There was this kid at my high school named Arty Willock.
There were a lot of strange things about Arty beyond the fact his name was ‘Arthur’, which was a pretty rare name, and unless you watched the cartoon aardvark show or were into English folklore, you probably hadn’t heard of anyone named Arthur, let alone ‘Arty’.
He was quiet in a way that made you think something was wrong, like he had a speech impediment or disability. When he did speak, though, it was clear he had a fine intelligence and penchant for language, and I think he simply saw little reason for speaking. Fair enough, as the rest of us were probably not worth talking to.
In fact, Arty probably had beyond average lingual skills, because one time I caught him etching some logographic characters into his loose-leaf.
“What’s that, Arty? Some Japanese?” I asked him, figuring him to be another one of those anime obsessives.
He smiled our graduating class’s ‘Best Smile’ in the yearbook. He wasn’t a looker, Arty, but he was goddamn pearly.
“No, Chinese, actually.”
“Why Chinese?” I knew Chinese was one of the hardest languages to learn.
He shrugged. “I want to be able to watch and understand Star Wars with the Chinese overdubs.”
Things like this made up the rest of Arty’s strangeness.
But the strangest thing about Arty was he could impersonate a dolphin.
Like, really well.
It’s difficult to explain how well, actually, without imploring you to look up videos of people making dolphin noises and actual dolphins. Arty was not the first person to impersonate dolphins, and some others have done it pretty well, but when you watch those internet videos, just know Arty did it better, even better than the dolphins themselves.
I never knew Arty had this capability until one time in gym class when he got a rare base hit and the jocks of the class, who had of course reduced his vibrant self to this one characteristic, began to goad him into performing it in celebration:
“Arty! Ar-ty! Make-the-noise. Make-the-noise! Do it Arty! Make the noise!”
So Arty smiled, stepped one foot off first base, clenched his fists, raised his face to the sky and let out a shrieking ‘EI-EI-EI!’ that, if we hadn’t been hundreds of miles from the sea, would have surely been heard by the nearest pod.
I wouldn’t have thought of this incident, nor would Arty have ever returned to the foreground of my memory, if it weren’t for Judge Judy putting down the gavel for the final time in 2021, after 25 years on the air.
Why? In another oddity, Arty was one of Judge Judy’s biggest fans.
He was a 16-year-old boy who wore a Judge Judy shirt to school every day. It was the stuff of school legend, to the point where, as Christmas approached, other students would buy him Judge Judy themed gifts. His first post on Facebook was an image of his bedroom shelf full of Judge Judy memorabilia, collectibles and the DVD box sets of each season.
I went back on Facebook for the first time in a long while, just to check in on him, to see how he was handling the series finale. Surprisingly, there was no mention of it. It seemed he was preoccupied with starting a new job he was excited about and proud of.
He was working at SeaWorld.
Our tale might have ended there: with my eminent disbelief.
SeaWorld?
Where there were...dolphins?
Was he a dolphin soothe-sayer?!
I had the chance to clear things up when, on the way home from doing some Christmas shopping, I stopped at a Panera Bread to get lunch. I ate inside and a couple tables down, sitting by himself with one of those drinks they had to cancel because it killed someone, was Arty Willock.
Approaching people from my past with enthusiasm is not something I usually do, but I couldn’t resist Arty’s smile, which he beamed as he stood to shake my outstretched hand.
“Arty Willock! How you doing, dude?!”
“Art,” he said in the manner people use when they politely correct you on what to call them now. “I’m very good, thanks! How are you?”
I rudely ignored his inquiry to my life and asked where he was at now. He told me he was living in San Diego and was visiting home for the holidays.
“Last I saw you were working at...Sea World? Is that right?”
He chuckled. “Kind of. I work at a Sea World sometimes. Consulting.”
“Oh cool! What do you consult on?” I asked. My hope soared. He talked to the dolphins. He really did.
“I’m a bioacoustician,” he said.
“A what?”
“Technically, a marine biologist. But it’s someone who studies the sounds living beings make. I specialize in dolphin echolocation and vocalizations.”
It was real. He talked to dolphins.
“Wow! That’s incredible. Now did you go to college for that, or...”
“Actually, I went to college for audio production.”
“Audio production? I didn’t know you were into music.”
“Not exactly. I wanted to be a foley artist.”
“A what-artist?”
He laughed again. “Foley artist. It’s someone who makes sound effects for movies.”
I wasn’t connecting any dots. “Okay, I just have to ask. What inspired you to be a ‘foley artist’?”
“I loved Star Wars! I loved the noises all the space ships made, the blasters, the lightsabers...”
“So then how do you get from that to bioacousta-whatever marine biologist?!” If my incredulousness was rude to him, his smile couldn’t betray it.
“Making sounds! I’m good at it for some reason. Whale and dolphin languages, they’re sounds to us, but language to them. Similar to tonal human languages actually. I’ve got a unique set of skills, I guess,” he laughed again. Apparently another of his skills was being disarming.
The most beautiful Asian woman I’d ever seen, possibly Chinese, came up to us and sat in the chair across from him with a drink of her own.
“This is is my wife, Mei Chen,” he said. She put forth a delicate hand for me to shake and nodded with an unforthcoming tight smile which made me feel my time was up.
“I’ll let you enjoy. Pleased to meet you. And good to see you again, Art. Hope you have a great holiday!”
I turned to go, then paused, feeling embarrassed at my forthrightness and curiosity, but I just had to know.
“Wait, uh, Art. What about the Judge Judy thing?”
He tilted his head at me, like he was a cat. Fucking Arty. Art.
“What about it?”
“Like, you’re still into Judge Judy right? How does that fit into the whole talking to dolphins thing?”
“Uh, it doesn’t? I just really like Judge Judy. And I don’t talk to dolphins, it’s more that I...”
“Oh...right. Right. Well, good to see you Art.”
After imbibing a heart-stopping drink of my own, I went back to my car and sat in the parking lot.
Strange was how I thought to describe Arty in our high school days, but I understood then he was intriguing. His strangeness was like a sound, a reverberation echoing from within him that only others could receive. But intriguing was the best word for the interpretation of that sound, and how to best describe him.
“Do the dolphin noise, Arty. Do it,” I said to myself as I pulled out of the parking lot.
I guess you could say Art was a piece of work.
thanks for reading this story about someone who was a really cool person. even if you didn’t like it, maybe click the little heart button so that people who might will find it.
BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS:
How does strange morph into intriguing when we think about the characters in our lives?
Did you know anyone like Arthur Willock?
thanks for reading PNP, where we love the strangeness of intriguing people. if you liked this story, you might also like my novel, the big T, posted here on Substack:
Incredibly tender and real. I’m curious how your classmates would describe (or remember) you?
Good read! I love the transformation from the ‘weird’ kid to the multi-faceted successful adult. Well done