December 18th | Thirteen Days until NYE

The three of us sat silently in dusk. The TV was flickering while we watched the movie, by Maureen's eyes, but our minds were elsewhere. Leah's fingers kept tapping her knee. Benji had a hand in his hair, resting his weight on his arm to look fatigued. I was slowly eating the last of the popcorn, the kernels brushing my nails as I skirted them away, the loud rolling across the bowl made Maureen jump, blink rapidly, and she shook herself awake.

"Oh..." She groaned, sitting upright from the couch, and looked at the time. "I'm gonna go to sleep early, 'that okay?"

"Sure Gran." Benji blew her a kiss. "Sleep tight."

I said goodnight as she stepped over Leah's stretched legs on the floor. Leah said 'night', and Maureen merely waved, stumbling from the long day into the comfort of sleep.

We'd spent most of our day hanging out with Maureen, because we knew the long wait we'd have until night fell - until we could go to Siren Bay under the shadow of those sleeping, to not be caught, and not have Henry and the others be caught as well.

When Maureen's door shut, we waited. Benji held a hand up when Leah began moving, and we heard the creak of a bed being laid in, and the click of a light turning off. Benji slowly lowered his hand after a few moments - then we set my plan into motion.

I turned off the TV, the last scene of Leah's favourite show The Witcher echoing in my mind. As we packed away the food, being as quiet as we could to not alert Maureen, I replayed the scene in my mind.

To think that a show with monsters, creatures, humans, and sorcerers, ended with a hug sat warm in my chest. For a world showcasing how evil people could be, how cruel, the last scene between two characters who just wanted to sit down, to be safe, and to not be hunted for a moment - it was a little too real for me.

I couldn't stop thinking of Henry and his mermaid family - where they monsters? Henry's touch on my waist when he saved me flooded in my mind, even though the golden-tailed mermaid had tried to drown and hurt me. No, he wasn't a monster.

Just because someone wasn't human didn't label them a monster. Just as someone being human meant they could be a monster too.

What mattered was who made the monster - was Frankenstein the monster for creating his creature? Or was the creature the monster all along?

As I finished putting the food away, Leah and Benji wiping down the table and setting the cushions and blankets back to where they belonged after where we'd all gathered on the floor to watch The Witcher, the fridge door shut with my final thought echoing in place.

Were the mermaids born or created? And if so, where was the creator now? Who was the Frankenstein in this tale?

"Sylvia?" Leah asked as she grabbed her bag, motioning to Benji, ready to go. They were waiting on me.

I smiled weakly, nodding as I grabbed my own bag and we edged to the front door. Benji grabbed the keys from the hook and waved for us to get out. I breathed in the hot summer air, my skin sticky with humidity after we bathed in the air-con for most of the day.

We had done everything we could to stay awake and wear Maureen down enough so she slept heavily through the night. To make sure she wouldn't catch us sneaking out and tell on my parents. The cold, sweat trailing down my spine while Benji, Leah and I walked to meet Henry in Siren Bay was both from the heat and from the fact my best friends knew about my biggest secret.

I didn't want to think about my parents finding out I was breaking my word to them. Their reaction... I would be grounded for life, and that would just be the beginning.

The sun was just starting to set as we made our way down the steep street to the sea. We decided to walk, just in case Benji's Swift Taylor woke his gran, and the walk down would give us the opportunity to talk about yesterday.

Yesterday, when my best friends discovered the existence of mermaids in the ocean, and that I'd known for six months and not said a word.

For a while, all I heard was the sound of our footsteps on the road, Benji's thongs slapping against his heels. Leah's boots were a solid thunk against the ground, a sturdy reminder of her presence at all times. At the pace we were walking, it was less of a stopwatch, time counting down, and more of a strong heartbeat.

"So..." Benji broke the silence. "Mermaids."

"Yep," I said.

Benji slowly nodded his head in thought. "Yep, that's all the information I needed."

"You're welcome."

"So helpful."

"What would you do without me?"

Leah rolled her eyes at our antics. "I know your word is everything to you, and all that, but we need some answers here."

I sighed and kept my eyes on my feet as we went further down to the sea, my internal box of secrets beginning to tip further into the open. "I don't know about mermaids." At Leah's abrupt snort, I looked up. "I'm serious. All I knew was Henry, and I've known him for six months."

