Martyn Green
Coordinator,
Baywater Anglers
“I am not! I, I just, I just thought I heard my friends.”
The crab sniggered. “Well, you did! At least in a manner of speaking, you did.”
“That is not what I meant.”
“I know,” replied the crab, shifting into its own voice, “but it’s all in a manner of speaking, don’t you see?”
Wilbur did, and said so, starting to relax as the crab nodded and grinned. Then they started to talk, about life in the pool, which the creatures called Rockwater, and about its inhabitants. The crab, grinning all the time, or at least trying as best as he could, dropped in little snatches of his friends’ voices and mannerisms until Wilbur was nearly crying with laughter.
And that was the start of their friendship. Over the next few days the wrasse and the crab, whose name was Cruncher, became inseparable. Wilbur found him witty and exciting and pretty darned good fun, but he did not notice that his friends, or at least his old friends, never called when the crab was around. He did not notice the peculiar looks he received or the way his friends shook their heads.
He also failed to notice when the crab hurt his friends’ feelings.
He did not even notice when they stopped calling at all. Nor did he notice the great, lumbering shadow that started to follow him around, standing as still as a statue when he paused, moving only after he had turned away and moved himself.
But if Wilbur did not notice the dropping off of his old friends it was hardly surprising. He was constantly surrounded by Cruncher’s many friends and relations, caught up in a whirl of activity that soon left him exhausted at night. He had no time to be bored.
Then, one day, his marvellous new friend took him up above the weed, showing him all manner of things that he had never seen before. “Have a look at this,” whispered Cruncher, holding out his claw.
