by Aurora Smith
“What’s happening now?” Liam asked us.
“At the beginning of every camp year Tortellini takes us hiking up a big mountain with an amazing waterfall in it.” Christina answered him. I fought to not glare at her as my mouth was half open ready to answer him.
“And why is this bad?”
“Because,” I said quickly before Christina could say anything. “It’s a few hour hike.”
“And you don’t like hiking?” Liam asked.
“Well…” What should I say? Did I like hiking? Not particularly but I wanted to impress him. Why did I want to impress him?
Ugh. I had the worst destiny in the world; getting goo-goo eyed over every Tom, Dick and Harry that I gave a nightmare to.
***
Yes we had to go on the hike and it was particularly unpleasant, but it was mostly my stewing mind that was sweating rather than my actual body. The hike was twelve miles long, and I knew this because of the horrible markers that were put up by the unkind forest rangers. It got longer each year too. Which wasn’t geographically possible, but I swear there was a hex on the mountain, placed by ancient witches for the purpose of torturing young, impressionable whippersnappers like us.
I had spent the last several hours arguing with myself about whether or not I was going to be going along with this whole dream-walking thing. I had been in Liam’s mind for about two minutes last night and today I was feeling a connection with him that I didn’t like. For the first time in a year I no longer wanted to talk to or see Justin, but to be fair that happened when he started being a little sissy and throwing his temper around like he wears lady pants.
Liam was walking at the head of the group; I don’t think he meant to be our leader though. So far he had shown that he didn’t want to be seen much, as the oozing boils on his once invisible hand would prove. I think he was just up there because he was in better shape than everyone else. Justin looked like he was meaningfully keeping his distance from his brother, residing with his gaggle of new friends. The look of eager protectiveness had been clean wiped away. How had he gone from guardian, to bragger, to angry, to completely ignoring in that short amount of time? There was a piece of this puzzle that I was missing, or rather the entire middle and I was fighting with myself on whether or not I wanted to piece them together by invading Liam’s dreams. Too much thinking…this was supposed to be fun!
We rounded the last mile marker, all of us dragging our feet now and hiking up our backpacks that had our swimsuits, towels and sunscreen in them. Liam hadn’t brought anything, but I didn’t expect him to be baring any skin to anyone anytime soon so I wasn’t surprised. Cupid didn’t even give him any grief.
Then there it was. The most beautiful sight at camp and the only reason no one really flat out refused to go on the hike. The smell of churning water and wet grass filled everyone’s lungs as we simultaneously breathed in. The roaring of the waterfall was loud and sounded like chiming summer memories and fun.
Randy, whom I’d hardly seen since we got to camp, Vanessa, Christina, Dominic and I sat down under a big tree that provided the perfect amount of shade and was close to the water. Christina and Dominic started talking once they sat, Christina furiously blushing from the attention. I tried to ignore the jealous feeling once again. Yes, she always got the attention from boys and I should have been used to it by now. And I was, but it didn’t make me feel any less skinny and awkward. And purple haired. I really kind of hated my purple hair. I needed to write my mom and have her send me some black hair dye, if that went wrong it would at least go to brown, which was a perfectly acceptable color for anyone to have.
While we sat down and got comfortable most everyone else didn’t waste any time to get into the water. The beautiful people all got into their two piece suits and walked like runway models to the water, dipping their toes in for the pause effect so everyone could gaze longingly at them. I didn’t understand the whole ‘my thighs are touching’ dilemma that some of these girls had. I would love it if my thighs touched. I tried smashing my legs together but my knees knocked together and I would be standing there like a pigeon toed stick.
“Where’s Abby?” Vanessa asked. We all looked around for our shy mermaid friend, but we couldn’t find her.
“She probably jumped into the water, she looked bad coming up that mountain, pretty sure she has a harder time using her legs than most of us,” Christina said.
I got bored looking for Abby and began searching for Liam instead. He wasn’t hard to spot; the only boy who had a long sleeved shirt and long pants on, on this humid day outing at a waterfall. He was on the other side of the lake, a ways away from Justin, but closer to him than he was too us. He was still scratching his poor hand and was looking down at his shoes.
“Stop.” I heard a familiar voice, but it sounded louder than I was used to. I swivelled my head around, following the commotion until I saw a group of girls, all of them in colorful bathing suits that showcased their greater assets, all by the waterfall, engulfing Abby like a gang.
“Whoa,” I said, standing up and pointing towards the girls. We watched, as if it was slow motion, the girls put their hands on Abby’s shoulders and push her into the water, at the base of the cascading waterfall. I didn’t know what was going on, but I didn’t think that she was in any danger being thrown in the water like that, although it seemed obvious that she didn’t want to go in.
“Is she okay?” Dominic looked worried and stepped towards the girls he knew too well and what they were capable of, which was probably why he looked so worried for Abby.
“She’s fine!” one of the prettier ones yelled back. “She’s a mermaid!”
