Trade Deadline - Avon Gale Page 0,5
felt bad he couldn’t be out living wild and free, he’d formed a bond with the dolphin. He’d been a junior researcher when Silver came in, and spent a lot of his off hours patiently getting to know the clever creature. Micah had a cat at home—mostly because it wandered onto his lanai and never left—and he knew the difference between a pet and a wild animal—he spoke about it often to groups both at the aquarium and off-site. He knew Silver wasn’t the same as a domestic companion animal, but they definitely had a bond.
Still couldn’t keep him in his bathtub, though.
“I know what you want,” Micah told the dolphin, pulling out his phone. “You have to promise not to splash me, Sil. My cellular company straight-up told me dampened by dolphin is not going to get me a new phone. Not a third time.” He held up his hand, and Silver chittered and went up vertical, using his tail fin to keep himself upright. He chirped, as if to say hurry up, buddy, this isn’t that easy, you try it and Micah neatly slid in the frame, turned his phone around, and snapped a selfie.
Today’s #selfiewithsilver, Micah typed, sending the photograph to the aquarium’s Instagram feed. He hashtagged it appropriately, then switched over and added it to his personal account. It was a popular feature, and Silver often “posed” with others, too. Sometimes it skirted the line of performance, but it also brought attention to the aquarium and that brought in money for more rehab and better facilities. It was a delicate balance. He rubbed his hand over Silver’s head, whistled, and promised an extra fish as the dolphin gave him a last chirp and dove underwater. The tank was huge, with a large outdoor area and the inner section comprising both the upper and lower levels. Micah’s favorite place to be was in the tank with his dolphins, but today he had some tours to lead and—even though it was his least favorite—some paperwork to do in his office before checking in on Dudley.
As he went back to the lobby, he smiled when he saw Ava and her moms heading into the gift shop—if he knew kids, and he liked to think he did a little, she’d want a stuffed dolphin to commemorate her visit. Micah was also happy to see the nontraditional family unit, and it made him feel a little wistful; would he ever be able to stroll around the aquarium with his own kids, telling them about dolphins? His work took up a lot of his time, and while he’d had a few relationships in his life, most of his focus had been on his education and landing his dream job. Maintaining a social life while being in school and on research trips on boats was not easy to do. Micah didn’t have any family close by—he’d had a falling-out with his parents shortly after he’d come out—but he did have a great group of friends, and that along with his position at the aquarium had been enough to satisfy him for the last few years.
Things were beginning to settle down, though, and Micah was starting to think about having a family. Or, first things first, a partner; someone who would listen to him talk excitedly about sea turtles, since Micah was never going to be the kind of guy who could leave his work at home. But his last attempt at a relationship had been pretty abysmal, though it hadn’t been so much a clash of personalities as schedules. Vin was a chef at a fancy hotspot in downtown Miami, and they did not at all have compatible working hours. They’d left it as friends, but Micah was still bummed. He didn’t want to have to choose between his job and a family, even if he did appreciate the free tapas he scored whenever he went by the restaurant.
The tour group was waiting, though, so Micah put on a grin and a wave, and went to meet them. It was comprised of older kids that were part of a homeschool group, which Micah was used to by now. At first he’d had some pretty narrow-minded ideas about what that meant—his parents had disowned him thanks to a Southern Baptist upbringing in which being gay was a sin—but he’d quickly come to realize there were a lot of nontraditional education options and not all of them involved religion. Thank goodness. One visit where a