The Summer of Chasing Mermaids

by Sarah Ockler

  In the real world, I thought, your parents shouldn’t hang you out to dry.

  My heart squeezed. I missed my dad. Granna.

  Christian, head in hands, tugged at his hair. I couldn’t see his eyes, but his anger was obvious. Still, despite the few barbs he’d launched, I suspected he wouldn’t erupt. It was just like the night of the bet; his father was wrong, but no matter how hard the man pushed, no matter how infuriating his words, Christian wouldn’t unleash his anger.

  A shiver rolled through me.

  I wasn’t physically afraid of Mr. Kane. He didn’t seem like the kind of father who’d smack his kids around, or put his fist through a wall, or even raise his voice above the stern tone he’d always used in my presence. But in him was a deep well of bitterness, the kind that could swirl and tug and yank you under before you even realized you’d ­gotten your feet wet. I scooted my chair closer to the table, reached across for the syrup.

  Next to me, Christian seethed.

  “It is, after all, the Pirate Regatta,” Mr. Kane said, looking pointedly at us both. “If you’re insisting on racing, time to pirate up, kids.”

  At that Christian tossed his napkin onto the plate and rose calmly, letting me know he’d be ready to head out to the Vega in a few. He thanked his father for the waffles as though it had been uneventful, just another morning at the Kane house.

  Maybe it had been.

  I trembled with anger for Christian, but I stayed put, eyes on the coffee that had since chilled in my mug.

  Sebastian finished clearing the table, and when he returned, he stood next to his father, tapped his shoulder. “I have an idea. Let’s just keep the house forever. When you die, me and Christian will take care of it. And then our kids and their kids and—”

  “Why don’t you leave that for the grown-ups to take care of?” Mr. Kane said. He offered a belated smile, but even Sebastian could tell it was insincere.

  Sebastian sighed. “All the grown-ups do is fight about it.”

  “Clear Elyse’s plate—she’s finished eating. Then you can go with them to the boat,” he said. “Mom and I have some things to discuss today.”

  “I know, but—”

  “Sebastian,” his father said sternly. “It’s not a suggestion.”

  Sebastian’s shoulders sank, but he did what he was told, picked up my plate and silverware and disappeared into the kitchen without another protest. Sadness emanated from the space he’d just vacated. My eyes blurred as my gaze drifted back to his father.

  “More coffee, Elyse?” Mr. Kane held up the carafe, his fake smile as bright as the sky was gray.

  I passed him my mug for a warm-up.

  He topped it off.

  I gave a tiny smile of thanks, even though I didn’t really want more coffee.

  Behind its protective seashell, the starfish scar on my throat burned.

  There were lots of ways to lose your voice.

  Chapter 15

  In the stainless-steel kitchen of the main house of d’Abreau Cocoa Estates, Granna sat at the counter, a pot of callaloo simmering on the stove behind her.

  I closed my eyes, could just about smell the spicy soup across the miles.

  “If you were home, gyal, you wouldn’t have to imagine how it taste.”

  I smiled at the computer. After yesterday’s tense breakfast with the Kane family, I was just grateful Granna was home to accept my Skype invite this morning, no matter that she was baiting me.

  I’m eating okay here, Granna, I typed. Hot pepper sauce fixes a lot. :-)

  “Too quiet there, though,” she said, narrowing her eyes suspiciously. “I can hear your hair growin’.”

  She was right; in the house it was quiet. Back home our windows were always open. The ocean was a lullaby, an undertone to the constant blare of music, the steel pans from neighboring bands, the chit-chatter of hundreds of birds. Someone was always talking, and when my sisters were visiting, there were never fewer than three simultaneous conversations, all of us dipping in and out of them effortlessly.

  Here in Oregon, though, the ocean was all of it. The melody and the harmony. The bass and the beat. The simultaneous conversation, an endless symphony of hush and roar. I had to close the windows if I wanted to hear my Granna across the miles.

  I messaged: If I open the windows, all you hear is ocean. All day, all night.

