And Then I Turned Into a Mermaid

by Laura Kirkpatrick

  ‘What are you guys talking about?’

  At the same time, Molly and Margot both said, ‘Nothing.’

  To Molly’s great surprise, Melissa’s shoulders slumped and a sad expression flitted across her face. ‘Why do you always do that when I walk into the room?’

  Margot looked nervously at Molly. ‘Do what?’

  ‘Stop talking.’ Melissa stared at the ground. ‘Act like Aunt Maureen’s just appeared in the doorway.’

  Margot winced. ‘Well . . . you can be a little . . . Reenish.’

  ‘That’s not very nice, Margot,’ Melissa chastised. ‘You should really be nicer to people.’

  It would have been very easy to point out that Melissa had just proven Margot right, but Molly decided not to cause World War Three. She was a bit tired. ‘Funnily enough, we were just saying that.’

  Melissa gave her a weak smile. ‘How was the zoo? It’s nice that you and Ada are friends again.’

  At the sound of Ada’s name, Molly’s stomach churned uncomfortably. ‘Mmmm.’

  ‘What? What’s wrong?’

  Molly sighed deeply. ‘It’s just . . . it’s hard, having to keep the mermaid thing a secret from her. I mean, I’m not even sure I want her to know. She’d think I was an even bigger freak than ever. I just hate knowing that if she did find out somehow, I’d get us all in trouble.’

  Melissa nodded sagely, like a middle-aged woman. ‘It’s a burden we all have to bear.’ There was a strange little beat, in which Melissa glanced at the ground once again. ‘The trick is not to get too close to anyone.’

  Molly stared out of the window at the night sky. It was clear, and the stars twinkled over the ocean. ‘What happens if . . . the humans do find out?’ It felt strange using the word ‘humans’ as though it wasn’t a group of which she was a part.

  Climbing into her dressing gown, Margot mumbled, ‘We’ll all be sent back to Meire. All of us.’

  ‘Meire?’ Molly asked, surprised that the answer didn’t involve being mauled by piranhas. ‘The old mermaid queendom?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘But I thought you said it was overrun with plastic and pollution.’

  ‘And poo,’ Margot pointed out.

  ‘It is,’ Melissa agreed, a prim look on her face. She didn’t like discussing bodily functions, which Molly found difficult to wrap her head around. ‘Being sent back to Meire would be a death sentence. That’s why we have to be so strict about keeping it a secret. It’s for our own good, Molly.’

  Molly’s stomach twisted and turned. ‘And if we were sent to Meire, we’d never be allowed back home?’

  ‘No. Never.’

  Molly’s heart sank at the thought of never coming back to Little Marmouth. Never seeing Ada again, or eating seamarbles, or serving battered sausages to Fit Steve. No more wonky lighthouse or dressing up as a haddock. Even though some of those things did her head in, she would really, really miss them if they were taken away from her.

  Maybe her life wasn’t as rubbish as she thought it was.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  The Good Ship Haddock

  A few days later, Mum and Myla returned from Cambridge. Mum went straight to check up on the chip shop – probably to make sure Margot hadn’t burned it down in her absence – while Myla went straight up to her bedroom at the very top of Kittiwake Keep. None of this was particularly unusual, but Molly found herself feeling a little dejected. She’d really been looking forward to seeing her mum and sister.

  After everything that had gone down over the last month, Molly had promised herself that she wouldn’t take her family – or her life – for granted. So while her gut instinct was to leave Myla to her studying, she decided to go up there for the first time in years. She remembered how much she appreciated Myla coming to see her on the night of her first transformation, and hoped her big sister would feel the same today.

  Tapping softly on the open door, Molly said, ‘Hey.’

  Myla, who was predictably sitting at her desk by the porthole window, turned around. ‘Molly! What a surprise.’ She blinked through her glasses. ‘Is everything OK?’

  ‘Of course!’ Molly smiled. ‘I just wondered how your interview went.’

  Myla nodded. ‘It was OK, I think. Some unexpected questions, but I fudged through the answers.’

