Fantasy Life (44 page)

“All right,” she said, hoping her voice wouldn’t betray her lie. “I’ll tell you.”

Aluke nodded. “I got some clothes in the truck. They’re probably way too big, but they’ll work better than that dress if you’re heading to the beach. Otherwise, I can drive you to Cliffside House.”

Athena had made noises about bringing Walters back to the house to impress him with it.
We show him the front area, serve him a nightcap, and send him on his way,
Athena had said.
Maybe the house’ll put the fear of God into him.

Cassie had objected, but as usual, her mother hadn’t listened. Cassie didn’t want Walters to know about Cliffside House or its powers. She had a sense that he was looking for something to manipulate, some kind of advantage so that this wouldn’t end badly for him, even though it looked like it was going to.

“Cass?” Aluke said.

“I don’t really want to go home, thanks. But I will take the loan of the clothing, if you don’t mind. Even though it’ll get ruined, you know.”

“That’s what I brought ’em for. I figured other folks were going to need extra too.”

She followed Aluke to the passenger side of the truck. He was a good man, and well-intentioned. She was sorry that she couldn’t agree with him about the selkies. He had offered to tell her his stories, and she had made excuses every time.

Much as she trusted Aluke on most things, she didn’t trust his opinion of the magical creatures taking refuge off Anchor Bay’s shores. He hated most of them, spoke of wanting to crush the barnacle drivers that combed the bottom of his boat searching for food, and of the afternoon he had caught the Fish of Many Wishes, only to refuse the wishes it offered.

Aluke had said he would have let it flop on the deck and suffocate, until he remembered that all protected creatures that
lived in the water were amphibians—even the ones that looked like normal fish. He had wondered aloud about that—what did deep-water creatures need with the ability to breathe air?—and no one had answered him.

It had been a speculation no one in Anchor Bay had wanted to make.

Cassie had heard variations on those conversations her whole life and knew that the people who feared the fantasylife in the protected harbor could not be trusted when it came to legends about the various creatures.

As well intentioned as Aluke was, his attitude toward selkies and every other magical being in the sea was one of hatred. He would always see the dark side.

Aluke had a stack of clothing on the front seat, most of it suitable for the Salvation Army. Apparently, he had come here as prepared as he said he had. Cassie wondered what made him want to work in the dark, then got the answer, filtered, directly from him.

He didn’t want to see people looking at him, blaming him the way he blamed himself.

She wished she knew how to comfort him, but words were empty against such a strong belief. Maybe if he spent some time with Spark Walters, Aluke might change his mind about his own culpability.

Aluke handed her a flannel workshirt and a pair of Levi’s that were stiff with mud. She took them gladly, along with the pair of gloves he handed to her.

“Thanks,” she said. “I’ll return them to you.”

“Please don’t. I brought them because they’re not worth anything.”

“Okay.” She adjusted the clothes and put a hand on his arm. “I appreciate this.”

“I know.” He pushed the pile of clothing back and leaned on the seat, letting the interior light from the truck illuminate
his face. It was a gentle face, made harsh by years of exposure to salt water and the elements. “Do me a favor. When you see your boyfriend—”

“Husband,” Cassie murmured.

Aluke didn’t seem to notice.

“—tell him not to do anything rash. Tell him he’s got you to think about. And tell him to make sure he knows all the implications before he listens to the rest of his group.”

“Tribe.”

This time, Aluke seemed to have heard. “Just tell him.”

“I will.” That much she could promise. “Thanks again.”

He closed the truck door. “Don’t mention it.”

Cassie started across the parking area. A cinder-block building with bathrooms on either side stood at the southern tip of the wayside. The coffee table that some local women had manned all day was still there, but no one sat behind it.

Cassie headed for the women’s room, a two-stall that always smelled of disinfectant. Still, it would be the best place for her to change. She would just leave her clothes there and pick them up when she was done.