  Granna laughed. “Need to tell Lemon to fix up her music collection. Get some soca, a little spice from the islands.”

  I almost told her about Bella Garcia. The song that had infiltrated my nights alone on the beach again, got me back to dancing. Since that first time, I’d been out twice more. Never for as long as that first night, never as passionate. But I was moving again, mouthing along with the words. Workin’ my way back, as the song went.

  The dancing was a small thing though, just for me, and I knew she’d read too much into it.

  Lemon has wind chimes, I typed. And fairy music. Those fairies know how to party, Granna.

  Granna swatted at me with a laugh. She got up to stir the callaloo, humming as she did. “So,” she said, sighing when she settled back into her chair. “What about a regatta? You sailing again, gyal?”

  I nodded quickly, as if it weren’t half the big deal she was making it. I typed her a message about the race, how Christian and I had to patch up the boat first.

  Lemon had already told her about the bet, but I wondered if Granna would ask about Christian. Tell me ’bout dis boy, den, she’d say, and I’d smile and deny it, no matter that he was quickly becoming the last thing I thought about as I drifted off to sleep, the first when I woke. When it came to boys, my older sisters had always warned Natalie and me to never reveal too much to Granna.

  Somehow she figured it out anyway.

  But when her words came now, it was as if Christian was the least significant part of the story.

  “Sailing again. This mean you coming home soon?” She fixed me with her patented no-bull Granna stare, and all I could do was squirm beneath it. “Not the same here without you.”

  I tried to smile, to throw her off the trail, but like all the boys that had crossed our paths, sadness was not something I could hide from Granna.

  “You can’t go on like this,” she said, and the lightheartedness that opened our conversation was officially gone.

  I sucked my teeth at her, the only sound I could still make. Especially thousands of miles away, where she couldn’t smack me for it.

  “Don’t you give me that steups,” she scolded. “It is a tragedy, yes. But it is what fate decide for you, Elyse. Don’t throw away your life and your family for this grief. Let it go.”

  I don’t know how, I typed.

  “Call your sister. Text her. Skype her. Send her a note.”

  I shook my head rapidly. Reflex, self-defense, denial . . . Call it what you will, but Natalie was the very last thing I wanted to discuss with Granna.

  She banged her fist on the counter. “You know what the gyal say to me, Elyse? Just yesterday. She say, ‘Oh, Granna, it’s like half my soul missing.’”

  She couldn’t have made me feel worse if she’d tried. I knew Granna wasn’t guilting me on purpose—it broke her to see our family in tatters, to explain the family rift to neighbors and resort staff, to make excuses with my older sisters about why I ignored their calls and e-mails, to know that the once-unbreakable connection between her twin granddaughters had shattered—but it still felt like a knife twisting in my side.

  I knew I was a bad sister, a bad friend.

  Jealous, spiteful. Selfish, awful.

  Wouldn’t forgive, couldn’t forget.

  Broken heart, everything black and sticky inside.

  But how could I pretend to be anything else, anything other than utterly wrecked and ruined?

  Sorry, I typed. I left it there; th
ere were just too many things that word could cover.

  Granna frowned. “She got some good news, wanted to tell you about it. The lady, Bella Garcia?”

  My heart jumped; blood rushed to my head. After the accident Bella had tried to get in touch, had sent cards and flowers. But we all knew there was nothing she could do—it’s not like we had a close personal relationship, and no amount of sympathy would bring my voice back. I hadn’t heard from her since I came to the States.

  “She call Natalie, say she has another chance to go on singing. She wants your sister to take lessons in Trinidad, an exclusive place Bella knows there. They only take referrals, so Bella offered one.”

  Another chance to go on singing.

  Another chance, as if she’d lost her voice that night too. Her future. Her dreams. But for Natalie it was only a temporary setback, something that could be fixed with lessons at an exclusive place.

  Granna’s eyes softened, along with her voice. “She miss you, Elyse. She just miss you real bad.”

  My fingers hovered over the keys, the letters that spelled out the response in my heart:

  Right.