"You met him at your birthday, that's where you ran to." Leah said, repeating what she'd said yesterday, on the boat before the golden mermaid tipped us all out and tried to kill us.

"Yeah, but I didn't know he existed before that night." I admitted as I glimpsed the car park of Whale Beach through the trees. "I went to Siren Bay because..."

"Because?" Benji pushed.

"Because there was a misunderstanding at the party." I swallowed the memory down, the burning of my cheeks from shame. "And I needed to breathe."

"So you go to the ocean? Bit ironic."

"What?"

"Going to the sea, where in it you can't breathe, because you need to breathe." Benji explained, stumbling as his thongs slipped when he stepped from the road onto the curb.

Leah rolled her eyes again. "Okay, ignoring the irony, you went to our Siren Bay and you, what, saw Henry lounging on a rock like Ariel?"

"Something like that." I smiled, biting my lip at the memory. "We'd just met, I'd seen his tail when we heard some people at the beach and he didn't know if he could trust me with his secret yet."

Leah stopped, putting a hand on my arm so I halted as well. "Did he kidnap you?" Her voice was cold.

"...Uh, yes and no. He panicked, he didn't know what to do."

"Did he or did he not kidnap you?"

"Leah..."

"He kidnapped you." Leah started walking again, Benji and I following at her heels quickly. "I can't believe this."

"Leah there's more to the story than that!" I hurried to keep up, Benji's flip-flopping shoes the staccato of an increased heartrate. "There's Henry's side too-"

"Oh I'll have words with him." Leah bristled as we made it to the car park of Whale Beach. Leah paid no mind to the shut cafe, the empty kids playground, or the pine needle leaves under her feet as she walked by them all and jumped down to the sand. "Very, very, big words. Words like justice system and imprisonment."

Benji caught up to Leah, holding her arm so she slowed down. "And where, exactly, are you going to imprison a mermaid? Where are you going to find a lawyer that will believe you if you tell him a mermaid kidnapped your friend?"

Leah stopped on the sand and turned to me, the cogs turning in her mind. It was like she finally twigged that mermaids were outside of the law - because outside of the three of us, no one knew they existed.

"Technically we were in international waters." I joked, and Leah's expression tightened like she was doing everything she could not smile.

"That was funny, I'll give you that." Benji held out his hand for a high five and I slapped it. "But why did you keep wanting to go back?"

"Because of Henry." I looked at my friend as we walked to the ocean pool by the cliff, around the corner from our Siren Bay. The golden sunset kissed the rocks, lighting the way for us as we made our way over. "He kept me alive in the water, in winter, and I owed him to keep his existence a secret."

"But he also brought you into that position in the first place." Leah pointed out.

"He was scared Leah, he didn't know what I'd do - and I think I was the first person he'd spoken to in a long time." I admitted as we crossed the first trench in the rocks, the water churning beneath as the tide came in.

"But there was more of them?" Benji said, counting on his hand. "There was Jason, then your Mr. Kidnapper, Goldie-locks, the Johnny Bravo look-alike, the Trent dude, and...the orange-tailed one."

I raised a brow. "Your nicknames are so original."

"Hey, they tried to kill us, I can call them whatever I like."

Leah shook her head, her plum-purple hair brushing her shoulders as we rounded the corner of the cliff to our treasured hideaway. "The nicknames aren't the worst part of this - Sylvia, be honest with me. Is this the first time you've been back to see him?"

"The night you caught me was the first time I'd seen him since my birthday." I said honestly.

"From the way you worked Benji's boat, I'd have thought otherwise."

I held a hand up. "No, I knew how to work Benji's boat because I used to sail - I know my way around a boat, Leah."

"Why didn't you see him sooner?" Benji asked, holding his arms up so he kept his balance while he walked across the wet boulders. He was probably regretting wearing the thongs; they had no grip on wet surfaces. "Wait - your parents?"

"Yeah," I said as we came up to the second trench in the boulders, the one filled with sand and the gateway to the ocean, the sea rushing through the portal and brushing the hidden cove. "They grounded me and I gave my word to not go in the water, especially at Whale Beach, until the new year."

"Why are you breaking it now?" Benji asked as I hopped down easily onto the sand. When I looked back up, he and Leah were standing side by side, waiting for my answer.

