Allie Jo
The moon is now missing a banana-shaped chunk. The mosquitoes aren’t bad; one whines past my ear and I swat around my head.
“Sending smoke signals?” Chase asks.
I make a face at him and look across the water. After not being able to talk about Tara in front of Sophie, we agreed to meet at the springs after dark. Mom and Dad said letting me outside tonight was a trial run after the last time, so I’d better not blow it.
Chase was sure Tara would be here. “You’ve seen her there three times,” he pointed out. Plus, he wanted to give her a shirt he stole from Lost and Found.
I told him employees weren’t allowed to pick through it until after thirty days. But he shrugged me off. “Think of it as a donation,” he’d said.
I look at him now, sitting expectantly with the shirt neatly folded beside him.
We sit there, the moonlight spilling on us, the water softly tugging at our feet. A lone whip-poor-will calls out. It’s rare to hear one in summer; this one must have forgotten to fly back north. Whip-poor-will! Whip-poor-will! Whip-poor-will! No one answers him back. I wonder if he’s lonely.
Suddenly, the water surges over my calves.
“Look!” Chase points across the pond.
Dark shapes stream through the shadows in the water.
I snatch my legs up and scramble backward, all the while watching.
The shapes spin and twirl, floating around each other as if they’re dancing … or playing. I steal a glance at Chase; his eyes are locked on the springs.
The water shrieks and parts in a crashing fountain right where our feet just were.
I scream, but it’s voiceless. That’s how scared I am.
“Hello,” Tara says, as if she didn’t just scare the life out of both of us.
The watery shapes lumber away.
Her face is radiant. She climbs out of the water wearing her usual outfit. Nothing about her gives off the impression that she finds it strange for us to be here.
I notice neither Chase nor I have said anything. Tara walks past him to the cabinet, grabs a towel, comes back, and sits on the grass.
I watch her twist and squeeze her hair, then do the same to the tail of her top.
“What was in that water?” Chase’s voice explodes with curiosity.
“Manatees,” Tara says, same way I might say grass if someone asked me what was green and grew on the lawn.
“Sea cows?”
Tara giggles. “They hate that name.”
Chase snickers, but I’m confused. What a strange thing to say.
I gesture toward the springs. “You were swimming with them,” I say, my voice full of awe.
Something strikes me to the core. “You’re … you’re …”
She stares at me dead on. “Yes, say it—say it.” Her eyes penetrate mine deeply.
“A mermaid?” I say in a small voice.
Her mouth drops.
To my side, I hear Chase chuckle, then laugh openly. I look away from both of them, the tips of my ears burning. I sounded like a little girl saying that. Chase is still laughing. A mermaid. Oh, he’s right. I turn back, ready to laugh at myself, but when I glance at Tara, she’s staring after me with a haunted look.