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“Really?” he said, grabbing a dirty t-shirt to soak it up. Teddy meowed and lapped at the pooled water at the bottom of the bowl. Ethan paused as he stared back at his reflection in the shallow puddle, his mind whirring.

“Water?”

Ethan moved back to his desk and grabbed his pen, furiously moving across the page as he wrote, Water?? He underlined it over and over, pressing the pen hard enough that the ink started to bleed through to the next page.

His chest tightened as he remembered the way the ocean had reacted last night. The way it had surged around them, practically exploding in response to touching Evie.

He’d only been in Seattle for a year, but it didn't take a scientist or a local native to know that the ocean didn't writhe like that without the aid of powerful winds. And last night there had been nothing to justify it. No storm. No wind. Nothing.

Ethan had been writing everything off as stress-induced hallucinations, his mind playing tricks on him. But that? That had been undeniable.

Why is it always something with water?

Not to mention the nightmares of drowning. His hallucination on the Ferris wheel. Last night at the lighthouse. All of this weird shit revolved around water one way or another, with Evie directly in the center.

“All of this weird shit started when I met Evie.”

He flipped back through the notebook, turning the pages until he landed back on the poem he wrote the night they met.

“Blue…The Gray Gull,” he muttered.

Ethan had first met Evie that night at The Gray Gull, right on the water, overlooking Elliott Bay. Then, Pike Place Market—also the same thing. The Ferris wheel on the pier. And last night, the lighthouse.

“Always water,” he muttered, tossing the pen onto the desk. “Also, who the fuck doesn’t have a phone?” Sure, it was possible, but what twenty-something didn’t?

Ethan found himself mindlessly scribbling on the page, lost in thought, his pen moving in aimless circles. When he looked down, his stomach dropped.

Two glowing eyes stared back at him from the page, suspended in the black scrawl.

Teddy jumped onto the desk with a hiss as he pressed his eyes shut, scrubbing his face with both hands.

Looking back at the paper, the eyes had disappeared. Only a black mass of scribbles was on the page. “What the fuck?” He paused, staring at the page where the eyes had been, then back at Teddy, who had already moved on to the couch behind him, meowing softly.

Ethan couldn’t shake the feeling inside him, something he knew was insane, but everything that had been happening to him pointed toward it. The hypnotic melody he’d been hearing in his dazed mind, the nightmares of drowning, the scales he was positive they’d both seen. All of it was impossible—and yet.

Ethan brought up the search browser on his phone and paused, chewing his cheek before he typed: Mermaid, Seattle. He was met with a list of overpriced nightclubs, a link to hire professional performers for birthday parties, and a roaring sense of embarrassment at the thought.

Heat flooded his neck and cheeks as he slammed his phone down on the tabletop. Teddy jumped a few inches, back arched, before settling back down with what Ethan was certain was a glare back at him.

“What the fuck am I even saying?” He groaned, running his hands through his hair. “I sound fucking crazy.”

This wasn’t some fucking fantasy book. This was real life. He didn’t even recognize himself anymore. Creating a fucking conspiracy board about a girl he couldn’t get out of his head? A girl who’d just made it very clear she didn't want anything to do with him.

Holy shit. I’m actually losing my mind.

Ethan abruptly stood from his desk. His gaze moved toward the single open window next to him, watching as dust motes floated in the stream of sunlight. The apartment walls were closing in on him.

Air.

He needed to get the hell out of his thoughts and his tiny apartment.

Grabbing his phone, he glanced at the time. He’d been sitting here for over an hour, and what had that gotten him? A list of random observations and a search history that would get him committed?

I’ve gotta go, he thought.

“I’m heading out. Be back soon, okay?” he said, giving Teddy a parting scratch behind the ears.

She stretched and yawned, curling back into a ball on top of the couch, without a care in the world.