"I felt like I was running out of time," I admitted. "I didn't know if Henry would be here, I didn't know anything, not even his name. I just knew I had questions and he was the only one who could answer."

Leah lifted her chin. "I have questions too."

"Leah you can't fight a mermaid." Benji hopped down next to me and I steadied him when he swayed off balance.

Leah shrugged and jumped down as well, though her landing was much sturdier thanks to her boots. "I bet I could - I've read enough books to know how to kill vampires and werewolves, and there's hundred percent a book out there that deals with mermaids."

"Should I remind you we almost drowned yesterday?" Benji said, but he was smiling at Leah's determination.

"I was caught off guard - it happens!" Leah scowled at Benji's grin. "Stop laughing at me, I'll find a way!"

Benji didn't stop laughing at Leah, and when he kept on chuckling Leah punched his arm lightly. "You're an idiot."

"Says the one who's trying to fight a mermaid," Benji pointed out. "You can't even find your sunnies most days, how are you going to find a way to kill a mermaid?"

"Well silver is a good place to start." Leah hummed to herself as she sat on the sand, I followed suit and Benji sat on my left. "That seems to hurt supernaturals."

"Where are you going to get silver large enough?"

"I'll get a knife."

I raised an eyebrow at Leah. "Do you know how expensive silver is?"

Leah paused, took out her phone and searched the going rate. "It's $863 a kilo?!" She shrieked. "Fuck me that's a lot."

"You have $900 for a knife?"

"No." Leah pursed her lips and threw her phone aside in a huff.

Benji leaned forward with a smile. "Maybe you won't need to hurt them Leah, they could be really nice and lovely."

"Shut up Benji."

"Maybe you'll fancy one."

"Over my dead body."

I smirked. "You could be the Eric to their Ariel."

Benji gasped. "Oh my gosh, Leah as a Disney Princess? I can't, that would be fantastic!"

"Just imagine it!" I began to laugh.

"Can you feel the love tonight?" Benji quoted. "'No, piss off!'"

I clutched my belly as Benji and I hysterically laughed. It was funnier looking over to Leah and seeing her cold expression, and Benji began wheezing. I started to snort - and Leah cracked.

"Oh my God you and your fucking snorts!" Leah laughed, the smile immediately lighting up her face. "Stop it you two."

"Imagine," Benji wheezed, "imagine Leah on The Bachelorette!"

Leah held her head in her hands as Benji and I laughed to the point we were rolling on the sand. "I won't be that bad!" She said, smiling as we were tearing up at the thought of it.

"Just think!" Benji held a hand up, the other clutching his chest as he wheezed again. "A guy walking up to Leah and being like, hey, but she'll just be like, nope go back the way you came, I can't-"

"You'd definitely tell someone to turn around!" I laughed to her and she went to shake her head. "Don't try and deny it!"

"Okay I would!" Leah admitted and Benji and I laughed harder. "Will you two pull yourselves together? You're so childish."

"Says you!" Benji called out and Leah shot up.

"You wanna fight?!"

"Children!" I put my arms around them both and hugged them to me. "This is a safe space, we can be civil and respectful and most of all, peaceful."

Benji paused as our laughter died down, the waves the only sound we could hear as the night began to creep up to the sunset like a cup over a firefly. "Leah would still be the greatest bachelorette ever, just saying."

"I'd flay them alive, Benji."

"That's why it would be great!" He said and I laughed, Leah smiling into my shoulder as I let the hug go. The moon was glistening as the last of the sun melted into the horizon, and darkness began to dance on the water.

As our laughter died down, my smile remained. "What would Benji be like on The Bachelor?"

Leah snorted. "He'd fall in love with everyone."

"I would not!"

"You so would!" Leah laughed. "You see someone with dimples and tats' and you're planning your wedding."

Benji raised a hand to counter, but shrugged instead. "Okay, yes I would."

Leah looked to me. "Syl' would hear out everyone's story, with all their red flags, and still go on a date."

I dipped my head. "Yup, that's me."

"The secret keeper and story hoarder of all," Leah mocked a cheers with her hand. "For all monsters and humans alike."

I paused at the underlying tone. "They're not monsters, Leah."

"You were kidnapped by a mermaid - there is nothing he nor his group of fishes could do to change my opinion of them."

Benji leaned into my ear. "She's gonna school them."

