by C. S. Moore
Shutting the door behind me, I laid down in front of the canvas.
“Mom,” I whispered. She was so beautiful. Sylvia had captured her disposition well. Her face was the kindest I’d ever seen. How could anyone do what they'd done to her? All she'd tried to do was save a child and they'd killed her and strung her up and harvested her. I looked at her chocolate brown hair that fell well below her waist. Had they chopped it all off like they had Jaron’s mother’s?
I raised my hand and touched her face. How could I miss someone I'd never known? When I started sobbing, I couldn’t stop. Making no effort to quiet myself, I was sure my aunt heard me. But she let me have my space, and I was grateful. Sylvia’s mournful cries reached me and I thought of Dylan. Where was he? Was he okay? Was that the last time that I would see the man who had raised me with such love and care? My sobs turned into full-blown hysterics. How could I—how could Sylvia live without him? This was the first time that I’d heard her cry… she must have been wondering the same thing. At some point in my breakdown my father came to mind but I pushed the thought away. He had chosen to give me up, and it was a hard thing to not feel angry about. My eyes were puffy and heavy and it wasn’t long before I drifted off to sleep. The last thing that went through my mind was the hideous face of the Siren and its hollow black eyes.
20
Guests started to trickle in that evening. I couldn’t believe the party Sylvia had thrown together in such a short time. Fairy lights covered every tree and bush, lighting the garden warmly. In Dylan’s absence, she'd hired a restaurant to cater the party. Men and women dressed in white walked around carrying trays full of decadent looking bites. I was no longer sick, thanks to the medicine Sylvia had given me, but that didn’t help my heavy heart. I missed the ocean terribly and couldn’t believe that Sylvia and Dylan had been feeling this way all of these years just to protect me. It had been such a selfless act for them to give up their home for me. Many mer were still in the ocean, scared and on the run, but I was sure that most of us would choose an existence in the ocean, even a terrible one, over living on land.
My eyes hurt and I was incredibly dry all over. Unfortunately that wasn’t going to go away. I would always feel like a fish out of water here, because that’s what I was. I had never been conscious of the symptoms before because of the potion Cala gave me, but I didn’t have that to make me forget my mer self anymore. I tried to smile and greet guest while ignoring my discomfort and sadness at being there. Once again my heart swelled, realizing how much my guardians had gone through for me.
“You doing okay?” Sylvia asked, taking advantage of a break in guest arrivals.
“I’m honestly trying to understand why you would do this for seventeen years,” I said, blinking my eyes a few times to moisten them. “Acting like someone other than who you are, being all itchy, and missing the ocean and your family—”
She straightened the strap of my cocktail dress. “For you, my darling, it was easy.” I couldn’t understand how that could be true, but her face was nothing but genuine. “Oh—Stephanie! So glad you could come,” she said to a middle-aged woman rounding the corner and coming into the garden.
I sighed and walked to the back of the property, away from the party, and sat on a stone bench, wishing I could step in a time machine and go back to the previous day to kick my own ass. How could I have ever been mad at Sylvia? Now that I knew the truth and was experiencing a small part of what she'd sacrificed on a daily basis, I couldn’t help but love her even more. She wasn’t just beautiful, sweet, and talented. Sylvia was strong and unselfish in a way that most people would never dream of being. If only Dylan were home safe, I could feel almost happy. All of the secrets were out of the way now. They didn’t have to pretend anymore. Getting used to the idea of my father giving me up would take some time, but at least I understood that it was what he'd thought best for me. And that’s really all a parent could do for his child.
“Maribell?” Jaron’s voice came from behind me.
He was standing five feet away, shuffling his feet. I tried not to notice how sharp he was in his gray suit, but it was impossible. He was the most glorious specimen of the male gender to walk the earth… or swim in the ocean. And it was impossible not to drift back to the memory of kisses we'd shared in his shop. The sculpture of the star falling into the waves was clasped in his hand tightly, like he was worried someone was going to snatch it away.
“Mind if I sit here?”
“Of course,” I said.
“Oh, right. I’ll just set this here. I want you to have it.” He set the silver piece on the bench before turning to go.
