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‘You found your skin?’ Wayanna’s joy hit Myna with force and she took a step back as she shook her head.
Wayanna frowned. ‘I can smell it on you.’
Myna stopped her head from moving.
‘I—’
‘You didn’t bring it?’
Myna felt the nerves bubble up in her chest and she laughed. There was no way she was going to touch it again. But she couldn’t say that to Wayanna.
‘I can’t carry that! You haven’t seen it, it’s enormous. So thick and heavy.’ She shook her head again. ‘I’d never get it here all by myself.’
‘What about Father? He could help—’
‘He doesn’t know.’
Wayanna’s eyes widened and Myna felt the all too familiar pang of guilt.
‘How could I tell him? How could I ever explain all this? He doesn’t even believe in selkies—’
‘But you can show him otherwise.’
Myna shook her head again. ‘You have no idea what I’ve been through. Your father is the only person who’s ever been on my side. I couldn’t bear to lose him. And I don’t even know what life is like for you. I have no recollection at all of life below the waves. How can you expect me to long for something I don’t even remember?’
Wayanna’s eyes narrowed. ‘But you do, don’t you? You long for the sea, to swim in the waves. What is it you’re afraid of, Mother? Are you afraid you’ll lose yourself and never come back? I’ve seen you gazing over the water, and yet you’ve never even dipped your toe in. Why? You won’t turn into a seal with the touch of the sea—you need your skin for that. Or perhaps you’re scared of finding yourself and realising how fulfilling life could be if you actually followed your true nature.’
Myna kept shaking her head, trying not to hear Wayanna’s words. ‘I can’t go into the sea. My mother—’
‘Your mother is out there, under the waves. Missing every moment she could be with you.’
The anger of a sixteen-year-old was too much for Myna and she fled back up the beach, slipping in the soft sand and stumbling over loose rocks.
‘As if a child could understand,’ Myna muttered to herself. But of course she couldn’t. Of course her life under the waves would seem preferable to one above. She’d never understand that life above the sea felt normal to Myna.
And yes, Myna did yearn to swim, and now Mother was dead there was no reason not to, and yet... It was honouring her mother’s memory, staying away from the waves. Her mother had done so much for Myna, endured the loss of community, suffered from the whispers and gossip of the villagers, just as much as Myna had.
The woman you call Mother stole you. A voice spoke in her mind. She was ostracised because she stole you. Any suffering was punishment for her own actions. And she wasn’t the only one who suffered, what about your family; your mother, your father, mourning the loss of their child. What about your daughter? You lost her because she looked different, ill-formed. She has grown up without parents because the human you insist on calling ‘Mother’ stole you.
Myna closed her eyes, fighting against Wayanna’s accusations in her mind.
She pulled her shawl tighter around her shoulders and increased her speed. It would be midnight soon. And Myna needed her sleep.
