Emerge

by Easton, Tobie

  “I feel like a pretzel,” I mutter. Clay’s so much bigger than me that this feels impossible.

  “Stop assuming you can’t do it.” Clay’s tone is serious. “If using this move could help save your life, could protect someone you love from getting hurt, you would do it. And you’d get it right. You can do this, Lia.” Hearing Clay talk about me with such confidence, like he believes in me, is motivating.

  He’s right—I can do this. I bring one hand around to create the chokehold at the same time that I angle my hips toward the corner, reach under his knee, and lift with all my strength. My body rolls over Clay’s. I’ve flipped us over.

  It’s empowering. Like I can handle myself, protect myself.

  I release Clay’s arm and look down at him. That’s when I realize the ending position of this move has me straddling him. His hazel eyes meet mine, and I stop moving. A part of my brain knows I should get up, move away. But it’s as if my body is fused to his. My breath still comes in hard pants from the exertion, and the room is warm now despite the central air conditioning. All I seem to be able to do is stare at Clay. At Clay’s lips.

  A lock of my hair has fallen out of its makeshift bun and hangs between us. His thumb skims my forehead and the shell of my ear as he tucks it away. We’re so close together that Clay fills my entire field of vision. Every detail of his face is exquisite. I want to stroke his cheek, see what the light stubble there feels like. His tongue peeks out to lick his lips, and I’m seized by the urge to press my mouth to his. His chest rises and falls beneath me; he’s breathing hard, too.

  The blaring rocker notes of his ringtone are the worst sound I’ve ever heard. We stay frozen until the jarring noise rings out again and shatters the heat between us. Clay’s large hands grip my waist and lift me up. Coming back to my senses, I take over and move on my own. His girlfriend is calling. His girlfriend! What’s wrong with me?

  “I should get this,” he says, his voice ragged. “I didn’t answer it before.”

  “Yeah, you should.” I take another step back, away from Clay, and busy myself with fixing my hair while he answers the phone.

  “Hi, Mel. Yeah, sorry I didn’t pick up before. Lia’s here and we’re … working on school stuff.” A pause. She must be speaking. Then, “It’s good to hear your voice.”

  My heart aches and my throat constricts. Of course he wants to talk to her—they’re together. I want to run out of the room, to be anywhere else. I could escape to the bathroom, but that would mean missing the rest of their conversation. I’m torturing myself, but I stay.

  It doesn’t do me any good. Melusine must be talking now because Clay’s quiet, but I can’t hear her end of the conversation. Minutes drag by like hours until Clay says, “Got it. Talk to you later, Mel.”

  I look up from where I’ve been pretending to futz with my shoe. Clay’s expression, so open and exposed earlier, has shuttered off. Is he angry at me for what almost happened? At himself?

  “We’ve gotten enough done. You should probably go home.” He doesn’t sound angry exactly, just … cold.

  I don’t want to leave on such a strained note. “Thanks for helping me with self-defense. You’re a real lifesaver. Or grade saver … ” Great, now I’m rambling. Clay stares at me, silent. “I’ll see you and Mel at school,” I continue, walking out of the den and into the hallway. It seems like forever ago that Clay and I moved together down this same hallway with his hands covering my eyes. Clay follows me to the door.

  “We’re okay, right?” I ask.

  “Sure,” he says, but his tone is the opposite of comforting. “See you at school.” His voice is robotic, like he’s only saying what he has to to get me to leave. I want to say more, to make things better, but as soon as I step over the threshold, he shuts the door without a second glance.

  Chapter Seven

  I’m so tied up in knots that it’s all I can do to slap a fake smile on my face when I walk in my front door and find my whole family in the living room.

  “Look who walked up the stairs all by herself,” my mother announces, gesturing to where Amy sits on the couch beside her.

  “Stairs are complicated,” Amy says, only half-joking.

  “Now that we’re all here,” my mother says, “your father and I have a surprise. It’s a congratulations gift for Amy, but I think you’ll all enjoy it.”

