Fins Are Forever

by Tera Lynn Childs

  Mrs. Ferraro is really big on what she calls self-discovery projects—autobiographical collages, representational free-form sculpture, self-portraits. I think it’s her personal mission to be both art teacher and therapist.

  “Precisely right, Lily and Shannen,” Mrs. Ferraro says as we head to our table. “You may begin whenever you’re ready. Take a digital photograph of yourself, print it out, and then proceed to sketch your self-portrait.”

  I sigh as I sling my backpack under our table.

  “I’m sure the girls can explain the project to you, Dosinia,” Mrs. Ferraro says, before scurrying after the rest of the students trickling in.

  “What’s to explain?” Doe asks, sliding her briefcase next to her chair. “Click, print, draw.”

  Doe and I have been on a kind of if-you-don’t-bother-me-I-won’t-torment-you truce since last night. Saves a lot of tears and bloodshed, but doesn’t do much to get the mutual-respect thing going between us. I’m going to have to step up and be the bigger mermaid.

  Eventually.

  “Pretty much,” Shannen says. She grabs the camera. “Who wants to go first?”

  “Just get it over with,” I say, not in a higher-road mood.

  We go out into the hall, where we’ll have the cream-colored cinderblock walls as a background. I’m first. Until last night, I probably would have made some kind of overjoyed face for the camera—having found and caught the perfect boy and figured out my future and all, I should be thrilled—but now the best I can manage is annoyed resignation.

  Shannen makes a very supermodel pose, with her lips pursed, cheeks sucked in, and eyes smiling as wide as possible. I don’t tell her she looks a little crazed. That might influence her sketch.

  When Dosinia steps into position against the wall, she asks, “So that’s a camera?”

  “What?” I twist the camera back toward me, as if needing to inspect it. “Yeah. This is a camera.”

  “You’ve never seen one before?” Shannen asks.

  Doe shakes her head.

  Sometimes it’s so easy to forget why she’s here—besides to make my life miserable. She knows nothing about the human world and it’s my job, my royal duty, to teach her. This is the perfect opportunity to further her human education. And maybe make inroads on the attitude thing, too.

  “Well, then,” I say, smiling, “let’s do this photo shoot right.”

  For the next several minutes, Shannen and I coach Doe in a photo shoot of fashion-magazine proportions. At first she just stands there, a blank expression on her face, staring intently at the camera. We give her poses to try, trade out accessories, restyle her hair, until we’ve exhausted all possible combinations. We even grab a fashion magazine from the classroom to show her what fashion photography really looks like. When Mrs. Ferraro pokes her head out into the hall and says it’s time to get sketching, we must have taken over a hundred pictures.

  After returning to the classroom, selecting our photos for the project, and printing them out on the computer, we settle in at our table with the paper and pencils.

  “That was fun,” Doe says quietly, her lower lip chewed between her teeth and her attention on the photo of herself.

  “I’m glad,” I say just as quietly. “I had fun, too.”

  Wow. We each said something to the other without breaking out into either a fight or insults. It must be a record. I should declare a Thalassinian holiday to mark the occasion.

  Too bad I won’t be in a position to declare holidays much longer, because that would have been quite a celebration.

  For several minutes, the three of us sketch quietly at our table. I begin by faintly marking the outline of my chin and jaw, my neck, and my hair, giving myself a boundary to work within. Then I move on to smaller features—nose, lips, eyes, freckles. Eyes are always the hardest. I try to keep my pencil extra light so if—when—I have to erase and start over, it won’t leave big gouges in the paper.

  Mrs. Ferraro comes around to our table for an evaluation.

  “Lovely work, as always, Shannen,” she says, “though I do wish you would relax your lines. Art is not always crisp. Some of nature’s most bounteous beauty is found in rough edges and shadowed contours.”

  Shannen nods, but I can tell she’s mentally rolling her eyes. Mrs. Ferraro has been trying all year to get Shan to loosen up artistically. Clearly it hasn’t worked.

