Sitting on the dock nearby was Mullins, his britches rolled up and his bare feet dangling in the water. He was staring at a little gold device in his hand attached to a broken chain like it was a puzzle.
“Well?” I urged.
“Uh…” He shrugged, putting the pocket watch in his lap and scrubbing the confused look off his face. “Three minutes.”
“You jest,” I said, treading water as I contended with his answer.
“Seven minutes!” someone called from up the beach.
David was standing with his hands cupped around his mouth and I waved, thankful someone else was counting.
“Agh, this thing makes no sense,” Mullins complained. “Don’t know why people carry ‘em.”
When he drew back his hand to toss the thing into the water, I stiffened.
“Don’t!” I watched it arch over me and disappear in one of the waves. “The thing’s worth gold, you idiot.”
“Huh. Don’t know why I did that.”
“Go get it, then.”
“You go get it. I been staring too long at the damn thing and you’re the one who wants to be a damn fish!”
Just then, a ghostly shape moved past me in the water, surfacing at the dock. Mullins yelped, pulling his feet out of the water as Meridan emerged, holding up a delicate hand with the pocket watch dangling between her fingers.
“Lose something?”
“Don’t do that!” Mullins chided. “There are sharks in these waters.”
“We know.”
He took the watch, tossing it onto the dock before reaching for a beige shift that was draped over one of the posts. As Meridan climbed out of the water, her legs halfway shifted from her long, white tail, he handed it to her, letting her pull the garment over her head before she sat beside him.
“Where is Dahlia?” I asked.
“She patrolled the east side. She’ll be along.”
“Any trouble?”
Meridan shrugged, leaning back on her hands. “Far less than a few months ago.”
I took a few calm, deep breaths, preparing my lungs for another plunge. When I ducked under the water, all I saw was the sand and thickening darkness beyond where the sunset lit up the waves like fire. I emptied my lungs, letting myself sink further into the water, and watched those shadowy depths, listening to the strange silence that was the vast ocean. My heart slowed. My muscles relaxed. I floated, between the surface and the floor, waiting, when subtle chirps started to echo from beyond the shadows and rhythmic clicking noises started to bounce off every surface like pebbles.
Since hearing Dahlia and Meridan in the water for the first time, I knew I could never tire of it, but Dahlia was uniquely beautiful to me. To the untrained ears, it was nothing but an ambient sound rolling on the rhythm of the waves, but to me, it was her voice. Her true voice. And as her dark shadow materialized from the murk, her onyx tail shimmering with silvery-violet undertones, my heart thundered in my chest as if trying to go to her. She glanced my way, the length of her flowing hair gathering like smoke around her head. She pivoted her body toward me, cutting gracefully through the water like a snake across grass, long and gorgeously lethal in her effortlessness. There was something in her hand, but I disregarded it, elated just to see her.
I watched her circle me like a shark, winding around my body once before settling in front of me. Those same little chirps and clicking noises surrounded us and I knew they were coming from her, despite seeming as if they were all around us. On her ribs, three crescent slits fluttered softly as she breathed me in.
I longed to spend more time beneath the surface, but my time was cut short by my mortal need to breathe air. I pushed off the bottom and Dahlia followed, mirroring my pace until we both breached.
Under the darkening sky, her eyes practically glowed as she shed the blackness. She smiled softly at me, her fangs still sharp.
“You’re getting much better.”
“Aye. Still no gills, though.”
She slowly started to circle me again, sucking her bottom lip between her teeth as she ogled my bare torso. Her tail, at least twice the length of her legs, encircled me fully, rubbing lightly against my legs.
“The water’s quiet, like yesterday,” she said.
