The Mermaid's Secret (21 page)

He's standing there with a look on his face that I can't quite place, except to say it's a look I haven't seen before, and I don't even notice the bouquet of flowers in his hand until he sticks them out in front of me. “You look beautiful. These are for you.”

“Oh. Flowers,” I say, trying to act totally cool and casual. So this is like a real Date, with Flowers and Everything.

He smiles.

Then there's a really long, awkward pause where I'm standing on one side of the threshold and he's on the other and I just want him to turn around and start walking so we can get this date out of the way, but he obviously wants to drag it out. So I take the flowers and invite him into the apartment.

I poke around the kitchen looking for a vase while Matthew talks to Sammy, but I don't have a vase, since no one ever brings me flowers. I settle on a Big Gulp cup from the 7-Eleven. When I put the flowers in, it tips over, and I have to rummage around for something taller and heavier. I find a glass pitcher that we use for margaritas sometimes.

At least the pitcher doesn't fall over like the Big Gulp cup, but the mouth is too wide and the stems splay out so that the flowers look spindly. I decide that giving flowers to someone kind of sucks and lead Matthew out the door.

Sammy does an obnoxious pelvic thrust dance for me when Matthew has his back turned.

*   *   *

The big surprise he has planned is a reservation at Au Pied de Cochon—which is literally French for “the Pig's Foot.” It's the fanciest restaurant in all Ne'Hwas. Booked all summer long. He must have pulled some strings to get us in.

The inside is elegant, with starched linen tablecloths and place settings that include more silverware than a person can possibly use for one meal. The tables all have floral arrangements that are not jammed into Big Gulp cups or margarita pitchers.

The hostess seats us at a special table on the porch with a fantastic view of the ocean. Matthew pulls my chair out for me, which throws me for a loop. There's a whole bunch of very polite and extravagant offers by the hostess, who assures us that our waiter will be over to serve us shortly, and that she wishes us a pleasant evening, and she insists that we let her know if there's
anything
she can do to make us more comfortable. (I resist telling her that leaving us alone would make me more comfortable.) She isn't gone two seconds before our waiter comes over and goes through the whole rigmarole again.

Then another server comes over and fills our water glasses, and by the time Matthew and I are left alone, we are both so out of place and disoriented we can't find anything to break the nervous silence.

“So…” he says, after a dramatically long pause.

“So…” I repeat.

I rack my brain for anything to say, but nothing pops up.

“Who do you think's going to win the fishing derby this year?” Matthew finally says.

“Probably Nick.” I ponder this thoughtfully. “Yeah, Nick.”

He nods like he's considering the depth of my answer. “Yeah, probably right.”

“Nick usually wins.”

Silence.

“Unless Joey wins. Then I think Nick would come in second.” Thank God for Nick, Joey, and Mario. At least we have
something
to talk about.

There's more excruciating silence. The minutes tick away. Matthew smiles and looks away. I look away, too.

The first waiter brings our drinks. I slam my Dark 'n Stormy and Matthew orders me another one. It's obvious we're going to need a little liquid courage on this date. But why? We've had a million conversations about a million different things over the years. There's never been any of this awkward smiling and looking out the window and reaching for things to say to each other. Is it because we're both so focused of how the date will end—i.e., with a kiss, like dates are supposed to end, or without a kiss, which is how really bad dates end?

The fact that I'm in the middle of a fairly big existential conundrum also looms large. In ten days I'm either going to stay human and continue life as I know it or I'm going to surf through that barrel and never return. And if that's the case, then what am I doing here? Leading on a man I really, really care about?

And that, I realize, is what's truly eating at me. I really, really care about Matthew. I care about him in more than just a guy-I-work-with kind of way. No matter what happens ten days from now, today, I don't want to blow it.

Finally, Matthew comes up with something: “You look really beautiful tonight.”

I fake a smile. Not exactly the conversation starter we need.

The waiter comes back with menus and this, at least, gives both of us a distraction. However, it's in French. All I can read are the prices, which are so outrageous that at first I think it must be a joke. This meal will cost a week's worth of tips.

