The Fate of the Muse

chapter NINETEEN

WARNED





“Hey Dollface,” his voice softly called me, “Wake up.”

I sat up, blinking myself back to consciousness. Ethan put his arm around me and started nuzzling my neck, sniffing behind my ear.

“What’s wrong? What happened?” I asked in a rough voice, looking around, trying to get my bearings in the pre-dawn pitch black.

“I’m sorry it’s so early… But I’m gonna need a ride to work,” he said, “I made you some coffee.”

He got up and went over to my little makeshift kitchen, returning with two cups.

“Where are you going so early?” I asked, stretching and yawning.

“I’m crewing another fishing charter for my dad.” He set them on the table, sitting down close to me with a smile, “Can you drop me off at the Marina… Marina?”

I yawned, “Sure…What time is it anyway?”

“It’s five. I wish I didn’t have to wake you up. I didn’t know you had overnight plans for me.”

I blushed, looking down. All the sadness from the night before came flooding back to me, tightening my throat, “OK.”

“Are you alright?” he asked.

I nodded yes, reaching for the coffee, and asked hopefully, “Can we go surfing after you get back?”

“Sorry, but I have a couple of jobs lined up for this afternoon. They’re gonna keep me going all day.”

My God, I thought, it’s getting worse. My eyes welled up and burned with hot tears, and I turned my head so he couldn’t see. I tried to blink them back, but they spilled over, rolling down my cheeks and splashing onto my lap.

“Hey!” he reached over to turn my face towards his, alarmed, “What’s wrong?”

I swallowed, meeting his eyes, “Don’t you think you’re working a little too hard lately? I mean… you never want to do anything else anymore…”

He draped his arm around me, pulling me close, “I’m sorry, don’t be upset. I just wanted… I just needed…” His voice trailed off as he stroked my back thoughtfully.

“I’m fine,” I straightened up and wiped my eyes. I shouldn’t make him feel bad with my self-pity. He couldn’t help it; it wasn’t his fault.

He squeezed me a little, “It’ll be different once we’re married.”

I sighed, looking down again. His vision of a sweet idyllic future was like an old story that was no longer entertaining. I’d heard it so many times I doubted if it could ever be true.

He nudged me, “Hey, what are you doing on Friday?”

I forced a smile, “I don’t know. What do you have in mind?”

“Let’s spend the whole day together… Just me and you.”

“Surfing?” I asked hopefully.

He looked at me speculatively, “I have a surprise.”

“What should I wear?”

“You’re perfect just the way you are,” he said, right before he kissed me.





I dropped him off at the harbor just in time to see the first brilliant rays of light peek over the horizon. He told me that he’d pick me up at Abby’s first thing in the morning on Friday, and gave me a goodbye kiss so full of love and longing that it took my breath away. I started to feel a tiny flicker of hope that maybe I could get him to slow down a little bit. I drove back to my studio, looking forward to a day of painting and reading in solitude.

Around lunchtime Cruz called, bubbly and full of stories about Shayla’s continued success in Paris. Listening to him made me feel better, but it also reminded me of Evie and Olivia.

“Do you know when Evie’s coming back to San Francisco?” I asked him casually.

“She’s flying in on Saturday. That’s one of the reasons I called,” he said excitedly, “We’re invited to her place for a dinner party Sunday night in honor of some friend of hers that’s coming back with her. She told me to tell you to bring Ethan. I’m bringing Brad over to meet her… Oh Marina, do you think she’ll like him?”

My heart started pounding in my ears, “Of course she will,” I said, steadying myself on the arm of the couch. Olivia sure wasn’t wasting any time. Now I could seriously smell a rat.

“It’s formal, so she said to be sure to dress up… How formal is formal? What should I wear?” I could practically see Cruz swooning over the phone. I knew he’d love one of Evie’s fancy dinner parties.

“Uhm, I don’t know… A tux I guess.”

“Do you want to know why else I called?” he asked coyly.

“I don’t know… do I?” I was feeling faint, and I sat down with my palm pressed to my forehead.

“Yes silly! Brad and I are coming down this weekend, remember? We’d like to schedule a day to go out surfing with you!”

“Sure,” I heaved a sigh of relief, “Sounds good.”

“How about Friday?”

“I have plans with Ethan. Maybe Saturday?”

“It’s a date! I can’t wait to see Brad surf!” Cruz chattered on and on about how fabulous Brad was, and the wonderful places he’d decorated in the city while I sat numbly, trying to decide what to do about Olivia. By the time he hung up, I’d thought it through. I would find a way to get Evie alone as soon as possible and tell her what I suspected. Once she was in the safety of her own place, surely Boris could protect her.

