Real Mermaids Don't Need High Heels (8 page)

Dad cleared his throat. “I would marry your mom a million times if I could.”

“Aw.” Mom stood and kissed Dad on the cheek. “And I would say ‘I do' a million times in return.”

“Oh, gag!” I cried. I guess Mom and Dad were annoying enough as it was, married or not. But, still…

“But since I don't exist on paper,” Mom continued, “you're just going to have to keep on
pretending
to listen to your wife.”

“Well, you'll be happy to know, I
did
take your advice and decided the wind tunnel at my work would be too obvious and might raise a few questions,” Dad replied.

“So you decided to build us a padded room at Gran's house instead?” I asked, looking at the three-inch-thick rectangular slabs of insulation stacked on the floor. “We're mers, not crazy people. Though, I'm wondering about your mental health right now.”

“Well,” Dad pulled out his measuring tape and sized up the far wall, “some say there's a fine line between genius and insanity, but in this case I think I've come up with a very inspired solution to our supermoon problem.”

“Which is—to keep us toasty warm in Gran's den?” I joked.

“Well, it's the aluminum foil layer I need. The insulation part is just to give the foil a bit of structure,” Dad said. “It's the best I could come up with at Home Depot. Here, help me with this.”

Dad lined up several slabs of insulation on the floor, foil up, so their edges matched. Then he taped them together with metallic duct tape.

“What we're going to do is line this whole room with a foil layer and create a magnetic-free zone for all of you to hide in so that you can escape the magnetic properties of the moon. It's based on the scientific principles of the Faraday cage.”

“The Faraday cage?” I asked. “Isn't that the experiment where the cat's in a box and nobody knows if it's alive or dead? Because I don't think that worked out so well for the cat.”

“No, that's Schrödinger's box. A Faraday cage is an enclosure that blocks out external electromagnetic fields.” Dad pulled the couch to the middle of the room and propped up his patched-together sheets of insulation against the wall. “They're used to protect sensitive computer equipment from lightning strikes and power surges. Hand me another one of those.”

I picked up another slab of insulation for Dad while Mom watched with a concerned look on her face.

“I'm really not sure this is going to work, Dal,” Mom said.

“My theory is that if a Faraday cage can deflect something as powerful as a lightning bolt, it might just do the trick against a supermoon,” Dad said cheerily.

“I just don't want you to get your hopes up.” Mom put a hand on Dad's shoulder as he worked.

“Well, apart from three new rolls of duct tape, the only thing I have left is hope,” Dad whispered. He pulled off another strip of foil duct tape and fastened two more slabs together without looking our way.

We spent most of the weekend remodeling Gran's den into a foil-lined looney bin.

Despite the use of Gran's rubber dishwashing gloves, my forearms were raw from the fiberglass insulation, and by Monday morning I looked like I had scratched them to bits with a metal rake.

“What's that smell?” Cori asked as we walked to school with Serena after popping into Mug Glug's for our Monday morning hot chocolates.

“Some aloe vera cream Bridget gave me,” I muttered, trying not to scratch. I'd gone to check on Bridget at the diner the day before. I felt bad about judging her for “abandoning” Reese. We had a good chat, but unfortunately, she hadn't seen Reese over the weekend. “She uses it for her legs and thought it might help, but all I want to do is rip my arms off.”

“I noticed she was limping last week,” Cori said.

“Bridget is okay?” Serena asked.

“Not really. She thinks it might be her scaliosis acting up from when she was a mer. Everybody seems off these days,” I replied, taking another sip of hot chocolate. “My mom's eyesight is getting really bad, Luke keeps knocking back packets of salt, and Coach Laurena's asthma is really acting up.”

“How are you guys feeling?” Cori asked Serena and me as we walked along Main Street.

“Goodly!” Serena replied. Actually, she seemed to have an extra flick in her flip-flops that morning.

“And other than being sleep deprived, I feel completely normal,” I added. Every night, the moonlight was getting brighter and brighter through my bedroom window, plus a weird bonging noise from somewhere in the neighborhood was keeping me awake, so I was beginning to feel like a zombie.

“Hopefully everyone will return to normal once we get through the supermoon on Thursday,” Cori said.

“
If
we get through the supermoon,” I said. “We actually caught my mom sleepwalking around the yard last night.”

Once we got Mom back inside, she said the bonging reminded her of the sound mers used in their nurseries to train the mer-babies to sleep and eat. Dad couldn't hear the noise, but he said something about Pavlov's dog, which brought us back to the subject of Schrödinger's cat, then a tense conversation about the Faraday cage, so we all dropped it.

“Dundee that way, right?” Serena pointed northward as we crossed the bridge at the canal.