“What if she hit her head or something?” I said quietly to the group. “There are rocks down there and the water will be pushing her down.” Just then the horde of dreadful girls started laughing as Liam began to run towards the lake and tore his shirt off then dove like an Olympian swimmer into the water. Shocked by the momentary display of wrinkled, burnt skin on top of strong shoulders, tight stomach muscles and a touch of untouched tan skin, I almost forgot about my new friend who hadn’t emerged yet from the water. The girls started laughing even harder but were interrupted by Dracula who swooped down on them.
“Vhat is going on here?” He asked the giggling beauty queens.
“Abby fell in the water, but she’s fine, she’s a mermaid,” a tall fairy said, her long blond hair moving almost magically behind her milky shoulders. She gave the older than dirt vampire a smile that would make the meanest rock giant crumple to his knees.
“Vhy did Frankenstein jump in?”
“I don’t know, because he’s weird,” one of the Stepford wives said.
I waited, my stomach dropping every second that Abby and Liam were under there and wanting to jump in to help. Although I knew I would be little to no help in there. I could offer my amazing dog paddling skills, that’s about it.
Gasping for air Liam came up, holding Abby in his arms who kept her face under the water. They swam over to a rock that was close to us and we all hurried over to them.
“Abby, are you okay?” I asked when her face finally came out from the water and Liam’s bare chest. I tried to focus on my potentially hurt friend and not Liam. And the muscles, but like I said, I was thinking of Abby.
“I’m fine,” she said quietly and dunked her head under again, forcing us to wait till she came back up to talk to her again.
“What’s the big deal?” Blondie asked as she walked by with Dracula at her side.
“Move,” Dracula barked and we moved for him to go over to Liam and Abby.
“Vhere is she?”
“She is right there, I think she is embarrassed,” Liam answered.
“She is a mermaid, is she not?” he asked.
“It looks like it.”
“You did not know zis?”
“I didn’t realize she was a mermaid, I was afraid she was drowning because she hadn’t come up.” Liam was trying to explai
n his actions.
“What’s the big deal?” Christina asked.
“The big deal,” we all turned around to see a girl that I knew as one of the mean mermaids at camp and had led me to believe that Abby might also be the same way, was standing with her arms crossed and her dry legs showing, “is that if you go into water with clothes on then the fins will tear them apart. She will be pantsless when she dries off.” With that the nasty fish lady turned around and walked away in all her nastiness. Liam looked embarrassed as he went under the water and came up again a few moments later with an even more embarrassed looking Abby. She was wrapped tightly in Liam’s protective arms and a real jealousy burned in my chest.
“I have a pair of swim trucks you can wear when we go down this afternoon,” Randy said to Abby who nodded appreciatively.
“So, do we get to see your fin?” Vanessa asked, but Abby looked like she wanted to go down under the water again.
“It’s not very pretty,” she said quietly.
“I doubt that, none of us ever think we are pretty,” Vanessa answered back.
“Yeah…” Abby trailed off and looked around. She got out of the water, her strong arms dragging her body up onto the lake’s beach, bringing with her a long, greenish brown, scaly tail. It didn’t twinkle with the brightly colored scales that I had seen so many times on other mermaids. She looked sadly down at her fishy looking fin and back up at us, her eyes filled with tears as her fat squirrel friend jumped onto her fin and sniffed around it.
Chapter Nine
Abby dried out and did wear Randy’s swim trunks down the mountain. She clutched onto the too large trunks for dear life so that they wouldn’t fall down. That would have been even worse than an ugly fin and a drowning mermaid, which would be like me dying from oxygen overload.
“When should we meet in the forest?” An accent made me jump.
“Tortellini said to go right after the hike, so, how about we change, then meet at the girls’ cabin? Where Dracula found us?”
“Sounds good.” He smiled, his brown eyes looked apologetic. “I’m sorry you have to do this. I will do all of it if you want to just sit and keep me company.”
“I don’t mind.” Oddly, that was true. I was kind of looking forward to getting him alone and possibly picking his peculiar brain. “I see you’ve got your shirt back on.” I elbowed his ribs.
“Yeah, can we not talk about that, I feel ridiculous.”
“Why? You’re the only one who helped her.”
“Because I’m the only one who didn’t know that she could breathe under there.”
“I think it’s great.” My macaw flapped its wings on my head and I ignored it. Ignore it and it will go away my mother always told me. It was a lie.
“It’s a good thing I didn’t take my pants off too.”
I laughed and touched his arm which seemed to surprise him, but it resulted in the first real smile I’d seen him give. His lips were mostly untouched by whatever burned him and I couldn’t help but notice the perfect point that they had; it was what I admired most about Justin but never from this close of a distance.
“How’s your hand?” I asked, trying to not bring attention to my blushing. And the bird. I hated that bird.
“It feels better.” He held it up for me to see and it did look better. At least the boils were settling down, it was still scarred like crazy.
“Were you going to try and make yourself invisible?” I asked then realized it might have been a bit blunt.
“Oui.”
“That means yes, right?”
“Sorry. I forget sometimes which language I am speaking.”
