by D. G. Driver
Groaning, I sat back in my seat. I closed the door and put my seatbelt on without saying anything.
Carter flipped off the radio and said, “Well, hi to you too. I’m fine, thanks.”
“Oh, sorry,” I said distractedly, watching the crowd of popular girls watching us pull out of the parking spot. “Hi. How are you? You’re fine? That’s good.”
“Hmmm,” was all he replied. Then he put the car in gear and drove out of the lot. Once we were on the highway he spoke again. “Tough day?”
“A little bit.” I paused, not sure what I wanted to say about it all. I decided what I really wanted to do was call my dad. I’d let Carter hear just enough and figure the rest out. “Can I use your phone? They took mine away from me and either Mom or Dad has to get it back for me.”
“That stinks,” he said.
“You don’t know the half of it,” I told him. I wanted to tell him everything that happened, but since the worst thing of it all was that I was going to get some sort of bad rep for supposedly sleeping with him, I didn’t figure he needed to know about it. I mean, we weren’t even dating. He hadn’t even asked me out. He hadn’t even hinted that he might possibly at some time in the future think about asking me out. I was probably just some silly high school kid to him. He was in college. He could date college girls. What did he need me for? Nothing. He just wanted to get points for knowing my dad, was all.
What would I say anyway? “Hey, everyone at school thinks you and I got it on all morning. Ha ha. Isn’t that a riot?”
How do you sit in the car with a guy for an hour after that?
So I kept silent.
“Did your meeting go well? Did you get your club?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I answered. “I think so. They signed the paper at any rate.”
“Then it was worth it,” he said.
It was my turn to say, “Hmmm.”
Carter handed me his phone. I stared at it for a moment trying to remember my dad’s phone number. I had it on speed dial on my phone so I never had to actually punch in the numbers. For my life, I couldn’t think of the digits.
“I saved it,” Carter said softly, as though reading my mind. “Under ‘S’”.
I scrolled to ‘S’ and found dad’s number. A moment later he answered.
“Carter?” he asked.
“It’s me, Dad,” I said.
“Why aren’t you calling from your own phone?” he asked.
“Dad, I know you’ve been busy all day, but you do remember me being in the school’s office all morning, right?”
“Oh, that’s right. Sorry, honey.” He paused. “They took your phone?”
“Yes,” I huffed. “You or Mom have to get it back for me.”
“That was very inconsiderate of them. I really need you to be in contact today. What if I have your Mom make a call? Have you left school already?”
I sighed. My mom could not use her persuasive skill for this situation, and I knew it. “Mrs. Slater isn’t exactly supportive of our cause, Dad,” I told him. “Besides, we’re already on the road.”
“I’ll try to get it back for you tomorrow, okay?” Then he paused for a minute, and it sounded like someone was talking to him. He mumbled a couple “Uh huhs” then said back into the phone to me, “Well, if not tomorrow, I’ll get it soon.”
Great.
“How are things going over there?” I asked.
He told me that it was very crowded at the beach. The Affron people had effectively shooed off most of the reporters with their fancy double-speak and crisp white eco-uniforms. None of the major network news correspondents had lingered more than an hour. Only a couple nosy journalists from NPR, and some green-friendly websites that Dad had called, stayed. A handful of volunteers from town had shown up along with a few employees of Affron gas stations in the area who had probably been forced to be there. They helped remove the dead carcasses from the beach, and the living creatures had been taken to the Marine Rescue Center. There was still a lot to do, so they would be working until dark.
“Are you and Carter coming here or going to the Center?” he asked.
“I’d like to get back to the Center.” I looked over at Carter to see if that’s what he had planned as well
Carter nodded. “That’s where I’m headed. Dr. Schneider said that the mermaid has been really calm all day, so I was thinking about getting into the tank to help clean her up. I could use your help.”
My help? Really? I nearly squeaked with excitement at being asked, but I did my best to sound mature and in control.
“Isn’t Dr. Schneider there?” I asked him. It didn’t really matter. I wanted to help, desperately.
