Sea Change

  I nodded, but I didn’t feel as if I could talk to my mother about anything at the moment. There was an emptiness in my gut. Yesterday, when Mom had given me the spare key, I’d thought we’d patched things up, that we were back on friendly ground. Now, it seemed, everything had ruptured again.

  Before Mom left the living room, she glanced back at me and added, “I expect you won’t be having any more strange visitors or taking any trips to Fisherman’s Village today?” I could tell she was trying to come off as lighthearted, but her tone was firm.

  Since she hadn’t mentioned Siren Beach, I was able to nod.

  As Mom went upstairs, I deposited the water glasses in the sink and fleetingly touched Leo’s roses. I felt restless and jittery, almost like I’d felt my first night in The Mariner, after I’d gone for a swim. And, as I had that night, I found myself wandering down the hall, past the stairs and the mariner painting. I stopped on the threshold to the study. I hadn’t been in there since my kiss with T.J., and I was surprised to see that Mom hadn’t packed away any more books in the meantime. We so weren’t ready to leave yet.

  My thoughts roaming from Mom to Leo, I stepped into the room. At least I’d see Leo tonight, and could tell him I was leaving. But I couldn’t stop recalling Leo’s parting words, or the fact that he’d been able to observe me and T.J. from an undisclosed location. I couldn’t shake my growing suspicions, suspicions that seemed as insane as they were impossible.

  Like any good student, I knew that the answer to most questions could be found in a book. And it was starting to become clear that my questions about Leo could be answered by only one book. So I strode over to the shelf that contained A Primer on the Legend and Lore of Selkie Island. Yes, the book was, as Virginia had said, no more than a collection of superstitions. But these superstitions had taken up residence in my head, and I hoped that by returning to their source, I might banish them.

  I took the book off the shelf and settled into the high-backed chair. I was careful not to let too many pages slip out as I turned to the appropriate section. I put the book on my knees and started reading.

  Selkie merfolk are usually recognizable by a few key features: a lush, sensitive beauty; a predilection for the colors red and gold; kindness toward visitors and explorers; and homes close to the shore. They can sometimes be spotted at night, when venturing out to swim in the waters off Siren Beach.

  The island’s merfolk blend in nearly seamlessly with their neighbors. However, certain oceanic markings often adorn their places of residence. Also, it is widely believed that, despite their common ancestor, Captain William McCloud, Selkie merfolk branched off into two distinct families. One branch tends to carry the surname William or Williams, and the other carries surnames that are variations on McCloud.

  I lifted my hands from the book as if I’d been scalded. Goose bumps had broken out all over my arms and legs, and blood roared in my ears.

  Leomaris Macleod. Macleod sounded like a variation of McCloud, didn’t it? My heart was thudding. There was his lush, sensitive beauty. His nighttime swimming. The rocky grotto, where he must have always kept a pair of swim trunks to do a quick change.

  It all fit. It all fit. Like pieces of a puzzle, clicking together.

  Think of science, I commanded myself, trembling. Think of the manatees that the sailors mistook for mermaids. Think of evolution and reproduction and the system of chemicals that make up the human body.

  And then something occurred to me, something so obvious that it filled me with instant relief. I leaned back against the chair, wanting to laugh. I might not have seen The Little Mermaid, but I’d absorbed enough through pop culture osmosis to know that Leo couldn’t have been a merman. Of course not! Leo had been in the water with me. We hadn’t gone swimming, but he’d gotten his feet wet on the beach walk, and in the rain. Didn’t merfolk grow tails the minute water touched them?

  I flipped back a page or two, recalling a tiny detail I’d read last time, something about the descendants of Caya needing to submerge in the water completely to transform. But then I slammed the book shut, refusing to go down that road. Forget it. I set the book on the writing desk, beside the oblong black box.

  All the puzzle pieces were mere coincidences. The residents of Fisherman’s Village had probably decided that the colors red and gold went nicely together, and Llewellyn Thorpe had incorporated that tidbit into his elaborate fictions. The same went for the surnames, which probably just happened to be common names on the island. My first instinct on the ferry had been correct: The legends of Selkie were just that, legends.