“No not of course I mind, of course you can sit here,” I clarified, feeling like it was the first day he was in art class all over again. We had circled to where we had started, and maybe that was good.
He sat next to me, immediately warming my side, and hung his head. “I need to tell you everything, from the beginning… so you know that I never meant to—that I did everything I could to protect you.”
“Jaron, you don’t need to do that—”
“Yes I do.”
“All right,” I whispered not sure if I wanted to hear anymore. Between Dylan being gone, finding out my mother had been murdered my father was alive, and sprouting a tale… I already had too much on my mind.
He took a deep breath and began. “About two years ago, my life took a turn for the better. My brother was finally eighteen, and he became my legal guardian. We were no longer in the system, sometimes together, sometimes apart. We could actually start trying to be a real family again.
“For a while it felt like maybe I could be happy. Then my brother went on a trip, from what Sylvia has told us, I’m guessing it was to the ocean— although he never told me that. When he got back, he was sick, terribly sick… and he didn’t get better. We went to hospital after hospital, eventually he went into the coma and it was just me again. They put me back into the system because my caregiver wasn’t able to take care of me.
“The day I turned eighteen, the men that you saw in the alley were at our house. They said that they knew what was wrong with my brother and could help for a price. All they wanted was for me to talk a girl into going to the ocean with me. It sounded insane. Impossibly crazy. But when their medicine made my brother more stable and he started putting weight back on, it didn’t matter to me that it was crazy and it didn’t matter what they wanted with this girl. Because I wanted to help the only family had had left. I could tell these men were bad news, but I just wanted him okay again.
“And then I saw the girl they wanted. Even from far away I could tell that you were beautiful. Blushing the way you did at Sylvia shouting hysterically at you. I felt myself smiling. A thing that I hadn’t done in a very long time.”
I thought back to the first time I saw him, the grin I’d mistaken as a smirk, and felt bad for taking the side entrance.
“Then you got so mad at me after I asked you a simple question. I’d never been more confused or intrigued in my life. When I saw what a little firecracker you were, I knew that getting you to come along with me was going to be hard. At the end of school that day, I wanted to know why they wanted me to take you away. But when I called to check in like I was supposed to, I didn’t ask them… Because I was scared of the answer.” He ran both hands through his hair.
“When I saw you at the art fair admiring my sculpture, my chest was so full of pride I thought I’d explode. I was so happy that you liked something that came from me. And when I saw Brad laying his hands on you, I thought I was going to explode from a rage more powerful than anything I’d felt since I watched my parents get mutilated. I knew then that I couldn’t go through it, even though I didn’t know what it was at the time. I knew then that I’d die before letting anyone hurt you. So that night, I didn’t call them.
“That next day, all I wanted was to make you smile, and I did. When I saw you swim, it brought back so many memories, but they followed me there. I was abl
e to lose them and hide out in a store’s bathroom overnight. I don’t know what I thought; maybe if I didn’t call they would just give up… Anyway, the next night at the movies, they found me and took me with them.”
He hadn’t left me that night, at least not on his own.
“They knocked me, out and when I woke up, I was in a dirty room with no walls. The only thing in the room with me was the chair I was tied to and an old television set that was playing the security feed from my brother’s room at the hospital. An intercom crackled and a voice told me that they had stopped giving my brother medicine. I had to watch as he went in and out of violent convulsions for days.”
The tears brimming in my ears finally spilled over. How could anyone hurt him like that? Who were these monsters?
“He was on the brink of death when I swore to help them. But I was only biding time. I wouldn’t let them hurt either of you. I just had to think of a way to save you both. It was then that they told me not to get attached to you because you wouldn’t be alive long. They used the same kind of crazy voodoo that Cala used to make it impossible for me to warn you.
“Then they dropped me off at the lake house and I started giving them my daily reports, trying to keep them appeased and you and my brother safe. But when they tired of my stalling and demanded that I take you to the ocean. I refused. I was only strong enough to protect one of the two people in my life and I chose you. But I haven’t done a very good job. If it wasn’t for Sylvia and Dylan, you’d be dead.” He choked on the word. “I’m the reason that Dylan’s gone. I’m the reason that my parents are dead. I ruin everything I touch!”