  She miss me so much, I hear her news only from you.

  She miss me so much, she never asked for my new phone number.

  She miss me so much, she forgot.

  Forgot that just because I have no voice, doesn’t mean I don’t want to hear hers.

  Forgot us, all the ways we used to be, all the things we shared.

  Forgot a thousand summer days,

  a hundred promises sealed with

  a million tears and

  two fragile dream bubbles, so afraid anything louder than

  a single whisper would break them.

  Forgot all of our hopes and plans.

  Forgot how they’d been altered in one moment, one wrong move, a bad choice.

  Forgot that sometimes a tarnished life was worse than a swift death.

  And that after, all the dreams once singular and shared had to be divided.

  One side for her.

  One side for Death.

  Nothing left for her twin heart.

  Yeah, Granna. She miss me that much.

  My fingers stilled, scared and stiff over the keys. Across the ­invisible distance, Granna frowned again, though I couldn’t bring myself to actually type any of those words.

  How’s Dad? I typed instead. He didn’t trust the Internet, was certain it was a tool for spies and thieves, and since I couldn’t talk on the phone, our communications had been relegated to postcards. He’d sent two each week, without fail, but after the first few I couldn’t bring myself to read them. He never played the guilt-trip game—went instead to the other extreme, pretending all was well, as if I was on some vacation with his dear friend Lemon. He never mentioned my voice, my sister, everything that had happened. Never asked me when I’d be coming back.

  He just assumed I would be.

  Eventually.

  My older sisters were too busy with their own lives to focus on my shortcomings, but Granna and my father—well-meaning as they may have been—made my heart ache.

  “He miss you too,” Granna said. “Everyone miss you. What else can I say?”

  I grabbed the seashell at my throat, twisted and turned.

  “Oh, I see what’s going on, gyal. The devil keeping you company now,” she said, which is what she always said when one of us girls was being stubborn and mean-faced, but this time I wanted to tell her no, it wasn’t the devil. It was Death himself, shadowing me, lying in my bed, whispering against my skin. Death himself, come to remind me of his deal with the sea, and if I turned my back even for an instant, he’d drag me back to the depths to fulfill his end of the bargain.

  In so many ways he already had.

  “The devil with you,” she said again, certain. “You call back when allya done visitin’. But best you send him away quick, Elyse, or he move in with you.”

  I nodded solemnly, eager now to wrap things up. I typed my final words, asked if she’d send over those books for Sebastian and a few pieces of clothing I’d left behind.

  She said she would, but she wasn’t saying good-bye. Instead, she rose from the counter, stirred the soup, and disappeared.

  There was muffled conversation, a spoon clanging to the floor. Granna cursed under her breath. Despite the downshift in my mood, I smiled.

  The screen flickered, darkened, brightened again.

  Suddenly a familiar face smiled back at me.

  A mirror.

  A memory.

  My twin.

  Her eyes glazed with tears, and for an eternity we stared at each other, locked in silence as warring emotions drowned my heart.

  “Elyse?” she whispered, stretching her fingers toward me.

  I slammed the laptop shut, crushed her fingers and erased her face. Her tears. Everything about her that looked exactly like everything about me, save for the silver star in the hollow of my throat.

  The scar that had changed my life.

  The scar that had shattered my dreams.

  The scar that my sister had put there.

  Chapter 16

  “In total defiance of American tradition, they don’t do Fourth of July fireworks here,” Kirby said. “The Cove saves them for the Mermaid Festival. But if we were anywhere else in the States? Fireworks.”

  Why are we going? I asked. After weeks of turning down invitations to hang out with Kirby, Vanessa, and the gang, I’d finally agreed to this one, mostly because Lemon had threatened to make me an herbal-lotion lab rat if I didn’t leave the house tonight.

  Kirby shrugged. “We always go. And I’ve been working my butt off lately, so I need a fun night out. And anyway­”­—she grabbed my sleeve; she could sense I was about to turn back, and she held firm, kicking up her campaign—“there’s a bonfire, with hot dogs and s’mores and sparklers. Sometimes people bring beer. I mean, usually they do.” At my ongoing reluctance she tossed out a final bone, though with markedly less enthusiasm. “Christian and those guys will be there.”