“Yes,” I replied. “You can get there by boat or by car like we did last night coming back from Gran's, remember?”

“Yes.” Serena nodded and smiled. She'd obviously been paying attention when Gran showed her where everything was on the map at the school office. She snuck in one last peek at the lake before we stepped off the bridge and headed along Main Street toward the school a mile or so away.

“So…” I snuck a peek at Cori between sips. I had been dying to ask her if Mrs. Chamberlain called to tell her about her mentorship, but Cori hadn't said a word. “Anything new?”

“Not really,” Cori replied.

“Anybody call?” I asked.

“No, why?” She narrowed her eyes at me.

I just couldn't help myself; I
had
to know.

“I was just wondering if you heard anything about your mentorship.”

Cori looked at me skeptically, then a flash of anger crossed her face. “You were at the mall last week. Did you say something to Mrs. Chamberlain?”

Busted. “Maybe?”

“Ugh. Jade! Why would you
do
that?” Cori shook her head and walked quickly ahead of me.

“Cori, wait!” I called after her.

“Whether or not Mrs. Chamberlain wants to mentor me should be
her
decision.” Cori stopped and turned to face me while Serena looked on, confused. “You can't just swoop in and save everyone, Jade. It doesn't work like that in the
real
world.”

“That's not what I was trying to do—” How could I explain to Cori that I did it because I felt responsible for screwing things up in the first place? It was my fault for dragging Cori in on the plan to stop Chamberlain Construction from landfilling the tidal pool where my mom was transforming into a human. It was my fault Lainey had it in for Cori. Everything was my fault.

“Well, whatever. Mrs. Chamberlain hasn't called,” Cori said sternly, walking onward.

“It's still early. The mentorships don't start until November,” I said, following her and hoping she wouldn't stay mad for too long.

“I'm starting to think I'm not cut out to be a fashion designer anyway,” Cori said quietly.

“Don't say that. Your designs are amazing,” I replied. “Better than anything
I
could ever come up with.”

Cori shook her head in irritation.

“And what about you, huh?” she asked. “Have you made any plans?”

“No.” It was true. I hadn't given any thought at all to what I'd wanted to do for my school mentorship. The past few months had been so focused on Mom and all the mermaidy stuff happening. But what about me? What was it that I truly wanted? I wasn't sure.

“Well, how about if you worry about your mentorship and I'll worry about mine.”

“I'm sorry—” I began.

“No, I'm sorry. Whatever. Just forget it.”

But I could tell Cori was still peeved.

Should I not have butted in? Was Cori right? Did I think I could just sweep in and fix everything when
I
didn't even have my act together?

The three of us walked in silence until we reached the bank and I could hear Luke's skateboard as he swerved down Queen Street. He appeared at the corner of Queen and Main and flipped his board into one hand, adjusting the canvas guitar case slung across his chest with the other. We held onto our hot chocolates and jogged up to meet him.

“Hey, guys. Hi, you.” He reached for my free hand and gave me a kiss on the cheek, making my heart race. Though my thumping heart might have been from running twenty feet down the sidewalk, something I usually avoided at all costs.

“Where's Trey?” Cori asked, looking over Luke's shoulder. Luke and Trey usually hitched a ride with their mom to her work at the flower shop on Queen Street and then skateboarded the rest of the way together.

“He went with my dad to take his driving test,” Luke said as he fell into step with us on the way to school. “Again.”

“Just imagine,” Cori joked. “By midday there could be one more student driver terrorizing the streets of Port Toulouse.”

“Yeah,” Luke agreed. “So lock up your pets and look twice before crossing the street!”

“Thankfully, we'll only have one Martin boy to worry about,” I teased. “I can't imagine what it will be like when both of you have your licenses.”

“What do you mean?” Luke gave me a wry smile and dropped his skateboard to the sidewalk, squeezing my hand before pushing away with three strong strides. “I think I would make an excellent driver—” But a crack in the pavement made him stumble forward and he almost wiped out.

Cori and I laughed out loud.

“Sorry!” I called out, trying to stop laughing. “But you gotta admit—that was pretty funny.”

Serena, on the other hand, looked horrified over Luke's stumble. She ran to his side and offered her hand to steady him.

“Luke okay?” she cried, her voice high pitched and strained.

“Yeah, I'm okay.” Luke smiled his curvy-lipped, trying-not-to-smile smile and took the hand Serena offered but helped her onto his skateboard instead. He looked at us and gave us a scathing look. “Now at least I know who my real friends are. So
she
gets a free ride to the corner.”