  Molly gaped at her. ‘I never thought I would hear you, Myla Seabrook, admit to fudging through anything.’

  ‘I fudge through a lot of things.’ Myla laughed. She adjusted a book on her shelf that was slightly out of place. ‘You think all the school stuff comes easy to me?’

  ‘Uh, yes. You’re a super-genius.’

  Myla scoffed. ‘Only because I study a lot. I find it as difficult as anyone else.’

  This genuinely surprised Molly. She thought Myla was just naturally Einsteiny. ‘I didn’t know that.’

  Myla shrugged. ‘You’ve never asked me.’

  There was an uncomfortable pause. Molly thought of purple-tailed Amy, and how hurt Margot was that Myla had kept her love life a secret. But, really, it was more the case that they never asked Myla about her life. They just left her here alone at the top of the Keep, never bothering to ask what was going on with her.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Molly mumbled.

  ‘Don’t be daft,’ Myla said, too quickly.

  ‘No, really. I am. I should ask you things more often.’

  Myla tucked her legs up under herself. ‘I’m just as guilty. I know we don’t talk much, Mol, but with you and Margot being so close . . . I just feel like I’m interrupting sometimes.’

  There was a sadness in her voice that Molly hated hearing. Especially since she’d heard the very same sadness in Melissa’s voice when she’d told them she didn’t like the fact they stopped talking when she was around.

  Molly thought of how left out she felt when Ada was hanging around with Felicity and the popular group, and wondered if that’s how her sisters felt around her and Margot. It was a horrible thought. She never wanted anyone to feel like that, especially the people she loved. Because she did. She loved her sisters. Even though seventy-five per cent of them were a pain in the tail.

  ‘Please don’t think that,’ Molly said softly. She swallowed hard. ‘Especially with you going away next year. I want to spend more time with you.’

  To Molly’s surprise, Myla started to cry. Not big, rollicking sobs, just a gentle trickle of tears. She sniffed and wiped her eyes on her sleeve. ‘That’s really sweet. Come here.’

  Hugging Myla for the first time in forever, Molly couldn’t help but shed a tear herself.

  After school the next day, Molly finally got the chance to sit down with her mum and talk through everything that had happened. She left out the part about being blackmailed by Felicity, because she didn’t want to admit someone knew about her tail, but she did confess to discovering her strange merpower. Mum was just as confused as Margot had been.

  Mum stirred a spoonful of sugar into her black coffee. ‘I wish I could explain it, kiddo, but I’ve never heard of anything like it.’

  ‘Great. I knew I was a freak.’

  Mum laughed at this. ‘We’re all freaks. You’re right at home.’ There was a pause as she sipped, then smiled warmly. ‘But we’ll figure it out together, Mol. I promise. Now get dressed. You’re needed on the Good Ship Haddock.’

  The December afternoon was cold, and for once Molly was not sweating in her haddock suit. In fact, it was the beginning of a rather pleasant evening, with the gushing and fizzing of waves on the shore, the cawing of the seagulls overhead, and the kaleidoscope of red and orange and pink as the sun set over the sea.

  As she watched Ada frolicking on the beach with Penalty Pete, Fit Steve and Felicity, she found herself getting jealous once again. She wanted to be spending her evenings laughing in the sand and having rock-skimming competitions, not handing out leaflets and worrying about whether or not she was about to transform.

  But for some reason, the feeling of being left o
ut didn’t sting quite as much as before. Knowing this life could be taken from her in the blink of an eye made her appreciate it all the more. She was genuinely grateful for her weird family. Her mad, skinny-dipping mum, and her messy, complicated, wonderful sisters. Who, you know, also happened to be mermaids.

  As Molly was thrusting wodges of leaflets at locals who probably had a thousand identical leaflets stuffed in their kitchen drawers, Ada and her new crew climbed the steps back on to the pier and started walking in Molly’s direction. They all laughed at something Fit Steve said, and for a split second, Molly worried they were mocking her.

