Don't Tell Him I'm a Mermaid

CHAPTER THREE

I Didn’t Know There Was a Meire in West Lothian

Myla’s bedroom was right at the top of Kittiwake Keep. She liked the quiet for studying, but a few weeks ago, she’d admitted to Molly that she sometimes felt hurt that nobody went to visit her up there. Molly had been making more effort ever since, bringing Myla cups of milky tea and asking what subject she was revising, even though she understood precisely none of the answers.

Considering how sensible she was, Myla was surprisingly messy. Tonight her bed was covered in wrinkled clothes, dog-eared textbooks and random pieces of half-eaten toast. Molly tried to clear a small corner of duvet to perch on. As she did, something tiny and furry scurried out from under a navy school sweater.

Molly screamed at the top of her lungs. ‘A rat! A rat! It’s after your toast!’

Myla laughed and scooped the little grey furball up from its terrified spot on the wooden floor. ‘It’s a rabbit. She’s called Boudicca.’

‘Right,’ said Molly after a moment. ‘Of course. Boudicca. I . . . where did Boudicca come from, exactly?’

‘She was queen of the Iceni people of East Anglia.’

Molly fought with all her might, but her eyes rolled regardless. ‘I meant rabbit Boudicca.’

‘Ah, yes. I should’ve deduced that from context,’ Myla said in her very best Sherlock voice.

‘Don’t beat yourself up,’ Molly muttered. ‘Not everyone can be as intelligent as me.’

‘Rabbit Boudicca is a rescue. I adopted her two months ago. Nobody has noticed yet.’

Molly gaped at her. ‘But I’ve been in your room loads in the last two months!’

‘You never were that observant. Honestly, I’m surprised you didn’t notice the smell.’

‘I did. I just thought you were too busy studying to wash your hair.’

Myla smirked, stroking Boudicca absent-mindedly. ‘That too.’

With no subtle way to segue into what she really wanted to talk about, Molly plonked herself down – watching out for any other rogue mammals nesting in the chaos – and said, ‘Do you ever study Meire?’

‘Meire?’ Myla blinked. ‘The mermaid queendom?’

‘No, Myla. Meire in West Lothian.’

Myla frowned. ‘How interesting. I didn’t know there was a Meire in West Lothian.’

Molly snorted. ‘Myla.’

‘Oh. It’s that sarcasm thing you do.’

‘Yes. I am famously the only person in the world to use sarcasm.’

Myla peered disapprovingly over her thick-rimmed glasses. Boudicca purred in her lap. ‘I read about Meire a lot. The books beneath the trapdoor are an endless source of knowledge.’

There was an ancient library hidden below the lighthouse, underneath the broken dishwasher. Molly remembered running a finger over those dusty tomes as though it were yesterday, although it hadn’t occurred to her to revisit them. She was no good at reading long, complicated things.

Plucking at some stray crumbs on the bedsheets, Molly mumbled, ‘Maybe . . . maybe we could talk about Meire sometime. I’m not good at reading, but I’d love for you to teach me some cool stuff.’

Myla grinned then, as though all her nerdy dreams had come true at once. ‘I can do more than teach you about Meire. I can show you.’

Heart skipping a beat, Molly asked, ‘What?’

‘I’ve found a place. A little shelf of seabed from which you can just make out Balaena, the old capital of Meire.’ Eyes glittering with a kind of mischief Molly had never seen in her big sister, Myla added, ‘I have a special underwater telescope which was passed down by our ancestors.’

Molly’s chest was pounding with excitement now. ‘But won’t we get in trouble? Mum doesn’t like us going in the sea. And you of all people hate breaking the rules.’

Then it was Myla’s turn to roll her eyes. ‘I’m smart, Mol, not a goody-goody. That’s Melissa. In fact, my curiosity often wreaks havoc with my moral compass. I’m happy to bend the rules if it means discovering something new.’

Molly beamed. ‘You know, I really like you, Myla.’

‘I like you too, kid. So what do you say? Meire at midnight?’

