A Mischief of Mermaids

by Suzanne Harper

  “Would you be quiet?” Poppy snapped. “Nerissa’s upset and your yelling isn’t making things any better.”

  “How much time can a person spend in a shower that’s so small you knock your elbow on the wall when you reach for the soap?” Will asked. He pounded on the door again. “Franny!”

  “Here, let me try.” Poppy leaned closer to the door and said loudly, “Franny, I just saw Colt go by on a Jet Ski! Don’t you want to be on deck when he circles back around?”

  Will grinned. “Brilliant!” he whispered. “Stand back. Don’t let the door hit you when she stampedes out of there.”

  But the door remained closed.

  “Aggh.” Will leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor.

  “Dude, I didn’t know you cared so much about hygiene.” Henry smirked.

  Will folded his arms and gave Henry an icy stare. “Look, I don’t care about washing my hands before dinner, but my mother has this fixation—”

  “Shh.” Poppy held up a hand, then put her ear to the door. “Listen.”

  “What?” Will said grumpily, but he scooted over and put his ear to the door, too.

  For a moment, there was silence. Then came the sound of a whimper.

  “Franny? Are you all right?” Poppy asked.

  There was a pause, then Franny said, “No . . .” Her voice wobbled as if she were crying.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I can’t tell you! It’s too horrible.”

  “What, did you run out of conditioner or something?” grumbled Will.

  “No!” Franny’s voice trembled on the edge of hysteria. “It’s worse than that! Much, much worse!”

  “Can you open the door?” Henry asked.

  “No!”

  “Should we get Mom and Dad?” Poppy suggested.

  “No!” Franny wailed. “They can’t see me! Nobody can!”

  “Come on, Franny, we can’t help you if you won’t open the door,” Poppy said. “Whatever’s happened, I’m sure it’s not as bad as you think.”

  “It is, it is,” Franny wept. “You have no idea. How could you? Nothing like this has ever happened to anyone, ever! I’ve turned into a freak!”

  Will rolled his eyes at Poppy. “I bet she tried to dye her hair again,” he whispered. “I bet it’s purple this time.”

  “Shh.” Poppy turned back to the door. “Listen. Whatever’s happened, I’m sure we can help you, but only if you let us in. . . .”

  Poppy had experience in talking Franny down when she was about to have hysterics. The longest this had ever taken her was six minutes, twelve seconds (Poppy had started recording the times in her logbook, on the chance that she might want to write a case study about Franny someday, perhaps for a journal that focused on psychologically unstable personalities). This time, however, it took Poppy a full fifteen minutes to convince her sister to open the door a tiny crack. She only agreed to do this if Poppy promised to not let anyone else look inside.

  “Fine. I promise,” said Poppy, exasperated.

  The door creaked open an inch.

  Poppy gave it a push, just enough to stick her head in, and said, “So what’s all the fuss—oh no! What happened?”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Franny said tearfully. “I don’t know!”

  “What’s going on?” Ignoring Franny’s protests, Will pushed the door open even wider and looked in.

  Then he, too, stood still, staring, with his mouth hanging open.

  Franny was sitting on the floor, half in and half out of the shower. Water was still spraying over her, turning her long blond curls into limp rats tails.

  But that wasn’t what had Poppy and Will rooted to the spot with horror.

  Franny’s legs were gone. In their place was a long tail with glittering blue scales.

  Chapter

  ELEVEN

  Nerissa was furious. “I told you not to touch that!” she yelled at Franny. “Now look what you’ve done!”

  “I just wanted to try it on,” Franny said, her eyes wide and pleading. “I was going to put it right back—”

  “Well, it’s too late for that now,” Nerissa snapped. “Thanks to you, I’ll never be able to go home again! I’ll have to stay a mortal forever!”

  Will and Henry looked from Franny to Nerissa, astonished.

  “What happened to Franny?” Henry asked Poppy.

  “What do you mean, you’ll have to stay a mortal?” Will asked Nerissa.

  They were both ignored.

  “I thought you didn’t want to go back,” Poppy said to Nerissa. “I thought you were running away.”