  “I left it next door,” my father says, rising to his feet.

  We spend the next few minutes trying in vain to wrestle clues from my mom. Then it happens. My dad comes in holding a wiggly, furry, happy—puppy!

  “PUPPY!” Amy and Em cry out together.

  We rush forward as my dad places the tan, shaggy bundle on the ground. In her excitement, Amy loses focus and flops to the floor, her purple tail back in place and the cotton skirt she’s wearing now rucked up around her waist.

  My parents take in an audible breath. We’ve never had any pets in our home before. They believe restricting fish to bowls is cruel, and land animals make them nervous. How will this four-legged creature react to a Mermaid in her true form?

  The puppy tilts its head in curiosity then runs right toward Amy. We all watch as it sniffs her tail. Then—taking advantage of her position on the floor—the puppy jumps right up to her chest and licks everywhere he can reach.

  “He likes me!” Amy exclaims through her giggles. “Is it a he, Uncle Edmar?”

  “It’s a he,” my father confirms, letting out a sigh of relief. “I finally have another male in this house.”

  “Do you like him?” my mother asks.

  “What do you think?” Lapis asks sarcastically, kneeling to scratch his head.

  “He’s just about the handsomest puppy ever!” Lazuli adds, dropping to the floor to get in on the action.

  “I always told you dogs would be Mer-friendly,” Em says, holding out her hand for the puppy to sniff before petting him. “They love water.” Emeraldine has been trying to convince our parents to get a dog for ages.

  Except for one family that has a couple turtles, no one in the Community keeps a pet. Dogs, cats, hamsters—they’re just too foreign for parents who grew up in the ocean to get used to. I’m friendly with a family of bottlenose dolphins and three different sea lions that I play with sometimes on my swims, but I certainly don’t own them. Amy hands me the squirming puppy. Shaggy beige fur frames big, brown eyes.

  “Hello,” I say. He barks once. I think I’m in love.

  “Stop hogging my new boyfriend, Lia,” Lazuli jokes, reaching out for him.

  “We’re just getting to know each other.” I put him down on the ground where he scurries between all of us, then tugs on a shoelace from Lapis’s knee-high boot.

  “Look! He has good taste,” she squeals.

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Amy says to my parents. We all repeat the sentiment, and they smile, looking both pleased and relieved.

  “I can’t believe this,” I say. “I thought you’d never let us have a land pet.”

  “We’re constantly telling you girls to acclimate, so we figured we’d try to ourselves,” my father says.

  “But no one else in the Foundation—”

  “There’s a first time for everything,” my father cuts me off with a warm smile.

  “We’ll be pioneers,” my mother adds.

  “Who knows, maybe we’ll even start a trend,” my dad says.

  “Besides, this way Amy will have good motivation to learn to walk.” My mother glances around to make sure we’re listening. “And I expect all of you to help out by taking turns walking this little guy in the meantime.” This has to be the first household chore in history we’re all enthusiastic about.

  “Hey, Em,” Amy says as Em rubs the pup’s belly, “you should call Leo. The two of you can take the puppy on his first walk together.”

  “Maybe. I think he has plans tonight.” Emeraldine gets up and walks toward the kitchen. Her cheery tone sounds forced w
hen she says, “I’ll get our new little monster some salmon. I think we have some that’s cooked.”

  “Nice try, Aims,” I whisper. Em told me she talked to Leomaris at the party. They’re still together, but they couldn’t come to any decision. She believes in following tradition and he says that’s not the type of marriage he wants. I guess they’re at a standstill. A really strained standstill. I haven’t seen this little of Leo since before they started dating. And I definitely haven’t heard any more talk about an engagement.

  “I hope they work it out soon,” Amy says, voicing my own concerns.

  “They will.” I hope I’m right.

  Amy closes her eyes, and a moment later, she’s pulling her skirt down over her new legs, which of course the puppy has to sniff.

