Hart of the Sea

Chapter 7

I'd slept in my cave again that night, too eager to see Talia the next day. I also didn't want to swim all the way home and have to face my parents. I awoke at the first light of dawn, but she hadn't arrived until the sun made it fully above the horizon. As I swam towards her this time - taking extra care not to let my tail above the waves - she watched me with a small smile on the edges of her lips. This time, she was waiting for me, too.

Both of us being pretty tired, the only subject we could coherently form thoughts about was how our mornings were going. "Yeah, I had some cereal after I woke up, but then I came right here. I didn't want my dad to stop me before I had the chance to leave," Talia said, rolling her eyes.

Cereal? What's that? I opened my mouth to ask her, but then thought better of it. It must be an everyday human thing, judging by how she talked about it...if I reveal that I have no idea what she's talking about, that would just lend more credence to the idea that I'm not human. She must have her theories by now. I think I've given her enough material to work with, anyway.

"I'm surprised to see you here this early, though," she continued. "I thought I was the only person crazy enough to come to the beach at this hour." She giggled, but then fell silent as her eyes locked with mine. "Hey...are you sure you don't want to come out of the water and sit up here with me? You must be a human popsicle by now, I'm freezing just looking at you."

My eyes widened. "Oh. um...I'm good, but thank you. I...I guess I'm used to it. I'm in the water a lot, so..." Silt, did I give too much away?

She raised her eyebrows at me. "I mean, I used to be in the water a lot too. Sometimes it would be this early, like when I wanted to get extra surfing practice in before a big competition. But I definitely don't miss how cold it was," she said, laughing lightly. "You do you, I guess."

I gulped. "So, um...when was the last time you were in the water?" I couldn't imagine never being in the water, let alone moving around with legs instead of swimming with a tail.

She sighed. "Well, let me think...it's been a couple weeks since the accident," she said, pausing as her face crumpled ever so slightly on the last word. "And I...haven't been able to touch water since, so...yeah. A couple weeks. I've had to drop out of surfing regionals, it's that bad."

I pulled myself up, closer to her. "What...what accident? If you don't mind me asking..."

Talia exhaled roughly as a few water droplets trailed down her face. "I, um...well, my mom..." She paused, biting her lip hard.  "I can't believe I'm about to tell someone I just met about the darkest part of my life," she mumbled to herself. She took another breath, wiping her cheeks with her oversized sleeves. "My parents were both marine biologists. Both of them were so proud of their line of work. Too proud. They butted heads a lot, and...long story short, they'd been divorced since I was really little. Surprisingly, they stayed good friends, which I bet made co-parenting a lot easier. Who knew that splitting up would bring them closer together? Well, just in some ways, I guess." She lifted one corner of her mouth in a small smile to herself, as if there were some inside joke that I wasn't privy to.

All too quickly, though, her expression darkened. "Then...that day happened." Her eyes flooded with water, a sight that I was still trying to get used to. "My dad invited my mom out on his new boat a few weeks ago, right when summer started, and..." She stopped, looking out at the horizon before burying her face in her knees, which she hugged tightly to her chest.

"Hey," I whispered. Then, almost instinctively, I raised one of my hands from its place on the edge of the dock to offer her comfort. "You don't have to go on if you don't want to." It hurt me to see her so upset. I had never seen anyone as sad as Talia was in that moment.