Real Mermaids Don't Sell Seashells

by Helene Boudreau

  I said good-bye to my dolphin friends and swam to the far end of the wharf, hidden from view, so I could watch what was going on without being seen while my tail transformed back to legs. I took a few deep breaths of air and tried not to cough as it burned down my throat. Music played from inside the restaurant, but there was still no sign of Officer Ensel.

  Soon, my tail started to burn with its own heat, and I knew that it was only a matter of minutes before it started dissolving into legs. My eyes stung with tears as I forced myself not to cry out in pain, but the more I forced the pain away, the more it kept coming. I could barely keep from screaming when I saw him.

  Carl Ensel.

  He’d stripped down to his boxer shorts and was climbing down the ladder near the hook. At first I don’t think he saw the bag, but soon he spotted it and climbed a bit farther down into the water to try and reach it. Thankfully, my legs had fully formed by then and my fancy knot handiwork gave me a few extra minutes to get myself out of the water to check and see if the police had arrived yet.

  The coast was still clear, so I hobbled barefoot toward where Officer Ensel was retrieving the backpack, keeping close to a small shed near the water’s edge and out of sight. The patio of Señor Frog’s was on the other side of the shed so the customers couldn’t see me, but still, I didn’t want to have to explain why a fourteen-year-old girl was walking around barefoot in a dripping-wet sundress in the middle of the night.

  “Oof.” I almost tripped on Ensel’s clothes as I sneaked around the shed. When I realized what they were, a smile grew on my lips. I picked up the clothes and bundled them in my arms. When I heard a jingle, I realized it must be Ensel’s keys! I slipped those into the pocket of my sundress for safe keeping.

  I could hear Officer Ensel cursing as he kept trying to untie the backpack, so I took the time to plot what to do with his clothes and smiled at the thought of him stuck in his boxers.

  But where were the police? I wondered. I tried Mr. Martin’s phone from my backpack, but it was fried. I checked the pockets of Ensel’s pants for a phone. Nothing. Maybe he’d left it in his car, but I had no idea what his car looked like. I could only hope that Cori and Trey got the message to the police and they arrived in time to catch Officer Ensel red-handed.

  “Got it,” I heard Ensel whisper to himself.

  Ensel’s head popped up over the pier as he climbed the ladder and struggled with the water-logged backpack. I looked all around me, trying to see if the police had arrived yet, but I couldn’t see anyone. I slipped behind the shed, watching Ensel as he hunted around for his clothes. After a few minutes, he gave up and started to leave. He probably wouldn’t get very far without his keys, but I couldn’t take the chance that he would escape with the evidence.

  “Yoo-hoo!” I called out from behind the shed as I dangled his pants in the air. “Looking for these?”

  Ensel looked my way. The nearby streetlamp was enough to show the shocked look on his face.

  “Where did you get those? Give those back, you little brat!” He started toward me, but I threw the pants at him to slow him down. He picked them up and put them on hastily, giving me enough time to run back a few dozen feet, closer to the stalls of the Straw Market. I slipped into the maze of stalls, trying to hide as Ensel approached. I could hear him on the other side of the stalls’ canvas walls, cursing as he walked along the uneven gravel.

  “You’re that girl who was with Dillon on Monday, aren’t you?” Ensel called out. “Good thing he made it back home okay, isn’t it?”

  His words rang with a false note, like an actor trying too hard to convince you of his part.

  I waited until he’d passed the booth where I was hiding before answering. “We both know Dillon didn’t make it home.”

  There was silence on the other side of the canvas for a moment, and then his voice pierced the dark night.

  “It would be a real shame if you didn’t make it home either,” Ensel replied.

  A chill ran through me.

  I backtracked along the stalls in the opposite direction, knowing there was an opening where I’d popped out to see Dillon’s shells back on Monday. I hung on to Ensel’s shirt and shoes and tried my best not to trip. I peered around the corner of the canvas to catch a glimpse of him and saw that he was about thirty feet away, pulling back the canvas of the stalls to look inside. Now that he knew that I knew he had something to do with Dillon’s disappearance, there was no way he was leaving without getting the whole story.

