“Luke…” I stole a glance at Chelse to see if she could bail me out and serve him while I faked a trip to the bathroom. I couldn’t talk to Luke! Not without rehearsing every itty-bitty detail in my head to avoid making an idiot of myself like I had the day before.
Chelse looked my way and rolled her eyes. My real-life troubles obviously paled in comparison to her virtual ones. I flashed her a thanks-for-nothing eye bulge and turned back to the takeout window to face Luke.
I was on my own.
“If you’re looking for suggestions, I just had the Nutter Butterscotch and it is delicious. I recommend a crumbled Wigwag topping. My specialty.” I tried to keep my tone as businesslike as possible, but I was sure I sounded like my brains had been scooped out and put through a salad spinner.
Luke braced his hands on the counter and looked over the cooler lid to scan our selection. “As good as they all look, I’m not really here for the ice cream.”
“Oh. Well, you can get frozen yogurt at Mug Glug’s,” I offered. What was wrong with me? I owed the guy an apology, big time, and all I could do was blow him off with dairy-related chitchat.
“Cori says you get off your shift soon,” Luke said.
“Um, no…actually I work until five.” I made a mental note to kill Cori.
“Actually, she’s off right now.” I felt someone yank the dish towel from my shoulder and flick the back of my leg. Speak of the devil.
“Ouch. And you’re early,” I whispered to Cori, turning toward her.
“And you’re welcome,” she whispered back. She looked up at Luke and smiled. “Jade will meet you in the parking lot out back in a couple minutes.”
“Got it.” Luke drummed his fingers on the counter, then gave an adorable salute before disappearing past the ice cream parlor window.
I turned and grabbed the towel back from Cori. “What are you trying to do to me? What am I supposed to say to him?”
“How about ‘I’m sorry’ closely followed by ‘How’s your mom?’ and then finish it off with a ‘That Cori is so awesome, isn’t she?’”
“Ha ha.” I folded the dish towel until it was an itty-bitty square then shook it open again and tossed it on the counter.
“Seriously, Jade—you can do this.” Cori unhooked the time sheet clipboard from its nail and handed it to me.
“Weren’t you the one who told me to stay away from the Martin boys?” I took the clipboard from her. “Are you saying you weren’t right, after all?”
“Yeah, well…it’s not that I’m always right, I’m just never wrong. So, step away from the ice cream cooler. You are being relieved of your duties.”
I looked at her with an exasperated smile.
“All right, all right.” I found my name on the time sheet and signed out. “I might as well apologize so I can breathe my last breath with a clear conscience before I die of embarrassment.”
“Good girl.” Cori held out her hand for the clipboard but Chelse took it from me before I could hand it over.
“A friendly word of advice?” Chelse signed out for her break and shoved the clipboard back onto its nail. She tossed her cell phone into her purse and swept by me. “Guys suck.”
“Wow,” I whispered to Cori once Chelse was out of earshot. “That was weird.”
Cori pulled down the lever to fill a sugar cone with swirls of soft-serve vanilla. “Yeah, well, not sure if you’ve been on Facebook lately but there’s a really embarrassing video of Chelse being posted and shared. I’ll admit I snuck a peek. It’s kind of cringe-worthy.”
“Really?” I glanced over as Chelse pushed through the diner door. I knew it was probably wrong, but I was dying to know. “What’s the video of?”
“Just something stupid. I’ll tell you more about it later, but go. Luke’s waiting for you, remember?”
Remember? I pictured Luke making that adorably silly cow face and sighed. Luke Martin was kinda hard to forget.
•••
Luke was sitting on the curb of the back parking lot when I came out of the kitchen door. He stood when he saw me and slid his hands deep into the pockets of his cargo shorts.
I felt for the toe ring I had strung on a chain around my neck. It brought me back to that night in the tub, the first time I’d ever changed from feet to flippers. The weirdness between Luke and me would be a big bummer, since I really wanted to talk to him about this whole mer thing. Who else could understand what it was like to be me?
