The Mermaid and the Murders

by Rachel Graves

  “Bigger than being a freak of nature that doesn’t age, right?”

  At first I thought his comment was about me, but then I realized otherwise. “Is that what you think about yourself?”

  “I look about eighteen.”

  “Maybe nineteen, maybe twenty, or sixteen.” Every time I said another number, his face got darker.

  “Exactly. The guy that died, Ryan, he’d lived eighteen years, but he’d always been in the right place at the right age. I’m always the wrong age. I’m always repeating things I don’t want to repeat, whether it’s driver’s ed for the fourth time at the fourth school or trying to remember what it felt like the first time a friend died.”

  “Do you remember?”

  He sounded angry enough for me to believe he did.

  “His name was Shane. He got cancer. The whole school did fundraisers for him. He was a pretty good person. Not that it mattered.”

  “Ryan was a pretty good person,” I said, but I caught myself wondering. I turned the car around the track, feeling the wheel glide under my palm. Had Ryan ever done anything really good? Or even really bad? He got me flowers on Valentine’s Day and talked about us going to college together. He talked me into taking my SATs. Was that good or bad?

  “I’m sorry. I’m sure you’re hurting. It sounds like you knew him.”

  “We dated last year. Most of the year, anyway. He saw me from the football field and told his friend how pretty I was.” I smiled to myself and decided that was a good thing he’d done. Ryan was the first person to tell me I was beautiful. Mom didn’t say it. All mermaids were beautiful to her, so why say anything? But Ryan said it a lot.

  “I didn’t realize you were that close. I’m sorry. And you just lost your cousin.”

  Mara. Her face came back to me, her pale hair that looked so much like mine, her green tail. I hadn’t thought about her since I found Ryan, he’d taken her place in my consciousness.

  “They died the same way.”

  “Your cousin was killed like Ryan?”

  I nodded. I had to be careful what I told him, what I said and how I said it. I trusted him, but I wasn’t ready to risk telling him I was a mermaid.

  “Do the police know?”

  I shook my head. “My family wouldn’t report it. It’s not what we do.”

  His eyes grew wide with shock. “So you just buried her? What about justice?”

  “I don’t think it’s something they care about. Not in the way you’re thinking. I mean if they found the person who did it, I think maybe they’d want retribution.” Would they? I didn’t know. If a man had killed Mara and he showed up in their ocean, they would kill him. But it wouldn’t be much different than them killing the men they killed anyway. I mean they probably wouldn’t seduce him and kill him with sex, but they would drag him under the water to drown, cutting him with their tails, or biting him. “Maybe not, though.”

  “I’m amazed at how calm you are.”

  I focused on my driving, trying to parse through too many thoughts in my head. “It’s not something I’ve given a lot of thought to. What I want to ask you about, the serious thing, that I’ve given more thought to.”

  “Right, sorry. Got distracted. What was your question?”

  “I found Heather on the beach on Tuesday. She’d been there since Sunday. She and Ryan were hooking up under the pier. She said a sea monster took him.” My words came out in a rush, like a mouthful of air let go under water. For a second I could picture how they would look: fat silver bubbles racing toward the surface. Instead, my words raced toward Sam. In the silence that followed, I had to stop myself from cringing. “I saw the body. I saw all of them actually. Mara, Tiffany, Ryan. I don’t want to talk about how; I just did.”

  He stayed quiet.

  “I didn’t tell the police, because sea monsters, that’s crazy, right? Except you’re a salt golem and…”

  “And that’s a type of sea monster. Is this why you asked me how I killed people last week?”

  “I was hoping you forgot that.”

  “It’s not the kind of question you forget.”

  “Well, that’s why I asked. Tiffany had her throat cut.” I thought about it for a second. Cut didn’t begin to describe the ragged flesh I’d seen. “More like torn, torn open and I was afraid…” I let my voice go quiet.