  “Great job!” I say, complimenting her improved leg control. Then, keeping my voice low so the others won’t hear: “So, I guess you’ve found a guy to think about?”

  “Yeah, there’s someone.” Amy ducks her head, and I know better than to push for details, no matter how much I want to.

  “I can’t believe you got my parents to get a dog,” I say instead. “You are so their favorite.”

  “We should get him a studded collar,” Lapis suggests.

  “Gross,” Lazuli says. “I refuse to let you turn him into a punk rock puppy. I say rhinestones all the way.”

  I take another look at the furry mutt. He doesn’t exactly strike me as the rhinestones type. Then again, I can’t picture him in studs either.

  “Uncle Edmar, what’s his name?” Amy asks.

  “That’s up to you.”

  Even a brand new puppy isn’t enough to distract me from dreading school tomorrow. I keep playing through possible scenarios in my head. In most, Clay decides we shouldn’t spend any more time together; I picture him talking to me in that same cold voice, telling me I’m a threat to his relationship so we’ll need to split up the work for the project and finish it alone. If he actually said this, I couldn’t disagree with him. He’d be right.

  Still, I much prefer the scenario that occurred to me right before I fell asleep—the one where Clay tells me he felt exactly what I felt, the same crackle of heat between us, and he’s breaking up with Melusine. He grabs me to him and, before I can say anything, kisses me the way I wanted him to kiss me on that mat. But then what? My logical brain knows we can’t be together. Sure, it’s a nice fantasy—a wonderful, tail-curling, butterflies flying, spine tingling fantasy—but we have no future.

  Besides, it’ll never happen anyway. I can still hear Clay from his phone call with Melusine: “It’s good to hear your voice.” He likes her. Wants her. Kisses her. And he’s probably about to tell me we can’t even be friends.

  By the time I get to school, I’ve done everything I can to brace myself. Then Clay drives into the parking lot in his Mustang, and I’m back to full-on nervous mode. He gets out and walks right toward me.

  His words are the very last ones I expected.

  “So, you coming over today?”

  “Huh?” He can’t mean what I think he means.

  “You came over the last couple Fridays, so I figured you’d come today. We didn’t really make any history headway last night, with the self-defense and all.”

  “You don’t have plans with Mel tonight?” I hedge.

  “I haven’t talked to her yet today, but we don’t have anything planned. She knows you and I have to get the project done. So, you’re coming, right? Our report’s not going to write itself.”

  “Sure.”

  “Cool, Nautilus.”

  If I could do a cartwheel, I totally would.

  “It’s weird that none of your ancestors have come up in any of the databases. You sure your family’s not from outer space or something?”

  Stay calm. “Hey, one of those sixty-three Margaret Smiths could have been related to me,” I tell Clay, using one of the many generic-named, made up relatives on my list. “Anywho, I spoke to Mr. Reitzel and he said, since I’m not getting enough results online, I can use interviews with my parents as research sources in our bibliography. So we’re covered.”

  I dig out the notebook where I wrote down the interviews—combinations of complete fabrications and tweaked truths—and place them on Clay’s desk. We’re in his room again and, in an attempt to show him I respect his relationship, I’ve scooted my chair as far from him as I can. His desk is on the small side though, so we’re only a foot apart.

  “We’re lucky we’ve got that Denmark connection. That can be the focus of our poster board,” Clay says.

  It’s actually true that I have ancestors from Denmark—well, from the waters surrounding Denmark, but why quibble? My mother’s side of the family, including her distant royal relatives, lived in that area for thousands of years before the Little Mermaid refused to kill her prince and unleashed the curse by prizing a human life above her own immortal one.

  Devastated and enraged at the loss of their immortality, the Mer dethroned her father, blaming him for her actions. He was executed. In the ensuing turmoil, ruler after ruler came to power, promising to find a cure for the curse.

  As each one inevitably failed, a mutiny would break out to depose him. His supporters would cling to their hope and take up arms, arguing that all the current leader needed was more time to break the curse—that he almost had an answer—while others would rally behind a new leader who pedaled a new, useless method to save us all.