CHAPTER FOUR

Not the Kind of Place You Want to Go on Your Jollies

Melissa, Molly’s older sister and pedantic roommate, did not like to be left out of Mermaid Fun. She had a rota of mermaid activities that she regularly referred to, including Margot’s Clamdunk matches and family card nights playing Snapfish, the mermaid card game. Molly suspected that if Melissa discovered she was missing out on an impromptu trip to the sea, she would not be all that happy. And yet Molly could really do without the incessant rules and lecturing. She just wanted to enjoy the outing without being reminded every forty seconds about seaweed safety procedure.

Melissa fell asleep at around ten o’clock. Molly half expected to follow suit soon after. She’d always been quick to drift off, and often had trouble staying up late, even when there was something exciting to look forward to. Something exciting like a secret mermaid mission and catching her very first glimpse of her homeland (homesea?).

As it happened, Molly’s eyes remained open, staring at the hands of the broken cuckoo clock pinned wonkily to the wall. The waves crashed against the rocks surrounding the lighthouse. The minutes inched forward as though they were moving through gloopy treacle. Molly’s limbs grew more and more restless. She twitched with anticipation, and also with the fierce desire to transform.

Quarter to midnight eventually crawled around. Molly slipped quietly out of bed and into her fluffy slipper socks, which were great for muffling your footsteps. She crept down to the kitchen, where Myla was already waiting, finishing the dregs of a milky tea. Since she was nearly eighteen, Myla could stay up until whenever she wanted, and it didn’t look like she’d even attempted to go to bed. She was still in the woolly green jumper and black jeans she’d been wearing several hours earlier.

Once they’d moved the broken dishwasher and descended through the trapdoor, it took Molly’s eyes a few moments to adjust to the dimness in the perfectly round secret room. Slowly, the glorious sight of hundreds of dusty books materialised around her. In the brief minute before the floorboards were wound back and the sea was revealed, the only scent was that of well-loved old pages.

As they transformed – a strange, tingly feeling – Myla plucked a particularly worn tome from the shelves and laid it to one side. The gold-foiled title read: The Extremely Unauthorised But Highly Interesting Complete History of Meire.

‘You’ll like that one,’ Myla said with a coy smile, wiggling her emerald-green tail in the spray from the gushing ripples of sea beneath them. Her long-sleeved top, which matched the colour of her tail perfectly, had also materialised, and glistened in the dim light.

The jumping in was the best part. Those short seconds of weightlessness as Molly dived through the air, the plunging sensation of fully immersing her body in the cool swell. The instant relief, the hit of fresh air – well, water. It never got old.

They weren’t supposed to be here at all, of course. Mum was strict about when and where the Seabrook sisters were allowed to transform. They had a midnight trip down to a hidden cove once a month, where they could splash around and get it out of their system, but other than that they were supposed to avoid transforming wherever possible. It was too dangerous, she said – too dangerous on land, because they might be seen, and too dangerous in the water, because . . . actually, Molly didn’t know exactly why it was so bad down here. All she knew is that Mum would flay her alive if she knew about the secret trips.

They swam in a different direction to Coley Cavern, where Molly went to watch Margot play Clamdunk, or to spy on Myla as she met her secret girlfriend. Instead they swam further out to sea, where the water was cooler and darker; the fish fatter and less welcoming.

On the way out, Molly was surprised to pass a few other mermaids. None of them were supposed to be this deep in the water any more. It was too dangerous, too polluted. But they passed a group of three older mermen all carrying matching spears with octopi carved on the stems, and also a haggard old mermaid with a haunted look in her eyes.

Just as Molly was beginning to worry Myla was taking her all the way to Denmark, they stopped by a slightly raised shelf of rocky seabed. Myla perched on a jutting ledge and smiled triumphantly, pointing out into the middle of the North Sea.

Molly followed her gaze, and she saw . . . nothing. Just more water, more fish, more patches of light and shade. Plus thousands and thousands of pieces of plastic shrapnel, from Tesco carrier bags to bottles of Coke and everything in between. The sight made her sad. Humans were awful and they ruined everything. There was no way she’d be able to see her homeland through all that debris.

