Deep Betrayal

chapter 24

CONFESSION



A hand slapped down hard on the kitchen counter. “Tell me,” Mom said. “Don’t lie to me anymore, Jason.”

“You’re getting upset over nothing.” Dad’s voice was a cool contrast to Mom’s frantic plea.

“Nothing? Nothing? What is wrong with you?”

Sophie and I crept down the stairs to listen. I held my arms open, and she crawled into my lap, burying her face in my neck.

“Where are you going?” Mom asked, her voice dropping an octave. “Every day you disappear. For hours on end.”

“I told you, Carolyn. I’m working. Getting ready for classes.” From where I sat, I could see Dad’s face. It was barely recognizable. A person’s soul is in their eyes, and his were all wrong.

“Bullshit,” Mom said, and Dad winced, turning his back on her. I thought a curse from my mother’s lips would make the earth crack open. Instead, the front door slammed with an enormous bang, sending vibrations up the wooden steps and into my backside.

I shifted Sophie onto the step and ran back to my room, throwing open my window to the crisp morning air. “Dad? Dad?” I called.

I couldn’t see him, but he snapped back, “What?”

“You all right?” I asked, quiet and unsure.

“Perfect.” He took three long strides down the porch steps and across the driveway.

“Where are you going?” I called.

“Out.”

I took the screen off the window and crawled onto the porch roof just as Calder came around the side of the house. I hadn’t seen him in days, and he ignored the fact I was even there.

He grabbed Dad’s shoulder and stopped him in his tracks. “Give her another try, Jason. You need to give it time to work.”

“I tried to do it like you told me, but it’s no use. I only feel worse.”

“Dad, please don’t go,” I said, creeping closer to the gutter. “I haven’t seen you in two weeks.”

He didn’t turn around. He only shook off Calder’s hand and ran into the woods. I watched him go, forcing myself not to ask Calder the questions that hung in the air between us: Was Dad’s betrayal complete? Had he left us for good? I knew the answers. To have Calder confirm them aloud would only make them more real.

Calder was smart enough and kind enough to be silent. He seemed to be listening for something, anyway—something too far away for me to hear. After a moment, he said, “That’s that, then.”

He hung his head and walked to his car. I watched as he climbed in the back and lay down on the seat. His feet hung out the door, and he threw one arm over his face. Only in that gesture did he answer me. Dad wasn’t coming back. And I couldn’t help thinking it was all my fault. If I’d never told him the truth about what he was, he’d be a normal dad, in the kitchen doing crossword puzzles.

Running back downstairs, I found Mom in the living room. When she heard me coming she drew the back of her hand across her eyes.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“What does it look like?”

She was going to have to work harder to deter me. “He’ll be back,” I said, hoping it wasn’t a lie. Even if I didn’t believe it, I needed to get the words out for her. Even if she didn’t believe me, she needed to hear them.

Mom moved slowly into the kitchen, wetted a rag, and started wiping down all the surfaces. “He’s always gone. He comes home late, if he comes home at all. He hasn’t slept here in nearly a week. I think it’s pretty clear what’s going on, Lily.”

“No, Mom. It may be many things, but it is definitely not clear.”

“Tell me I’m being silly.”

“Dad’s not having an affair, if that’s what you’re saying. I know that much for certain.”

“He never used to lie to me. I know life hasn’t been easy since I got sick. I wouldn’t blame him if he wanted to leave.”

“Dad loves you. He needs you to be happy. Try and fake it if you have to. I can’t explain, Mom, but you have to trust me. If you’re angry, if you’re sad, it’ll be harder for him to come back.”

She laughed one hard laugh and threw the rag into the sink. “Seems a little circular, don’t you think, babe? It’s the coming home that will make me happy, not the other way around. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be having this conversation with you. Fine bit of parenting, isn’t it? Never mind, never mind. I think I just need to take a bath. A bath and a nap.”

A small whimper drifted down the stairwell and Mom rearranged her expression. “Can you take Sophie out for a bit? She’s been cooped up with me so much. Go do something fun with her. That would help me a lot.”


The noontime sun blazed down on us as we bobbed a safe thirty feet from our dock—me, Sophie, and Calder—in our small, aluminum fishing boat. A blue plastic cooler sat by my feet. Water sloshed gently against the hull. None of us spoke. Worry roiled in my head like storm clouds. I hoped that was the only reason Calder wouldn’t look at me, and it wasn’t that he was still mad about my eavesdropping, or worse, holding back an I told you so. You should have never told your dad the truth.