Luke looked like he was debating what to say, judging by the way his eyebrows scrunched together and the slow breath he was exhaling. What if this was the final showdown? What if I didn’t get a chance to apologize before he dumped me for good?
“Luke, I…” I began, but the rest of the words got stuck in my throat like a dry cracker.
Luke held out his hand for me.
“Walk?” he asked, nodding to the path that followed the canal to the beach.
I nodded and took his hand.
Luke’s hand. In mine. What did this mean?
We walked along the mile-long canal that separated the Atlantic Ocean from the fresh water of Talisman Lake. Luke’s grandpa, Eddie, was in charge of opening and closing the canal’s lock when boats wanted to sail through. But the canal’s lock served another purpose. The Mermish Council used Talisman Lake as a prison and the lock kept the criminal mers, “Freshies,” from escaping.
“You totally knew I was down there that day, didn’t you?” I remembered how Luke had looked into the water the day I finally got Mom and Serena through the locks to the ocean.
“I almost dove in when I saw you were down there, but I figured that would blow your cover.”
“Thanks for nothing. I was freaking out down there!” I slapped his arm as we continued walking. “So, I still don’t get why you never said anything to me. All that time, when you knew about me…”
“Grandpa thought I shouldn’t. He says mers have been able to stay alive because we keep each other’s secrets, which I guess kinda makes sense.”
“I guess.”
“We haven’t really had much of a chance to talk about this whole mer stuff since Cori’s pool party, and I know that’s mostly my fault.”
“No, wait a sec.” I squeezed his hand for him to stop. “I need to apologize. I’m so sorry about jumping all over you yesterday. How’s your mom. Is she doing okay?”
Luke nodded. “Yeah, thanks. We were all pretty freaked out for a while there, though. What about you? Any news about your mom?”
“Not really. It’s kind of driving us nuts. My dad and I are planning a search and rescue mission tomorrow, though, to keep from going crazy.”
“Anything I can do to help?”
“Got any contacts at the Mermish Council?” I asked hopefully.
“Hmm…” Luke considered this for a second. “If I knew what a Mermish Council was, maybe I could be more useful.”
“I think it’s in that mer handbook they forgot to give us.” I laughed. “Anyway, I’m happy things worked out with your mom. And really happy I got to apologize before Cori strangled me with a dish towel.”
“That Cori is so awesome, isn’t she?” Luke said in an exaggerated tone as we continued walking.
“She told you to say that, didn’t she?” I asked.
“Yep.” Luke laughed.
Cori, Cori, Cori.
A warm ocean breeze swept up from Port Toulouse Bay, smelling of salt and summertime. The canal trail hooked up with the wooden boardwalk running along Toulouse Point Beach. Moms were out pushing jogging strollers along the boardwalk while a few guys tossed a football near the lifeguard tower. We reached the far end of the beach, where the sand gave way to a rocky shore that led to a point of giant granite boulders.
“So.” We sat on a large log of silver-colored driftwood. “Is there actually a mer handbook? Because I’m mostly clueless when it comes to this mer stuff.”
“Tell me about it.” Luke leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.
“Hardly.” Luke looked out over the ocean, then glanced over his shoulder to me. “You remember the first time you crashed into me at Dooley’s pharmacy?”
“Technically, you crashed into me, but yeah, I remember.”
“I felt like there was something different about you that day, but I wasn’t sure if it was you or because of what had just happened to me.” Luke stood and crouched next to a puddle of ocean water left over from when the tide had gone out. He fished out a small crab. It waved its claws blindly in the air as Luke eyed it closely.
“You’d just gotten back from your sailing vacation with your family,” I said.
“Yeah, but it was a bit more than just a vacation.” Luke walked down to the edge of the water and placed the crab carefully in the water, then turned back to me.
“How so?” I asked.
“Well, my mom and dad had always told me I was adopted.” He finger quoted adopted.
“So you always knew you were a mer?” I plucked a couple of starfish from the puddle and joined Luke at the edge of the water.