“What are you going to get?” I ask.

Matthew frowns at the menu. “Maybe we should ask the waiter for a suggestion.”

“Yeah, they didn't exactly teach French at Ne'Hwas High, did they?”

Matthew forces a smile. “I don't know.”

School. Another conversational dead end. He dropped out to help support his mom and started working for Roger. His youth cut short.

At the table next to us, a group of yacht club types orders their food, speaking in fluent French. Even their laughter sounds French.

“Maybe we can ask them to order for us,” Matthew says.

I smile, and this forced, fake laugh comes out of me, which is more embarrassing than the silence.

Things don't get any better after that. I finish my drink and order a third. The waiter, who agrees to order for us, brings us an appetizer of escargot, which neither of us knows how to eat and which tastes like snot dipped in butter.

The group next to us only makes things worse, with their booming, confident voices telling stories of their wonderful, worldly lives. One has a son who just graduated from Stanford. Another just closed on a house in Aspen. Someone else is fired up about the trip to India they're taking in the fall. They all have lives elsewhere, but Matthew and I are stuck right here. I've never felt like such a townie as I do while eavesdropping at Au Pied de Cochon.

At least the drinks are softening the hard edges and making me care less about how I might look to the yacht club types.

I get up to go to the bathroom. There's a massive fish tank in the foyer, which faces the dining room on the other side. I stop and look at it. Orange roughies, bonitos, and black bass are packed together so tightly that they bump into one another. Powerful pumps at the top of the tank stir the water into a mini current. A whirlpool spins on the surface. All the fish are on the menu; fresh seafood taken to the extreme.

It might be the three drinks, but I imagine myself jumping in and swimming with them. I crave the weightlessness of it. I want to breathe the dense salt water and hunt for my dinner. A bit of drool gathers at the corner of my mouth.

“Are you all right, dear?” a woman asks as she passes me on her way from the restrooms to the dining room. I must be quite a sight in my hip-hugging dress, drooling at the fish.

“I'm fine, thanks,” I say, wiping my lips. I go to the bathroom, splash my face with cold water and return to my seat.

We manage to get through the meal by talking mostly about Harold and the
Dauntless
and the ever-revolving hookups and breakups of the Slack Tide crew.

When the waiter asks us if we'd like to look at the dessert menu, we both give an enthusiastic no.

*   *   *

The awkwardness carries over into the truck, but at least now there's a light at the end of the tunnel—an end to the evening.

Matthew and I like each other. We tried to be more than friends. We failed. Simple as that.

Probably for the best. I'm probably leaving to be a fish for the rest of my life. Even if I stay human, he might leave at the end of the summer, head south, and never come back. We're doomed either way.

Thank God for radio. I reach over and turn up the volume.

When we get to Barefoot Lane, Matthew keeps driving.

“Where are you going?”

“One more drink?” he says.

*   *   *

Once we're perched on bar stools in the musty air of Dick's Bar, where people still smoke cigarettes inside, I start to relax.

“Do you remember the first time we met?” Matthew asks.

“Nipon Beach. My first time paddling out past the break.”

“You were, what, twelve years old?”

“That's right. You took pity on me and gave me pointers,” I say.

“It wasn't pity. Not even close.” Matthew swivels his stool toward me. “I mean, here's this little grommet paddling out all by herself in these peaky, six-foot swells, getting knocked around, falling off her board every time a wave rolls in, attempting the worst duck dives I've ever seen in my life. I thought, oh man, this girl is going to get slammed and one of us is gonna have to rescue her. All the guys were thinking the same thing. They were already making bets on who would tow you in.”

I remember it well. I was young. I had no business attempting the break at Nipon. I swallowed more seawater than a right whale feeding on krill. “Are you hoping to get lucky tonight with all this flattery?”

“Is it working?”

I smile. “Dredging up memories of what a cocky little misfit I was is not going to get you laid.”