Why hadn’t I believed him when he said it was a bad idea? Surely he had better instincts when it came to merman matters than I did. But no, I had to go plowing ahead, so certain it was the right thing. Dad would have never left if I’d only kept quiet.

Sophie reached into her pocket and pulled out the prism from her Girl Scout project. She dangled it over the side of the boat and let the sun work its magic. A spray of sparkling color reflected off the water and the side of the metal boat. Rainbow beams twirled around in a circle, hitting our faces, as the prism spun on its string.

“What are you doing, Sophie?” I asked.

“Fishing,” she said, as if this should be obvious. She wouldn’t look at me, either.

Calder shifted in his seat and kept his head buried in an old National Geographic.

“You’ll have better luck if you put some bait on a hook,” I said. “Maybe they’d like salami.” I grabbed a sandwich from the cooler and broke off a corner for her.

“You fish your way,” she said. “I’ll fish mine.”

Calder didn’t seem as amused by her as I was, and seconds later the first lake trout darted toward the surface, knocking its side against our boat with a soft thud.

“See?” she said smugly. “They like the colors.” My skin prickled when she added, “Isn’t that right, Calder?”

Calder laid down his magazine but kept his eyes cast down. He dragged his foot through the scattering of sand on the bottom of the boat.

Sophie continued, “I was playing with the prism one day when I was working on my Girl Scout project. A whole bunch of fish started circling around the dock. I put the prism away, and they went away. When I pulled it out again, they came back. Calder likes prisms, too.” She looked up, seeing for the first time the way I stared at her.

“Don’t be mad!” she said, looking away quickly. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

Calder asked, “What do you know, Sophie?” His tone was serious but nonthreatening.

She shrugged. “I watch. People think I’m too little to notice stuff, but I know.”

Sophie spoke only to Calder now. “You and my dad disappear. You’re gone for a long time. When you come back, your hair is wet. When I hug Dad, he’s cold. Once when you came back—you weren’t here, Lily—you found my prism and dangled it over your head. I know what you are. I know Dad is the same.”

“That’s enough,” Calder said, and Sophie shut up, her cheeks flushing scarlet.

I leaned forward, touching her arm. How long had she known? Why hadn’t she come to me? She must have so many questions.

Sophie reached over the side of the boat and tickled a silver fish. “I watch you, too, Lily.”

Okay. Now you can shut up.

“I know what you’ve been doing with the stopwatch.”

Calder’s expression went from sad to anxious.

“I tried to copy you,” Sophie said, “but I couldn’t do it. Besides, it’s too cold for me. I guess I can only see the colors. She says it’s because I’m a ‘Half.’ ”

“She? Who’s ‘she’?” I asked. “What colors?”

Sophie swallowed hard. “I can see the prisms in people. That’s why I wanted to do the science project. When you’re happy, you look so pretty, Lily—like raspberry ice cream—but right now you don’t look so good. Are you okay?”

I turned to Calder, but Sophie’s question did nothing to shake the rigid set of his jaw.

Sophie was still talking. “But you don’t look as bad as Gabrielle’s big brother. It makes me sick to look at him.”

“What have you been doing with the stopwatch?” Calder asked me.

This was not the way I wanted to tell him. Sophie realized a little too late that he didn’t have a clue. She shot me an apologetic look before turning her attention back to the fish circling the boat.

“I’ve been experimenting to see how long I can go without air. My best time so far is four minutes, thirty-two seconds,” I said sheepishly.

“No tail,” he said, but it was a question, and the anxiety in his eyes needled me. Why didn’t he want that for me?

Oh. I could read it there on his face. He was worried that if I was a mermaid, I would fall into their mental funk. Well, that was silly. Why would I need to look for energy in other lives when I was perfectly happy myself? Calder and I would still be enough for each other, wouldn’t we? Even if his worry was justified, we could keep each other from hunting. Couldn’t we? I was sure of it.

“No tail.” Sophie sighed, reaching over the side of the boat and stroking a whitefish.

Calder exhaled and, bracing himself, asked, “Anything else I should know?”

I stared at my feet. “You and Dad aren’t the only ones I can hear in the lake.”


Later that night, after the sun set, Sophie crept into my room and slid under the covers with me. I dropped my book to the floor and wrapped my arm around her. Her skin was cool through her thin nightgown. She tucked her head under my chin, and I could feel the moisture on her cheeks against my chest.

