A Season of Mermaids

We were mermaids that year.

Even though we were twins, I'd never felt as mysterious or beautiful or smart as Lily. Not until that summer.

Fresh on the cusp of adulthood, splashing into the unknown and diving deeper than we'd ever been. We'd spent the last of our summer working at Beach N' Burger together, a small burger and shake shack right on the boardwalk. All of the boys came to gawk at her, her high ponytail swishing as she passed their tables. She didn't know how much I envied her.

After work, with a tangerine sky turning into night, we'd take our boards and paddle out into the ocean, sitting under the bone-colored moon. Beneath the surface of the sea, I felt myself becoming more real. Holding my breath until I saw the stars in patterns behind my tightly closed eyes. Then I'd break the surface with a huge splash, taking in as much oxygen as my lungs could hold.

In those nights, I learned to breathe more of the air around me, to take up more space, to expand as much as I could, instead of shrinking into my own bones.

Somehow, the salt cleansed more than just my outer scars. It filtered through my pores and detoxed the sadness in my soul.

Lily never knew my inner turmoil. She thought we were the same. That her light and my light had the same luminescense. But I was always dim and dull compared to Lily, just a shadow that stretched out onto the pavement behind her while she walked.

She was always bright and airy and tinkly, like wind chimes. And I was hollow and full of bass, a dark tunnel where bad things had crawled inside and still lived there.

But that summer changed everything.

When we got our jobs, I started saving money. I hid it in an old gym shoe, wrapped up in a sock at the back of my closet. I knew I would leave when we turned eighteen. I knew I'd never look back. I loved Lily with all my heart. And even though I was always a fraction of a person next to her, she was the only one that mattered.

But I couldn't wait until the whispers in the night were gone. The shifty fingers that fumbled in the darkness. The violations from the vile and the vain. I couldn't wait for all of it to stop. Until the madness was swept out to sea, with my old life and my old name.

The more I played below the waves, the calmer I felt. The longer I held my breath, the easier it was to breathe. Being a mermaid would be my salvation.

I'd started surfing further out. Sometimes, Lily and her boyfriend Max would call out for me, frantically waving their arms from the shoreline. I knew I scared her, but she never asked me why.

I like to think she knew what I was planning. That she was giving me permission. She had to have known. That's why she did what she did.

At the end of summer, I planned to swim out one last time. I would go out as far as possible, watching Lily as she got smaller and smaller on the shore. And then I would simply sink to the bottom. I would do it at night, so it would be harder to search. I'd do it at night because the darkness was already where I lived.

But Lily, she foiled those plans.

We found her on the last day of summer. Her towel was folded in the sand, her phone and her flip flops neatly on top, waiting for her to come back.

I left two days later. And when I pulled the money from my sock at the bus station, I found a note from Lily.

Layla,

You were never the darkness. He was. You are the brightest star in the sky. The North star. Shine for me, so one day I can find my way home.