When We Believed in Mermaids

by O'Neal, Barbara

  He asks, “When you fall in love?”

  I shrug. I don’t want to say aloud that I don’t do that, because then he might think it’s a challenge, and it isn’t. I just don’t want all the drama.

  He inclines his head, puzzling over me, then captures a lock of my hair and tucks it behind my ear. His mouth turns up on one side, activating that ridiculously charming dimple. “Now I am convinced that you have not known the right men.” He settles his beer on the ground, then takes mine. “I have been thinking today about kissing you.”

  “I’ve thought of that too.”

  One hand runs up my arm, and he follows the motion with his gaze. “I thought of it in the bookstore, when you looked so sad, but it was not quite right.” His hand moves over my shoulder, up to my neck. “And as we came out of the café, you smiled up at me, and your throat looked long and golden.” His fingers alight against my throat, slide to my clavicle. All the nerves in my body rustle to life, and yet I’m enjoying the slow caress.

  “When you leaped over the railing, my heart squeezed so hard I could not breathe, because what if”—now he touches my ear, my temple, my wet hair, and pulls me closer—“what if I had lost the chance?”

  I lift my face, and he cradles my head as our lips join. And then I forget to keep my guard up or shield myself with cynicism, because his mouth is as lush as plums, and he shifts slightly to fit us together more perfectly. My head is in his palm and the front of my knee against his thigh, and it’s like a fragrant smoke surrounds us, makes me dizzy. Behind my eyes, the world is faintly rose. I reach out a hand to brace myself, holding on to his upper arm, and as if I’ve asked permission, he opens his lips slightly and invites me in, and I go, I go, reach for his tongue and it reaches mine, and then I’m lost in it, a kiss so perfect it might be a poem, or a dance, or something I’ve dreamed.

  With a little gasp I pull back, covering my mouth with my hand as I look up to his dark eyes, eyes that crinkle a little at the corners. He smooths back my hair from my forehead. “Is that happiness too?”

  I let go of a soft laugh. “I don’t know. Let me try again.” And I pull him closer, lean back, and invite him to press into me as the ferry chugs across the water and the family nearby shrieks over raindrops that start to fall. I’m aware of a big drop that splashes on my forehead and a pair that plop on my hand, but mostly what I’m feeling is Javier’s mouth kissing me; and Javier’s body close to mine; and Javier’s graceful tongue, which I want on me everywhere; and Javier’s back, which I want naked.

  And it doesn’t matter when there is more rain, a slow, soft patter that falls on us all the way to the CBD. We only press closer and kiss more. I taste the salt on his lips from the sea and the rain, and we’re soaked and kissing and lost.

  And I don’t even think for a moment to consider this might be dangerous. That I might—that I have let down all my guards.

  I just kiss him. In the rain. On a ferry halfway around the world. Kiss him, and kiss him, and kiss him.

  Chapter Twelve

  Mari

  I met Nan years ago in Raglan, a town on the central coast of the North Island known for great surfing. I was waiting tables in Hamilton and had only just begun to allow myself to surf again, fearful of running into someone I might know. Raglan was only a few miles away, and I drove out there on the weekdays, when the crowds were small and passionate, to ride the left-breaking waves.

  By then it had been nearly two and a half years since I’d fled France on the passport of a dead girl, and I had since discarded that identity too, to become Mari Sanders from Tofino, British Columbia. I found a guy to make me the papers I needed and trashed the original passport, scattering it from Queensland, where I first arrived, all the way north.

  I had not had a single mind-altering substance, not so much as a mouthful of beer, in 812 days. It was the thing that made the rest worth it and the only thing I believed would save me: to be sober, I had to leave the wreck of my old life and make a new one. Never look back.

  On the beach the first day, I met Nan. Tall, skinny, black-haired, she was a law student at the University of Waikato in Hamilton, and had grown up, as I had, surfing. We clicked, respectful of each other’s chops. Within months, we lived together in Hamilton and surfed every time we could manage. I worked in a café and enrolled at Wintec, the equivalent of community college. I started in cookery and hospitality, thinking of my family’s restaurant, but it was a hard-partying group, and I found myself struggling against the wave of their happy drunkenness.