  Still, I felt unsettled, and I knew that there was only one way I could convince myself for sure. It had to do with that most basic principle of science: experimentation. You could read and think about something forever, but nothing compared to seeing it firsthand.

  I stood up, full of resolve. Tonight, I was going to prove that the boy I was crazy about—the boy who’d also made me crazy—was not a merman. I was going to get Leomaris Macleod to go swimming with me.

  Thirteen

  KEYS

  Leaving the study and walking upstairs to my room, I was surprised to hear my cell phone ringing. Aside from Dad and Wade, no one had called me during my stay on Selkie. My first thought—hope—was that it was Leo, until I remembered that we’d never exchanged numbers. Was it Linda, trying to apologize again?

  I snatched my cell off my nightstand. I didn’t recognize the 912 area code, so I answered cautiously.

  “What happened last night?” a girl with a dainty drawl demanded.

  CeeCee. I sighed. I’d forgotten she had my number.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, kicking off my slippers. In my mind, I was still downstairs with Llewellyn Thorpe’s book.

  “Oh, my gosh! Could you have taken off any faster?” CeeCee cried. On her side of the line, I heard the creak of what sounded like a door opening, and then the thwack-thwack of CeeCee’s flip-flops as she walked. “Jackie and I were worried about you.”

  “Virginia wasn’t?” I asked wryly, flopping across my unmade bed.

  CeeCee was silent for a moment. “Miranda, I’m so, so sorry,” she said, and her voice was truly full of regret. I was starting to grasp that CeeCee, despite her shallowness, had a good heart. Maybe I’d been the shallow one, dismissing her. “Virginia and T.J.,” CeeCee continued reluctantly, “they—um—sort of, like, got together. We all went back to Bobby’s house, and they—”

  “CeeCee,” I cut in, feeling a smile cross my face. “I thought that might happen, and I’m all right with it. Honestly. I realized last night that T.J. isn’t really…the guy for me. You know?”

  “I feel so bad!” CeeCee wailed. I heard a splashing sound in the background, followed by Jacqueline’s voice. “Yeah, I’m talking to her now,” CeeCee said to Jacqueline. “Miranda, can you at least come over tonight?” she then asked me hopefully. “Maybe if you saw T.J. one more time…” She trailed off, her tone questioning.

  “Why? What’s tonight?” I asked, and felt a surge of impatience thinking of Leo. I glanced out the window, willing the late afternoon sky to somehow darken faster.

  “Mama told me she invited your mother and Mr. Illingworth over for a farewell dinner,” CeeCee explained. “I can’t believe you guys are leaving on Sunday.”

  “That makes two of us,” I muttered. What I couldn’t believe was that Delilah—and CeeCee—had known about my departure before I did. But that made the departure feel somehow all the more real.

  I assured CeeCee that I had no desire to see T.J. again. I refrained from adding that I especially had no desire to see Mom interact with Mr. Illingworth. But I was actually a little bit giddy at the thought that Mom wouldn’t be in the house come evening. That would make my escape all the easier.

  “I think I’m going to pack tonight,” I told CeeCee, lifting her bracelet from where I’d put it on my nightstand. “But maybe I could come over tomorrow to return your bracelet and dress?” I also did want to say
good-bye to CeeCee and Jacqueline—and even Virginia if she was around. I really bore her no ill will.

  “Or you could come now!” CeeCee offered, and the splashing sounds grew louder. “Jackie and I are just hanging out by the pool. Virginia’s not here,” she added loyally.

  I pictured Jacqueline and CeeCee lounging in their bikinis and felt a pinprick of jealousy. Lucky girls. They weren’t sitting around obsessing over insane things like merfolk and sea creatures. Why did I always have to be so different from everyone else?

  It was all because of Llewellyn Thorpe’s book, I decided with a small swell of anger. I thought of the book sitting innocently on the writing desk beside the black oblong box with the golden clasps.

  I felt my brow furrow. Wait.

  The box.