  “I was!” Nerissa cried. “But not for the rest of my life! I only wanted to be human for a day or two, then I was going to turn back into a mermaid! That was the plan. And now she”—she scowled ferociously at Franny—“has ruined everything.”

  “I didn’t mean to!” Franny wailed. “And now I’m, I’m—” She stared down at the scales covering what used to be her legs and burst into loud sobs. “I’ve turned into a fish!”

  “Mermaid,” Nerissa said frostily.

  “Wait a second,” said Will, clutching his head. “Nerissa’s really a mermaid? And now Franny’s one, too?”

  “Exactly,” said Poppy, exasperated. “Try to keep up, Will.” She turned to Franny, who was still sobbing, and hissed, “Be quiet! Do you want Mom and Dad to hear you?”

  Will and Henry exchanged an uncomfortable look.

  “Come on, Franny,” Will said. “If you keep this up, you’ll turn Lake Travis into a saltwater lake.”

  This only made Franny sob even harder. Will rolled his eyes. Henry sighed. Nerissa said something under her breath that Poppy was glad she couldn’t hear.

  “Okay, everybody take a deep breath,” said Poppy. “Let’s think this through. Nerissa, what do we have to do to turn her back?”

  “How should I know?” Nerissa said. “I’ve never heard of a mortal who was silly enough to try on a mermaid’s cloak—”

  “Well, who expects to put on a cloak and turn into a mermaid?” snapped Franny, who stopped crying long enough to glare at Nerissa. “That would be like, like . . . putting on a fur coat and turning into a bear!”

  “It’s not at all the same thing—” Nerissa began.

  But at that moment, Franny suddenly turned pale and fell back onto the linoleum. She moaned slightly as her eyelids closed.

  “Franny?” Poppy grabbed her hand. It was cold and clammy. She looked over her shoulder at Nerissa. “What’s going on? What’s wrong with her?”

  Nerissa frowned. “I think she’s having the same kind of reaction any mermaid would have if she spends more than an hour out of the water.”

  “It looks like she’s gone into shock,” said Will. “What should we do?”

  “We have to get her into the lake, fast,” said Nerissa.

  Poppy straightened up. “We’d better call Mom and Dad—”

  “No!” Nerissa almost shouted.

  They turned to stare at her.

  “You can’t do that,” she said. “No one can know that mermaids exist. There have been a few times in our history when humans have found out where we lived.” She added darkly, “It’s always ended badly.”

  Poppy frowned. Ended badly for whom? she thought. The mermaids . . . or the mortals?

  “But Poppy’s right,” said Henry. “We need to get help.”

  “If you tell your parents,” Nerissa said quickly, “I won’t help you figure out how to turn Franny back into a mortal.”

  “We don’t need your help,” Will said. “Anyway, you said you didn’t know what to do, either.”

  “I don’t,” Nerissa admitted. “But Coralie might.”

  Will threw his hands up. “Okay,” he said. “Who’s Coralie?”

  “Shh.” Poppy cast a worried glance over her shoulder. “She’s like, I don’t know . . . the head of the mermaids.”

  “Oh, right, of course.” Will nodded several times
. “I suppose she’s a sort of queen? Runs the mermaid crew? Makes sure that everyone stays together when they go out for a swim?”

  “We are not called a crew,” said Nerissa coldly. “The proper term of a group of mermaids is a mischief. And Coralie has been our monarch for the last five centuries. If anyone knows what to do in this situation, it’s her. We should get Franny in the lake, then take her to the cove to ask Coralie for help.”

  Poppy and Will glanced at each other.

  “Your parents won’t know what to do; you know they won’t,” said Nerissa. “And Coralie won’t help any mortal—unless I ask her to.”

  Poppy looked at Franny. Her skin was so white that Poppy could see the blue vein in her wrist throbbing. Was it her imagination, or was Franny’s pulse getting more faint?

  “She doesn’t have much time,” Nerissa said urgently.

  “Okay,” Poppy said. “Will and Henry, you grab Franny’s shoulders. Nerissa and I will take her tail. . . .”