The wind was starting to pick up. It was cold, and Cassie shivered. She’d never felt a wind with such bite to it, not in all her years in Anchor Bay.

Still, it was January, and she had seen pictures of snow on the beach. Her mother swore that Cassie had seen the snow too, but she didn’t remember—she had been much too young.

Snow, and ice, would probably be the worst thing right now. The oil would become viscous and even harder to get off the beach. Or maybe, if it was more sludgy, it would be easier.

Cassie let out a breath. She was out of her depth here, just like everyone else, and the only person who knew anything about oil probably wouldn’t help any of them out.

The cinder-block rest room had a small wall that created a small hallway, a pathway into the ladies’ room. A dim bulb hung
over the rusted steel door, revealing the filthy window and a pile of sand in the corner.

Cassie passed the faucet that children used in the summer to wash the sand off their feet. It seemed impossibly low to her, although she could remember using it more than once, whenever she had come to the beach by herself, when her mother hadn’t allowed it.

Cassie pushed the door open. The interior smelled worse than she remembered. The smell of urine had overpowered the disinfectant long ago. The pungent stench of the oil had also gathered in here, making the bathroom a gathering place for foul odors.

The lights inside were dimmer than the one outside. A mirror, the silvering flaking off, hung over the sink. The concrete floor was wet and smelled as if it had never been dry. A single window was open several feet above Cassie’s head. Through it, she could hear voices, the honking of a car horn, and the ocean.

Both stall doors were open, and Cassie took the one closest to the wall. She remembered seeing a hook in there that most women used for purses. She would use it for her dress.

The wind whistled through the window, and the voices grew louder—people were arguing. She sighed. She had hoped that wouldn’t happen, but she supposed it would be inevitable. Emotions were high right now; people were frightened. Eventually, that would find its way to the cleanup site, particularly at night, when the workers were tired.

She hung up the shirt and jeans and reluctantly set the gloves on the back of the toilet. She hoped the slight dampness that seemed to cover everything wouldn’t penetrate the gloves in the short time she would be in here.

Then she pulled her dress over her head, shivering in the cold and damp. The lights flickered, and the wind howled, and her shivering got worse.

A storm was blowing in, a rapidly moving storm. She wished she had listened to the weather predictions, then she would have been prepared for this. But she hadn’t. And storms could come in quickly during the winter, particularly when the system had high winds.

She grabbed the flannel shirt and slipped it on. It smelled of cheap cigars, but it was warm. The shirt’s ends went down to her knees, and she had to roll up the sleeves.

A gust of wind hit the building, and the lights flickered again. On the beach, she heard shouting—people warning each other to take cover.

Cassie had never heard that before. Coasties were a tough bunch; they usually didn’t need warnings.

She slipped off her shoes, but kept standing on them so that her sock feet wouldn’t touch the wet floor. Then she pulled on the jeans as fast as she could, losing her balance more than once and catching herself on the flimsy metal stall divider.

As she put on her right shoe, a gust of wind hit the building so hard that the cinder blocks shuddered. The window rattled.

Cassie slipped on her other shoe. Then the rain started, pounding the ceiling as if rocks were falling from the sky. The window’s rattling continued, and the rusted chain holding the window open vibrated dangerously.

The jeans were too long, but they fit loosely around her hips. She grabbed her shawl, rolled it up thin, and used it like a belt to hold the pants up. She had to pause to roll up the legs. The glass above her bounced as another gust hit.

Then the chain broke. The glass window fell next to Cassie and shattered. Instinctively, she closed her eyes. Glass shards pelted her, like tiny needles against the skin.

“Run!” a man outside yelled. “For god’s sake! Run!”

And then the lights went out.

Cassie cursed and felt for the door, finding her dress. It was
still warm from her body, but the fabric was covered with more glass.

The wind was flowing in like a live thing, howling, knocking everything inside around as if the wind were trapped here with Cassie. She fumbled for the lock, found it, and unbolted it.

