And Then I Turned Into a Mermaid

CHAPTER FOUR

The Transformation

That evening, the sky was clear and smattered with twinkling stars. The new moon reflected in the smooth surface of the ocean. It was nearly midnight, and the town was fast asleep. And yet, for some absurd reason, here Molly was in a secluded little cove on Little Marmouth beach, shivering in her dolphin-print pyjamas.

Less than five minutes earlier, her mum had hauled her out of bed and out of the house. Despite Molly’s protests, her mum was adamant, and threatened to feed her tuna salad every day for a month if she didn’t oblige. Like any sane person, Molly detested tuna salad, and so here she was.

Now she was left wondering why on God’s sandy earth her mum and three older sisters were perching on a cluster of rocks and staring at her so expectantly as she stood at the edge of the water. Minnie had mercifully been left to snooze in the lighthouse mere metres away.

‘May I help you?’ Molly said. She patted her face to make sure there was nothing on it. The light of her torch swung wildly around the cove.

‘I wonder what colour it’s going to be?’ Margot chattered excitedly, hopping from one foot to the other. Her long curly hair was wrapped up in a silk sleep turban, which she’d stolen from the snooty old lady on the promenade.

‘It better not be yellow. That’s my favourite colour.’ Melissa folded her arms across her chest.

Margot snorted. ‘Definitely not pink. What’s the opposite of pink?’

Myla pushed her glasses up her straight nose. ‘RGB and CMY are the correct representations of the spectrum of visible light, wherein the opposite of red is cyan, and the opposite of light is dark. Thus, the opposite of light red, a.k.a. pink, is dark cyan, a.k.a. teal.’

Margot smirked. ‘Or . . . pinkn’t.’

A wave crashed and fizzed on the sand, narrowly missing Molly’s feet. The tide was coming in.

Molly was getting more irritated with every nonsensical comment. ‘What are you talking about, for the love of –’

‘Less of the lip, Molly,’ her mum tsked. Thankfully she was fully clothed this evening, which was a relief for everyone. ‘And for what it’s worth, my money’s on tangerine.’

Molly pressed her teeth down on her tongue to stop the snarky comment from escaping. But just then, another wave lapped at the shore, at Molly’s feet, and the tips of her toes began to tingle.

She blinked against the moonlight, wriggling her toes in her now too-tight wellington boots. The tingle continued to spread, a confusing warmth building in the arches of her feet, shooting up the planes of her shins and wrapping around the crooks of her knees.

Am I having a stroke? she wondered, terror growing in her chest.

Her great-uncle had a stroke once, back when Molly was in primary school. Apparently he smelled burnt toast when it happened. Molly sniffed the air in desperation, trying to pick up a trace of charred Hovis, but all that met her nostrils was the tangy stench of seaweed. And, you know, seagull poop.

‘What’s happening to m–’ she started, before realising her discomfort was causing excitement levels amongst her siblings to skyrocket. The more her legs shook like jelly, the more they grinned and squealed. ‘Seriously, why–Ooft!’

Suddenly her legs clamped together, causing Molly’s balance to be entirely thrown off. She fell backwards and hit the sand with a muffled thud, eyes watering from the impact. As she did, her loud-mouthed family fell deadly silent.

‘Can someone help me up?’ Molly moaned, massaging the spot on her shoulder that had taken the brunt of the fall. Nobody moved. ‘Or, you know, don’t, and just watch me suffer.’

Still silence.

Her hip was aching too. Molly went to rub it, and let out a squeal.

It felt like . . . scales?

Molly gasped, wriggling into the best sitting position she could manage. She was terrified to look down, but her eyes tugged her there anyway.

No. Surely not. She had a tail.

A mermaid’s tail, whiter than snow.

She was dreaming. She had to be. Or was it an elaborate practical joke? Margot was famous for her pranks, and this was a particularly impressive one. Next she’d be turning Fit Steve into a centaur. Molly didn’t think she’d mind that, actually. She’d always thought centaurs were weirdly handsome.