  I slide my sketch to the left so Mrs. Ferraro can see it better. It’s not done or beautiful or perfect or good, even, but I’m not hating it as much as I thought I would. Although I’m definitely better behind the camera than with the pencil, it’s not an embarrassing effort.

  “Nice, Lily,” she says.

  Then she moves on.

  That’s it? No critique or comment or suggestion? Just . . . nice?

  For once I’m actually not in hate with my project, and she can’t say anything more than “nice”? How disappointing.

  I tug my paper back in front of me and hang down over my drawing, pencil clenched in my fist. Whenever we get scathing critiques, Mrs. Ferraro says she wouldn’t take the time to tear us apart if she didn’t think we had potential. I guess I am potential-less today.

  I’m just about to scar my drawing with angry pencil jabs when Mrs. Ferraro, looking over Doe’s drawing, says, “Spectacular, Dosinia.”

  My ears perk up, and although I don’t lift my head because I don’t want them to know I’m listening, I am intently focused on every word.

  “Your use of cross-hatching is extremely evocative for someone who has never taken art before.” Mrs. Ferraro holds up the sketch and calls for everyone’s attention. “If anyone would like to see an excellent example of impressionist sketching, please come see Dosinia’s work.”

  About half the class comes over and crowds around Doe to study her “excellent example.” I try not to heave on my self-portrait.

  “Why?” I mutter. “Why does this always happen to me?”

  “What?” Shannen asks, drawing the collar of her polo shirt with a—shocking—crisp line.

  “Dosinia,” I whisper, as if I have to explain. “She always outshines me. Always steals everyone’s attention.”

  “Even Quince’s,” Doe says casually.

  I jerk up to look at her.

  I hadn’t thought we were talking loud enough for Doe to hear.

  Her admirers gone, Doe’s focus is back on the sketch below her. But her mouth, her perfectly pouty, overglossed mouth, is pulled into a smirk on one side.

  “You do not,” I say, my voice low and hard, “have Quince’s attention.”

  Slowly, very slowly, she lifts her gaze from the paper until she’s looking at me through her thick mascara-blackened lashes. For half a second she just holds my gaze with a piercing blue stare.

  “I will by the time you get back.”

  My jaw drops open.

  Truce over.

  We glare at each other across the art table, Doe looking smug and me, I’m sure, looking completely shocked. She cannot possibly be thinking about putting her moves on Quince. Can she?

  I’m not worried about Quince. I know he’s fully committed to me, and he once told me he likes Doe well enough, but she’s too immature for him. He wouldn’t be interested in her, even if I weren’t in the picture.

  That doesn’t mean she won’t try.

  And me having to disappear to Thalassinia for a separation is just the opportunity she needs. The opportunity she wants. The opportunity she—

  I gasp.

  “You did this on purpose!”

  Doe bats her eyes innocently. “Did what?”

  Dropping my voice to a furious whisper, I accuse, “You kissed Brody because you knew I’d have to go home for the separation. You planned this.”

  Her unfreckled shoulders lift in a lazy shrug.

  As she goes back to her sketching, I feel like my blood is on fire. I can’t believe she did this. I can’t believe she would do something so underhanded, something that would affect B
rody’s life as completely as the bond does, just to get the chance to steal my boyfriend.

  “Is anyone else warm?” Mrs. Ferraro asks. “It suddenly got very balmy in here. Maybe the air conditioning conked out.”

  On the verge of scratching holes in my self-portrait, I set my pencil carefully down on the table. I take several deep breaths, trying to calm myself and my effect on the moisture in the air around me.

  “You’ve sunk to a new depth, Doe.”

  She doesn’t look up from her sketching.

  “When I get back,” I say, trying to sound as stern as possible, “you and I are going to have a long talk.”

  “If you say so.”

  “I do say so,” I reply. “Because if you ever want to get back in the water, you have to go through me. This is not exactly endearing me to your cause.”

  Though she doesn’t look up, her eyes widen a little, as if realizing she hadn’t thought this all the way through. But then she dismisses the feeling and goes back to her sketch.