  The familiar burn of shame stung in her cheeks. She was wearing a haddock suit. In front of the love of her life and the most popular girl in school. Who knew she was a mermaid.

  At least she’d remembered to put on some of the lipstick Ada had got her for her birthday. Although she suspected she might have done it wrong. There was a funny taste in her mouth. Maybe it wasn’t supposed to go all the way inside your lips.

  For an agonising moment, she half-expected her friend to ignore her and walk straight past, but to her massive relief, Ada stopped and waved. ‘Hey, Mol. How’s it going?’

  Ada acknowledging their friendship in front of the Populars made her beam like a lighthouse. ‘Good, you?’

  ‘Fine. Hey, you know F– Steve, right?’

  Fit Steve nodded in her direction. ‘How’s it goin’?’

  ‘This is Pete, and this is Felicity.’

  Felicity gave Molly the tiniest of smiles. ‘Hi.’

  Molly smiled back. Reflex made her want to say something snarky, but knowing what she did about Felicity’s mum – feeling the pain for herself – stopped her in her tracks. The wave of sympathy was so powerful it almost took her breath away.

  ‘Hey,’ she mumbled. ‘Nice to meet you.’

  Then the two girls nodded at each other, so subtly nobody else noticed, and a burst of warmth rocketed through Molly’s chest. It really did feel better to be nice.

  In the back of her mind, she briefly worried what would happen if news naturally got out about Felicity’s mum. Molly would completely lose her leverage, and there would be nothing to stop Felicity telling the world about Molly being a mermaid. This whole set-up was a ticking time bomb.

  Maybe she could try to befriend Felicity for real. She didn’t seem that bad, underneath her Cool Girl facade. And Molly could definitely relate to a lot of what she was going through – the sick mum, the poor grades, feeling totally at odds with herself.

  It was certainly worth a try.

  ‘I like your teeth,’ Molly blurted out. Then, as though it would make her ridiculous statement less weird, she added, ‘They are very straight and white. Shiny.’

  Shiny. Just . . . why, Molly?

  But Felicity only smiled again. ‘Thanks. That’s sweet.’ Fit Steve nodded at the leaflets in Molly’s fin. ‘So you have to get rid of all those flyers, huh?’

  ‘Yup. Our family basically murders an entire rainforest every month just to get these printed.’

  ‘Gimme a handful. I’ll ask my boss if we can have some on the ice cream counter.’

  Molly couldn’t quite believe it. He was offering to do her, Molly Seabrook, a favour! ‘Thanks, Steve,’ she said, as calmly as she could muster.

  This was, quite frankly, an astonishing turn of events. She was talking to Fit Steve, and not once had she uttered the word ‘sausages’. Or ‘glumph’, for that matter.

  Maybe this was it. Maybe this was the start of her journey into the popular group.

  Right at that second, Minnie darted out of the shop and yanked her by the hand. Well, fin.

  ‘Molly-macaroni,’ she asked excitedly. ‘Did you have a nice poo earlier?’

  Then again, maybe not.

  Acknowledgements

  Working on this series has been so much fun that I don’t think it would be fair to call it work – in no small part thanks to my amazing publishing team, who have been a dream since day dot. Thank you to my literary agent Suzie Townsend (I’m sorry for making you rep a mermaid book), the rest of the New Leaf family, and of course Team Egmont: Ali, Liz, Siobhan, Olivia, Sarah, Hilary, Laura, Amy, Janene, Susila and Melissa. You’re all brilliant.

  My incredible writing friends: especially Emma Theriault, Sasha Alsberg and Francina Simone. Operation World Domination is a go.

  My real human pals (because all writers are witches and cyborgs): Mum, Dad, Jack, Gran, Toria, Nic, Hannah, Lauren, Lucy, Hilary, Steve and Spike. My dog Obi, even though the reading lessons aren’t going so well. And Millie, the best mermaid I know.

  And finally to my husband Louis. I love you. I apologise if this book brings shame to the Kirkpatrick name, but really, you knew what you were getting into when you said ‘I do’.