"Shut up!" I laughed and when our giggles died down, I realised that the ocean was eerily quiet. When Benji went to speak again, probably to make another pun, I gently placed a hand up to halt them. They both froze and looked at the gateway to the sea, the bridge between monster and human, and waited.

Benji wasn't patient. "What is it?"

I swallowed the pebble of emotions in my throat. Before I could explain the cool feeling in my belly of an eerie presence, that sixth sense of something other watching, a human-looking hand gripped the rocks. The gateway framed the mermaid slithering its way into the gap, the dark eel tail flicking back and forth as he hauled his weight over sharp rocks and into the alcove of Siren Bay.

I smiled when Henry looked up to meet my gaze, and he nervously returned it, flickering his brown eyes between Benji and Leah as they beheld him in the sea, properly seeing him for the first time.

"Hi Henry," I said, watching as he shifted his weight so most of his tail was under the water and hidden from sight.

"Hi Sylvia." Henry withdrew slightly at Leah and Benji's staring until I elbowed them both. Benji jumped, grinning wide, and Leah crossed her arms in an attempt to be unimpressed - yet her brown eyes were glistening with revelation.

Benji sat up straighter, his back hunched as he cocked his head to the side, examining every inch of Henry - to his bare chest, the tousled black hair, and where his torso melted to tail. "Hey," his voice wavered as he realised he was talking to an actual mermaid, "I'm Benji and this is Leah."

Leah lifted her chin in acknowledgment as Henry hesitantly waved at them both. There was this tension like caramel beginning to simmer, and I didn't know how to break it - until the waves broke it for us.

Another hand grasped the gateway and Trent hauled himself through. Henry snapped his head to him, a flash of shock in his eyes, and Trent just shrugged his large, broad shoulders. His black skin blended smoothly into the dark tail, the moonlight kissing the curves of his body.

When he was finally through, resting in the alcove with Henry, he sighed. "They wanted to come, and I couldn't let Trouble go without proper supervision."

Henry groaned as I heard more splashes outside the gateway. I tried to lean and peek but I couldn't see beyond, it was too dark now, and Leah looked to Trent. "Which one is Trouble?"

"Jason." Trent and Henry said in unison, and someone popped their head in the gap with a wide grin.

"You called?" Jason joked, and with his only arm hauled himself through, tumbling at experiencing his weight above water, and rolled through the shallows before he got his balance. He looked at us three on the beach and bowed his head. "You have been blessed with my perfect self."

Trent slapped him round the side of the head, Jason immediately went to slap him back but Trent's tail snaked out and shoved his under the water, and Jason slipped again with a shriek. When he was above the surface, he spat water in Trent's face.

With his face soaked, Trent looked to us. "This is why he's Trouble."

"I get it," I laughed out, watching as Jason's arm held firm while he adjusted his tail so he could sit upright, unlike Henry and Trent who were resting their weight on their arms. It looked like Jason had done it a thousand times before, or maybe all mermaids were naturally fluid in their movements - but then, he had also tumbled through the gateway like a newborn foal.

Henry looked up to Trent. "Just him?"

"No." Trent scowled at the gateway. "Danno and Caspar are here too."

Henry pinched the bridge of his nose. "This...this is gonna be chaos."

Jason's tail splashed water over Henry. "Hey, just because I'm here doesn't mean it's gonna be chaos."

"You're the epitome of trouble."

Jason turned to us with a grin. "You piss off one whale and suddenly you're nickname is trouble."

"It was a killer whale!"

"Orca, schm-Orca!" Jason's smile didn't leave his face.

Henry groaned as the blonde-haired mermaid hauled himself through, his arms scraping the sides of the rocks. He was the largest of them so far, and his bright blue eyes watched Leah, Benji and I carefully as he slid amongst his friends. It was beginning to be a tight squeeze, eel-like tails churning in the water as they tried to get comfortable in the shallows, when a copper-haired mermaid leaped through with the grace of a salmon.

All of them groaned as the orange-tailed mermaid, the smallest of them all, landed on their backs and his tail went wild while he tried to get comfortable. We watched as they snapped and laughed and groaned, water splashing up in all our faces as the last mermaid quickly fell in place, landing in front of Leah's shoes.

