𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬 𝐠𝐨𝐥𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐚𝐬𝐭, charlie conway

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐖𝐎

Chapter Two
Roman Holiday

     I was on Mermaid Beach at dawn. I'd go walk down there some mornings after nights where I couldn't sleep and try to spot the mermaids on my own. I saw them less and less the older I got, but I still believed. I saw their conches and seaweed purses and felt like the world still had light. I was on Mermaid Beach at dawn, but I wasn't alone.

There was a boy there. He had pretty brown hair and blue eyes, and he was standing with his feet in the water. I walked toward him, the sun warming my skin as it rose, my toes sinking in the sand with every step.

"You just missed it. I saw a mermaid splash."
"They swim away when I come now." I sighed, crossing my arms.
"They know you belong with them, but that you can't ever join them."

I snapped back to the present, sitting in my classroom across the world on my first day of school—my first ever U.S. History course. I desperately needed to pay attention, but I was so nervous I'd make a fool of myself that I couldn't.

Sometimes my mind tried to tell me things in my daydreams. I couldn't figure out what this daydream was supposed to mean, though. The image of the water and his searing blue eyes wouldn't leave my head.

I tried to focus by noting all the people and places my teacher mentioned that I had never heard of so I could study them, but I gave up on that about three quarters into the class because I already had two pages of it. I would desperately need some help—question and answer sessions with my dad and Beck and an extended visit with the encyclopedias in the library.

The bell rang and I gathered my things to move on to my next classes. I held my books to my chest until I made it to my locker, switching them for the ones I needed next. In Australia most of us simply carried our books from class to class rather than put them in a book bag, but Americans preferred the opposite so I stuck out like a sore thumb. As I turned away from my red locker door, I saw a familiar face turn and walk into the room across the hall. I only had to see a moment of his face to know who he was and that he had seen me too.

Charlie, the beach boy.
And the boy from Mermaid Beach in my daydream. I don't know how I hadn't noticed it before.

I really wished I could talk to him, but I had more important things to think about at the moment—I didn't know where my next class was. I took my schedule from the back pocket of my jeans and unfolded it, books still in my arms, and tried to discern where my film class would be.

That afternoon, I changed up after school and found my way to the olympic sized swimming pool in Eden Hall's sports complex to try out for the swim team. I'd been on the team at home and enjoyed it, but I wasn't sure if I'd be able to keep up here—Americans took sports a lot more seriously.

I swam lap after lap until slower girls were weaned out. They had me try dives and all different strokes before ending the tryout. I think I did well enough, but there was no way to tell. The first thing I did was take my hair out of my swim cap, as dry as it was before, as I made my way to change in the locker rooms.

I walked out the front door to a bench so I could watch for my father, who was due to arrive any minute since tryouts ended on time.

"They know you belong with them, but you can't ever join them."
I couldn't wrap my head around what that would possibly mean. As far as I knew, the mermaids didn't know me, just like I didn't know them personally. And I obviously knew I couldn't ever be one of them.

"Miss Gold Coast!" I heard a boy holler and my eyes snapped to him and his group of friends on the paved walkway—Charlie. "Trying to join the mermaids?"
"You betcha!" I called back. Then I realized he was being sarcastic, and his friends were laughing. I had a harder time hearing sarcasm spoken in an American accent.