  I made friends with a woman in landscape design and construction and made the switch. Much to my surprise, it was a perfect fit. I liked working outside, loved working with my body, and once I started to understand the basics of horticulture with a range of plants I’d never seen, I fell in love.

  Nan finished her law degree a year later and moved to Auckland, but I stayed in Hamilton, surfing Raglan on the weekends, making a life for myself. We kept in touch, and when Simon, an Auckland native, wooed me north, our friendship took up where it had left off. Once or twice a month now, we meet for dinner near her law offices in the CBD and catch up.

  Tonight I find parking almost immediately and walk down to the Britomart and our special restaurant, an Italian one that reminds us both of childhood. Nan stands in front, sleek and skinny, her hair swept up in a French knot that suits her cheekbones. “They’re having a special event,” she says. “We’ll have to go elsewhere.”

  “No worries. Any preference?”

  “Mind walking a few blocks? There’s a Spanish guitarist at the tapas place. Everyone is talking about him.”

  “Sounds great. Let’s go.”

  She takes a few steps, then halts. “Oh, wait. The girl wanted to talk to you.”

  “The girl?”

  “Yes. The pretty one with all the hair? She said she wanted to see you when you arrived.”

  “About?”

  “I don’t know.”

  We both half-heartedly peer into the busy restaurant. “I’m sure it will wait,” I say. “I’m starving.”

  “Me too.” She links arms with me energetically, and we stride up the hill, exchanging small bits of news. A case she’s been working on has come to fruition at last. She knows about the house, and I tell her about the day with Rose, checking things out.

  At the tapas bar, we settle outside on the bricked alleyway, away from the crowds standing three deep at the bar, mostly made up of well-dressed millennials from the local offices. “Popular,” I comment.

  “It’s Friday night.” She orders a martini for herself and sparkling water with lime for me, and we start with roasted Padrón peppers and stuffed olives with bread. Overhead, the sky among buildings is a golden spill of light, bright with distant rain. I feel myself relax. “Tell me,” I say. “Do you have a theory about who killed Veronica Parker?”

  “The Maori actress?”

  “The one who built Sapphire House.”

  “Right. She was also Maori. It’s one of the things that set her apart.”

  “I remember.”

  “She’s a fascinating figure.” Nan pops an olive in her mouth, eyeing a man in a very formal suit. In general, people dress well for work here, unlike the more casual United States. “I don’t know why someone hasn’t done a big book on her by now. New Zealand girl makes good in Hollywood, falls in love with another native New Zealander at the Olympic games. They have a mad love affair for years, and she’s murdered.”

  “Don’t forget he died too.”

  “Right. It was only another year or two, right?”

  “Yeah.” The peppers are small and mild, my favorites in all the world, and they’re perfectly roasted and salted here. I nestle one into an envelope of soft bread and take a bite. “Maybe it was his wife?”

  “They cleared her almost immediately. She was with her family or something. I don’t remember exactly.”

  Gweneth is a fanatic for the history of Auckland, and the three of us have specul
ated before, over book club snacks and various meals. I was grateful that the two of them liked each other. My two best friends, and as close as I could get to replicating the experience of being a sister.

  “Not the wife. Not Veronica’s sister,” I said, ticking them off. “Not George. Then who?”

  Nan lifted a shoulder, skeptical. “My money is still on George. They never found any evidence, but he was notoriously jealous. In the case of a violent death at home, it’s nearly always a loved one who did it.”

  “But he adored her.”

  “Yes, but he was under a lot of pressure to—”

  “No. I just don’t see it. There were never reports of domestic violence, no violence at all.” Enjoying the discussion, I lean my elbows on the table. “My father was a jealous man, but he would never have killed my mother.”

  She inclines her head. “I don’t know that I remember you mentioning this before.”