“Yeah, Grandpa was the one who found me washed up in a puddle like this when I was a baby.” Luke shaded his eyes to look out into the ocean, then turned back to me. “At first, when I was little, I thought it was just a bedtime story, but when I was about nine, Mom, Dad, and Grandpa explained it all to me. But it wasn’t until this past spring that I knew what it all really meant. Grandpa knows another Webbed One in Florida…”
“A human who is part mer, like you and my mom, you mean?” I remembered the term Webbed One from Dad’s Mermaidia: Fact or Fiction book. But Webbed Ones were far from fiction. In fact, Finalin and Medora had pulled me under the waters of Talisman Lake when they’d seen my webbed toes. “And me too, I guess.”
“Yeah. So we sailed there to get help for my first time and everything.”
“You mean, the first time you ever changed back to a mer since you were a baby was just this past spring?” I tossed the starfish into the water and wiped my hands on my shorts to dry them.
Luke nodded. “Yup.”
Then, something occurred to me. Luke wasn’t exactly like me. I was born human. And since my human DNA was so strong, I just had to crawl out of the water to change from mer back to human. Luke was different, though.
“So, if you’re a Webbed One, but were born a mer, you must need a tidal pool to change back.”
“Yeah. The tides in and out of a puddle like this were enough when I was a baby but the older you get the more complicated it becomes. There was a large pool on Bobby’s property in Florida. We tried a few others, but they weren’t as good and took much longer.”
“Just like your grandpa told my dad. The pools aren’t really magical at all, are they?” Huh. Dad’s Merlin 3000 sounded like it was on the right track. “So, how long does it take you to change exactly?”
“It gets easier each time. By the fourth time, I was down to about two days.”
“Two days?” I asked.
“Yeah, why?” he asked. “How long does it take you?”
“No more than a couple minutes, but usually I puke or pass out.”
Luke laughed and I’m sure I blushed, remembering the time he’d found me passed out next to Talisman Lake mid-transformation.
“This mer stuff is pretty nuts, huh? I’m still trying to figure out how I feel about it all.” Luke turned to me and took my hand in his. He raised our hands in the air. “About this too. I hope that’s okay?”
A warm feeling spread through my hand as I considered this for a second.
“So, what you’re saying is that you’re just as clueless as I am?” I asked.
“Pretty much.” Luke dropped my hand and picked up a flat rock. He rubbed it between his thumb and index finger, then threw it over the water. It skipped a couple of times before sinking. He picked up another rock. “Things are just all really new for me too. What I could really use right now is a friend who gets where I’m coming from.”
Friend. Was that a friend-friend or a kissy-friend I wondered. But before I could ask, Luke stopped tossing his rock mid-throw.
“Do you hear that?” He looked over his shoulder at me.
“What?” I listened, but all I could hear was the sound of waves washing up along the shore. But then the wind changed and I heard it too—a high-pitched whine like the sound of a motorboat. “What is that?”
Luke tossed his rock aside and strode down the beach. I followed. “Wait, Luke. What’s making that noise?”
Luke broke into a run and headed for the breakwater, calling over his shoulder, “It’s Reese!”
“Owrch!” I stubbed my toe on a rock, trying to catch up.
Who the heck was Reese?
By the time I reached Luke, he’d already scrambled up onto the rocky breakwater jutting out into the ocean and was hopping from one enormous boulder to another.
“Wait! Luke!” I yelled, afraid of what he might do. Thankfully, we were at least a quarter of a mile from the main part of the public beach, but still. With the pounding surf and jagged rocks, this was not the best place to plunge into the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, even if you were a pesco-sapien. “Be careful!”
“Come on!” Luke waved an arm over his head before jumping down and disappearing behind a rock.
“Luke!” I called out, worried he’d hopped into the ocean and was sprouting a tail by then. I caught my flip-flop in a crack trying to climb a boulder to get to him, scraping my big toe in the process (again!). “Ow, ow, ow! I do not have the right shoes for this.”