“He doesn’t like to get in the tanks,” Carter answered. “He’s still studying the cadavers and organizing the traffic for the rescued animals from the beaches. I could call another guy in, but I thought it might be best if we keep the mermaid a secret for a while longer.”
I put the phone back to my ear. “Did you get that, Dad?” I checked.
“Sounds like you have a full afternoon,” he said back. “I’ll meet you over there later on.”
My mood picked up after that. The mermaid was still alive. I was going to be able to help her. My dad sounded proud of me. And Carter thought I was worth his time. What had happened at school suddenly became so insignificant, and I put all my worries about it aside to focus my energy on the rest of the day ahead.
An hour later we were both in wet suits and diving gear. My suit was a man’s. I’m tall so it fit length-wise, but it was too big in girth and chafed between my legs. I had learned how to scuba dive two summers ago on a whale-watching trip with my parents down in Southern California. We took a crash course so we could swim under water and look for signs of pollution damage.
Yes, that’s my parents’ idea of a vacation.
I’ll confess it was kind of fun. And it was the trip that made me fall in love with California.
“Do you need a quick refresher course?” Carter asked.
“I think I remember the basics,” I said.
“Okay,” he said. “Just stay calm. I don’t know what she’ll be like once we get in there, and I don’t want you to get hurt.”
A large painter’s tarp had been draped over the mermaid’s tank to hide her. I figured that the isolation had helped to calm her down. She couldn’t see the people coming in and out of the building all day. Of course, she couldn’t see us either until we had already climbed up the ladder and our heads popped up over the top.
The mermaid’s head jerked up at the sight of us, and she backed away, nearly pressing herself against the glass closest to the wall. Her eyes were huge and her body very rigid. She didn’t recognize us in the wet suits. I tapped Carter, stopping him from climbing in the tank. “Hold on a second,” I said.
I descended the ladder and stood in front of the tank between the tarp and glass. I slipped my mask down around my neck and pulled back the hood of the suit so that my hair showed. Smiling at the mermaid, I said, “It’s me. Remember? We met this morning.”
I put my hand on the glass and waited. The mermaid cocked her head and stared at me for a moment. Then, very hesitantly, she moved toward me and put up her hand to press against mine. Her eyes softened as she recognized me.
“We’re going to come in there with you,” I told her. I didn’t think she could understand my words, but she seemed soothed by my talking to her. I climbed up the ladder again with my face and head still exposed, talking the whole time. “See what we’re doing? We’re coming up here and then we’re going to get inside. Watch Carter. He’s at the top.”
Carter put his mouthpiece in, stepped over the top of the tank and slipped into the water up to his chest, holding on to the top of the tank to keep his head above water. The mermaid instantly backed away from him. Her eyes widened in alarm, with her arms out in front of her warning him to keep at a distance.
I leaned way over to the side of the ladder, to make sure she could
see me. I kept smiling and talking. “It’s okay. That’s Carter. You met him this morning, too. Watch me put my mask on.” With my left foot on the ladder on the outside of the tank and my right foot on the ladder inside the tank, I balanced and used my hands to put my hood and mask back on. I made sure she was looking at me the whole time, and Carter stayed very still. “See?” I said. “It’s still me.” I put the mouthpiece in my mouth and finished getting into the tank.
The mermaid continued to shy away from us, waving her arms and tail to keep us from getting too close. Carter and I remained still for a long time, patiently waiting for her to realize we were not there to harm her. I couldn’t talk once I got under the water, so I couldn’t use my voice anymore to soothe her. I just hoped she understood that we were there as her friends.
Looking right at her, I concentrated all my thoughts toward her. Shhhh. It’s okay. We’re your friends. We want to help you get the sticky stuff off.
After a few minutes, the mermaid stilled. I swear I heard in my mind a voice other than my own. The sound of it was a soothing acceptance of what was going on. It wasn’t a word like “okay”, but I understood it as though it was a word, and I knew it came from her.