“Oh, I'm so jealous,” I joked, admiring how sweet Luke was with Serena as he showed her how to hang onto the loop of his backpack so he could tow her along the sidewalk. It reminded me of the time I'd used the Beckers' canoe to tow Mom from Gran's cottage to the bridge so I could get her back to the ocean.

Serena wobbled on the board and grinned a huge smile. “Skate rolling!”

“Go, Serena!” Cori laughed.

“Woo-hoo!” I called, rushing after them. It felt good being just normal teenagers goofing off on a normal day. For a few minutes, I actually forgot that in three days we'd be facing Tidal Law and might be pulled to the bottom of the ocean.

“So, what else is new?” I asked as Cori and I caught up with Luke. We tossed our empty hot chocolate cups into the garbage.

“I heard another boat went missing close to here.” Luke steered Serena around the garbage can. “The Howsers' canoe?”

“The Howsers who live by the point close to the bridge?” Cori asked.

Mr. and Mrs. Howser came into the ice cream parlor at least once a week over the summer and shared a sundae on the park bench outside the diner.

“Yeah, that's what they said at the flower shop when I was helping my mom pack a few orders into her van,” Luke replied. “Mrs. Howser had left the canoe at the edge of the water on the beach below their house and someone took it overnight.”

“Are you kidding me?” I whispered to Luke. I glanced back at Serena but she was too busy concentrating on keeping her balance on the skateboard. I nudged Cori. “I bet Finalin's behind this.”

What the heck were Finalin and Medora trying to prove with that stunt? Gran had said the couple would stop vandalizing the boats on the lake (or worse) if we took Serena during the week to give her a “real teenage girl” experience. Had I spent a week mer-sitting her, practically drowning at underwater hockey practice, and dealing with Lainey Chamberlain's wrath over the school election for nothing?

I couldn't say all that out loud, though. Not with Serena there. She couldn't help it that her parents were ungrateful troublemakers.

“I dunno,” Luke said. “There might be another explanation.”

“Yeah,” Cori agreed. “It could be just a coincidence.”

“Coincidence, my foot,” I muttered.

Luke slowed down when we got to a red light at the corner and steadied Serena so she could get off the skateboard.

“So, new best friend,” he asked, “how was your weekend with your mom and dad?”

“Weekend was right,” Serena said, though a strange look passed over her eyes as though she felt guilty for having fun on land just then. “I told about election for Mother and Father. And maps. And Folly Dance, too.”

I cringed and snuck a peek at Cori. Serena's English was getting a lot better, and that wasn't always a good thing. I still hadn't officially asked Luke to go to the Fall Folly dance because I hadn't had a chance to figure out what I could possibly wear. I'd looked in my closet the night before, but the fanciest thing I had was a pair of jeans I'd bejeweled with Cori during one of our sleepovers last winter.

“Folly dance?” Luke asked. “Oh, that's the thing you and Trey are going to, right?” he asked Cori.

“Yeah.” Cori nodded. “The Fall Folly.”

“Jade go with Luke!” Serena said enthusiastically.

“Serena…” I muttered, then turned to Luke, trying to act casual. “It's this thing where the girls need to ask the guys to go or something.”

“When is it?” Luke asked.

“The nineteenth,” Cori replied brightly.

I made a mental note to kill Cori later.

“Of October or September?” he asked.

“September, which I guess is after the supermoon so we shouldn't
really
be making plans beyond Tidal Law, considering,” I babbled. “Although October nineteenth has kind of a ring to it. Why does that date sound familiar?”

“Seriously?” Luke got a weird look on his face, making me wonder what was going through his mind. What if he actually didn't want to go to the dance with me?

I glanced at Cori, and an awkward silence fell over our group. Luckily, the light changed and we were off again.

Dodged another bullet.

• • •

Thankfully, Cori took Serena to Junior Environmentalists Club during Monday lunch so I didn't have to listen to Cori chew me out for messing up a perfect opportunity to invite Luke to the Fall Folly dance.

The whole conversation had turned out to be so confusing and weird that I wasn't sure I could bring it up again with Luke anyway. Had I sort of invited him? Not really. Had he kind of accepted? I wasn't sure.

So basically, I had no idea if I had a date, needed a dress, or was going to the dance at all.

I took advantage of the Serena break by researching some final details for our joint Social Studies project without the risk of her deleting it on us again. Mom and Dad had been hovering around me since school started, making sure I was finishing my homework so I wouldn't have a repeat performance of last semester, so I really didn't want to mess up on my very first assignment. I was at the library computers, caught up in a Google and Wikipedia time warp, when I heard the “toc, toc, toc” of Lainey Chamberlain's inappropriate shoes winding their way through the aisles of library shelves.