I hold my hands out, trying to get my balance and ground myself. “It’s okay, I have probably nottotallylost it and cracked under the stress. I’m sure I’m not hallucinating right now.”
My words do very little to calm me because if I’m not dreaming—and I suspect I’m not—and I’m not hallucinating like I just said… then that means that I really am a mermaid and I’m not entirely sure how to process that sort of information right now.
“Okay,” I say too loudly. I wince slightly, wondering how my voice carries in the water. It should be muffled but it isn’t. “I won’t process anything.”
First things first, I need to get to the surface. I think I’ll feel better if I am breathing air instead of water. And in the face of something as daunting as trying to figure out what is going on, I will take the little wins where I can get them.
I bite down on my lip, struggling to get my fin to work. I find that if I pretend I’m pressing my legs together and moving them in sync, I’m able to better control my movements instead of trying to yank my legs apart.
My head breaks the surface of the water and out of habit, I gasp for air. I reach my hand up to swipe the water and my trailing hair out of my face just as a ship comes into view, rocking on the waves and heading straight toward me.
My eyes widen, but before the ship bears down on me, its side swipes against some of the rocks. The rocks rip a jagged hole in the wood and water immediately rushes in.
My hand flies to my mouth as I hear men shout in panic overhead.
It’s as though the ship is disintegrating in the storm and chunks of wood and stuff from the top deck begin falling into the water. I’m so shocked and enthralled watching this that I don’t notice the chunk of wood plummeting toward me until it smacks me clean in the face.
My head whips back and faintly I taste blood. I think I bit my tongue, I process hazily as I sink to the depths of the sea.