  I realize that I was speaking of my actual father, not the father I made up. For a moment, a chill halts me. I’ve never been so careless!

  But Nan is looking at me expectantly. Maybe it will ease my sense of loneliness to tell the parts of my story that I can. “I don’t think about it very much”—which is a lie; I compartmentalize, but they all haunt me anyway—“but he was. Traditional Italian man, of course, and my mom was not at all traditional. They had a volatile relationship. She was quite a bit younger than he was and very beautiful. Very, very, very, very beautiful. Had this voluptuous figure that my dad liked to see in expensive, fitted dresses.”

  “Go on.”

  “I think she liked him to be jealous.” I take a sip of lime-flavored water, opening the door to that world ever so slightly. I’m cautious, afraid of the flood of things lurking, but a minuscule bit of tension I haven’t been aware of holding gives way. “It was how she controlled him. Men were always flirting with her, coming on to her, and she encouraged it.” I see her in my mind’s eye in a slim red dress with a low, square neckline that showed off a lot of cleavage, laughing on the patio overlooking the ocean. My father fetched her, grabbing her by the wrist and tugging her behind him to a dark alcove beneath the wisteria that grew in thick ropes over the pergola. He pushed her against the post, into the leaves and flowers, and kissed her. I saw their tongues and the way they pressed their bodies together. My mother laughed, and my father let her go, swatting her behind as she sashayed back out to the patio and all their guests.

  Enchanted by her power, I sashayed right behind her, imitating the swing of her hips and the way she tossed her hair. I wore a chiffon negligee she’d cut down for me, and the sheer black fabric flowed around my nine-year-old body in a way that was exhilarating. To feel it all the more, I spun around in a circle, sending it spinning outward, knowing my shorts and bikini top were mostly hidden. Air touched my belly, my thighs. Nearby, a woman laughed, and a man clapped lightly. “Suzanne, your daughter is a natural.”

  Delighted by their attention, I played it up, twirling for their pleasure, dancing the way my mother danced, swinging my hips, shimmying my shoulders, and I knew when I captured them, my audience. A circle of faces, all turned to me as if I were the sun, as if I were a queen.

  A body swooped in and picked me up. Dylan, who tossed me over his shoulder. “School night, kiddo,” he said. “Wave good night.”

  I arched my back like an ice dancer, pointing my toes and lifting my shoulders high, flinging kisses with both hands. The patrons loved me and clapped and whistled as Dylan carted me away.

  “Hel-lo?” Nan says.

  “Sorry. I just thought of something I hadn’t remembered in a long time.” I grin. “I wonder if Veronica tried to make George jealous. Maybe it didn’t work, but the other person got possessive.”

  “It must have been a bit more than possessive. She was stabbed a dozen times or more, wasn’t she?”

  “Mm.”

  “That’s passion.”

  Again, I see my parents in my imagination, but this time much later, my mother throwing something—an ashtray? A highball glass?—at him.

  Nan adds, “I’m sure you can find society news about them. They were a very big deal in this town at the time. Glamorous, exotic, passionate.”

  “Did George live with her outright?”

  “You’d have to ask Gweneth, but I’m pretty sure he did. His wife made their lives a misery, but they lived at Sapphire House.”

  I nod, narrowing my eyes to think a bit more. And there, walking past the end of the street, is a woman wearing a wrinkled red sundress with a thick braid falling down her back. A man walks with his arm over her shoulder and dips to kiss her, as if he can’t resist, and there’s something in the tilt of her head that electrifies me. I’m on my feet, ready to run after her, my sister.

  Kit.

  She disappears around the corner, and I realize I’m being ridiculous. All the thoughts of home, the longing to understand this house and its owner, have made me a little homesick, that’s all.

  But I wish fiercely for one long moment that it really had been her.

  As I drive over the bridge, the memory of that night on the patio wafts around, still in the days before my parents started fighting so bitterly. Where was Kit that night? I search the memory and can’t see her anywhere. Maybe she was reading in our room.