‘I think you’re cracking up, babe,’ she said kindly to Myla.

‘Firstly, I don’t think our relationship can survive you calling me babe. Secondly, be patient. Once you’ve seen it, you’ll never unsee it.’

Molly scooted over to Myla and settled down beside her. There was strangely little sensation in a mermaid tail, so sitting on rugged rocks wasn’t as uncomfortable as it should have been. Molly sometimes thought she could take a bullet to the bit where her kneecaps were supposed to be and not immediately notice.

Myla reached into an extremely large clamshell, which had been turned into some sort of cross-body clutch bag. Molly hadn’t even noticed she’d been carrying it. Inside was a dainty bronze instrument studded with pearls: the special underwater telescope she’d talked about. The word Marefluma was carved on the stem in ornate swirly letters.

With eyes like fireflies in the deep blue water, Myla delicately swivelled various sections of the telescope into place. Removing her glasses, she held it up to her face and stared down its length.

‘Our maternal grandmother, Murielle, passed this telescope on to Mum when Mum left Meire for the human world. Mum gave it to me when I was around your age. I was just as curious as you about Meire and its secrets. If anything, seeing this tiny glimpse has made me even more so.’

She handed the telescope to Molly so carefully, you’d have thought it was a priceless diamond necklace.

‘I don’t think you’re ready for this,’ Myla murmured mysteriously.

Hands trembling ever so slightly, Molly held the peculiar instrument up to her face. As soon as her eyes adjusted, she gasped.

She could see it. In blurred strokes of light and colour, like the impressionist paintings Mrs Makvandi, her art teacher, was always banging on about.

There were swathes of copper and pearl, and what she could’ve sworn were ancient shipwrecks. There were towering buildings in deep blue and dark green and shimmering clear glass. There were a million twinkling, moving lights swirling through the city like bees in a hive.

‘Balaena,’ Myla announced grandly.

‘What are all those lights?’ whispered Molly, who had been expecting a murky ghost town. ‘I thought nobody lived there any more?’

Myla sat up straighter, eager to don her supergenius cap. ‘Once upon a time, the merministers in government paid electroreceptive fish to power the city. When the pollution got too bad for the mermaids and most of them fled to the land, the fish had nowhere to go, so they stayed in the larger towns.’

‘And the human government were happy to have us?’ Molly asked, struggling to picture a negotiation between the two species.

‘Not at first,’ Myla said. ‘In fact, the human prime minister was completely unwilling to help us. But legend goes that we had a great leader representing us, and they eventually managed to make a deal. Nobody knows what we offered in return for safe refuge. But for now, we’re allowed to live on land, providing we conceal our true identities. The second we slip up, we’re back in the sea.’

Molly mulled this over. The light through the telescope continued to shift and swirl, like the city was a living, breathing thing. ‘Hang on . . . you say most of the mermaids fled, including us. But you also mentioned our grandmother. Murielle? Where is she now? We’ve never met her, have we?’

‘No, we’ve never met her.’ Myla didn’t meet Molly’s eye, and Molly wondered whether that was the whole truth. She reached for her merpower, trying to read Myla’s emotions, but no answer came. ‘Stubborn old crone, Murielle. Refused to abandon the place she’d lived her whole life, no matter how ugly things got down there. There are still a bunch of human-hating traditionalists who refuse to move to the shore.’

‘So it isn’t too dangerous,’ Molly pushed. ‘To live there, I mean. Or at least visit.’

‘I don’t know about that. Rumour has it that the streets of Balaena flow with human sewage, and the mermaids that remain are forever being injured and maimed by vicious tangles of plastic. Maybe it’s not as dangerous as Mum makes out, but it’s still not the kind of place you want to go on your jollies.’

Molly’s heart sank. She had a grandmother down there she’d never be able to meet. A piece of herself she’d never be able to touch.

‘What else do you know about our family?’ she asked, desperate for more information, for anything that would make her feel closer to her mermaid identity.