‘Very funny, Margot,’ she said, trying to find the place where the tail ended and her waist began so she could wrench the darn thing off. But even in the starlight, Molly could see that Margot was pale as the moon, lips pressed into a faint pink line. And, most notably, Margot also had a tail. Pillar-box red and speckled with coppery sparkles.

In fact, they all did. Mum, who was now paddling in a rock pool, had a tail of dreamy lavender. Melissa’s was buttercup-yellow, and Myla’s was deep emerald-green with silver shimmers.

Really, this was a very advanced practical joke. Molly had to applaud Margot. She had definitely evolved from the days of cling film over the loo.

She was about to congratulate her sister on her world-class pranking abilities when something stopped her in her tracks. Her hand had found the place where the tail joined her waist, high up near her belly button, but there was no seam. It was like the scales were welded to her skin. Like they really were a part of her.

The thought sent her stomach into a spiral, and dizzy spots prickled around her vision.

‘Um, guys? What’s going on?’ she asked.

Myla was the first to speak. ‘It’s white. That’s . . . different.’

‘That’s boring,’ Melissa added.

Margot snorted. ‘When it’s Minnie’s turn, I’m starting an official sweepstake, and I’m putting all my worldly possessions on mauve.’

Molly felt four pairs of eyes boring into her, like when the kittiwakes watch you intently in case you drop a chip. She still felt dazed and woozy, the way she did when she was drifting off to sleep.

Forcing some strength into her voice, she muttered, ‘If you’re done with your nonsense commentary, I have some questions.’

‘Right! Yes, of course,’ said Mum, wiggling her pale purple tail in the rock pool. ‘What would you like to know?’

Molly stared at her. ‘Well, I thought that might be obvious.’

‘Well, we thought the mermaid thing might be obvious,’ Margot snarked back.

Molly shot her a dagger-filled glare.

Shuffling up on to a rock, her mum said gently, ‘You’re half-mermaid, sweetie.’

‘Half ?’

‘Your dad was a regular human.’

Molly never thought she’d envy her long-lost father for something as basic as his biology. ‘Lucky him.’

Mum ignored the snark. ‘Anyway, now that you’re thirteen, your mermaid side has awoken. You’re old enough to explore the other part of your life. Your tail. Your mermaidhood. But don’t go in the deep sea. It’s no longer safe. Especially for half-humans.’

‘Oh, right, of course,’ Molly muttered. ‘No sea. I’ll just flop around on the promenade, then. How about ponds? Are ponds dangerous? Or bogs?’

‘Ponds are fine,’ Mum answered, as though it had been a serious question. ‘I wouldn’t recommend bogs.’

Molly’s mind raced. Surely, surely she was dreaming. And yet when she bit down hard on her tongue, she didn’t wake up. Her chest pounded, and her breathing grew quicker and quicker as she tried to fight back the tide of panic.

‘But mermaids aren’t real,’ she said, her words growing in uncertainty the more she examined her bright white tail. ‘They . . . We . . . Mermaids aren’t real.’

‘That’s what we want them to think,’ Mum replied, winking.

Who’s ‘them’? Molly wondered as she stared at her shimmering scales. The tail was as easy to move and control as her legs, and twice as powerful.

Looking around at her sisters, Molly noticed they weren’t wearing those tacky seashell bras, like mermaids do in cartoons. Instead they were wearing elegant long-sleeved tops – perfectly fitted and cropped just above their tails, in the same shimmery colours as their scales – that they definitely had not left the house in. Even her mum, who’d had a double mastectomy not long after Minnie was born, wore a top so well-fitting it was like her very own skin had turned a glittering lavender-purple. Molly looked down to find her own pyjama top had somehow been replaced with a beautiful shimmering white top.

Molly dimly wondered how all their pyjamas and shoes had disappeared, but it seemed quite minor compared to suddenly sprouting a fishtail, so she shook the thought away.

‘I’m . . . I’m a mermaid?’ she said, as though saying it out loud would make it feel more real.

‘But you only get the tail when you’re near water,’ Margot explained, adjusting her sleep turban. Her poppy-coloured tail was vivid and, Molly had to admit, beautiful.

‘How near?’ Molly asked.

‘When you can feel the ocean in your heart, then you’re near enough,’ murmured Mum, eyes glazed and glassy.