  There’d been so much else to distract me in the study that I’d never bothered to wonder what the box contained; fancy writing pens or small pads of stationery would have been my guess. But now that I thought about the box, I realized that it was a clone, in miniature, of another item in the house.

  The trunk in Isadora’s closet.

  “Miranda? Are you there?” CeeCee was saying.

  My heart began pounding and I swung my feet off the bed.

  “CeeCee, I’ll call you later,” I said distractedly, and ended the call.

  Certainty raced through me as I bounded out of the room and flew downstairs. Suddenly, I felt as if everything was about to unlock before me, the secrets of Leo and of my grandmother. I reentered the study, ran over to the writing desk, and for once, ignored Llewellyn Thorpe’s book.

  I reached for the black box and found that its lid was, thankfully, unlocked. And nestled against the crimson interior were, just as I’d predicted, two gold-tipped writing pens. Disappointment shot through me, but then I picked up one of the pens and stared at what had lain underneath it.

  A tarnished brass key.

  My thudding heartbeat started up again.

  The key. It had to be.

  I glanced up at the painting of Isadora. She must have loved the study, to hang her portrait here. In my ransacking of The Mariner, I had never thought to look for the key to her trunk in the most obvious place.

  Clutching the key in my fist, I swept out of the room and was starting up the stairs when I almost crashed into Mom. She was in her linen pants and a boatneck top and was carrying her tote bag.

  “I’m headed into town to pick up a bottle of bourbon for the Coopers,” she told me, and then filled me in about the dinner that evening. “You should come, too, if you’d like,” she added, giving me a contrite smile; it was obvious she still felt bad about Greg.

  The key digging into my palm, I managed to say that I’d already declined CeeCee’s invitation. I waited until Mom had descended the stairs and exited the house, and then I continued the rest of the way upstairs, my pulse hammering.

  I dashed into Isadora’s closet and pulled on the string to turn on the overhead bulb. Then I pushed past the rack of clothes I hadn’t packed away, knelt before the trunk, and inserted the key.

  Even though I’d been sure, I still heard myself gasp as the lock turned.

  Slowly, I lifted the lid, and the smell of mothballs drifted up to greet me. The trunk contained a single dress: Cream colored and strapless, it had dusky pink flowers appliquéd along its neckline and down its full, gauzy skirt.

  Bewildered, I pulled the dress out, creating a shower of dust. The gown wasn’t as much my style as the lacy black dress that hung behind me, but it was inarguably beautiful. And it was definitely fancier than anything else in the closet. But that didn’t explain why Isadora would have stashed it away.

  Setting the dress aside, I peered back into the trunk, hoping for a clue. All that had been underneath the dress was a thick stack of envelopes, bound with a rubber band. I grabbed the stack and saw that a typed note on white paper was wrapped around the entire stack, encasing it.

  Curiosity quickened my movements as I snapped off the rubber band and unfolded the letter. The date at the top was recent, only a few months before Isadora’s death.

  The letter read:

  Dear Mrs. Hawkins:

  Per the request of the deceased, one Mr. Henry Blue Williams of Selkie Island, Georgia, enclosed please find the correspondence Mr. Williams wished to bequeath to you in his last will and testament.

  Sincerely,

  Daryl Phelps, Esquire

  I felt a shiver as I set the letter down on top of the dress. So someone—whoever Henry Blue Williams was—had granted Isadora a gift shortly before her own death. Had that inspired Isadora’s subsequent generosity toward Mom? And what was this correspondence, exactly?

  When I looked back at the yellowing envelopes in my hand, I gave a start; the address on each envelope was penned by Isadora herself, in her looping, elegant script. And they were all addressed to:

  Henry B. Williams

  5 McCloud Way

  Selkie Island, Georgia

  The return address on each envelope was The Mariner, and from the postmark date, I did a quick calculation: When these letters had been sent, Mom had not yet been born, and Isadora must have been in her late twenties. I tried to recall if I’d heard the name Henry Blue Williams before, but the only names familiar to me were Daryl Phelps—the lawyer Mom had been in touch with—and the street name on the envelope: McCloud Way. That was the name of the dirt path that led to Leo’s house. Why had my grandmother been writing to someone in Fisherman’s Village?

