like a fish.
So I ask, “Is your shadow a cetacean too?”
Her eyes dart to the side, and she murmurs, “Oh, yeah, my mom picked it out.”
Then I recognize her shadow’s dorsal fin.
“An orca, right?”
“Yeah,” she says like she’s admitting something is her fault. “Next year, I’ll probably be a narwhal,” she quickly adds. “Or a beluga.”
“Both of those whales are really cool,” I reply. I imagine a narwhal summer shadow with its tusk always out in front as if pointing toward the future. “Maybe I’ll go with a narwhal next summer too.”
“Then our shadows can be in the same pod!”
“Yeah, but our shadows can already be in a pod together.”
“But orcas… are different from dolphins.”
“Of course they are, but we can do anything we want with our shadows.”
“I guess so.”
“Summer is a lot more fun when you don’t stick to reality.”
“I know, but it’s kind of weird doing things that are wrong.”
“Just because something isn’t realistic doesn’t automatically make it wrong. And things that aren’t realistic can be fun. That’s what play is for. Trying things that aren’t realistic for fun.”
Before she can say anything, I add, “Here, let’s try it now. An orca and dolphin swimming together in this river.”
She seems to think this over for a moment then comes toward me. Her steps are sluggish, like she’s not sure we should do this. Near the river’s edge, she stops to take off her shoes and socks then roll up her pant legs.
Once her pale feet are next to my tanned ones, her shadow falls in front of mine, and a dizzying delight rushes through me as I admire the two sea creature silhouettes together—hers very definitely an orca and clearly smaller than my dolphin shadow now that it isn’t stretched out over that hunk of driftwood. It’s hard to think about an orca this small as a killer whale, but predators do come in all sizes. Or maybe it’s a calf.
I wade to the left and to the right, to the left and to the right, getting my dolphin shadow to swim back and forth. Soon, her orca shadow does the same, and I’m glad she’s decided to join in. But a moment later, I stop in my tracks when I notice that her feet aren’t moving—haven’t moved at all.
My eyes seek out hers. I’m about to blurt, “Your shadow can move without you?” But then I see her already wide eyes get even bigger, and I immediately turn back to our shadows and see what she’s seeing—my shadow also moving on its own, following hers as it swims out toward the middle of the river. Too stunned to say anything, I just watch them go.
When I’ve almost lost sight of them, both shadows head back—two dark streaks beneath the water, crossing paths with each other like they’re braiding their movements. Soon, they’re here, circling us. Then as quickly as they came, they leave, launching themselves at the opposite bank, side by side as though racing each other.
Will they return this time, or did they swim around us to say goodbye? I turn to her, to ask what she thinks, but she’s calmly watching our shadows beeline away, like she knows the answer—so completely understanding that the passing seconds simply bring us steadily into the future.