Leah stiffened as the orange-tailed mermaid with dark copper-brown locks looked up and met her eyes, his own a deep hazel, and quietly smiled. Gently, to not startle her, he held out a dark shape in the moonlight. A gift, a token, a sign of-

"Aren't they your sunnies?" I blurted out as Leah froze. They were definitely her dark aviators, her precious sunglasses that she constantly lost. She'd been wearing them yesterday when we capsized, she must have lost them overboard, and now...

Leah held her hand out, hesitated, and then gently took the wet glasses from the mermaid's grip. Her expression was calm, in awe, there was no anger in sight as she looked at him and said, "thank you".

Benji whispered in my ear. "Like a rose." I fought the urge to smile, thinking of Leah on The Bachelorette and a mermaid as her winner.

"So..." Leah said, her throat bobbing as she broke the silence. "Who's who?"

Henry raised a hand. "I'm Henry, and Trouble here is Jason, then Caspar," the blue-tailed blonde nodded his head, "then we've Daniel next to Trent at the end."

Daniel, the orange-tailed mermaid who gave Leah her sunglasses back, smiled at us and the silence descended for a moment before I cleared my throat. "I'm Sylvia, and this is Benji, and Leah."

Caspar stared at me for a moment. "Nice to finally put a face to a name."

Henry quickly slapped him with his tail, the scuffling beginning again as Caspar went to start another fight, even with Jason between them.

"Boys, we have company." Trent hissed, motioning to us three. "We should be a little more civilised, don't you think?"

"I'm sure some of them like it rough." Jason said, winking at Benji, who went incredibly red in the face. I could picture it now; the boy who couldn't swim and the mermaid who'd do anything to walk again.

This time, Caspar slapped Jason on the back of the head. "What?" Jason ducked, grinning.

"Civilised, Jas'." Trent scolded. Jason frowned, but seeing Daniel still smiling he grinned again.

"Fine!" Jason bowed deeply to us. "I hereby extend my apologies to you, oh blessed ones of astounding beauty. Please accept this favour as a token of my gratitude."

"Did you just quote Shrek?" Benji asked.

"Yes!" Jason was still smiling as he nodded to him. "A man after my own heart."

"Where's the other one?" Leah asked, and the silence crashed upon us all like a fierce wave. The only sounds were their tails gently moving in the shallows, their eyes darting between themselves, not once looking at the beach. "Where's the golden one?"

Caspar shifted his weight on his elbows. "Winnie decided to stay back. She didn't want to scare you guys again."

"She's the one who tried to kill us." Leah pointed out.

"That wasn't Winnie." Caspar immediately defended. "She...wasn't herself."

"Is she now?" I asked, and Caspar stared me down. "I mean, is she okay?"

Caspar's stare softened at the edges. "Yeah, she'll be alright."

Daniel quickly reached a hand out to tap the beach, locking eyes with Henry. He stiffened at the action, when Daniel gestured with his hand between him and us sitting on the beach.

"Daniel wants to know if you're okay." Henry said, and seeing the slight confusion on our faces, he clarified Daniel's silence. "Danno's mute. Winnie usually translates for him, but she's... You know."

"Oh," I said, and looked to Daniel's intent hazel eyes watching us. "Yeah, we're fine. Just have some questions though about...how this all happened, I guess."

Leah sat up. "I'm sorry, but I'm confused as fuck. You guys seem so human and yet-"

"We're not?" Trent said harshly, and the mermaids stilled, like they'd remembered the weight of their tails. "It's not easy to forget."

"I bet it isn't," Leah hooked her glasses onto her collar so she had her hands free. "But how are you guys so..?"

"You can say it, you know." Caspar's voice was a low baritone, but like his stare, fierce with a soft edge. "You can say the word mermaid."

Benji sat forward. "Technically, wouldn't you guys be mermen? And Winnie, mermaid?"

"We're not really fussed." Henry explained. "We don't really care about the word, we're more focused on what it means for us."

"I think what Leah was getting towards," I cut in, seeing how tense Trent and Caspar were getting, and how Jason was losing his smile. "Was how you ended up here? I mean, you can't have been in the ocean all your life, because you've seen Shrek? But can you guys go on land?"

"What," Jason asked. "Like H2O?"

"Why aren't your tails glowing?" Benji suddenly asked - and the mermaids fell silent again.