  “I know about your pal over at Wonderment Cruiselines too, you jerk!” I yelled, throwing a shoe out into the water to confuse him. Ensel spun around, trying to make out the source of the splash as I ducked back into the stalls and cut across to the opening on the other side of the tent. I checked to see if the cops had arrived yet, but there were still no flashing lights to be seen. I doubled back, dashing down the side of the tent toward Señor Frog’s, hoping to buy a little more time.

  “I’m clean.” Officer Ensel’s sinister voice rang through the air. I couldn’t tell where it was coming from because it was so dark, but he was close. Very close. “Nobody can pin anything on me about that kid. Now give me my keys!”

  “Ahh!” I yelled as Ensel jumped out from behind the canvas tent and lunged toward me. I threw his shirt over his head to distract him then made a break for it. That’s when a set of headlights whizzed toward me and screeched to a stop in front of the Straw Market.

  “Faye!” I recognized the taxi van right away. She jumped out and ran after Ensel, brandishing her handbag.

  “Yeah, you better run, Carl Jr.!” she yelled at him as Ensel ran off, toting the backpack on his shoulder. “Wait till I tell your mama what you been up to, terrorizing little girls! You should be ashamed of yourself.”

  The flashing lights of a police cruiser came from the other direction and screeched to a stop in front of Señor Frog’s, trapping Ensel against the outdoor patio as Faye hurled insults and swung her handbag at him from the other direction. Two police officers jumped out of their cruiser, and soon Ensel was on his knees with the backpack on the ground and his hands over his head.

  I clutched Ensel’s other shoe to my chest as everyone else piled out of Faye’s van. There were Mom and Dad, the Martins, the Blakes, and Cori, Trey, and Luke.

  “Oh my gosh,” I said, trying to keep from shaking as they huddled around me to see if I was okay. I wasn’t sure if it was because I was still drying off from being wet or because of what had just happened, but I welcomed the sweater Dad draped around my shoulders just as the police slapped handcuffs on Ensel and read him his rights.

  “I’m guessing your hair isn’t wet because you forgot to dry it after your shower,” Dad said.

  “Yeah, about that…” I began.

  “Cori, Luke, and Trey explained everything,” Mom said.

  “So you’re not mad?” I asked.

  “Oh, I’m plenty mad,” Dad replied. “But first, are you okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m okay,” I said.

  I guess that gave him license to go off on me because I listened for a full five minutes to his rant about how we’d come to the Bahamas to relax, not to get drawn into another mer fiasco, and how could I worry my mother like that and did I know there are sharks off the coast of Paradise Island?

  “Thanks for the reminder, Dad,” I muttered, with the memory of my good buddy shark-a-doodle dancing in my head. But, I didn’t think it was the right time to bring that up. Maybe another time. Another lifetime!

  “The point is, you have no idea what’s underwater here in the Bahamas! Are you crazy, swimming around here like that?”

  “It was for a good cause,” I said hopefully, pointing to the police cruiser. “Look, we caught the bad guy.”

  Just then, Faye arrived, still brandishing her handbag at Ensel as the police shut the cruiser’s back door on him.

 
Mom gave Dad a warning look to get him to shush, so we didn’t spill our mer secret to Faye.

  “We’ll talk about this later,” Dad muttered.

  “The absolute nerve of that man,” Faye said when she finally calmed down after the police cruiser drove away. “First he helps kidnap poor Dillon. Then Cori tells me he takes Jade here on a wild boat ride around the harbor.”

  Ah, so that’s the story Cori made up. Good girl.

  “Did he hurt you?” Faye asked.

  “No, I’m fine,” I assured her.

  “Well, let’s get everyone home,” Faye said as she headed for the van. “I hear tomorrow’s the big day and everyone needs their beauty sleep.”

  “It has been a long day,” Mom said as she held the door of the van for me to climb inside.