  “I don’t like to think about it, but you’re right. We leave a throat pretty torn up.” He looked at his hands for a minute, then when he spoke his voice sounded sad. “I don’t have any way to prove I didn’t do it. If you go to the police about me, I’ll have to run.”

  “I…”

  “Don’t feel guilty. I understand. You’ve known these people all your life and I’ve been here for like two weeks. Not even that.”

  “That’s not what I meant.” I stopped driving to turn to him. I thought about slapping him, a light playful slap, but he might not get that either. “I trust you more than I trust these people. That’s why I’m telling you about finding the bodies. I’m asking you about it because I hope you’ll be able to tell me about sea monsters, dummy.”

  “Oh.” He looked up and grinned. “Oh, okay.”

  “Really?” I rolled my eyes at the ceiling of the car. “Can I go back to driving or are you going to keep being stupid?”

  “Go back to driving, you need the practice. And hey, it wasn’t being stupid. I’ve had to run before.”

  “Well, I’m sorry, but you’re not going to run now. You’re going to help me figure this out. So…sea monsters?”

  “Right. What don’t you know?”

  “Everything? My mom tried to tell me sea stories when I was a little kid, but I never listened to them. I only wanted to hear about real life.”

  “Okay, well there are lots of things we could call a sea monster. What else do you have to go on?”

  “Heather said it had two arms, long yellow arms. She saw hooks in the end of them. Does that help you?”

  “Hooks?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  “Like a fishing hook? A metal hook? That doesn’t make sense. Maybe she saw someone in a suit?”

  “It’s Heather. I don’t think we can rule anything out.”

  Mr. Whosley called us all to go in. I parked while Sam stayed deep in thought. “Well?”

  “I need to look at some books. Want to help me research?”

  I thought about it. Digging through books and hunting down answers was usually the sort of thing I liked, but tonight I wanted to wrap myself in Mother Ocean and never come out. I might even sleep on the sand, far away from detectives and murders. “I’m not really up for it.”

  “But you trust me, right?”

  “I do.” I nodded and half laughed.

  “And you don’t think I did it?”

  “I know you didn’t.” Because if he had done it, if he’d killed Mara, he’d know I was a mermaid. And Sam had never done anything that even hinted he knew the real me.

  Chapter Nine

  The car was quiet as we rode home. I’d planned to run out of the car and dive right into the water, but when I got there, I changed my mind. I’d found Mara at my reef. Maybe the ocean wasn’t the safest place for me. I hated feeling that way, but I couldn’t get in the water after thinking about finding the bodies. Instead of swimming, I went inside and locked every door and window. I put on the security alarm and locked my bedroom door, determined not to think about the world around me.

  I’d always loved school. As a little kid, I packed my book bag and sharpened my pencils with glee. The smell of fresh pencils still ranked as the second-best smell to me. The best smell ever was a new book, the crisp crackle of the spine, the sound the pages made as you turned them. I could escape into any book as a little kid: mystery, fantasy, fiction, anything. As I got older, it got harder for me to believe in books. When you’re a mermaid, when the world thinks you don’t exist, it’s hard to be surprised at the things that happen in books. But non-fiction, things that happen
ed in real life, things I might never see because of my ties to the ocean—that never bored me.

  I went on a history bender in ninth grade. I read nothing but historical fiction novels for months, devouring three or four of them each week. I read about wars in Russia and famine in Ireland, places mermaids in my pod had never been. I read every book in the historical fiction section, then I read history books. When school let out that year, I couldn’t stand the thought of another history book. Instead, I wanted biology. I wanted to know how things worked, where they came from, how people predicted them. There’s weather under the ocean, but no Weather Channel for mermaids. I studied the tides and pollution, things that could change my future home. Then I read about the things I’d never have in that home: elephants and microscopes.

