The Mermaid Girl by Erika Swyler Page A

the ceiling, and she wondered why she’d never told Michel that she’d wished he was her grandfather. She’d stitched the sequins on his vest, squared the edges on his ties, and watered his scotch whenever she could, because a wrong fall might kill him.
    The sequins ruined her fingers. Thimbles might have saved her, but she’d hadn’t known about them when she’d started, and by the time she did, the damage was done. She’d stabbed herself enough that her left hand barely had feeling in the fingertips, making touch a negotiation of where she ended and everyone else began.
    â€œPaulina?”
    Daniel was home, which meant it was 5:45. She’d been in bed for an hour and the blindness would soon dissolve, but the pain would sharpen, and within two hours she’d be in the bathroom, throwing up. Enola hadn’t been crying the full hour. That was good, better than last time. It had been a nice notion to call her Enola, reclaiming a tarnished name with something as hopeful as a baby girl. But in the years after Simon’s birth she and Daniel had forgotten that babies could be like bombs.
    Her name, again. She didn’t answer. Her voice rattling around inside her head would only make the pain open. As harsh as outside noises were, the ones that came from inside were worse.
    Daniel smelled like ride grease, though machine oil all smelled the same. Heavy, sour, and sharp. She knew he understood why she loved the smell of grease.
    â€œDid you take your pills?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œPaulina.”
    â€œFine. Get them.”
    Pills were a crapshoot, a wish more than anything, and not as pleasant as a large cup of coffee with two shots of whiskey, a trick Michel had taught her at thirteen, when the headaches first started, after she’d spent night shows in the mermaid tank, living on five breaths an hour. She swallowed the pills and waited for her stomach to roll.
    In an hour and forty-five minutes, her cheek was pressed to the bathroom tiles. She squinted and saw Simon peering around the door. Big-eyed, snotty-nosed. Red-stained Kool-Aid mouth. He needed a haircut. Beautiful.
    â€œMom?”
    â€œJust napping.” She smiled and closed her eyes.
    *   *   *
    For days after a headache, her sleep was erratic. In the dark morning hours, the ritual of paper against paper was calming, even if she couldn’t always feel the edges of the cards. Shuffling, cutting, was as automatic as braiding her hair, tying her shoes, or wiping a smudge away with spit and a thumb. She asked questions. Michel had taught her that all cards came with questions, whether reading tarot, playing poker, or doing magic.
    Mom, I need to talk to you.
    Queen of Cups.
    Mom, I need to talk to you.
    Queen of Swords.
    Mom, how do you get away from water?
    Ace of Cups and the rolling water.
    â€œMom?” her little boy said. Always watching, that one. Like his father, like the water right before a good storm rolled in. How was it possible to want to stay and leave somewhere so badly?
    â€œWhat’s wrong, darling?”
    â€œCan’t sleep.” There was too much spit in the S. He’d grow out of it eventually; it wasn’t worth real concern, but silly things like that pierced her. Had he no faults, she would miss the soft worries she had over all his imperfections. The joy of children was the worry, the constant reminder that a piece of you was running loose in the world.
    â€œCome here,” she said. Simon folded into her, a missing rib come home.
    â€œWhat are you doing?” he asked, face pressed into her side.
    â€œJust talking to myself,” she said. She scratched his head lightly with her right hand, feeling each hair in a way that her left hand wouldn’t allow.
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause I’m the best listener.”
    â€œTell me a story,” he said.
    â€œDad read two whole books to you at bedtime.”
    â€œYeah. But your