‘To be honest, there are more gaps in my knowledge than I’d care to admit,’ Myla replied. ‘Mum doesn’t talk about it much, about our lives back in Meire, but lately I’ve been feeling like something must’ve happened to us down there. Something bad.’

‘Because we left?’

‘Not just that. A lot of mermaids left. It’s more . . . well, why is she so strict about us coming down here? She only allows us in the sea when she’s there to supervise. I know it’s a bit polluted, but how dangerous can it really be? Plus she’s accidentally let things slip to me a few times. I think there was a big fight between her and Murielle, and it’s part of the reason we left Meire. I don’t know, Mol . . . I’ve suspected for a while that there’s a bigger reason for her fear. I just can’t figure out what.’

‘Maybe the reason Mum never told us about the trapdoor library is because there’s something in the books she wants to hide,’ Molly said, curiosity burning hotter than ever. ‘Something about our past.’

Myla pressed her lips into a straight line. ‘If there is, I haven’t found it yet.’

The girls talked for a while longer, until eventually, Myla suggested they head back.

On the way, Molly spotted a pair of mermaids swimming up ahead. A boy and a girl, both with long, flowing blond hair. The girl had a deep blood-red tail, and the boy’s was inky black. On each of their shoulder blades was a strange, jagged scar that perfectly matched the other.

They swam playfully together, flicking shells and starfish in each other’s faces. There was something vaguely familiar about them, but it wasn’t until they got closer that Molly realised who they were.

Finn and Serena Waverley.

They were mermaids too.

CHAPTER FIVE

Ice Cream in Winter

The next day was a Saturday. A cold, gloomy winter Saturday, with the sky dark and ominous, and the sea gunmetal-grey. A wonderful Saturday to dress up as a haddock and hand out leaflets on a wet promenade, Molly was sure everyone would agree. (By everyone, she obviously meant madmen, axe murderers, and Margot, who was somewhere between the two.)

With very few passers-by to harass into taking menus, Molly kept gazing out at the choppy sea. Not twelve hours earlier, she’d seen the Waverley twins swimming out there in their natural form: as mermaids. She wasn’t entirely sure whether they’d seen her or not. She was equally uncertain whether it would matter if they had. After all, mermaids didn’t need to keep their identities hidden from each other – just from prying humans.

Either way, the new kids in school had suddenly become a lot more interesting. For the first time in her life, Molly couldn’t wait until Monday, when she’d get to see them again – if only from afar.

Thankfully, she had an entertaining way of passing the time. Eddie of the Ears was helping out on her shift. At first he had tried to purchase a giant fish costume online, to no avail. When he asked where he could buy one, Molly had advised him that sadly the haddock suit was an old family heirloom and nobody was quite sure where it had come from.

So, Eddie being Eddie, he had taken to the task with aplomb and made his very own cod suit, using an ingenious combination of grey binbags, duct tape and strips of tinfoil cut into scales. When his mum dropped him off outside the shop and he rustled over to Molly with a dopey grin on his pale, freckly face, Molly thought her appendix might rupture from laughter. He had even donned a tinsel scarf for a festive twist.

There was nobody quite like Eddie of the Ears. And that is precisely why they’d named a sausage after him.

‘You know, you really suit being a cod,’ Molly said without sarcasm, for maybe the first time in her life.

‘Thank you,’ Eddie said sincerely. ‘I feel very at home in this binbag. And not at all sticky and disgusting.’

‘It is a gruelling experience. But you get used to it.’

Scratching at his tummy, he grimaced. ‘I have all new respect for you, Molly Seabrook.’

Molly clutched her hand (well, fin) to her chest in faux-offence. ‘You mean you didn’t respect me before?’

‘Not at all. You had a scrambled-egg cake for your birthday, for one thing.’

Molly burst out laughing. Minnie had forgotten to include the eggs in the batter, and they’d ended up forming an omelette-like crust on top of the cake. Harrowing. ‘Fair point well made.’