Thankfully, I found Luke on a low-lying rock near the end of the point. He had a hand to his ear, straining to hear over the sound of waves crashing all around us.
“What the heck are you trying to do? Get us both killed?” I stepped down beside him and hung onto a nearby boulder to avoid getting swept out to sea by a random wave.
“Where is he?” Luke shaded his eyes and scanned the water.
“This is a bad idea.” I turned to go.
“No, I swear I heard him. Just wait a second.” Luke caught my arm to stop me.
“Heard who, exactly?”
Reese! Luke called out into the vastness of the ocean. His mer voice came out as a high-pitched ring, like the sound of buzzing electrical wires or summer cicadas.
“I’m guessing this Reese guy is a mer, but how the heck do you even know him?” I asked. “Other than when you were a baby, you just said you’ve only transitioned to a mer once this past spring. In Florida!”
Luke turned and laughed when he saw I was clinging onto the boulder for dear life. “I met Reese way before that.”
“But how?”
“I didn’t actually meet him. I heard him.” Luke pounced onto the next rock, searching the waters as he went. “My mom and dad used to take us down here for picnics all the time. Trey and I would jump from rock to rock like this for hours. One day, my ears rang like crazy and Mom and Dad thought it was because I was listening to my music too loud. But that wasn’t it. I could hear him. I could hear Reese.”
“How do you even know his name?” I pulled a windblown strand of hair from my mouth.
“I don’t. That’s just the sound he made whenever he came by. Trey never saw him, but once I figured out how to make the sound back to him, Reese would swim by my rock every once in a while—to check me out, I guess.”
I scanned the waters for any signs of life, but all I could make out was a motorboat heading toward the canal and a harbor seal swimming a few dozen feet away.
“Ohmigod! Luke, there’s an actual seal right over there.” I pointed. “This would not be a good time to fall in.” I shrank back as far from the edge of the rock as possible, just in case seals ate people.
I couldn’t make out how big and potentially scary the seal was from that far away, but thankfully, it turned its head toward us and then flicked away.
“No, no! That’s
him,” Luke said. Reese! It’s me! It’s Luke!
A dark figure zigzagged toward us just below the surface of the water. The surf made it hard to spot as it swam, but soon the figure was beside our boulder and, sure enough, it wasn’t a seal. It was the chubbiest mer-dude I’d ever seen. Compared to the pasty-looking Freshies from Talisman Lake, this guy looked healthy and extremely well-fed.
Lukshh? Reese hung on the edge of our rock to keep from being swept away by the tide. He looked about our age and his long hair swirled around his full face, which broke into a smile once he got a good look at Luke.
Lukrshh! Reese rang up to Luke, then pointed to me.
Jade, Luke answered, as he pulled my hand into his. We both crouched down on the rock to get a better look at Reese. This is Jade.
Reese nodded. Ja-shhde. He glanced at Luke then pointed to himself and rang Reesshh, as if to say Luke’s nickname suited him just fine.
Luke rang a couple sounds I didn’t recognize.
“What are you saying to him? Wait. How do you even know how to speak Mermish?” I asked, wondering if there was some online Mermish-to-English translator I’d never heard of.
“I don’t really,” Luke said, turning to me. “I just picked up the basics when I was with Bobby in Florida.”
“Bobby? The mer your grandpa hooked you up with?” I let out a huge snort. Reese and Luke glanced at me with puzzled looks.
Bobby bobbing in the water? I rang out to both of them. What? It’s funny!
Fneeee, Reese rang back and smiled, then he swam around our rock, diving and darting around. Something caught his eye on the ocean floor. He picked it up and examined it, then stashed it in a satchel-like woven bag strung across his chest.
I whispered to Luke, “I’ll say one thing: the guy really has an ear for languages. You too, by the way.”
“You’ll pick up Mermish too, don’t worry. It’s pretty close to Spanish if you listen closely,” Luke said.
“Spanish?” I moaned. I hated Spanish. “Sounds more like nails on a chalkboard to me.”
Real Mermaids 2 - Don't Hold Their Breath Page 3