  The tail was much heavier than Poppy thought it would be and more slippery, too. It didn’t help that four people had to squeeze into a tiny bathroom and work together to pick Franny up. Finally, however, after whispered arguments about who was getting in whose way, they managed to stagger onto the deck with Franny between them.

  Perhaps it was the fresh air that revived her. Franny’s eyes fluttered open again just as they reached the railing.

  “On the count of three,” said Poppy.

  “Wait!” Franny yelled. “What are you doing?”

  “One—”

  “My hair!”

  “Two—”

  “My mascara!”

  “Three!”

  And with a mighty effort, they threw Franny overboard.

  Chapter

  TWELVE

  “Where is she?” Poppy leaned over the railing as far as she dared. “Do you see her?”

  “No,” said Will, looking worried.

  “Neither do I,” Henry said.

  “Is she at the bottom of the lake, do you think?” Nerissa asked. “She sank like a stone, she did.” She bit her lip. “If she drowns, I’ll never be able to go back—”

  “Stop thinking about yourself for one second!” Poppy turned on her, furious. “I thought you said this was the only thing we could do to save her.”

  “It was,” Nerissa said. “She would have died if she didn’t get into water soon. But you didn’t tell me she couldn’t swim.”

  “She can,” said Will, peering anxiously into the lake. “We all took lessons when we lived in Coral Gables. But she never goes in the water—”

  “She says the chlorine in swimming pools dries her hair out,” said Poppy. She paled, struck by a terrible thought. “You don’t suppose she forgot how to swim, do you?”

  “I don’t think that’s possible,” Henry said. “Isn’t it like riding a bike? Something people never forget?”

  Will shielded his eyes with his hands and scanned the lake. “Of course, if anyone could do an idiotic thing like forgetting how to swim, it’s Franny—”

  He was interrupted by what looked like a giant fish shooting up out of the lake, then landing back in the water with a slap of its tail that sprayed water over Will and Poppy.

  “What was that?” Will sputtered.

  Poppy dashed water out of her eyes and squinted. “I’m not sure—”

  At that moment, Franny’s head popped up above the still surface of the lake. Her skin was rosy once more, her eyes bright. She smiled up to them and gave a little wave.

  “Sorry I got you wet,” she said breezily. “But did you see me? Wasn’t that great?”

  “Franny, you scared us!” Poppy glanced over her shoulder, then lowered her voice. “We thought you’d drowned!”

  “Me? Drown?” Franny laughed. “That’s impossible! Watch this. . . .”

  She dove under the water. A few seconds later, she vaulted up into the air, turned a somersault, and splashed down again. “See? I look amazing, don’t I?”

  “Stop showing off!” said Will. “Do you want Mom and Dad to see you?”

  “Oh, don’t be such a spoilsport,” said Franny, flicking a strand of wet hair away from her face. “I’m just having a little fun. And I can’t believe how . . . powerful I feel!”

  Poppy and Will glanced at each other. They felt a little unnerved by this. Franny had always seemed scatterbrained, vain, and (in her worse moments) a little ditzy. That could be annoying at times—most of the time, if Poppy was honest with herself—but at least they knew what to expect. This Franny, the Franny who sounded strong and confident and bold, was brand-new. Poppy wasn’t sure what to make of her.

  “I’m going to swim all the way to the other side of the lake,” Franny called out.

  Henry’s eyes widened. “You can’t! That’s miles away.”

  “Who cares?” She shot off.

  Nerissa made a little sound. Poppy turned to her and saw that she was staring after Franny with a strange, intense look on her face.

  In only a few minutes, Franny circled back to the boat, laughing with delight.

  “Did you see that?” she called. “Now I’m going to swim to the other side!” She sped away again.

  Nerissa’s eyebrows drew together and her lips tightened. Watching her, Poppy shivered, then glanced at the sky.

  A cloud had moved in front of the sun, casting a shadow over the lake.

  The shadow was what made me shiver, she thought. That’s all.

  “It’s not right,” Nerissa said under her breath. “I’m a mermaid, not her.”

  “But you don’t like being a mermaid, remember?” said Poppy. “If you hadn’t decided to try being a human, none of this would have happened.”