The bubbles coming out of the oxygen tanks caught her attention and her eyes followed them as they drifted upward. Her webbed fingers flickered as though she wanted to touch them. I nodded at her and swiped at some of the bubbles coming out of Carter’s tank, making them scatter. This made the mermaid lean in close, and when I nodded again, she swam over to us and did the same thing. Soon she was swimming above us, swishing her hands through the bubbles and trying to catch them. For the first time, I saw the creature smile.
The mermaid had teeth, I noticed, very short and flat teeth. No incisors for biting. No extra-large molars for chomping. She probably didn’t eat meat. With teeth like that, she might eat only sea vegetation or maybe even plankton. The smile was pretty. The white teeth sparkled beneath her silver-blue lips. She even had dimples.
While the mermaid was distracted by the bubbles Carter reached out a hand to touch her tailfin. She pulled her body away fiercely and headed back to her safe side of the tank. I looked at Carter and shrugged. How could we get her to let us touch her? He tapped his head, a signal that he had an idea.
Tenderly, he took my hand in his own. A tingle went straight up my arm and made me slightly dizzy. If we hadn’t been in a tank of water, I would have thought he might be lifting it for a kiss like in those movies based on Jane Austen books. However, instead of kissing me, he held my hand with one of his and used the other to pull a terrycloth rag out of the pack around his chest. Ever so gently and slowly, he started moving the cloth back and forth across my hand and lower arm. We watched the mermaid’s reactions carefully all the while. Gradually, she got closer and closer to us to see what we were doing. I was careful not to act nervous. I even smiled, nodded, and hummed to convey to the mermaid that this cloth felt good on my hand.
Timidly, the mermaid stuck out her hand. The webbing between her fingers was pronounced, but so was the clotting of oil. Carter let go of me and took the mermaid’s hand as sweetly as he could manage. He lowered the cloth to her hand and pressed it to her hand so that it wouldn’t hurt. The mermaid accepted the sensation and let him continue to dab at her hand.
I knew that Carter would have to rub harder than that to remove the oil, and she might not like that. I thought it would be a problem, but he was very patient and took his time with her. He shifted from dabbing to a soft rubbing with the cloth. I took out a cloth and copied what he did to mermaid’s other hand and forearm. The mermaid seemed to like the feeling. She even squirmed and giggled a bit as though it tickled.
Then, as gradually as possible, we both increased the pressure of the cleaning so that the mermaid would accept the touch. It worked. She even waited eagerly when we had to throw the oily cloths over the top of the tank and pull out clean ones from Carter’s pack. Although it took nearly an hour, we finally removed a fair amount of the oil from the mermaid’s skin. The luster of her silver skin returned, and she shimmered as she moved.
I had to take extra time around her face and jawline, because the oil was thicker there. As I dabbed the cloth around her neck, the strange bumps that circled her neck began to loosen. It frightened me at first, but as the oil wiped away I realized that the bumps weren’t part of her. They were shells, strung together as a necklace. Once free, she put up her webbed fingers and rubbed her neck and smiled at me with an expression that made me feel that she was both glad that the necklace wasn’t strangling her any longer and pleased that it hadn’t broken. I wondered where she had gotten a necklace like that, and how she had managed to put it on.
Time was running out for our oxygen tanks, so we threw our last cloths over the tank and moved to the ladder to climb out. The mermaid followed right behind me and actually held onto the bars of the ladder as if she would climb up behind me. When I got to the top, she let go and popped her head out of the water for a second to watch me straddle the tank and get completely free of the water. Needing to breathe, she dove back under. I joined Carter on the floor, and we removed our masks. As he gathered up the cloths lying on the floor, I took one last look at the mermaid by slipping between the tarp and the glass.
She was right there, waiting for me, fondly touching the glass of the aquarium in front of me. She already seemed to be missing our presence in the tank with her.
“Carter, look,” I said.
I moved over and let him slip behind the tarp to stand next to me. The joy in his eyes was unmistakable.