  “No joke,” I replied, collapsing into the seat next to Luke. He put his arm around me (very good sign!) while Dad gave him the evil eye.

  “Not now, Dad,” I said, resting my head on Luke’s shoulder and fighting to keep my eyes open after a fun-filled evening of dragging my tail along the Bahamian coastline.

  The last thing I remembered about that night was a big green frog in a sombrero waving to us as we pulled away.

  “Five dollars each. Three for fifteen!” I called out from Dillon’s colorful blanket, surrounded by white and coral conches. The warm Caribbean sun made the shells sparkle, and a brisk wind carried the salty scent of the ocean from the harbor.

  Rayelle’s mom had gotten Raymond to tow Dillon’s boat back to the Straw Market with his water taxi. She’d set up the blanket with his shells next to her booth, and Rayelle, Cori, and I spent Saturday morning manning Dillon’s Treasures while Dillon was being kept at the hospital for observation.

  “Dillon should really think about adjusting his sale prices,” Cori joked after she finished packing up a conch for a middle-aged couple with matching fanny packs.

  “I dunno,” I replied, picking up one of the conches and admiring the pearly interior of the shell. “You know what they say—you get what you pay for, and these are pretty awesome.”

  Looking at the conches just added to the happy feeling of knowing Baldie and Ensel were safely behind bars, Eddie and Bobbie had a plan to sail back to Florida with Henry, and Mom and Dad were (hopefully) getting married that night.

  “So,” Rayelle said, looking up from a message on her phone. She’d been texting with Dillon all morning while he waited for the doctor to release him from the hospital. “Word on the street is that Ensel’s backpack was filled with cold medicine.”

  “Cold medicine? Is it flu season in the Bahamas or something?” I asked.

  “No,” Rayelle said. “They use the chemicals in the medicine to make a dangerous kind of street drug called Grip.”

  “Wow, can you believe all this?” I said to Cori. Sure, it was only shrink-wrapped, waterproof cold medicine when I dragged the backpack across Nassau Harbor, but I shuddered at the thought of how dangerous the cargo could be once the drug dealers got hold of it and transformed it into something much more potent.

  “Unbelievable. And scary.” Cori said.

  “Oh my gosh.” Rayelle put a hand to her mouth as she continued reading Dillon’s message.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Dillon had told me Charla and her friends were bad news, but I had no idea this was all going on. Look!”

  Dillon admitted to Rayelle that he had worked as a messenger for the group of kids who sold necklaces at the Straw Market. The same group who gave us a hard time earlier that week. Only, the necklaces were just a cover-up for dealing Grip.

  “Now I know how that girl could afford such expensive accessories!” Cori exclaimed as we kept reading Dillon’s text over Rayelle’s shoulder.

  “He says he stopped being the gang’s messenger once he figured out what they were really up to. He even helped Kiki’s boyfriend, John, get clean when John almost lost his job at Dolphin Lagoon for being high. But Dillon had no idea Ensel was behind it all,” Rayelle continued as she texted a message back to Dillon.

  “That Ensel guy was a real jerk, huh?” I said.

  “Not exactly in the running for Cop of the Month,” Cori agreed.

  “So…” I said to Rayelle. “Your mom seems to have had a change of heart about Dillon.”

  I stole a glance at her mom as she worked on a straw hat. She caught my eye and smiled.

  “Yeah,” Rayelle whispered, looking up from her phone. “I told her about how Dillon helped me last year. She’s kind of coming around.”

  “So are you guys going to start dating or something?” I asked, trying to get the dirt.

  “I’m not sure,” Rayelle said shyly. “We’ll see.”

  “Well, he’d be crazy not to ask you out,” Cori said.

  I looked at Cori and laughed. “I thought you were on the brink of giving up on guys for good.”

  “What can I say—I’m a hopeless romantic at heart,” Cori said.

  We hung out for another hour or so and sold a few more shells, but all too soon it was time to head back to the hotel so we could get ready for the big night.

  “Okay, so we’ve sold ten of Dillon’s shells and there are six left,” Rayelle said, counting up the money. “It won’t make up for missing a whole week of sales, but hopefully it helps.”