I wanted to hug him and tell him everything was going to be all right, but I couldn’t. In a world so new and messed up, I didn’t know if anything was ever going to be okay again.
“Can you ever forgive me, Maribell? I-I don’t blame you if you can’t, it’s just, I don’t know—”
“Jaron, it’s all right. You were just trying to save your brother. I understand.”
“You forgive me?” All of the tension in his body left, and he pulled me into his arms, dipped me low, and caressed me with his lips.
“Wait!” I mumbled around his perfect mouth before my control could be broken.
He pulled away, and his lips turned down at the corners. “What is it?”
I straightened up and looked at my intertwined fingers sitting in my lap. “I really do forgive you, but I don’t think we should be together.”
He put his head in his hands. “Why?”
I took a deep breath. “Because we wouldn’t even be together if those horrid people hadn't forced this on you. You might not have ever even noticed me if it—”
“Dammit, Mari, I would have noticed you even if I was the brother in a deep coma. You are the only thing in this life that has been worth noticing. I love you! Don’t you understand that?”
“And I love you, more than I can say…” His face lit up at my words and it was almost too much for me to handle. “But that doesn’t change the fact that we shouldn’t be together right now.”
“Mari,” he whispered, taking my face in his hands. “I love you with every fiber of my being, everything about you calls to me. It’s like you’re a vital organ that I didn’t notice was missing until I had you back. I ache when we're apart, even just for a little while…” He trailed his fingers down my arms and clenched my hands. “If you love me too, why make ourselves suffer? I want you. I want to see you—not just everyday but every hour of the rest of my life.”
I stood up, but he didn’t release my hands. “Everything has been so crazy lately—I’ve never been so confused in all my life.”
“But are you confused about me?” he asked, slowly standing up and locking me in a stare.
God I could look at him all day. “Of course I’m confused. I’ve never felt so vulnerable… Sylvia told me the reason that neither of us has had a crush before is that we’re only attracted to our own kind. What if you only like me because I’m the first mermaid you’ve met?”
The soft padding of footsteps made us both turn in alarm, but it was only Clarissa and her father coming to find us. Putting on what my aunt referred to as a public face, I sauntered over. “Clarissa! I’m so glad you came!”
“Of course.” She hugged me tightly and whispered in my ear, “Is everything all right?”
“Yes,” I assured. “And, Mr. Anderson! I haven’t seen you in so long. Clarissa was starting to pout, you know?”
His warm round face lit up and he grinned. “I was beginning to pout as well, which is not a very good thing for a CEO to do, at least not if you want to keep the employees scared of their boss.” He winked and hugged his daughter to his side.
“I doubt anyone is very frightened of you, Daddy.” Clarissa laughed.
I loved it when he was home. It wasn’t often I got to see my best friend truly happy, and she was beaming like a kid at Christmas. Even though she didn’t act like it, I knew she would have preferred his company over the Aston Martin.
“Well then I guess you came back just in time…” I trailed off. Clarissa’s forehead was pulled into a crease. I followed her gaze. Jaron hadn’t moved. He stood white as a ghost, glaring at us as though we were demons sent to take his soul.
I turned back to my companions as shocked as they were. Jaron seemed to be having a mental breakdown, which we weren’t allowed to have. Especially right now.
I stepped over to block him from view. “Where were you off to this time around, London, Rome?” I asked as if nothing had happened.
“Japan, actually. I’m so lucky that I get to travel to all the corners of the earth,” Clarissa’s dad said bashfully while running his hand through his bright red hair.
The End
Acknowledgements
I have too many people that I have to thank for helping me through this process. My husband who puts up with a dirty house and too many crockpot dinners while I’m off in another world. My amazing parents for raising me to believe that I could do anything. Amanda, Kelsey, and Nicole thanks for reading it little by little and I forgive you for the threats I received once you read the last line of Landlocked. Kim Bowman, you are a rock star editor with a heart of gold and this book would not be the same without you! Thanks to anyone else that has helped me along the way and for all of the support my author friends give me on a daily basis, you guys/gals are amazing!