After painting for hours I locked up the studio and went home, trying to look on the bright side. I had an entire day with Ethan to look forward to, followed by a fun day of surfing with Cruz and Brad. I would deal with Evie and Olivia after that. There was nothing to be gained by fretting.

All I had to do was get through the next twenty four hours. I got ready for bed and turned in, burrowing under the white down comforter in my little blue room. All things considered, it could be a whole lot worse, even if I did feel a little bit like the fabled Damocles, trying to enjoy myself while a sword suspended by a single hair dangled over my head.

I tossed in bed for hours, watching fast-moving high clouds alternately cover and reveal the bright moon in my window. It enthralled me with its blue light and then disappeared, reminding me that I shouldn’t be entertaining thoughts of surfing. I rolled over and tried not to look, but I was being jerked around like a marionette in a perverse game of peek-a-boo. I finally sat up in bed, unable to lie still one second longer.

Without even thinking, I automatically reached for my bag and started to slip on my wetsuit. Once I got down to the dark and deserted beach I zipped up, donning my hood, booties and gloves for extra protection against the cold night breeze. I had a good five hours before the first glimmers of breaking dawn would signal me to start for home, and I trembled inside with anticipation.

“Lorelei!” I threw my head back and called her, sitting up on my board on the blustery nighttime sea. She arrived swiftly, as excited by the moon as I was, ready to play.

“Marina! Let’s go see Nixie!”

Why not? I thought, there was plenty of time. I went prone on my board, relaxing and letting Lorelei take me out to the wild waves. I let go of everything, all my fears, desires and ambitions. Being with my mermaid sisters was like a vacation from thinking, a state of grace with all logic and responsibility washed way. My father would have hated it, but I knew that my mother craved it even more than I did.

Nixie and Nerissa’s glowing heads appeared out of the foggy night sea, as excited about my nocturnal visit as they ever were. I wondered if it was my imagination, but in just the few days since I’d seen her, Nixie appeared to have gotten a little bigger. At this rate she’d be fully grown within a few year’s time.

I watched as she greeted Lorelei with enthusiasm, wrapping chubby arms around her neck. They tossed and rolled in an exuberant reunion dance, a wild and fluid ballet that seemed to be an expression of pure joy.

We surfed under the black velvet sky, each one of us lost in the power of the ocean’s rhythms. The mermaids tackled the surf with complete focus, obsessively gliding through each wave as if it were the very first one, never seeming to tire. I could feel myself growing weaker, increasingly having to pause and rest my shaking legs. I told Lorelei that I needed to stop and she pulled me out to calm water.

“That was fun,” I sighed wearily, “But I need to go home now.”

“This is your home. We are your sisters.”

I rolled my eyes at her, too tired to argue, but my sarcastic look was completely lost on her, and she took my silence as a sign I was considering her suggestion.

“You should stay!” she cried, as if the thought just occurred to her. If she wasn’t being exasperatingly vague, she was annoyingly persistent. I wondered if she’d ever stop asking me.

“Yes! Swim with us!” Nixie chimed in, tugging at my wrist.

I smiled weakly down at her, “No. I have to go back to the land.”

Nerissa rested her cheek on the end of my board, “She’s going to leave,” she sighed, tracing the wave design printed on my surfboard with her finger.

I relaxed on the tow back to Aptos, and was deposited on the beach in the densest fog I’d ever seen. I hauled my board ashore and trudged onto the wet sand with a satisfying feeling of tiredness. There were faint strains of music in the background, and I looked around the foggy darkness suspiciously, unable to make out more than just the sand around me. I hauled the board up the beach, feeling my way to the dry sand, plunking down with a grunt to take off my boots and gloves. Suddenly, the fog swirled and parted to reveal a large ship docked at the end of a pier, rows of lights along its side burning through the swirling mist.

I startled, and sprang to my feet in confusion. Where had Lorelei brought me? The dense fog moved back in, obscuring my view of the ship and its surroundings. My heart beat in my throat as I looked around for any sign of a landmark to get my bearings, hoping I wasn’t too far from home.

A lone figure walking along the shoreline approached me, and I tensed up, ready to ditch my board and break into a run. As it drew closer, the silhouette of a young girl was revealed in the faint misty light. She wore a vintage polka-dot party dress that nipped in tightly at the waist, with cap sleeves and a petticoated full skirt. A pair of high heels dangled from her hand, swinging to and fro as she walked along the shoreline barefoot. Her dark hair was softly waved and rolled up at the sides. She seemed oddly familiar, and yet I was certain I’d never seen her before.