I was about to fall asleep, when she spoke. “Do you think we should tell Mom the truth about Dad?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Sophie pulled out of my arms. “If she didn’t cry so much, if she wasn’t so sad, it wouldn’t hurt Dad so much to look at her. Then he could come home.”

“I get your logic, Soph, but how does knowing the truth make her cry less?”

“Wouldn’t knowing the truth be better than thinking he’s left us?”

“He has left us.”

“No, he hasn’t. He’s probably swimming out in front of the house right now, probably waiting for your light to go out. I think he wants to come in. But he can’t.”

“No one’s locked the door,” I said.

She shook her head, and her eyes glistened in the dim light. “It gives me a tummyache to look at Mom. It’s almost as bad as looking at Jack Pettit. I bet it’s worse for Dad. I think it would be better if Mom knew the truth. I wasn’t scared when I figured it out.”

“And why is that, Sophie?”

She shrugged, her shoulders nudging the pillow. “I guess no one told me I was supposed to be.”

“I’ve been pretty dumb about things,” I said, tucking my blankets around her.

The moon shone through my window, lighting her face in a silvery blue. “Not dumb. But you don’t trust people.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Remember when I fell out of the kayak?”

How could I forget? That was the night Calder’s sisters almost succeeded in their plan to kill Dad. That was the night Calder confessed his part in their plot.

“Why did you come after me when Dad had already got there? Why did you jump off the cliff this spring?”

I closed my eyes tight, pushing out the memory. “Who told you about that?”

“Why did you do it, Lily?”

“I thought I was protecting the family.”

“Mom’s tougher than you think,” she said.

I chewed on my lip until the skin tore. “You’re sure he’s really out there?”

Sophie pulled me out of bed and we tiptoed downstairs to the bedroom where Mom slept alone, her body curled around a pillow.

I shook her shoulder gently. “Mom? Mom, wake up.”

“What?” She pushed herself up on her elbow. “Everything okay? Is Sophie okay? What’s wrong?”

Sophie came around my right side and sat on the bed, taking Mom’s hand. “Come with us, Mommy,” she said. “It’s about Dad.”

Sophie and I helped Mom to her walker and out toward the porch. We eased her across the uneven front yard. She asked why we were outside, but Sophie stroked her arm and told her there was something we needed to show her. When we got to the end of the dock, I turned on the motion detectors. They’d been off since I left last spring. For now, the lake was a silent black pool. We sat in the darkness and waited for something to activate the lights.

Mom said, “I don’t understand. What are we doing?”

“Like Sophie said, it’s about Dad. What we’re going to tell you, you know parts already. Other parts will be a surprise. We’re hoping it’s better for you to know the truth, than to imagine the worst. And Sophie thinks it was wrong of me to keep it a secret from you.”

“The worst?” she asked. “What have you been keeping from me?”

I started the story. Sophie filled in parts I didn’t know how she knew, like the part about Grandpa breaking his promise and stealing Dad away. Mom barely reacted. She stared straight ahead. Only occasionally did she raise her eyebrows or frown.

I hoped Sophie was right about Dad swimming in front of the house. We’d been out on the dock for twenty minutes and there was still no movement on the water. I got to the part about Dad rescuing me from the lake when there was a small splash against the dock. A mechanical buzzing followed, then a loud clunk as the motion detectors activated and the spotlights snapped on, illuminating the night. A dark shape breached and Dad emerged, head above the waterline, ripples sloshing against his shoulders.

Mom tensed and grabbed both Sophie and me by the knees. “Jason?” she called, terror in her voice.

Dad stared at us with a cool, blank stare. We might as well have been strangers for the amount of concern he showed us. There was no panic, no apology, no explanation. His face was devoid of all warmth, and I hoped I hadn’t made the biggest mistake of my life.

There was an intake of breath—maybe mine, maybe Mom’s—followed by a scream. “Jason! Jason! Oh my God, Jason!”

I counted to three, and Dad dove—a rippling bull’s-eye marking his exit.

MY SCRIBBLINGS

An Unappreciative Man of Pure and Utter Suckage

Ozymandias may be dust but

he was a better man than you, who blew

away with wind and water.

So piss off.

Signed, your loving Daughter

MERMAID STATS

Best Swim Time: 4 minutes 32 seconds

Voices:

Tail: Who are you kidding?