Tangled Tides (The Sea Monster Memoirs) (8 page)

"This ain't about just you and her. It's about all of us."

"You know what I meant."

Dina opened the door and stepped in front of my handlebars, passing me a frosty mug. "Here, hon. It's been on ice since it came in. She says it's full of passion and—"

"Dina!" I flicked my seagarette at her. "I told you, don't ever tell me anything about the donor."

"Sorry, I thought maybe—"

"Back inside, Dina," Jack ordered.

She shut the door without argument and I gulped down the blood, trying not to wonder who it belonged to. Whoever the donor was, Dina hadn't lied. Rapture coursed through me. I ached to devour someone—body and soul—but knew it would pass in a few minutes.

"Damn," I grunted, wiping my mouth. "Somebody had a good time last night."

Jack smacked me on the shoulder. "That's half the fun of donating to you. We can anonymously gift you with highlights of our lives."

"I'm grateful for it, but it's nothing compared to—well, you know."

"Soon that will all change. You two will be able to share your souls with each other and forget all about this donor business."

"I hope so. For hours I've been walking around thinking I've lost my soul mate forever." I punched the seat of my bike. "Treygan's a meddling prick. Just like our good-for-nothing father."

Jack stomped out his seagarette with the heel of his boot and tossed the empty vodka bottle in the dumpster. "Forget about him. We'll get Yara to side with us. Love will triumph."

Right. That's what fairytales claimed, but from where I stood, everything just got a hundred times harder—and messier—for the love gang.

B
efore I opened my eyes, I sensed someone watching me. Somewhere between half-asleep and almost-awake, it gradually came back to me. The hurricane, my tail, those tattoo thingies, the coldness in Rownan's kiss and—

My eyes flew open and there he was. Treygan.

"What a massive waste of time," he said. "Ten hours have passed since you closed your eyes. Do you know how much we could have accomplished in ten hours?"

I sat up and pulled my blanket over my arms. Sunlight beamed through the living room window. "It's called sleeping, jackass. Ten hours is an acceptable amount of time." I could have slept for another two or three. "You didn't sleep at all?"

"I told you, Yamabuki, I don't sleep."

"Stop calling me that."

"You can call me freak, kingpin, slimeball and jackass, but I can't call you Yamabuki?"

I made a mental note to stop calling him names. "What do you do at night if you don't sleep?"

"Work." He sounded awake and alert, but dark circles cradled his eyes.

"All night?"

"Yes, and it still isn't enough time."

So Treygan was a workaholic. No surprise there. I could totally see him having a never-ending need to feel important. "If you didn't go to work last night, what did you do?"

"Sat here, waiting for you to finish sleeping."

He looked even stiffer than usual, like he really had sat in the rocking chair for ten hours. "You sat there all night watching me sleep? Are you one of those deranged stalker types?" Dang it. Again with the name-calling.

"May I request you refrain from insulting me or any of our people today? I am running low on patience and might not have the restraint I had yesterday."

"Restraint?" I leaned forward. "Are you threatening me?"

"You will know if I threaten you. There will be no question about it."

"I don't like your tone."

"I don't like wasting an entire day and night here on land accomplishing nothing while our people are getting sick. I'm behind in my work, and you have a lot to learn in the next few days. We have to go." He stood up and walked to the door.

"When can I come back?"

"You may not want to come back."

"Oh, I'll want to come back," I picked at the hardened pools of candle wax on the coffee table. "You're delusional if you think I'm going to spend the rest of my life underwater."

"You'll be able to come and go as often as you like once your initiation is complete. That will take a few sunsets."

"Sunsets? I'll be gone a few days?"

"Yes."

"I need to see my uncle before we go."

"Your uncle?"

"You know, the man whose house you stole me from."

He tilted his head back like he just remembered something. "Right, of course. But please hurry. You're part of a much larger family now. Some of them are suffering because we've been ashore too long."

Some of
them
are suffering? My uncle's kidneys could shut down at any moment. I needed to be on the island looking after him. Instead, I had to go live like a fish. I followed Treygan out on the front porch. He kept his face to the sky, eyes closed, as I summoned up conviction for my next argument.