The problem with handing out leaflets in early December was that the promenade was all but abandoned for the year. As a result, Molly and Eddie had to fight to the death for customers. At one point Eddie even rugby-tackled Molly to the ground so that he could give a flyer to a disgruntled old man ahead of her. Despite having the wind knocked out of her, and a not un-heavy cod boy on top of her, Molly’s sides ached from laughing.

While Eddie was still perched triumphantly on Molly, Ada appeared around the corner, bundled up in her winter coat. Climbing breathlessly to their feet, Molly and Eddie panted as though they’d just run a gauntlet against several Roman gladiators and somehow emerged victorious.

‘Hey,’ Molly said, brushing wet dirt off her fishy behind. ‘Where’s Pete?’

Ada rolled her eyes so hard it caused a small earthquake. ‘Just take a random guess, Molly. Where on earth could Pete be on a Saturday morning?’

‘Singing to the homeless? Volunteering at a soup kitchen? Washing graffiti off the town hall?’

‘Close.’

‘He’s playing football, isn’t he.’ Molly winced in sympathy, although Ada had known what she was getting into when she seduced a guy called Penalty.

‘Yep.’ Ada jangled the coins in her trackie bottoms. ‘Although let’s be real, I’d rather be hanging out with you guys anyway. Fish costumes or not. Want to get some ice cream? Steve looks miserable.’

Little Marmouth had to be the only place in the northern hemisphere where they still sold ice cream in winter. Molly looked over to the kiosk for the first time all day, which was a first. Usually her eyes just wandered over there of their own accord. But with Eddie of the Ears here to distract her, she found herself not caring whether or not Fit Steve was looking at her.

‘Excuse me,’ Eddie said indignantly to Ada, flicking the end of his tinsel scarf over his shoulder. ‘We’re working here.’

Ada frowned at his costume as though only just registering that he was wearing it. ‘Can’t you just ask Molly’s mum for a break? Neither of you is being paid.’

Eddie folded his fins. ‘It’s a matter of pride, Ada.’

Ada sniggered. ‘Is that what they call it?’

‘You’re just jealous that you’re not dressed as a fish,’ Eddie said.

‘Fine, fine, I’m extremely jealous and left out. Literally all I want in my life is to dress as a fish, and you two are a living reminder of this personal failure.’

Eddie triumphantly held up his pointy fins as though they were pistols. ‘Knew it.’

‘But I also want ice cream.’ Another jangle of the coins. ‘Shall we?’

Two fish and a tracksuit sauntered over to the ice-cream kiosk. (Molly thought this sounded like the beginning of a bad joke. Or a very strange poem.) Fit Steve looked up from his phone. If he was surprised to see the peculiar trio, he didn’t show it. Maybe he was just used to Molly’s very particular brand of weird.

‘Hello, Steven,’ Molly said, just to really hammer the weirdness home.

He raised a very beautiful dark eyebrow. ‘Nobody has called me Steven since 2007.’

‘That’s a shame,’ Molly said earnestly, trying to mirror his seriousness. ‘It’s a lovely name.’

Eddie snorted. ‘All right, Grandma Molly.’

‘Shall I fetch your Zimmer frame?’ Ada chimed in. ‘Perhaps your knitting needles?’

Eddie hunched himself over and clutched at his back, putting on a thick Scottish accent. ‘Och aye the noo, who’d like a wee scone?’

Ada and Molly fell about laughing, while Fit Steve simply said, ‘You guys are like, fifty per cent weirder outside of school.’

‘Only fifty?’ Eddie asked. ‘We must try harder.’

There was an elderly couple nearby, stringing Christmas lights around a sad-looking fir tree. The high street was much busier than the promenade, with lots of people carrying shopping bags. Molly could smell the mulled wine stall that was there all through December, and for the first year ever, she actually thought it smelled rather good. Not that she’d tell her mother that.

‘Are you seeing Felicity later?’ Ada asked Fit Steve after he’d started scooping their ice creams. Molly found herself staring at his hands in a probably very gross way. Why had she never noticed how nice his hands were before?

‘Uh, yeah. Yep. Think so.’