  The dry-lander’s world is huge. For a mermaid, the world is small. We don’t like the cold, and I’d never even heard of a pod farther north than Bermuda. Maybe there are pods in India and off the coast of Africa, but I’ve never met anyone from there, never heard their songs sung. Going hunting with the other mermaids had been fun, but I wasn’t sure what it said about me, the girl who loved learning and books, that I’d been so fascinated by the hunt. I wasn’t sure I even wanted to know. Staying away from it meant things would stay the same, right?

  Except that I knew that wasn’t true. I’d read up on hormones and fertility. It might not work the same as it did for a human, but I couldn’t put it off forever.

  I closed my book and leaned back looking at the ocean. When all this was over, all the murders figured out and the danger passed, what was left for me? Hormones forcing me to hunt, to kill. Could I fight them forever? Did I even want to?

  I put my book away, feeling silly about all the locked doors. Maybe Mara had been surprised, and maybe there was a giant sea monster out there; but the odds were much higher that I would end up killing someone before I got killed. Killing lots of someones. I didn’t have to hide to be safe. I only needed to swim.

  I walked to the beach and stripped down. I didn’t pause and I didn’t wait until I was hidden in the water to take off my top. My cousins had made me bold. My usual twenty minutes of checking, double checking, and triple checking that no one would see me didn’t happen. Instead, I swam out to the tide and let myself drift. I’d learned the sailor song yesterday, learned that the tones of the crab song aggravated humans. What else did Mother Ocean have to teach me?

  I closed my eyes and felt the rhythm of the tide move my body. It would carry me out to Grandma’s, carry me to my mother, or carry me back home. Tides were tricky that way. I didn’t know which one I wanted.

  “Danika?”

  My eyes popped open. “Rose!” I didn’t want to sound so surprised so I tried again. “I’ve never seen you out here.”

  “We don’t usually come this way. You live here though, don’t you?”

  I nodded. I wasn’t too far from home yet.

  “I wanted to talk to you, alone.”

  “About what?” I couldn’t imagine what she wanted from me. She looked strong and confident, hanging in the water with her pretty red tail wrapped up under her.

  “I want to see things, go places, meet another pod. Celeste and I don’t always get along.”

  “I don’t know any other mermaids.”

  “Yeah, I didn’t think you did, but you know directions. So is there a way that I could get to another pod without asking everyone? Because I don’t want the whole world to know I’m thinking about leaving.”

  “If we knew where another pod was, sure. I mean, you couldn’t use a GPS, but maybe with a map or…”

  “There’s one by Key Largo, and one off Key West. There’s a small one starting by Duck Key. And I heard about a big one by Jamaica.”

  “How big do pods get?” I hated admitting my ignorance, but Rose didn’t seem to notice.

  “Anything bigger than two hundred and they break off to start a new group. That’s what’s happening at Duck Key.”

  “So you’ll go there?”

  “Sure. Unless I’m pregnant. Then I’d have to stay. It’s no good trying to see the ocean when you can’t fish for food and you have a baby to feed. But if not, Duck Key.” She seemed to have it all planned out.

  “Okay, what do you need me for?”

  “Where’s Duck Key?”

  “Oh. It’s south of here, well south and west.”

  Her frustration with my vague directions showed on her face.

  “Why don’t you come up with me and I’ll get a map, with coordinates and…do you know how to use a compass?” I asked.

  “I don’t know what a compass is.”

  “Swim back with me. I’ll show you.”

  “Wait. Have you eaten?”

  “A little. Why?”

  “I don’t want to be in your debt. I’ll catch your dinner.”

  “Fish isn’t the same as knowledge.”

  “Fine. Name something else.”

  “Tell me about hunting. Tell me everything about hunting.”

  We talked while we swam back, Rose telling me everything she knew. It was a lot. I felt impressed and a little scared at the same time. Mermaids were killers—very good ones. But the more Rose told me, the more I thought maybe we didn’t have to be. With the knowledge Rose gave me, I thought that maybe, just maybe, I could make it work. If I found the right person—say, someone like Sam.