Henry shifted his weight, his hands digging into the wet sand. "We've never actually explained this before." He said, looking to his friends. "I don't know...who wants to start?"

Daniel raised his hand with a smile. Trent rolled his eyes, and looked to us, to the humans on the beach. "I'll start at the beginning, how about that?"

"It's a pretty good place to start." I said, smiling warmly.

Trent tapped his fingers against the rock nearest him. "Last year, around this time last year, there were six earthquakes in western New South Wales." He cocked his head to the side in thought. "Just outside Wilberforce, I think. Anyway, we were in an underwater cave system, and each quake was the result of one of us getting our tails."

"The cave system lead out to the ocean," Henry added. "We all followed it and stayed by the coastline since, afraid to be caught, and we stuck together as much as we could."

"And it's been that way since." Caspar finished, eyes downcast in nostalgia. "We were just figuring...ourselves out; our tails, our humanity, and seeing what we'd become. It's just the six of us."

"Until Curious George over here decided to wander off." Jason flicked his gaze to Henry, who had the sense to look embarrassed.

"I wanted to see people." Henry admitted, and locked eyes with me. "I wanted to see humans again, to see people swimming in the surf, barbies and gathos', I wanted to see it and pretend I could be a part of it."

Benji looked to me after he paused. "And you found our Siren Bay."

"This isn't called anything." Trent raised an eyebrow. "Unless it's been named rather ironically recently."

"It's what we've called it since Year 7." I explained, nudging the sand with my toes. "It's been our little escape from everything - coming down to our own little beach and it just being us three."

Trent nodded, seeming to understand the need to escape from our own minds and worlds for a moment. Maybe the mermaids understood that more than we ever could - need to swim, to run, to clear your head from every shadow trying to catch up; every secret and monster.

Leah spoke up. "You've been like this for a year?"

"Yeah, just about." Henry said.

"Can you change back? Or are you stuck as...mermaids," Leah forced out the word, like she was afraid if she did it would all be real, "for the rest of your lives?"

Caspar, once again, broke the silence Leah created. "It's out of our hands." He said, and the words had more effect on the mermaids, who's expressions shattered with a memory that wouldn't escape no matter how hard they swam away from its shadow.

"Is there anything I can do to help?" I asked, and was aware of the weight of Leah's stare in the side of my head. Benji shifted on the sand, watching the mermaids react to my question.

Henry cracked a smile. "You've already kept our existence a secret for six months, which caused you more harm than good."

"How exactly did you meet Sylvia?" Benji asked.

"And why did you kidnap her?" Leah added.

"He didn't kidnap me-"

"You kidnapped her?!" Trent boomed. "Mate, please tell me they're joking."

"I...no? I mean, kind of?" Henry stammered under Trent's stern gaze, and practically wilted when Trent pinched the bridge of his dark brows.

Jason started to laugh, his tail coiling as he curled up, roaring in hysterics. Daniel was reacting the same way, though no sound emerged from his mouth. Caspar was frowning at the spray of water from their antics of hilarity, stiffening when their tails slapped over his.

"I'm about to throw you back in the ocean if you don't stop slapping me." Caspar warned quietly, but Jason and Daniel kept laughing away.

"How on earth did you kidnap someone, Henry?" Trent said over the top of Caspar. "What part of 'keeping safe, keeping away', did you not understand?"

"I panicked!" Henry admitted. "I heard people and I didn't know what to do-"

"So you kidnapped someone?!"

"Well, yes?"

Trent sighed, and stared at me. "I am so sorry for him in every way."

"Hey, what would you have done?!"

"Not gone to a human beach in the first place and risked being spotted!"

I quickly raised my hand, noticing the volume was rising a few octaves beyond quiet and quickly approaching loud. "I already forgave Henry months ago," I said to Trent. "He kept me alive until it was safe for him to come back. He did obey your rule, in a way - he kept safe and he kept away, he just so happened to bring me with him."

Trent sighed again, but the anger seemed to sizzle from his eyes, easing enough that his voice came out at a normal level. "He knew better than to be this close to the shore, Sylvia. He fucked up."

"I trusted him to get me back home," I added. "And without us meeting six months ago, we wouldn't be here now."

Henry stiffened under my words, and Caspar looked up at Trent rather coyly. "She has a point - they're the first people we've spoken to in a year."