‘Right, fantastic,’ Molly snapped. ‘In my heart. Got it. But just as a rough estimate, how many metres?’

‘The mermaid instinct cannot be measured in metres,’ her mum answered, laying her hand over her heart. ‘There’s no tape measure for the soul.’

Wondering gravely why her mother had suddenly transformed into a raving lunatic, Molly tried again. ‘Right, but if there were a tape measure for the soul, what might it say? Like, am I going to flop around the school hallways whenever it rains outside? Am I going to knock people out with my flailing tail whenever we pass the swimming pool?’

Mum nodded. ‘If your soul desires it.’

Molly had the strong urge to slap her mother with a wet cod, but reckoned there was every chance mermaids liked that sort of thing.

‘Mum’s mastered it to the extent where she doesn’t transform until she’s actually in the water. It’s very impressive.’

‘Hence the skinny-dipping,’ Margot added with an eye-roll.

‘How is this happening?’ Molly whispered fearfully, a thousand questions simmering in her brain.

‘How does anything happen?’ Mum answered. ‘It just . . . is.’

‘So if Minnie came home one day with an elephant trunk you’d say, oh, never mind, it just is?’

Margot snorted. ‘Be realistic, Molly.’

‘Realistic! You call this thing realistic?’

Myla tutted, shaking her head. ‘You’re really being very closed-minded.’

‘Well, excuse me for not just immediately being like, oh, I have a tail, cool, what’s for dinner?’

‘We already had dinner,’ Margot pointed out. ‘It was awful.’

‘Oh my God, why are you deliberately dodging my questions?’

Mum snapped out of her sea-witch whisper and sighed. ‘Molly, if you’d just calm down –’

Anger bubbled in Molly’s throat. ‘How do you honestly expect me to calm down?’

Melissa inhaled deeply, then exhaled exaggeratedly. ‘Just . . . breathe.’ She looked up at Mum for approval.

‘Through what, my face or my gills?’ Molly snapped. ‘Assuming I have gills? For the whole breathing underwater thing?’ Running her hands over her once smooth neck, sure enough there were a set of gills. ‘Brilliant. Just what I’ve always wanted. Holes in my skin! The hot new look! Coming to a freak show near you!’

Even Margot looked worked up now, wringing her hands together and gritting her teeth. ‘Molly, seriously, can you please just relax?’

‘I’ll relax you!’ Molly shouted. ‘Permanently! You know, because you’d be dead.’

‘Molly!’ her mum yelled, raising her voice for the first time in forever, at the same time as Margot said, ‘That’s a bit much.’

Molly wasn’t about to stick around to be told off. She began shuffling up the beach as best she could, using her hands to drag her impossibly heavy tail through the wet sand. Gasping and panting, Molly cursed this stupid situation as she moved mere flounders at a time, while her mother and sisters watched with alarm – and a little amusement.

She’d gone no further than two metres when she finally gave up, collapsing to the ground with a sob.

Mum shuffled over to the spot where Molly lay face down in the sand, and rubbed her shoulder affectionately. Her palm was warm and soft and comforting. ‘Molly, talk to me. Why is this upsetting you so much?’

‘Because . . . because . . .’ Molly spluttered, mouth full of sand. ‘I’m a freak. We’re all freaks. We always have been, and now we’re even more so. Why can’t I – we – just be normal?’

‘There will come a time when you’re grateful for the things that make you stand out. Trust me. Until then, you just have to weather the storm. And you’re a Seabrook – we’ve always been good at weathering storms.’ Mum gestured to her flat chest, then her empty ring finger, and smiled warmly.

Molly did understand what Mum was saying, but all she could muster was a half-hearted, ‘Hmph.’

‘And you mustn’t tell a single soul, all right? This is a secret we will take to the grave. Not a single soul. Do you understand?’

Molly snorted then. Did her mum think she was some kind of idiot? Like she’d ever tell anyone how much of a freak she truly was.

And that was it. The truth bigger than all of this. Bigger than discovering her freakish family were in fact mermaids. Bigger than having her very own tail.

Fit Steve would never fancy her now.

And she would never, ever be popular. Not in a million years.