Land To Sea

Last Minute

Dallas and I had been absolutely nothing short of impatient the last five days.
I won't deny it. We did attempt, multiple times, to get Aunt Bridgette to talk, but she wouldn't budge.
School seemed to drag on endlessly, but finally it ended. And there were only two more days until we knew what was happening.
Dallas and I were on the couch, mindlessly watching TV, but different questions were circulating in my brain.
Our parents said it would happen on our birthdays. So would that mean, it would happen to me first? Or Dallas?
And what was it???
What were our parents trying to tell us? But more importantly, would I finally get to meet them? Of course I knew them as a baby, but how could I remember, when they had left just less than a year after my birth?
"Hey Dallas,"
"Yeah?"
"You were almost 4 when our parents left, do you remember them?" Dallas sat up straighter and looked at me thoughtfully.
"I remember what they looked like, and I remember when they left, but that's about it."
"What does Mom look like?" I couldn't remember at all.
Dallas smiled a little bit at the thought of her.
"Well, they were both young, but Mom looked straight out of high school," he laughed.
"She looked a lot like you, actually. Long blonde hair, and she had the exact same eyes as you. Same shape face, but she's short, I bet you'd be a good 5,6 inches taller than her. You must've gotten that from Dad." I stood at a sturdy 5'9 and My brother was about 6'4.
"What did Dad look like?" I don't know why I whispered it.
"Dad had my hair, but he had green eyes. I guess I got Mom's." He smiled again.
"Dad was tall. Maybe my height, maybe taller. I don't remember. And he and Mom both had a little tattoo on their wrists."
"What was it?"
"It was a dolphin, and they would put their wrists together and the dolphins made a heart. They did it all the time for you as a baby." Dallas continued to smile.
"Do you ever miss them too?" I asked quietly.
"Constantly." He answered.
I nodded my head and stared at the Target commercial playing on the TV. A family of four were modeling clothes and dancing about beside a little white dog.
Perfect family.
Would Dallas and I ever get that?

•

I was awoken by my alarm ringing in my ear. I groaned and sat up in my bed as I silenced my cell phone.
"Holy shit." I whispered out loud. Today was June 17th.
Today was my birthday.
I jumped out of my bed quickly and ran to the bathroom for a quick examination.
I looked up and down, front and back, closely and from afar, side to side, but nothing was different. I didn't feel different, look different. Nothing.
"DALLAS!" I screamed towards his room, still scanning for anything wrong or new.
"WHAT?!" He yelled back, running into the bathroom.
"What's different?"
"Absolutely nothing! I'm so confused."
"Nothing? How? The letter..." He trailed off.
"I don't know." I responded.
"We don't even know what should be different." Dallas said, frustrated.
"Wait a minute," His eyes fell to my foot.
"What?" I asked curiously.
"Look!" He grabbed my foot and pulled it into the air, causing me to lose my balance and stumble backwards.
"What is that?" I asked, staring at the shiny silver dot on the side of my foot. Dallas examined it carefully, twisting and turning my foot around. I jumped in surprise when the light hit it, sending out an array of sparkly light.
"What the fuck?" Dallas whispered, still staring wide eyed.
"I know. AUNT BRIDGETTE!" I yelled.
"Bright idea." Dallas said, dropping my foot.
"Hey you two. Happy birthday, Skylar." She gave a smile and hugged me.
"What'd you need?" She placed her hands on her hips.
"What is this?" I jabbed my foot in her direction. She looked at it carefully for a moment with her eyebrows scrunched together. Then she started to laugh. Yeah. Laugh.
"What?" I asked confused. Dallas stood in shock beside me.
"Congratulations Skye! I assume the rest will come at your actual birth time."
"What? Congratulations? The rest? The rest of what?" I started firing questions at her.
"Oh don't worry. You'll know very very soon. Dallas, you'll be quite a bit quicker since you were born in the first minute of the day."
"I've never been this confused in my whole life." Dallas responded.
"I know. Please trust me." Aunt Bridgette smiled and left us alone in the bathroom.
"Well I guess we wait?" I looked to Dallas.
"I guess so."

•

"Dinner!" I heard Aunt Bridgette call up to where I sat in my room, reading a book.
I got up to go to the dining room and groaned as I noticed my feet and legs.
The silver things had populated over my skin, almost covering my feet and were scattered up to my calf.
I reached down to touch one. It was smooth like a fish's scales, but more defined with blue tints.
I tried to pull it off, scratch at it, the full 9 yards, but it wouldn't budge.
I gave up and skipped downstairs.
"Look at this!" I wailed at Dallas and Aunt Bridgette.
Of course Aunt Bridgette was elated about whatever the hell this was, but Dallas looked just plain scared.
"What happened to your hair?" Dallas asked.
"What?" I asked as I ran to the bathroom to look in the mirror.
My hair was significantly longer, brighter blonde, and its ends had been tinted blue.
"Holy fuck! What the hell?" I yelled. It didn't look bad at all, but definitely unsuspected.
I left the bathroom and sat at the table. Aunt Bridgette placed an aesthetically pleasing salad in front of me.
"Thanks." I mumbled.
"Oh, don't worry Skye. Only a few more hours. Trust me, everything is going perfect." She placed a reassuring hand on my shoulder and took the seat to my left.
We finished dinner quickly. Even though I was terrified, I forced myself to look.
The silver scales had traveled up to my knees and had almost completely consumed my feet.
"Just a few more hours." I assured myself quietly.
Just a few more hours.