me a break.
It’s stupid.
I tilt my head back and breathe out hard. Dylan is almost back to us. We need to finish this now. “I don’t resent him,” I say.
Dad watches me.
I choose my words as quickly as I can. “I am scared to death of him, Dad.”
Dylan runs—runs—into me and crashes into my arms.
I say, “Hey, buddy,” and give him a hug.
I think Dad is reaching out toward Dylan, but then he palms my head instead. And I can’t tell which of us he’s talking to when he says, “You make me so proud.”
I don’t want Dylan to see me cry again, so I hold my breath when he starts running around the beach in circles with his arms flailing around, looking exactly like this kid we’ve had in our heads for the past three years.
“Can I ask you a question?” Diana says, mid-kiss, not sexy, just conversational.
“Yeah.”
“What’s a swing set?”
“What?”
“They’re in books, but no one ever explains what they are. They aren’t in my encyclopedia.”
“When I was a kid, someone told me that ‘pear’ wasn’t in the dictionary and I never checked and I think about it all the time .”
“We can check later.”
So I explain to her what a swing set is and then I try to tell her about TV and the Internet and all sorts of foreign crazy things and she rolls her eyes and reminds me how much you can learn from books and how much you really can’t, like the feel of her waist in my hand, like sea air, like what a swing set is.
And her face when I tell her about Michigan, when I show her what to do once our pants are off . . . God, that fascinated face. I know that face.
My hand drifts to her hip and before I can stop it, before I can even process that I’m thinking it, my brain thinks, What would it feel like to touch scales, tail, scars? and I’m kissing her deeper without meaning to and okay, fine, it’s fine, who the fuck hasn’t had a mermaid fantasy? That’s something you can get from a book. That’s something that’s not real. It’s fine.
No, what’s actually weird is that I’m not really that concerned.
“Where have you been, kiddo?” Fishboy says as I make my way down the dock afterward. “Christ. No, I know where you’ve been. Don’t answer that.”
“Hmm?” I sit down and plunk my feet in the water. It hurts in a good way. “I need to talk to you.”
“I don’t want to talk.”
“It’s about the fish.”
“What about my fish?”
“Have you ever seen them hurt anyone? Anybody?”
“Like a human?”
“Yeah.”
He frowns. “Of course not. You know what I have seen? Humans hurting fish.”
“It’s not the same. No. Stop. You can’t say it’s the same. I . . . I don’t know, Teeth.”
It’s not as if people are going out and capturing his fish just to do it. We catch them because we need them to live. What did the fish get out of impregnating Ms. Delaney? What good did that do them?
I look at Teeth, bobbing in the water.
Shit.
Teeth frowns at me. “What?”
They needed something to keep them alive too.
I have to stay still for a few minutes just to collect everything in me. I can’t believe I’m weighing the morality of hurting a fish versus hurting a human. But it’s so hard not to compare the two with that creature in the water in front of me, sucking on his fingers.
“What are you thinking about?” he says.
“What would you say if I told you a fish hurt someone? Really hurt them?”
He’s making eye contact so fierce it scares me. “I’d say the fishermen hurt me every night.”
“Hurt you—”
“No. Really hurt me.”
“I—”
“Fuck humans! I hate humans. What the fuck do you want from me? I don’t give a shit about your little human stories, okay? Some fish are bad, and do you have any idea how many humans have fucked me over? Goddamn it, Rudy!”
I try to say something, I don’t even know what, but then he dives under the water and he’s gone.
thirteen
AND THE NEXT DAY, IT’S LIKE IT NEVER
It’s stupid.
I tilt my head back and breathe out hard. Dylan is almost back to us. We need to finish this now. “I don’t resent him,” I say.
Dad watches me.
I choose my words as quickly as I can. “I am scared to death of him, Dad.”
Dylan runs—runs—into me and crashes into my arms.
I say, “Hey, buddy,” and give him a hug.
I think Dad is reaching out toward Dylan, but then he palms my head instead. And I can’t tell which of us he’s talking to when he says, “You make me so proud.”
I don’t want Dylan to see me cry again, so I hold my breath when he starts running around the beach in circles with his arms flailing around, looking exactly like this kid we’ve had in our heads for the past three years.
“Can I ask you a question?” Diana says, mid-kiss, not sexy, just conversational.
“Yeah.”
“What’s a swing set?”
“What?”
“They’re in books, but no one ever explains what they are. They aren’t in my encyclopedia.”
“When I was a kid, someone told me that ‘pear’ wasn’t in the dictionary and I never checked and I think about it all the time .”
“We can check later.”
So I explain to her what a swing set is and then I try to tell her about TV and the Internet and all sorts of foreign crazy things and she rolls her eyes and reminds me how much you can learn from books and how much you really can’t, like the feel of her waist in my hand, like sea air, like what a swing set is.
And her face when I tell her about Michigan, when I show her what to do once our pants are off . . . God, that fascinated face. I know that face.
My hand drifts to her hip and before I can stop it, before I can even process that I’m thinking it, my brain thinks, What would it feel like to touch scales, tail, scars? and I’m kissing her deeper without meaning to and okay, fine, it’s fine, who the fuck hasn’t had a mermaid fantasy? That’s something you can get from a book. That’s something that’s not real. It’s fine.
No, what’s actually weird is that I’m not really that concerned.
“Where have you been, kiddo?” Fishboy says as I make my way down the dock afterward. “Christ. No, I know where you’ve been. Don’t answer that.”
“Hmm?” I sit down and plunk my feet in the water. It hurts in a good way. “I need to talk to you.”
“I don’t want to talk.”
“It’s about the fish.”
“What about my fish?”
“Have you ever seen them hurt anyone? Anybody?”
“Like a human?”
“Yeah.”
He frowns. “Of course not. You know what I have seen? Humans hurting fish.”
“It’s not the same. No. Stop. You can’t say it’s the same. I . . . I don’t know, Teeth.”
It’s not as if people are going out and capturing his fish just to do it. We catch them because we need them to live. What did the fish get out of impregnating Ms. Delaney? What good did that do them?
I look at Teeth, bobbing in the water.
Shit.
Teeth frowns at me. “What?”
They needed something to keep them alive too.
I have to stay still for a few minutes just to collect everything in me. I can’t believe I’m weighing the morality of hurting a fish versus hurting a human. But it’s so hard not to compare the two with that creature in the water in front of me, sucking on his fingers.
“What are you thinking about?” he says.
“What would you say if I told you a fish hurt someone? Really hurt them?”
He’s making eye contact so fierce it scares me. “I’d say the fishermen hurt me every night.”
“Hurt you—”
“No. Really hurt me.”
“I—”
“Fuck humans! I hate humans. What the fuck do you want from me? I don’t give a shit about your little human stories, okay? Some fish are bad, and do you have any idea how many humans have fucked me over? Goddamn it, Rudy!”
I try to say something, I don’t even know what, but then he dives under the water and he’s gone.
thirteen
AND THE NEXT DAY, IT’S LIKE IT NEVER
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