Except for the wind, there was only silence outside. She couldn’t even hear the ocean—and that freaked her out. She hurried across the damp floor, her shoes splashing in water she hadn’t even realized was there.

The moon was gone, and no light was filtering in. It was very dark. She could only guess where the exterior door was. She flailed for the exterior wall like a blind thing. Her knuckles scraped cinder block, making her wince, but she kept her left hand on it, using it to navigate toward the door.

The silence had an eerie cast to it. She couldn’t remember silence like this, ever. Even the wind seemed to have died down.

Then it hit the building with so much force that the walls shook. She didn’t know what it took to shake cinder block. Her flannel shirt rose up as wind got underneath it, sending shivers through her.

She was breathing through her mouth, more rapidly than she had believed possible. Her heart was pounding, and she wasn’t exactly sure why. She had lived through storms before—countless storms—and power outages and high winds. But something about this one felt wrong, unnatural.

Then she heard Daray’s voice, as if it were coming from inside of him, as she had heard it just a few hours before:
They say the resulting storm will clean all foreign matter that we designate from the sea and its shore. We just need a place to dump it.

“Oh, God,” she whispered. His father had warned him against this. But maybe Daray had found a volunteer, someone who was willing to help him and the humans.

Someone willing to sacrifice himself to save Anchor Bay.

Daray wouldn’t do it. He loved life too much. He and
Cassie were together now, and they were going to have children and raise them to love the sea—

Still, she cast about in her mind for Daray, but she only got darkness. Her arm, the one supporting her weight against the wall, was shaking.

Maybe she was too frightened to find him. Maybe her powers didn’t work in situations like this. Maybe something as simple as the storm was blocking her.

He was all right. He had to be. They were linked, heart and soul. She would know if something happened to him.

Wouldn’t she?

The building shook again, and she thought she heard a scream from outside. Several screams. And then a roar—like a train engine, only worse. Like the helicopter, without the motor. A
whup-whup-whupping
sound that made her breathe even faster.

The ground rumbled, but this wasn’t an earthquake. She would know an earthquake. It would feel different. It would feel like—

And then something slammed into the building. Water poured in through the open window, pushing the door open and shoving it against the wall. She heard the metal hit, felt the water, ice-cold around her ankles.

She screamed—not for help—but for Daray, and she wasn’t even sure she opened her mouth to do it.

The water pushed at her from two directions and rose so fast that she had only a few seconds before she realized she’d better close her mouth and hold her breath.

She kept her hand on the cinder-block wall, but the water shoved her away. The entire bathroom filled, water pouring in from above and through the door.

She rose with it, trying to keep her head above water, until she crashed into the ceiling. The pain filtered through her, a sudden, unavoidable headache, but she didn’t gasp aloud.
Instead, she felt around in the icy water, hoping to find the top of the stalls.

If she found that, she could find the window and get out when the water receded, because it would recede. This had to be an awful wave, something that she had only heard about.

Not a tsunami. Those were caused by earthquakes and there had been no earthquake. But this was something else.

Something other.

. . . this is no ordinary storm, my son. It makes the storm that drowned the oil ship look like it was nothing . . .

Cassie found the metal top of the stall. It still held. But her oxygen was running out. Her lungs hurt, and she wanted to take a breath.

Daray!
she screamed for him with her mind.
Daray, help me! Help me!

But he didn’t answer her. Maybe she had cast for him too late. Maybe he hadn’t known the storm was coming either.

If he had had this idea, maybe other selkies had too.

She screamed for him one final time—
Daray!
—and then made herself focus on two things: holding her breath, and using the stalls to guide her toward the window.

The water’s push didn’t seem as strong now, or maybe that was simply because she was submerged—the force of the water was going over her.

She flailed upward with her right hand, keeping hold of the metal with her left—and her fingers broke through the water, their tips scraping the ceiling.

The water was receding, like she had hoped.

Instead of pushing herself forward, she just held on. Her lungs felt like they were going to burst. Stars flashed in front of her eyes.