‘I like Felicity,’ Molly said. ‘She’s nice. Like mushy peas.’ For god’s sake! Why did she have to relate everything to chip-shop items? Or comment on how much she liked his girlfriend?

Fit Steve handed Molly a cone. He’d given her an extra scoop, which in Molly’s eyes was essentially a marriage proposal. ‘Mmmm, yeah. Anyway. Oh, er. Here she is.’

Molly’s heart sank as she saw Felicity sidling over to them. It wasn’t that she necessarily hated Felicity. Not like she used to. It was just that she always had to be a bit on edge around her, in case she let something slip about Molly’s tail – accidentally or otherwise.

‘Hey, babe.’ Felicity leaned over the counter and pecked Steve on the mouth. ‘Hey, Aydz. Hey . . . you guys.’ Her nose wrinkled at the sight – and probably smell – of Molly and Eddie in their fish costumes.

‘We were just getting ice cream,’ Molly said, trying to keep her tone light despite the fact that her speeding pulse sounded like a malfunctioning steam engine. Every time Felicity was around, she was painfully aware of how quickly and easily her life could be ruined. She had to avoid doing anything to annoy her, and if that involved making conversation like a total simpleton, so be it.

Felicity nodded. ‘I see that.’

Molly slurped her ice cream in an ugly way, to make it very clear that she was not trying to steal Felicity’s man. ‘Raspberry ripple.’

‘So the Waverleys, huh?’ Felicity said, grabbing a Flake from the glass jar and crunching into it.

‘Yeah,’ Molly blurted out, before realising she had nothing else to add that was not embargoed information regarding their tail status. ‘Er . . . twins.’

‘Do you think they seem cool?’ Ada asked, as though Felicity were the oracle of coolness. ‘Like, should we ask them to eat lunch with us?’

‘Finn plays rugby,’ Fit Steve said, as though this settled matters. Football players disliked rugby players for reasons Molly could not begin to understand.

‘That’s true, babe,’ Felicity said thoughtfully. ‘And I think Serena is a bit . . . you know . . .’

‘Vikingy?’ Molly suggested.

‘Why did the Viking buy a second-hand boat?’ Eddie asked. Everyone looked at him blankly. Barely containing his grin, he added, ‘He probably couldn’t a-fjord a new one.’

The appalled silence that followed was probably funnier than the joke itself. Molly couldn’t contain her laughter. She choked so violently on her ice-cream cone that she thought she might be sick. Fit Steve and Felicity, who were clearly humourless beings, stared at her in bafflement.

Ada came to the rescue. ‘Mol, I think your mum is shouting. Shall we go?’

‘Oh. OK.’ Molly swallowed the offending mouthful of cone. ‘Well, bye then.’

As Molly, Ada and Eddie wandered back to the shop, she couldn’t help thinking that hanging out with the Populars wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. They weren’t funny or weird, for a start, and the added tension with Felicity made it impossible to relax and chat like a normal human being.

It was all more hassle than it was worth. The original goal behind infiltrating the Populars was to make Fit Steve fall madly, passionately in love with her. But now that he was with Felicity, it felt a little pointless.

After Eddie’s mum came to pick him up, Ada hung around and chatted with Molly on the pier for a while. They talked about school, and Penalty Pete, and Minnie’s current obsession with death metal, which she had discovered on Margot’s phone.

The conversation moved from Minnie’s headbanging to the Populars.

‘Do you think Felicity likes me?’ Ada was perched on the windowsill of the fish ’n’ chip shop, shivering despite her thick coat. ‘Properly likes me, I mean?’

‘Um, I think so?’ Molly said. ‘Why?’

‘It’s just . . . I don’t know, she’s seemed a little off lately.’ Ada’s voice was soft and unsure. ‘I feel like I’ve annoyed her or something. I just hate feeling like people are angry with me, you know?’

Molly knew exactly why Felicity was off: her mum’s sickness. But she couldn’t tell Ada that. It was part of the pact. Even though Ada would never tell anyone, Molly couldn’t break her promise without Felicity breaking hers.

All Molly knew was that she had too many secrets from her best friend, and she was getting tired of trying to keep them.