I couldn’t imagine what she was up to, dressed like that, all alone in the middle of the night. I found myself staring at the incongruous sight as she drew near, singing to herself softly and staring straight ahead. I stood watching her silently, and just when I thought she was going to pass right by me without any acknowledgement she paused.

She looked up at me with a sly smile, wagging a finger at me, “Hey Kiddo, I see you’re up your old tricks again. You best be careful, because that big cheese is still out to get you. You got a real hellhound on your trail.”

“What?”

She put her hands on her hips, leaning towards me with a gentle, knowing look, “They already pulled the wool over your eyes once… Gosh! Whoever woulda thought that creep was in cahoots with his sis?”

“Um, excuse me, but I’m afraid you must be–”

“Listen Dollface, things aren’t always the way they seem. You be on the lookout!” She smiled warmly and continued on her way down the beach, shoes swinging alongside her billowing skirt.

When I finally recognized Stella’s voice, my knees gave out. I was kneeling on the sand when she called back over her shoulder, “And watch out for that red-headed dame. She sure gives me the heebie jeebies!”

When I looked up again she’d disappeared into the fog. I was trembling, shaking with a combination of fatigue and shock when the swirling fog receded again, revealing the wrecked hull of the cement ship, sitting low in the water. I don’t know how long I sat there, awestruck, but finally, when the first blush of a pretty pink dawn brightened the horizon I staggered home to bed.

I fell asleep the moment my head hit the pillow, and surprisingly, I slept soundly. At noon I woke to look out my window onto Abby’s beautiful sunny garden. It always reminded me of Ethan, and I wished he was in it. Last night seemed like a dream, but I knew that I’d seen Stella again, only this time she’d delivered a warning, and her confusing words replayed endlessly in my mind.

The redhead she mentioned must be Olivia, but I didn’t need to be warned to be wary of her. It struck me as odd that Stella would appear to me as her younger self, and I wondered if perhaps the warning she sent had been meant for my mother. Maybe it was some sort of wrinkle in time, like a recording of an exchange that had really occurred long ago.

My mind kept straying back to Stella. The second time around, the thought of seeing a ghost didn’t seem as weird, and I wondered what Ethan would think if I told him. When I told him, I reminded myself.

If I was going to stop him from working himself to death, then I had to change too. I knew that my secretive nature only made him more anxious. Maybe if I could learn to be more open, he could learn to deflect my influence, and gain the immunity to my muse powers that he clearly had to Evie’s.

I spent the rest of the day with Abby, painting the walls of the nursery a soft sky blue and standing on a chair to brush some fluffy white clouds across the ceiling. I finished off the room with a border of vines twining up and around the window.

“I can add some pink flowers later,” I smiled at her, “If it’s a girl…”

She laughed, rubbing her belly as she addressed it, “Hear that sweetie?” Dutch and Abby had decided to wait to find out the sex, repeating the old saying that they didn’t care what it was, as long as it was healthy. Abby sat down in her new rocking chair with a little groan and watched me paint.

“Is everything okay with you?” she asked, “Are you and Ethan getting along?”

“I’m fine,” I reassured her, “Ethan and I are going to spend the whole day together tomorrow.”

“That’s good,” she rocked slowly, “He could use a day off. He sure has been working harder than usual lately.”

I nodded in agreement, all of my worst fears confirmed.

Charlie the cat slept curled up alongside me that night, purring madly whenever I stirred as if to try and entice me to stay. I patted him absently, and though I was tempted by the siren call of the waves, I denied myself the satisfaction. Ethan was coming early, and he said I’d need my rest. I wondered what great new surfing break he’d show me, and I remembered our trip to Monterey with a shiver of anticipation.

I tried not to dwell on Stella, but eerie dreams plucked at my mind all night long, and I couldn’t help but wonder about the afterlife and what it might be like for her. It was funny, for Ethan thought her passing made me doubt my choice to remain mortal; on the contrary– I had a renewed faith that I was exactly where I was meant to be. Stella had shown me that common ordinary people could be every bit as mysterious and amazing as mermaids.

I was reminded of a line from another Shakespeare play, and I struggled to recall it. “There are more things in heaven and earth”, I remembered it going, “than are dreamt of in your philosophy”.

Evie certainly understood this, but I wondered what my father and Ethan would think of my ghostly sightings. I pet the cat again and rolled onto my side, snuggling deeper under the covers. I was going to do my best to make tomorrow a perfect day.

My fate was in my own hands.