  “Your sister stole my cloak!” Nerissa snapped, her voice rising. “If she hadn’t done that, everything would be fine.”

  The cloud darkened. A breeze sprang up, bringing with it a smell of rain and kicking up little waves on the surface of the lake.

  “Okay, she shouldn’t have done that,” Poppy admitted. “But she wouldn’t have had the chance if you hadn’t decided to run away from your family.”

  Nerissa’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “This isn’t my fault,” she said, spacing each word apart for added emphasis.

  A few seconds later, fat drops began to fall. The waves got bigger and choppier.

  Poppy clenched her hands. She wanted to argue with Nerissa, wanted to say that it was at least partly her fault, but she also didn’t want them to have to deal with a raging thunderstorm at the same time they were trying to help Franny.

  “You’re right, it isn’t,” she said peaceably. “It’s entirely Franny’s fault. She was very wrong to take your cloak. On behalf of my sister, I apologize.”

  Nerissa looked at Poppy for a long moment, then nodded. “I accept the apology,” she said grandly. “On behalf of your sister, who is very lucky to have you around.”

  The wind died down. The rain stopped. The cloud disappeared. Once more, the day was hot and sunny, and the lake was calm.

  Poppy sighed with relief. Just then, Franny swam back into view. She floated in the water below them, smiling up at them with delight. “This is amazing! I bet I could swim a circuit of the lake before you even get the kayaks in the water.”

  Nerissa leaned over the railing and scowled at Franny. “Don’t go anywhere! You don’t know anything about being a mermaid. You’ll get lost or someone will see you and capture you or you’ll get hit by a powerboat—”

  Franny’s laughter floated across the water. “I’ll be fine,” she said gaily. “You all worry too much!”

  “Nerissa’s right,” Poppy called. “Wait for us. . . .”

  They rushed to the kayaks but, as always, it took longer than they thought it would to put on their life jackets and lower the kayaks over the side of the houseboat. Franny watched for a while, but soon became bored. She began diving under the water and leaping up out of the air, sometimes doing flips and sometimes tryin
g new tricks, like half-twists and double somersaults.

  After one particularly ambitious triple gainer, Rolly’s head popped out of the galley door.

  “What was that?” he asked, his eyes glittering with excitement.

  Poppy turned to face him, her back to the railing, hoping that she was blocking his view of Franny.

  “What was what?” she asked innocently.

  “That splash.” Rolly trotted over to the railing. “Was it Mugwump? Because it sounded like Mugwump.”

  “Of course it wasn’t,” Poppy said. “It was just a fish.”

  Nerissa nodded. “A regular, ordinary fish.”

  “And small,” Will added.

  “That’s right,” said Henry. “A very small, very ordinary fish.”

  Rolly frowned. “It didn’t sound small,” he said. “It sounded huge. It sounded like a whale.”

  Will snickered. Behind her, Poppy could hear Franny’s squeak of outrage.

  Rolly stood still for a moment, his lips pressed tight in thought. “I’m getting my fishing pole,” he said, marching back belowdecks.

  “Quick!” Poppy said to the others. “We have to get away from here before Rolly sees something or before he wakes up Mom and Dad.”

  Henry and Will were grunting with the effort of lowering their kayak.

  “Hold on,” Henry said. “Lower the bow first—”

  “I’m trying! Give me a second!” Will said.

  With a splash, the kayak landed in the water. Will and Henry got in. Poppy and Nerissa managed to get the other double kayak in the water just as Mr. and Mrs. Malone came up on the deck. Mrs. Malone was wearing a shockingly pink canvas sun hat and a huge pair of sunglasses. Mr. Malone’s nose was white from the zinc oxide he had rubbed on it; he was carrying the telescope and tripod.

  “Where are you kids going?” he called out. “We’ve got work to do.”

  “We’re going to that little cove over there,” Poppy yelled back. “Franny said that Ashley said that her father said that one of his friends told him he had heard from someone that there was a strange glow in the sky last week. He took a picture. It looked like the glow was hovering right over the cove.”