“Amazing,” he said.
It was warm and cozy together under that canvas tarp. It reminded me of the forts Haley and I used to build under our kitchen table, except I never felt tingles all over my skin when I got under there with her. Carter’s arm pressed against mine. My heart raced.
“Wow,” I agreed with him. “That was so incredible. Have you ever felt anything like that before?”
There was this fraction of a second when he turned his face to me, but then he corrected himself to look in the tank again. He shifted his weight to his other foot, and broke the connection between our arms. “I had to get in a tank with a dolphin once. That was really cool, but this tops it by a mile.”
I smiled at the mermaid, who smiled back at me. “Do you think we should feed her something? She might be hungry.”
Carter nodded. “I was thinking she’s probably a vegetarian.”
“I thought so too, because of her teeth.”
Carter left me under the tarp and headed for some cabinets at the far end of the examining tables. I pulled back the tarp and watched him pull out a plastic bucket. “This might do the trick.” He hauled the bucket up the ladder. Reaching into the bucket he pulled out a wad of wet seaweed. “Let’s see if she likes this.”
He dropped some of it into the tank. The mermaid glanced up at it, seemed to smell it with her flat nose, and swam up toward it. Grabbing a piece with her fingers, she put it to her mouth and sucked on it. She grimaced and shook her head.
“I don’t think she likes it,” I said.
But she ate it. Carter dropped some more in for her. “She may not like the taste, but she knows it’s good for her. I’ll talk to Dr. Schneider about it and see if he has some better ideas for her diet.” Carter straightened the tarp over the aquarium and then joined me at the stools around the closest table.
“You’re good at this stuff,” I said. “Are you learning it at school?”
“Some of it,” Carter said. “Most of it I learn by doing.”
“What’s your major?” I asked.
Carter hesitated. “For the moment it’s Biology. They don’t have a specific Marine Biology major at Washington. I’ll probably go somewhere else for my Masters.”
“You’re going all the way for a Masters?” Ugh. I didn’t want to suffer through that much education. I wanted to get it over with and start working.
“They say you
have to have a Masters to have a real career anymore. A Bachelor’s isn’t enough.” He smiled and shrugged. “Unless being an assistant is all you want.”
Darnit! I guess this means I will have to do that much college. How depressing.
“I might even go for PhD. Then I could be the one to head up a Marine Biology department at Washington. Wouldn’t that be great?”
I sneered and shook my head. “Actually, that doesn’t sound great to me at all. I have no interest in teaching. What I want is to be in the water with the animals. Helping them. Healing them. I want more experiences like the one we just had with that mermaid. I want to fill my life with successes, not teach about the successes of other people.”
Carter raised an eyebrow. “I guess that’s a way to look at it.” Then he walked away from me and tossed the wet cloths in a basket next to the cabinets. He pulled a couple fresh towels out of the cabinets and handed one to me while using the other to dry his hair.
“Come on,” I said, patting my face with the towel. “You can’t tell me that what we just did wasn’t something you’d like to spend your life doing. You were great with her.”
“Thanks,” he said. “You too. You really have a knack for it.” But apparently that was all he had to say about that, because he completely changed the subject by asking, “You decided where you’re going to school next year?”
Nice way to deflect the focus.
“I was thinking about San Diego,” I answered.
“Good school,” he said. “Far away though.”
“That’s one of the benefits.”
Carter shrugged and turned away from me at that point. “I guess,” he said distantly as he popped his towel into the basket and closed the cabinet doors. From all appearances, he was done with this conversation.
Did I say something wrong? Why would he care where I went to school? Did he have a thing against San Diego?
All of a sudden my face began to heat up. Did I just totally blow it with him? Here he had been going on about how great Washington was and how he wanted to stay here forever and teach at the college and all that. And I had to go and blabber about how much I couldn’t wait to ditch this place. I knew at that instant Carter would never ask me out. What was the point of starting something up with a girl who was just going to leave once summer arrived?