"First off, none of you merpeople are my family. My family is my uncle—that's it. Secondly, don't blame your insufficient drug supply on me. Your people are suffering because you turned me against my will."

He didn't move or open his eyes. "Go say goodbye to Lloyd. If you aren't back in twenty minutes, I will come get you."

"Don't you go anywhere near him."

He turned and looked at me. I expected his eyes to be piercing and angry, but he looked calm and indifferent. "Be back in twenty minutes and I won't have to."

"Ugh! I h—I hay—"

"What? Hate me? You don't know me well enough to hate me. Now go."

T
he walk to Uncle Lloyd's was a daily routine, but today it felt strange. Trees and shrubs had been blown over by the hurricane. Flooding shifted the sand and dirt along the roadways and made hills and barriers where none had been before. Uncle Lloyd's house hadn't been damaged, but it looked different. Maybe it was the sun rising behind it, or the reflection off the ocean yards away from his porch, but the house appeared to be surrounded by a shimmering bubble.

The thought of explaining everything to him made my stomach hurt. The truth was unbelievable, but according to Treygan I couldn't lie. What could I possibly tell him?
Hey, Uncle Lloyd, this is Treygan the merman. He turned me into the Little Mermaid and I'm going to live under the sea for a few days. Hold down the fort while I'm gone.
Yeah, that would go over well.

I knocked on the door and stepped inside. "Morning," I called.

Uncle Lloyd came down the stairs with his usual laid-back grin and a limp that made my heart ache. "Happy birthday, sweetie."

My birthday. I had almost forgotten. "Thanks! I'm officially an adult. You can evict me from the house whenever you like."

"I would never."

As I followed him into the kitchen, I tried to memorize every detail about him just in case I ended up being gone longer than Treygan said. All things considered, he looked pretty good for being in his sixties. He still had a head of thick, white hair. Most of his muscles had gone flabby over the years, and he walked with a limp because the dialysis made his legs cramp and his joints ache, but he kept a positive attitude. He always wore yellow. Whether it was bright, tropical shirts, Capri pants, or his garden gloves, almost every memory I had of him involved a garment in some shade of yellow. Uncle Lloyd was my own personal sunshine, even during the dark times.

He grabbed a cake box out of the refrigerator and set it on the table. Opening a kitchen drawer, he pulled out two packages wrapped in pink and green paper. One was flat and rectangular. The other was small and square.

"You didn't have to get me anything. You already give me too much." I recited the same line every year before I tore open my gifts, and every year he smiled and watched in silence. I opened the flat one first. A manila envelope felt like it held papers of some sort.

"What's this? A million dollar recording contract?" I puckered my lips and turned my chin over one shoulder—my best pose for an album cover.

"Unfortunately, no. However, your voice has sounded more velvety these last couple days. Maybe this adulthood thing is making you rock star worthy."

"Really? I sound different?" I tried to focus on the typed document in front of me to calm my nerves. My hair turning blonde, my voice changing; surely Uncle Lloyd would start getting suspicious of— "Oh, my God!" I blurted out, finally comprehending the words on the paper. "This is a deed to mom's house with my name on it."

"It's your home now. Free and clear."

This, along with a million other reasons, is why Uncle Lloyd was my superhero. "This is—it's way too much. I can't accept—"

"Yara, we both know my days are numbered. I haven't enjoyed forcing you to grow up so fast, but I need to make sure you'll be taken care of when I'm gone."

"You promised not to say things like that. They'll find a donor soon."

"Alright, then." He folded his hands in front of him. "How about stating the obvious? You earned the right to own that house a long time ago. You haven't exactly had a normal childhood, kiddo."

He had a point. My mother never cooked, cleaned, or did laundry. In fact, she never did much of anything. Some days she didn't get out of bed because she was too tired. She had a weak heart, which up until Uncle Lloyd set the story straight, I thought was my fault. Every night I would go to her room to say goodnight, and she would tell me that my father and I made her heart sick. I didn't remember much about my father. He died when I was three, but back then he and I were an imaginary team. Together, we made my mother sick.