  My fingers shaking, I flipped the first envelope in the stack over and lifted its flap to reveal the onionskin letter inside.

  June 15

  My beloved,

  I think of you always. As I sit here, sweltering on the back porch, little C. is having a tea-party with her dolls, little J. is racing on the beach, and J.H. is storming around inside, fixing himself another gin and tonic. All of it ordinary, but when I gaze out at the deep ocean, you come to mind, and I remember how extraordinary—how magical—life can be. Thank you for teaching me that very important lesson.

  Forever yours,

  IBH

  I put the letter down, my heart banging against my chest. I couldn’t believe that people actually used such flowery, romantic language in real life. And I couldn’t believe that my own grandmother had written those words—to some guy. Not my grandfather—that would be the J.H. in her letter. And little C. and little J. had to mean, respectively, Aunt Coral and Uncle Jim.

  Then—

  Had Isadora had an affair?

  I felt like I’d just stumbled deep into history, into a part of my grandmother’s life that I wasn’t meant to see.

  An affair. The idea of cheating made the back of my throat burn, made me feel ill. I thought of Linda and Greg, and then I pictured my late grandmother in her youth, lovely and coquettish. Had she really been the type to cheat on her husband, on the father of her children? Was that why my mother called her a monster?

  I looked down at the curves and loops of my grandmother’s handwriting—so different from my own neat, solid penmanship. As of late, I’d been feeling a growing connection to Isadora, perhaps because of our physical resemblance. But now I could feel whatever strange loyalty I’d had beginning to ebb away.

  Still, determined to know more, I opened another envelope, this one postmarked a few days later.

  My beloved H.,

  I hate that we are kept apart by our vast and complicated differences, by your situation. It makes me want to push down the walls of my house and run reckless into the ocean. It makes me no longer want to hide our secret. If only we could spend forever on Siren Beach, far from the prying eyes of society. Tonight I will curl up in the study, read poems by T. S. Eliot, and dream about you.

  Always,

  IBH

  I put the letter down. There were many more envelopes, but first I had to think, to collect my scattered thoughts. I sat down on the dusty floor, leaning back against the unsteady wall of dresses behind me.


  I wondered if what I had read could be taken at face value. Maybe these letters, like Llewellyn Thorpe’s book, were metaphoric—not meant to be literal at all. Though there was no mistaking that Isadora had referred to this man, this Henry Williams, as her “beloved.” There was no denying that she’d planned to dream about him. I’d gotten C’s in English, but I knew that there wasn’t too much room for metaphor in those phrases.

  But there were other things in the letters, other vague references that were not so easy to decipher. I hate that we are kept apart, Isadora had written, by our vast and complicated differences. Her words reminded me of what Leo had said earlier, on the porch, about the two of us.

  And what did Isadora mean by Henry Williams’s “situation”? Was something wrong with him? Almost without meaning to, I glanced down at my bare feet. Webbed toes or fingers were interesting, I thought. There was something aquatic about their appearance, almost as if they were vestiges of people’s ancient existence in the water.

  Or maybe that’s what merfolk were.

  I felt my heart rate spike. There was something I’d just read in Llewellyn Thorpe’s book, some small seedling of a detail that was struggling to make its way into my head. I knew it pertained to Isadora’s letters, but I couldn’t recall it.

  I glanced back at the two envelopes I had set aside. The twin addresses stared back up at me. Henry B. Williams. Henry B. Williams.

  Williams.

  Shock coursed through me.

  Oh, my God.

  According to Llewellyn Thorpe, Williams was one of the surnames associated with the descendants of William McCloud. The Williamses were a separate branch of the merfolk family from the McClouds.

  Which meant that, if Llewellyn Thorpe’s book was in any way factual, then the man my grandmother had had an affair with had been…

  Sweat broke out on my forehead as I got to my feet. No. It couldn’t be. The book was not factual. Isadora must have been referring to their class differences—she living in the ivory tower of The Mariner, Henry Williams residing in Fisherman’s Village.