"I was getting tired of hearing your voices." Jason added, and looked to us three. "And they're much prettier to look at."

Caspar slapped him round the head again but Jason ducked before he could make contact with him. "I have a point and you know it!" He laughed.

Leah had her arms crossed. "I still don't like how you kidnapped one of my best friends."

Henry swallowed, no doubt seeing the unwavering loyalty in Leah's eyes to Benji and me. She was often called scary or intimidating behind her back, and it wasn't the common dark clothing or the purple hair, the black boots, or anything appearance related that made people hesitate around her - it was often they were intimidated seeing someone so fiercely themselves, and knowing they could never be as willing to defend their own.

"I heard her crying," Henry said and I flushed at the memory. "I couldn't just...do nothing, so I came over. We spoke, and Sylvia didn't freak out at," he motioned to the tail, "and when I panicked over voices coming, I tried to back out, but I didn't know if Sylvia would tell anyone, if I could trust her."

"You also had gotten stuck." I pointed out, just so I wasn't the only one embarrassed.

"I...yeah, my tail was stuck." Henry smiled as we recalled the memory. "When I took you into the ocean with me, we spoke about everything. You promised to keep my secret."

"We never traded names," I said to ease some of the wariness in the mermaids' eyes. "He never mentioned you guys, probably to not risk you."

Henry nodded in agreement. "We had nothing but our word and blind trust, but for the entire six months since, there's been nothing harming us from you guys; no police, no helicopters, nothing."

Benji nudged my shoulder with his. "You just so happened to kidnap the one human who can truly keep a secret to the grave. She never told anyone - we were all lead to assume she'd been adrift for two nights."

"So," Caspar asked me, "why was it more harm than good to not say anything?"

A pang echoed in my chest, that inner box of secrets rattling. "Surviving two nights in winter, adrift, would have killed me. The police knew I couldn't have been alone, and when I didn't answer their questions, that's what started it. They tried to get my parents to ask, but I said nothing."

I kept my lips shut at the words threatening to spill, the secrets twisting in my gut. There'd been so much fall out in not giving Henry's name - the police thought I'd been kidnapped too, and it was a form of Stockholm Syndrome, or that the kidnapper would return. I was adamant that the weeks after my surfacing there'd been an undercover police car camped outside the house, watching to see if anything would happen.

I'm certain they still visit, that car slowly driving down our street, doing a u-turn, and parking nearby for the night to see if I was still normal, my life was normal.

And that wasn't the most harmful part - the biggest secret I was keeping, Henry's existence, was so large a burden to carry I couldn't be the resident secret-keeper for my year anymore. I couldn't listen to anyone tell me their crush, that they were cheating in exams, that they were thinking of doing something stupid. I couldn't hear it.

"You truly said nothing?" Trent said. "For six whole months?"

"Yeah."

"The only reason Benji and I are here right now is because we followed her onto the dinghy yesterday." Leah admitted. "Everyone knew Sylvia was protecting someone, but Benji and I were the only ones who seemed to let her be. We know her so damn well that if she was protecting someone-"

"-It was for a reason." Benji finished, nodding. "Our Syl' doesn't give her word for no one."

I shyly looked up at Henry. His dark eyes were twisting with emotions I couldn't name, speaking in a way I wanted to understand. What was going through his mind as our tales finally connected and were spilled to our closest friends?

"This also means you guys can't say anything, you know." I pointed out.

"Oh yeah, of course." Benji said. "I completely get it. Cross my heart, I promise."

Leah nodded. "Siren Bay's safe - but I'm not gonna cross my heart." She gestured to Benji, who'd actually done the motion over his chest.

Henry smiled at me, and the twisting my gut wasn't from any anxious secrets I kept buried. "I trust you." He said, and those words softened the edges of my worries, and brought a smile on my own face as well. 

~

Meet the mermaids! Henry, Jason, Caspar, Daniel, Trent, and Winnie. More details about them will surface later, but to clarify if confusion - Jason only has one arm. Daniel is entirely mute. 

Fun fact regarding those six earthquakes, they actually happened. In December 2019, NSW experienced six mild quakes in the west, outside Wilberforce, with no one harmed and just shaking. There wasn't a lot of coverage on them at the time because it was in the midst of our dreadful bushfire summer.

Find out more about our misfit mermaid family in the next chapter!

With love, 

Libby x