  What am I going to do with her? I’m not a problem solver. I’m not good at resolving conflicts or settling disputes, which are just a couple of the reasons I should never be queen, if I were making a list. But with Doe especially I’ve always been at a loss.

  Hopefully Daddy can give me some advice. That’ll be one good thing about going home.

  Chapter 6

  Brody doesn’t want to leave his precious Camaro parked at the beach unsupervised, so Quince gives us a ride in his mom’s junker car to Seaview Beach Park—the same spot where I first told Quince the truth about me. As impossible as it seems, I think his mom’s car is even more of a death trap than his motorcycle.

  Dosinia, of course, just has to ride along.

  “We should be back tonight,” I say for, like, the fifteenth time. “Tomorrow morning at the very latest.”

  That is nonnegotiable. My interview is tomorrow morning. At ten o’clock. If we have to stay the night, I’ll still make it as long as we leave first thing. The key to my future and helping my kingdom from land might be in that interview. Nothing will keep me from making the appointment.

  Quince pulls out of the driveway and into our street.

  “Don’t go getting any romantic ideas about Benson while you’re down there,” he says with a smile. “I want you coming back to me.”

  “Well . . .” I pretend to consider. “He does know how to swim.”

  Unlike Quince. That was the first of many problems with our bonding. Imagine me, a mermaid, bonded for life with a boy who couldn’t even swim. The idea was ridiculous. Now I can’t imagine being with anyone else.

  “I’m learning,” he says.

  “You’re trying, anyway,” I tease.

  We’ve had a couple of lessons, but they have been tough. Whenever we get into the water, I feel a little sad. Even if he becomes an Olympic-class swimmer, like Brody, we both know he will probably never be able to go home with me again. The magical separation Daddy performed—at my request—made sure of that. He’s immune to the mermaid bond.

  I’m not sure if he senses my sadness. I think he feels that, by learning how to swim, he’s getting closer to me. But I can’t help worrying that he’ll never be quite close enough.

  I’m totally fine with my future on land, but still . . . it would be nice to be able to bring him home for a weekend or two. I can’t help but hold out a teeny-tiny bit of hope that someday we’ll find a way.

  I shake off the melancholy thought. No use crying over something that can’t be undone. We’re together, and that’s all that matters.

  “You’re right,” he says with a laugh. “Couldn’t pick a better human to race home with if you tried.”

  Tugging one of his hands off the steering wheel, I lace our fingers together and squeeze. I know his laugh was forced. As much as he almost always seems to sense what’s going on in my head, I’m pretty good at guessing his thoughts, too. Sometimes I think—or hope—that maybe our bond never got fully severed, that we’re still magically connected, but I know that’s not true. We’re just really tuned in to each other. Just how I like it.

  The entire time we’ve been talking, I’ve been trying to ignore the sounds coming from the backseat. Even if Doe only bonded with Brody to get a window of opportunity with Quince, the selfish sea urchin sure doesn’t seem to mind kissing him. Again and again and again.

  “When I get back,” I say over the smooching sounds, “after my interview in the morning, we can take our ride down the coast.”

  “I’ll have Princess all shined up and ready to go,” Quince says as he steers the car into the beachfront parking lot.

  We all pile out onto the blacktop and head for the surf line.

  While the sand squishes beneath my feet, I focus in on my transfiguration, mentally forming a finkini beneath my shorts. Quince walks with me to the water line, not caring if his biker boots get doused with salt water.

  Up the beach a few yards, Doe and Brody are getting in one last makeout session.

  As soon as we slip beneath the waves, she’ll turn her attention to Quince. I just know it.

  “Watch out for Doe,” I tell him as I unbutton and peel off my shorts, revealing my finkini of lime green and gold scales.

  “I’ll take care of her,” he says, holding out his hand. “Like she was my own sister.”

  “No.” I give him my shorts and then tug off my flip-flops and set them on top of the shorts. “I mean watch out for her. She’s devious and has her sights set on you. She set this whole thing up just so she could have time alone with you.”

  Quince glances at the lip-locked couple. “You’re reaching, princess.”

  “I mean it.”

  His Caribbean blue eyes look directly into mine. “You have nothing to worry about here.”