After she was gone, my uncle explained that her weak heart was a medical condition. She was also heartsick—very different from a diseased heart—over my father's death and the fact that she couldn't give me a better life. I still questioned if his take was an accurate one.

For the first few years after I moved in with Uncle Lloyd, I visited my old house every day, hoping my mother would magically reappear. When I turned thirteen my uncle let me stay the weekends by myself whenever I wanted. At sixteen he let me live there alone full-time, as long as I checked in with him every day. It was our secret, and if anyone asked I had to say I lived with him. No one ever asked.

Now that I was eighteen it didn't have to be a secret anymore. A new secret took its place. One we couldn't share. I had to keep the truth from the man who had never kept anything from me. I would come back in a few days and pretend nothing had changed. Uncle Lloyd would never have to know about this mermaid thing, and we could return to our normal routine.

"Thank you," I said. "This means a lot to me."

I remembered Treygan's threat to come get me if I took too long, and my pulse quickened. I didn't want him showing up and having to explain him to Uncle Lloyd. My hands shook as I hurriedly unwrapped the next present.

It was a pendant made from a grayish-colored stone. Veins of deep red snaked through its polished surface.

"Thank you, I love it," I said in a rush, despising Treygan for making me hurry through my birthday.

Uncle Lloyd laughed in his deep, full-bellied way. "You haven't seen the best part. Open it. It's a locket."

Inside the cracked stone I found a photo of my mother and father. They looked young and happy. I examined my father closely because he was sort of a stranger to me. "Oh," is all I managed to say.

"You don't like it?"

"I'd rather have a picture of you."

"Yara, they're your parents. They gave you life. Treasure their memory always."

I closed the locket, rubbing my thumb over the smooth surface. "What kind of rock is this?"

"It's an old sea stone. Protects those who keep it close to their heart."

I hated having to leave him. What if he got worse while I was gone? Or what if—I couldn't think about losing him. It would be a life without sunshine. I held the necklace out to him. "Will you help me put it on?"

Uncle Lloyd secured the clasp while I held my hair up. The stone hung low against my chest and felt cool on my skin. When I turned around to thank him I got a titanic head rush and swayed forward.

"Easy there." He held onto my shoulders. "You alright?"

I squeezed my eyes shut repeatedly, trying to blink the dizziness away. "Yeah, sorry—minor dizzy spell." Except it wasn't minor. Shades of blue and red flashed across my vision and my limbs felt like gummy worms. Treygan said we'd get sick if we were away from the water too long. If this is what he meant, and weed could cure it, bring on the smoke fest.

"Maybe you should sit down," Uncle Lloyd said.

"I'm fine. I just haven't eaten since—jeez, I didn't eat at all yesterday or today." How had I forgotten to eat? My stomach never growled once. No hunger pains or anything. If merfolk didn't eat, I'd be pissed off. I loved food and didn't want to give it up just because I had been turned part fish.

"Your blood sugar must be plummeting. How 'bout some cake?"

I forced a smile. "Birthday cake?"

"The best kind." He sliced two pieces and put them on plates.

"What? No birthday song?" I teased, still feeling lightheaded.

"You're the singer, not me. I didn't want to torture you on your special day." He was right. Singing was not one of his talents. Things like gardening, wood carving and repairing boats were what he did best.

I stuck my fork into my first bite of cake, hoping I'd be able to taste it. If I didn't get hungry anymore, had I also lost my sense of taste? Moist, dark chocolate cake with buttercream icing slid onto my tongue. Sugary decadence exploded in my mouth, more intense than ever.

"Mmmm," I moaned with pleasure. "This is the best thing I've ever tasted!" I definitely hadn't lost my sense of taste. If anything, it was amplified—or exceptionally great cake. I wasn't sure.

"Glad you like it. I ordered it from a mom-and-pop bakery in the Keys. Locals rave about how good their stuff is."