  No sooner did the most recent leader take power, and begin strengthening his army, than those who saw the flaw in his plan turned to someone else who claimed access to better magic. What’s worse, criminals have always taken advantage of each new war to loot and ravage cities, spreading the violence and destruction past the battlefields, so even those who don’t seek to fight must arm themselves to protect their families.

  Every new leader has brought more false hope, but no end to the anarchy. With each failure, the cycle continues, causing nearly constant chaos and peril. The sea has been in a state of continual war for two centuries. Hatred of many of the previous leaders is strong, but none is stronger than the hatred aimed at the memory of the Little Mermaid and her father. All their descendants, no matter how distant, became targets for annihilation.

  It grew far too dangerous for my mother’s family to stay anywhere near Northern Europe. At first, my ancestors took refuge in the waters near North America, but within a century, the wars spread and those were just as unsafe. The only choices for anyone with royal blood were to live in hiding or leave the ocean for good.

  After a boatload of internal debate, I told Clay my mother’s family lived near Copenhagen in Denmark until they came to America just before World War I. That way, I’ll be able to discuss U.S. immigration and the First World War for my part of the paper. Thank the tides he bought it. I hate lying—especially to Clay—but I seem to be getting plenty of practice.

  “Did you find anything else about that Danish opera singer?” I ask, steering the conversation toward Clay’s family.

  “Not really. I found plenty about her career, but there’s nothing much about her personal life.” He shuffles through a few printed articles on his desk, then reads, “‘After giving birth to a son out of wedlock, Astrid Ostergard withdrew from public life, eventually becoming a veritable recluse.’ Other than that, all I found was that her son moved his family to New York in the late 19th century. He’s the one who opened up that restaurant I saw the picture of online.”

  “And that’s on your mom’s side?” I ask.

  “Yep. A lot of his descendants died in World War I and even more in World War II, including my mom’s only uncle, so I think she’s the last one left. That’s why every one of my annoying cousins comes from my dad’s side of the family.”

  “And there’s some info on your dad’s side?”

  “Enough for a paragraph or two. I think I’ll focus mainly on Astrid, though. It’s strangely cool to find out you
’re related to someone who was famous.”

  It isn’t always cool. I don’t know what’s worse, that one of my distant, ancestral cousins is infamous for bringing death to millions, or that she’s been immortalized as a cartoon character.

  “Do you think Astrid’s who you get your musical talent from?” I ask.

  “Could be. My dad’s the one who taught me to play, so maybe I get it from both sides.”

  “When can I hear some of your stuff?”

  “Oh.” He looks surprised at my request. “I don’t know. I just sort of play for myself lately.”

  “You said you’re a musical prodigy,” I tease. “You must expect me to be curious.”

  “I don’t know. I wouldn’t want you turning all groupie on me.”

  I blush. “Why don’t you play at any of the clubs around town?”

  “I just don’t,” Clay says abruptly. Then, his voice softens, “You rocked it in P.E. today. Coach Crane looked like she was about to have a coronary from the shock.”

  I pretend not to notice the change of subject. “Well, you did it.” I never could have survived today’s kicks without his help last night.

  Clay lifts my chin with his thumb and forefinger and looks directly into my eyes, “Hey, stop that. You did it. All I did was help bring it out of you.”

  His face is close enough that I can see the green and gold flecks in his eyes. The same heat I felt last night rises between us now. As if just realizing he’s touching me, he drops his hand, but he doesn’t move farther away. Something else flashes in his eyes. Decisiveness?

  “My dad stopped coming.”

  “Hmm?” I ask, confused.

  “To my performances. I stopped playing guitar in public because he was the one who taught me … the one who always cheered me on. It was our thing.” Clay picks at the sleeve of his leather jacket where it’s draped off one end of his desk. “After the divorce, he came to a few shows. Then a few less.”