  “I know.” I wrap my arms around his neck and tug myself close. “But still . . .”

  “Okay.” He drops a kiss on my forehead. “I promise.” Another on my nose. “I’ll watch out for a surprise attack.”

  And then Doe is completely forgotten as his mouth closes over mine. His lips have a way of doing that, of making me forget everything else.

  “Are you ready to go?” Doe’s sharp voice penetrates my kiss-induced fog. “It’s only a few hours until sunset.”

  Well, wasn’t that just as transparent as jellyfish in rain? She’s eager to get me gone.

  I pull back. Reluctantly.

  “Yeah,” I say. “We should go.”

  “Go,” Quince says, pressing one last kiss to my lips. “I’ll be waiting for your call. At your house or mine.”

  He nods to the pay phone at the edge of the parking lot, which I’m going to use to call him for a ride when Brody and I get back. The coins I need to make the call are tucked into the bra top of my swim tank.

  Pulling out of Quince’s arms, I turn to Brody. “Come on.”

  Brody and I head into the surf, leaving Quince and Doe standing on the beach. When we reach the depth where we can go under, I turn back to wave good-bye. And notice that Doe has inched awfully close to Quince’s side.

  I scowl as I sink beneath the surface, pulling Brody down with me.

  I transfigure instantly, shedding my terraped legs for my tail fin. It’s somewhat cathartic. The familiar salt water and the magic of my change ease some of the tension Doe’s caused. She and her finful of trouble will be waiting when I get back. For now, my focus needs to be on Brody.

  Even though we—Doe, Quince, and I—explained the whole process to Brody last night, I still expect his brain to resist breathing water. To face suffocation rather than risk drowning. To fight, like Quince did, holding on to his last lungful of air with desperate determination.

  Instead, by the time I’ve finished changing into my mer form, Brody is sucking in big gulps of seawater like he was born to it. With Quince, I had to use the strength of my tail fin to hold him underwater until a breath became inevitable. I should have known that Brody the swim star would be the complet
e opposite.

  For three years I dreamed of this moment, imagined it going exactly like this. Brody taking to the mer world as if he’d always been a part of it.

  But now that it’s here, I only wish it wasn’t happening.

  “This is awesome,” he says, getting even the voice adjustment right on the first try. “I’m totally breathing water.”

  “Yeah,” I say, for some reason annoyed by how easily he’s adjusting to the underwater world. “It’s Valentine’s Day, Halloween, and Christmas, all rolled into one.” I turn my back to him and motion for him to grab my waist. He may be fast in the water, but he can’t compete with me in mer form. “Let’s get swimming.”

  The feel of Brody’s hands on my waist is surprisingly ordinary. No sparks or heat or flashes of light, like when Quince touches me. Which only proves that what Quince and I have is special, and what I’d thought I would have with Brody was nothing but a fantasy. That thought reassures me. If that whole mess can work itself out, then surely this will, too. Hopefully sooner rather than later.

  I take a deep breath and let out all my frustrations about the current situation, because really, Doe’s reckless actions aside, I’m happy with how my life is turning out.

  With a flick of my fin I push off, sending us out to sea. Out to home.

  “Don’t forget to stay streamlined,” I remind Brody over my shoulder. “And dolphin kick as hard as you can.”

  “No problem,” he says, and instantly my speed nearly doubles.

  And as glad as I am that Brody won’t slow me down with drag the way Quince did, I can’t help but wish there was some way they could trade places right now. Forever.

  If wishes were sea horses, then beggars would ride.

  Besides, wishing for something impossible is only going to ruin my mood. Again. I should try to make the best of a bad situation. I should be glad for the visit home. I should be glad the situation isn’t any more complicated than it already is.

  I kick harder, sending us sailing through the water toward Thalassinia. We’ll be there before I know it.

  With Brody’s dolphin kick making up for his extra drag, we make it to the edge of Thalassinia in about half the time it took me and Quince. We sail quickly over the deceptively organic-looking suburbs and industrial sections, heading directly for the royal palace at the center.