  No. Dylan set me on my feet by a banquette away from the action, so often empty. Cinder was asleep on the floor beneath the table, and tucked into one corner was my sister, her hair wild from dancing with me earlier. She’d shucked off the blue negligee my mother gave her and slept in a pair of shorts and a dirty T-shirt. Dylan reached down and picked her up, and she fell on his shoulder, nestling in close. He loved her more than he loved me, just like my dad did, and it made me mad. I danced away in my bare feet, wading onto the dance floor. I heard him call me. “Josie, come on! It’s time for bed.”

  My mother, in her silly voice, enfolded my hand in hers. “Never mind, Dylan. She’s with me.”

  I stuck my tongue out at Dylan, sure that would make him come after me, but he gave me an irritated glance and shook his head, carrying Kit around the back of the restaurant. I knew the drill. He’d make sure she brushed her teeth, then tuck her in, and if she woke up, he’d tell her a story. I almost ran after them, but my mother said, “Dance with Mama, sweetie,” and twirled me around.

  Billy was there that night. I’d seen my mother flirting with him, even though he was super young, just a teenager or something, a young TV star who’d originally started coming with his agent; my parents loved when he showed up, bringing the promise of cachet. He had black hair and blue eyes, and everyone said he was going to be a very big star. He came over to dance with my mom and offered a hand to me, and I forgot about my baby sister getting all the attention.

  The door to the past slams shut. A lifetime of secrets and lies later, I drive through the dark back to my neighborhood. Tears run down my cheeks, and I wonder who they’re for. My sister, Dylan? Or maybe that little girl dancing wildly for the entertainment of drunken adults?

  I don’t remember if Dylan came back and made me go to bed, but I do remember drinking sips of Billy’s beer and the way I giggled over him pouring it into a coffee cup so no one would know I was drinking. It bubbled up my nose and took away my sadness and made me dance all the more, looking up at the stars, dancing with the ocean, with the night sky, with Billy, and with a lady who came over later to twirl me around. I remember tiptoeing around to the empty tables and sneaking sips of cocktails left in the dregs of glasses. I remember thinking I could do anything, be anything.

  Anything.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Kit

  We walk up the hill together quietly. Javier throws his arm around my shoulders, which has never been comfortable before, but our heights and gaits make it seem very relaxed, so I don’t shimmy away as I ordinarily would. In truth, I’m crashing after the long, eventful day.

  He’s quiet too, humming under his breath sometimes, mostly j
ust walking with me. I wonder if he’s thinking of his friend back in Madrid. He hasn’t said much about his life there, but maybe he’s just glad to be away.

  As I am. I try to think about my sister, how to find her, but I can’t summon any urgency. I’ll get back to the search tomorrow. After all, she’s been missing for more than fourteen years. She’s probably not going anywhere.

  For once, my overactive brain is quiet. It’s cooler tonight after the rain, and it’s easy to see that it’s Friday night. The streets are packed with students and young professionals. Music spills out of the establishments we pass.

  It’s getting dark. I don’t have much to eat in my apartment, and my dress is a mess. I’m getting very hungry. “Should we drag a pizza back? I don’t have anything but coffee and eggs in my room.”

  “Are you inviting me over?”

  I might have run away before but not tonight. I nod.

  “I have food,” he says. “Would you like to come to my flat?”

  “You cook?”

  “I am a good cook. Are you?”

  “My father would have expected nothing less.” I smile up at him, and that too is a luxury. So rare that someone is taller than me. “I’m an especially good baker.”

  “What’s your specialty?”

  “Cake.”

  “We don’t make such sweet cakes in Spain as some places. Do you know Tarta de Santiago?”

  “Yes. Almond, so delicious.”

  “Do you know how to cook that cake?”

  “I have never done it before, but I would imagine I could.”

  “Maybe you will one day.” He winks. “For me.”

  “Maybe so.” As if there are more than a scattering of days ahead of us.

  At the hotel, we ride the elevator up, and he leans in to kiss me. “Will you let me cook for you?”