“Justin had said it to me yesterday, I recognized it.” Liam’s face suddenly went from friendly to stone.
“Do you know my brother very well?” Liam asked me, all openness gone.
“No. I mean, I knew of him, he kinda’ stands out.” Stupid, stupid, stupid. I needed to stop talking now.
“I suppose he does,” Liam said quietly, with an underlying tone that I didn’t understand. Anger? Frustration? Maybe jealousy? I wished I could just ask him where those burns came from, and then I wouldn’t have to go into his dreams to find out. “I’ll meet you at the dorms half an hour after we get back.” He said quietly and then walked ahead of me. His bald head gleaming in the sunshine as he walked away from me, his strong shoulders looking sad. I wanted to catch up to him again and ask what was going on in his head but my bird finally settled down when he left. Stupid Mother Nature.
***
Liam did meet me half an hour after we arrived back at camp and we worked in silence. He had given me a glove to wear so that none of the serum got on my fingers. We threw away every single piece of broken glass that we could find and it took several hours of awkward silence and then we parted ways. The bird enjoyed that.
Now I was trying not to fall asleep so that I wouldn’t have to go into Liam’s head and get sucked into whatever fascination was beginning in my mind. It wasn’t working though. My dad was tired of waiting and I could feel him pulling me into his realm. The smell of ground animals and dirty birds faded as my body went hot and I melted into a dream.
I was sitting on my pink flowered bedspread with my dad looking irritated with his arms crossed over his strong torso. It was not fair that my dad had a bigger chest than me.
“Glad that you could join me.”
“You know, I always thought that’s the point of summer camp was so that I could get a little break!”
“It is and I promise you will have no nightmares this summer, but you need to start learning the skills, my love. It has been long enough and I’ve let you get away with it. It’s time.” My dad sounded serious and I knew he was right.
“Can I be honest with you?”
“Always!” My father put his elbows on his knees and leaned forward to look at me and give me his full attention.
“I am worried that I’m going to start having feelings that aren’t real towards Liam Frankenstein. I was in his head for what a second last night and I couldn’t stop thinking about him all day.”
“This is exactly why we need to start doing it now. That is totally normal and the feeling will go away quickly, I promise you that.”
“Okay, if you say so.” I had no reason not to believe that what my father was saying was true. He was the expert and he has been through all of this over 400 years ago with his mother. I had always fought him on this whole nightmare thing, and I did owe it to him to start trying. Or the whole world would be killing themselves or doing really stupid things because no one was ever scared. I would single-handedly bring the entire human race to an end if I didn’t learn how to really scare somebody.
“Alright. So what’s the first thing we’re going to do? I asked, trying to be chipper and have a good attitude about all of this. Plus, there was a huge part of me that wanted to get back into Liam’s mind.
“Well, Liam has been asleep for a few hours. It’s been pretty insignificant, mostly dreams of strange floating things, electricity and his mother,” he said.
“His mother?”
“He dreams about her a lot. She passed away a few years ago and he seems to think about her often.”
“So the more he thinks about someone then he will most likely dream about them?”
“Exactly. Most of the things that I scare you with are things that are already there. I’ve mentioned it before but the way to really understand someone is what scares them the most. And losing her scared him, it still scares him,” he explained. It was all things that I had heard before, but I was listening with new ears this time.
“Do you ever use his mother in dreams?”
“Sometimes. But if that happens he is always the one who brings her out, not me.” He had an undertone of defensiveness in his voice; I would have sounded the same. Bringing someone’s mother into it was usually a low blow. It was like the ‘your mothers so fat’ jokes except times maybe a million.
“What’s he dream
ing right now?” My light blue walls and girly comforter dissolved in front of me and within seconds I was standing in front of a little boy with long blond hair and big pretty brown eyes. I assumed this little boy was Liam at the age of four or five. He was so cute; his little round face was chubby and his beautiful lips were speckled with the sand he was playing in.
“So what do you think you should do right now?” My dad asked me and I looked up at him shocked.
“Nothing! This is just a memory why would I mess with a memory?”
“That’s fair. All nightmares have their own style, if you don’t want to mess with a memory that’s totally fine. Do you want to know what I would do?”
“Not particularly,” I said but I already knew he was going to tell me.
“I would watch, look at what’s important to that little boy.”
“His…sand bucket?”
“This just looks like a little boy playing, but I could suggest something to him.” My father bent down looking like a concerned adult asking a child where his parents were. He got right down to little Liam’s ear and said, “Don’t you have a brother?” Just then a little boy who looked like Liam’s carbon copy, down to his clothes and the way he moved his little head, came running down the hill to his brother.
“Justin!” Liam waved to his brother who came toddling over and sat down next to him in the sand.
“What are you doing?” Justin asked his brother as he picked up a shovel and started scooping.
“They could speak English at that young of an age?” I couldn’t believe it. Where did all these genius people come from? I certainly didn’t get that kind of smarts.
“You’re in his dream, Maya. They’re speaking French but you can understand it because you are thinking and hearing what Liam is thinking and hearing.”