  “Thank you, honey,” Rayelle’s mom said with a grateful smile as she tucked the money into an outside pocket of her money belt. “I’ll be sure he gets it.”

  “So what do we do with the rest of these?” Cori said, motioning to the shells. “Should we put them back on his boat?”

  “Well, I can either buy that ‘It’s Better in the Bahamas’ T-shirt I saw earlier or clean out Dillon’s stock for tonight’s festivities.” I pulled out my wallet and counted thirty dollars to put with the rest of the money for Dillon.

  “Good choice,” Rayelle said as she helped us pack up the rest of the shells and take them to the water taxi.

  Raymond was waiting for us at the dock. He took the bag from Rayelle as we stepped into the taxi boat, and all of a sudden a wave of sadness washed over me, knowing I would be leaving the Bahamas in the morning and heading back to Port Toulouse. What would be waiting for me when I arrived back home? Rumors? Whispers? Sidelong glances?

  And what was I leaving behind? Sun and surf? But more than that. New friends. Great friends. Faye. Dillon. And Rayelle.

  “Hey, Rayelle,” I said as I stepped into the water taxi. “My mom and dad are having their wedding party tonight. Why don’t you come with your grandma? Bring Dillon too if he gets out of the hospital in time.”

  “Wouldn’t miss it,” Rayelle said with a wave and a beaming smile as the taxi pulled away from the pier.

  •••

  “What a crazy week,” I said, flopping onto my bed once Cori and I got back from the Straw Market. “I thought the Mermish Council thing this summer was whacked, but this week could have ended really badly. Especially for Dillon.”

  “I’m really sorry I gave you such a hard time about the whole Dillon thing,” Cori said. “Count that as a total fail for me in the friend department.”

  “Hey, you’re still staying here with me at the Asylum while your mom and dad are living it up at the Eutopia. If that doesn’t prove your friendship, I’m not sure what does,” I joked.

  “Yeah, but you knew something was wrong, and I kept trying to blow it off.”

  “Well, to be fair, I thought I was going a little crazy too,” I replied.

  “But I made it seem like you were being paranoid because of everything you’ve been through this summer when it was the opposite,” Cori added. “You, my friend, have excellent merma-drama radar.”

  “Merma-drama radar?” I asked with a laugh.

  “Built-in radar for mermaid drama. It’s your superpower,” Cori said.

&n
bsp; “Maybe I should get that on a T-shirt,” I joked.

  “Well, actually…” Cori got a sly look on her face and pulled something out of her bag. “It’s not the same but I hope you like it. Just a little something to thank you for such an awesome week.”

  It was a neon blue T-shirt with white lettering that said Mermaid Hair, Just Don’t Care. And just my size!

  “I love it!” I said, pulling it on over my tank top. “But you realize I won’t be able to set foot outside in this thing, right?”

  Cori laughed. “I wouldn’t set foot outside in that thing either, but mostly because it doesn’t match anything I own.”

  Luke and Trey arrived just then. Things had been so crazy, I wasn’t sure where the Cori-Trey thing stood after their squabble the night before. And if the Cori-Trey thing was weird, would that make things weird for the Jade-Luke thing?

  “Hey,” I said as I answered the door.

  “We have arrived!” Trey exclaimed, diving onto my bed to grab the TV remote. Soon, Flunky and Blob cartoons were blaring in the background.

  “Nice shirt!” Luke said as he sat beside his brother. “So, you guys all ready for the big day?”

  “I think so,” I said, going to Mom and Dad’s door. “I should check if my parents need anything.”

  “If they can hear you knock over the sound of the TV.” Cori rolled her eyes at Trey as she went into the bathroom to brush her teeth.

  So, the Cori-Trey thing wasn’t quite back online apparently.

  Dad answered the door.

  “Hey, Jade,” Dad said as he popped his head in through the doorway. When he spotted Luke and Trey, his face took on a four-star general look and his voice dipped an octave. “Hello, boys.”