The seal was back.
Same notch in its flipper. Same dock. Fourth year in a row.
Matt cut it from a net four years ago and never expected to see it again…
—
The seal was back.
Matt Torres stopped coiling rope the second he saw it. Same gray-white markings across its left shoulder. Same notch missing from the right flipper where the net had dug in four years ago.
It was hauled out on the last piling of Dock 9, staring at his boat.
“No way,” Matt said.
His deckhand Luis froze mid-step. “That the same one?”
“Can’t be.”
But it was.
Four years ago, Matt had found it tangled in synthetic gill net at dawn, maybe six weeks old, half-drowned and shredding itself trying to escape. He’d spent twenty minutes cutting it free while it screamed and thrashed, slicing his palm open in the process. The moment it was loose, it had bolted into the water without looking back.
Matt figured that was it.
But the next spring, a young seal started showing up at Dock 9. Always alone. Always watching his boat.
It came back every season after that.
Now it was September again, and the seal was back for the fourth time.
Matt climbed onto the dock. The seal didn’t move.
“You remember me or something?” Matt asked quietly.
The seal tilted its head.
Matt crouched down six feet away, the way he always did. The seal shuffled forward two feet, then stopped. It never came closer than that. Never let him touch it.
But it always came back.
Luis climbed up beside him. “Why’s it do that?”
“I don’t know.”
The seal’s eyes tracked Matt’s face. Not like it was begging. Not like it wanted food.
Like it was checking.
Matt’s throat tightened.
He’d cut that pup loose expecting it to forget him in ten seconds. Animals didn’t remember. They didn’t come back.
But this one did.
Every year.
Same dock. Same time. Always alone.
“Think it’s saying thanks?” Luis asked.
Matt didn’t answer.
The seal held his gaze for another five seconds, then turned and slid into the water without a sound.
Matt stood there long after it disappeared.
His deckhand headed back to the boat, but Matt stayed on the dock, staring at the empty piling.
He’d spent four years wondering if the seal remembered him.
Now he was starting to realize it wasn’t the seal he was worried about.
It was whether *he’d* be here next September when it came back.
Matt pulled his phone from his jacket and opened his daughter’s last text. Still unread. Still unanswered. Three months old.
*”Dad, I’m in Portland now. Let me know if you want to visit.”*
He stared at it.
The seal came back every year.
His daughter had stopped trying.
Matt’s thumb hovered over the keyboard.
He looked back at the water one more time.
Then he started typing.
—