“I'm not finished,” he says.

“Please. Let the humiliation continue.”

Matthew smiles. “You made it past the break. Then you caught this wave, right on the shoulder, perfect drop, down the line. There was no hesitation in you. No backing down. You were all-in. Absolutely fearless. You carved a perfect bottom turn, and spun right off the lip. I couldn't believe it. Then, you turn around, paddle back out, and do it again and again and again. I didn't even bother riding any waves that day. All I could do was watch you go. I thought, Wow, this kid knows the secret to life.”

I smile. “I remember being scared shitless when I got out the back that day.”

“That's not what I saw,” he says. “Back then, surfing was my escape. When things got really bad at home, I'd disappear all day in the waves. I'd skip school and surf so I didn't have to explain to the teachers why none of my paperwork was signed by my mom.”

“That blows.”

“It did. I surfed to get away. The other guys surfed to prove themselves. But you were different. You weren't running away. And you didn't care who you impressed. You were running
toward
something. I was in complete awe of you.”

I nearly lose my breath. No one's ever spoken to me like that before. “So you were checking me out when I was twelve years old?” I punch him in the arm. “That's really pervy of you. Sheriff would arrest you.”

Matthew's cheeks get red. “It wasn't like that. Not 'til much later.”

“What's it like now?” I'm feeling warmed by all the drinks.

“I like you, Jess. I always have.” He clears his throat. “I look at you and I see this wildness in you. You never think about the next wave, or the one after that. You go for whatever wave you're on. I love that about you. I loved it about you then, and I love it about you now.” Matthew's eyes sparkle this time when he looks at me.

“All-in,” I say.

“Exactly.”

God he's sexy. I lean toward him until we're touching, and I can feel the warmth of his breath.

“Why did you wait so long to tell me?” I ask.

“I've been waiting for you to be ready. When I saw you at Kay's funeral, I saw how you were. How sad. I was sad for you. I was sad for myself. The world can't afford to lose something as rare as a badass surfer chick.”

The knots in my stomach have turned to butterflies and have flown off. I lean in and kiss him. Right in the middle of the bar. And he kisses me back, a kiss as deep as the ocean.

 

E
IGHTEEN

The kiss keeps running through my mind all day. The tenderness in his lips, his strong hands, the taste of cherry-flavored ChapStick. The way he stood at my door and we kissed again before saying good night. I play it over and over as I'm frying up burgers and cleaning gum from underneath tables. I think about it while I'm emptying the grease traps and as we pull into Buster's Wharf in the lazy afternoon, where seals sun themselves on slick black rocks. Captain Ben is at the wheel because Matthew has to do repairs on the
Mack King
.

Is he thinking about me right now like I'm thinking about him?

I keep wondering about Ne'Hwas, too. What kind of life did she carve out for herself? Did she make it to the ocean, or did she stay in the river forever, safe from sharks?

Was she lonely?

After work, I start walking home down the pier, the air thick with ocean, my head full of things I have to do before I leave this human world. I'll have to tell Sheriff where I'm going. Write my mom a letter. Let Sammy know.

And Matthew. I will tell him good-bye.

Instead, I find myself window-shopping along Spinnaker Street, stealing glimpses of the harbor between buildings. I notice the beauty in everything. The wisteria-covered trellises, the antique onion lights, the cobblestone paths built before the first car ever came to the island. A pot filled with marigolds fills me with a sense of wonder.

Even the kitsch shops that sell driftwood lamps and river rock tables seem charming. I peek in the windows of the haberdashery, the silversmith, the marine salvage shop. I study the selection of bleached corals, starfish, and conch shells in Capt. Steve's Shell Shop, none of which come from local waters.

At a shop called Chez Eloise, headless mannequins show off delicate lingerie. Lace bras, teddies, camisoles.

Things other women wear.

I walk in.

The salesclerk, a well-dressed woman in her fifties whose bright red nail polish matches her lipstick, is immediately at my side. I'm vaguely aware that I smell like fish and Lysol.