  Rose swam up to our beach, her body barely floating in the last foot of water. I pulled myself on to dry land and got my legs back without much of a thought. It was easy once you learned the trick. I went half way up the beach when I saw Rose hadn’t learned the trick.

  “You’ll get legs when you dry off,” I explained.

  “I know. I just haven’t done it before.”

  “Really? Never?”

  “What is there up there that’s worth leaving the ocean?”

  “Mangoes.” The word slipped out before I thought about it, then a few tumbled after it. “Books. Music.”

  “Never heard of any of them. Don’t think I need them.” She pulled herself on to the beach and wrapped her arm around her tail. She looked helpless, a sharp contrast to the powerful hunter she’d been yesterday.

  “Well, what about…” I started the list with fruits, like coconuts and bananas, then talked about things like clothes and colors and TV. By the time she got legs, I realized she didn’t care about texting or the Internet. She’d never had any of those things and couldn’t see a need for them. “Okay, well, whatever. Let’s go inside and get you hooked up with a map.”

  Rose nodded and tried to stand, promptly falling down. She tried a few more times but her legs couldn’t get it. I was glad we were on our private beach, if anyone had been around we’d look drunk or worse. I thought maybe it was all in her head, that she’d never tried to walk so she didn’t know how, but her exasperation made it clear she didn’t want to know how.

  “Okay, I’ll go get the compass. Wait here.”

  “I’ll wait in the water, thanks.”

  “By the reef, on the right.” Far away from my private spot. Even if she was leaving, I wanted it to stay private.

  Chapter Ten

  I woke up to the sound of a car horn blaring. The anger in the sound meant it had to be Ashley.

  I got out of bed at light speed, my body moving before my mind woke up. I found my cell phone, threw on a skirt and a shirt, and got out the door in less than two minutes.

  “Nice hair,” Ashley said as I opened the door.

  “Where is everyone?” I took a glance in the rear view mirror. I looked like crap. Thankfully, Ashley was the only one around to see it.

  “Heather’s dad is driving her to school. He’s pissed because the cops worked her over without him. He’s going to blast the principal. I’m kinda hoping we get to see it.”

  I nodded, a barrette caught between my teeth and a brush in my hand. I tried talking around the barrette. “Sa-wah?”

  “Riding in with Heather and her d
ad. I guess Heather is all screwed up, needed the moral support.”

  “I know what that’s like.” I took a glance in the mirror on the sun visor. I needed makeup, more than a little. Rose didn’t have a clue how to use a compass. We’d been in the water way past midnight.

  Ashley watched me apply my makeup through a series of side-glances. “Are you okay about Ryan?”

  “Define okay.” I stopped working with makeup and sat back in the seat. “Because I don’t know what I am right now.”

  “He was your boyfriend.”

  “Ex-boyfriend. We were on a break. Heather’s got more claim to him than I do.”

  “That doesn’t mean you have to be stoic about it.” She pulled the car into the parking lot, and turned toward me. “You don’t have to be a hero. You can lean on people.”

  “Thanks, but I keep thinking this is something I have to figure out for myself.”

  “Well, at least you look better.” She shrugged and got out of the car, once again leaving me completely perplexed. But that was Ashley. Cold and mean, then supportive. Crazy aloof, but scared and alone too. It was like she enjoyed being a contradiction.

  Ashley was only the first of many confusing things that day. My teachers were nicer than usual, but other kids treated me like nothing had happened. It didn’t make sense that the people who were usually completely out of touch understood something, and the people like me were clueless. Then there was my own inability to concentrate. Maybe it was the things I’d learned from Rose, but my hormones kept me thinking about men: Ryan, Sam, all sorts of men, all day. I couldn’t concentrate, and when I did, when the world came back into focus, I remembered everything that had happened and felt guilty. How could I think about sex at a time like this? How could I think about anything when my friends were dead?

  I saw Heather at lunch. Clearly she was only thinking about how bad she felt. Her father had come to school and chewed out the office staff. The student workers heard all of it.