  Noah? I wanted to know. Even in the twilight haze, her face brightened. I smirked and marched ahead, but she ran to catch up, linking our arms.

  “One more thing. Um, Vanessa? I already told her you wouldn’t go for it, but she has this kind of fun but also crazy idea that the three of us should sign up for the—”

  “My girls!” Vanessa bolted for us as soon as she saw us cresting the last dune. Behind her they’d already gotten the bonfire going, a roaring orange blaze that the folks over at Coos Bay could probably see. “Let’s get this party started, y’all.”

  She handed each of us a plastic cup filled with something that smelled like peaches and burning.

  I downed a few gulps, let the alcohol soak in and loosen the tension that had been building steadily since my call with Granna earlier. With Natalie.

  But I knew that no matter how much I drank tonight, no matter how many hours or days passed, I wouldn’t be able to erase her image from my mind. Her voice from my ears. Elyse?

  “Elyse? Did Kirbs tell you about my master plan?” Vanessa asked.

  “She’ll say no,” Kirby said.

  “She did?”

  Kirby sighed. “No. But she will. That’s not Elyse’s thing.”

  I looked at Kirby. What’s not?

  Kirby held up her drink. “This? Peach schnapps and fruit punch. Vanessa calls it Texas tea.”

  “We’re talking about the mermaid parade, Kirby,” Vanessa said. “God, you two are, like, I don’t even know.” She grabbed my hand, flashed her impossible-to-ignore smile. “Before you say no, we’d all be doin’ it together, and we’d look smokin’ hot and it would basically be the most fun.”

  It was hard not to get caught up in Vanessa’s current. I offered a guarded smile.
<
br />   “Mermaid parade,” she said. “Tell her, Kirbs.”

  “Fine.” Kirby was ready with the full-on talking brochure. “It’s all part of the festival,” she said. “Friday night is the fellowship walk ’n’ feast, where everyone sets up food and drink stations outside their doors, and people just walk around stuffing themselves silly.”

  “And fellowshippin’,” Vanessa said. “Being neighborly and whatnot.”

  “Exactly,” Kirby said. “And drinking, too. Hence the walking thing.”

  “Stumblin’, more like,” Vanessa said.

  “Saturday is the big day. Arts-and-crafts festival, sea glass competition, parade, and then the regatta.” Kirby paused for a sip of Texas tea, then went on. “After all that, there’s a closing party at the Black Pearl for anyone left standing. That’s when they do the fireworks, right off the back docks. The parade is awesome—totally campy, but super fun. We all compete for the mermaid queen crown, but unlike the regatta, our stuff is really good-natured.”

  Vanessa laughed. “Damn, girl. You should work for the chamber a’ commerce.”

  “I would if we had one. Anyway,” Kirby said, “the parade is usually over by ten, ten-thirty, rain or shine. And the boats sail at noon. You could get there on time. I mean, if you were thinking about it. Which I totally understand if you’re not. But if you were, and you don’t mind sailing in your mermaid gear, you could swing it.”

  Gear? I mouthed.

  “Costumes and accessories,” Vanessa said. “I don’t think there’s a girl in town who doesn’t march. Local or not. It’s, like, the thing to do. People start planning months in advance, but I don’t need that kind of lead time—give me sequins and a glue gun, and I’ll Project Runway us a whole school a’ mermaids.” She looked at Kirby, her eyes fuzzy. “Are they called schools? Or gaggles?”

  This sent the two of them into a giggling fit. If I wanted to last the night, I needed to catch up. I finished my drink and grabbed Kirby’s, downed the rest.

  The mermaid parade sounded a little like Carnival back home. Playing mas, we called it—masquerading. Soon as one Carnival season passed, we were already thinking about the next, planning our costumes, mapping out the best parties and fêtes, scheming ways to stay out all night and hit them all.