College catalogs and application forms littered the living room. My mom and I pored through each one that looked interesting. So far (and we’d been at this for forty-five minutes) neither of us had raised our voices or looked cross-eyed at each other. It was truly a miracle.
“Now, what about San Diego?” Mom finally asked. I know she’d been avoiding it. “Isn’t that where you said you wanted to go?”
“I’ve thought about it,” I confessed. “I thought really hard. Part of me still wants to go there because I know they have the best program, but another part of me thinks I should stay in this area.”
Mom grinned as she ran her fingers through my long, black hair. “Could it have anything to do with a young college student majoring in Biology?”
I felt my cheeks get hot. “Maybe,” I answered. “It also has to do with something else.”
Mom nodded, but the grin changed to something more sincere. “You know the chances of seeing another mermaid are slim.”
“Oh, I know,” I said too quickly to fool her. “If they’ve got any brains at all they’re probably far, far away from here.” I knew that wasn’t true, though. They’ve lived out there in our waters for hundreds of years, and I didn’t believe they would abandon their homes or their killer whales. Every couple weeks I headed out to Grayland Beach to see if maybe my mermaid friend was swimming around by the buoys keeping an eye out for me.
I flipped through the pages of a Humboldt University catalog slowly, but I wasn’t looking at the pictures. I remembered all the effort it took to get the reporters to finally stop harassing our family and go away. There hadn’t been much point in defending my story any longer. No one believed me anyway. Plus, someone at Affron nicely retouched my video for me, messing with the image, brightening it too much and setting the contrast way off. It looked ridiculous. Not even worthy of the tabloid rags. Somehow, when this new image got spread around the Internet, the old one was forgotten.
Haley was angrier about it than me. She came over on Saturday afternoon, the day after our adventure, to show me what had happened and how quickly. “I worked hard on that video.”
“I know,” I said. “I think that Boyle guy wiped out all Schneider’s research, too. Carter said he was messing with the computer the whole time Regina was wigging out. So, there’s no proof of anything.”
“Well, I wouldn’t say no proof,” Haley said. She reached into her jeans pocket and pulled out a flash drive. “A good nerd always has one handy.”
I grabbed her up for a big hug. “You’re the best.”
“I’ll keep it safe. Who knows when it might come in handy?”
Over the next few weeks, Haley and I gradually went from being teased and hassled around campus to being ignored and forgotten once again. Glad to know things could get back to normal. We did manage to recruit six members to our Recycling Club, and we were already making a difference around campus. I promise that I wasn’t hijacking backpacks for water bottles. Actually, most of the support came from the many friends of the newly single Ted Cowley, who had become our most enthusiastic member and attended every meeting.
The stories about the whole mermaid sighting being a scam made all the crowds disappear. All that remained were the die-hard conspiracy freaks. There’s not much you can do to stop them once they get a hint that something supernatural is out there. My parents had to do a lot of work explaining how their daughter had tricked them as well—the only way to save their reputations. It hurt to hear them bash me, but none of it was how they truly felt and we’d all agreed telling lies was the only option.
Eventually though, the whole thing went away. Just another urban legend.
I had worried that disregarding the mermaids would wind up helping Affron. Luckily, my parents, the world’s greatest environmental activists, knew what to do. They used the footage my dad and I shot of the oil-coated sea life (absent of mermaids) and took it right to the governments of both countries. Armed with laws about oil tanker retrofitting and signed promises from Affron not to roll that fateful night, my mother had a case that knocked Affron on its butt.
According to legislation in both Canada and the United States, Affron had to cease operation until all their tankers were redesigned and inspected by government officials. On top of that, they were hit with heavy fines and forced to put a much larger percentage of their profits into the condition and staffing of their rehabilitation centers.
I raised my eyes over the college catalog and gazed at my mom with admiration. She really was a powerful and wonderful person.
“The other reason I was thinking of staying close to home is that I think I kind of got a taste for this activist stuff,” I told her. “I thought I’d stick around and help you and Dad out.”
Mom pulled me in for a squeeze and tossed the Humboldt catalog on the floor. “You can do whatever you want, June,” she said. “I’ll be proud of you no matter what you choose or where you choose to do it. I’ve raised the strongest, most incredible girl in the world.”
We decided to call it quits for the night. Too many decisions to make with Dad out of the house. So, while Mom made dinner, I headed up to my room.
I dropped a bit of food into the goldfish bowl on my dresser and watched the tiny creature swim around and gobble up the flakes. Then, as slowly as I could, I dipped my finger into the bowl. At first the fish backed away from me, but I was persistent. I held my finger absolutely still and waited. Curious, the goldfish approached my finger and seemed to be sniffing it. After a moment the goldfish must have sensed that the finger would cause it no harm, so it swam around, pressing its little body against the finger, enjoying the sensation of touch.
The phone rang. Wiping my wet finger on my jeans, I picked it up. “Hello? Dad? Are you okay?”
The line was scratchy, but I was pretty sure I heard my dad say, “Plantation Lumber is creeping into Chinook protected land. They want to rip down the cedar trees here and use them for rabbit cage linings. We could use some people to stand with us out here. You and your mom want to join us?”
“Yeah,” I said. “We’ll be there as soon as we can.”
I hung up the phone and shouted. “Mom! Cedar trees falling! Dad needs us right away!”
Not waiting for my mom to answer, I jumped into gear. As I changed my clothes into more rugged attire and gathered up the necessary tools, I found myself feeling happier than I had in weeks.
Anything could happen, I thought giddily. I saw a mermaid on my last mission. Maybe today I’ll see a unicorn or a dragon.
And if not, if a certain college freshman could be persuaded to come along (and I felt confident that might be the case), I would at the very least have a night of holding hands, chanting in protest together, and cuddling close to stay warm. It could be as romantic as my dad had hinted once upon a time. That delicious thought in mind, I followed my mom out the door and headed toward another adventure.