In one brief moment that Merrick probably didn’t even remember, everything had changed.
They sat across from each other on the bench that day in May, a basket of sweet potato fries between them. Merrick chose tartar sauce, but Coral preferred ketchup. The inventor of all things weird and gross—Coral soon learned—Merrick decided to mix the two and create a new sauce he dubbed “tarchup.”
As much as she hated the way he broke through her barriers, Coral laughed and rolled her eyes. “I’m pretty sure that’s already been invented.”
Merrick’s expression exuded mock hurt. “How could you?” His hand flew to his heart. “Tarchup is an original creation by yours truly and I am appalled you would accuse me of plagiarism.”
He spoke her writerly language and Coral’s amusement betrayed her again. “Forgive me. I did not mean to offend thee, sir.”
Merrick tossed another fry.
Revenge became sweet, and what was meant to be a meeting in which they discussed clues turned into an hour-long game of “Would you rather?”
“Would you rather encounter a shark in the water or a tiger on land?” He dunked a fry into his sauce mash-up and shoved the entire thing in his mouth.
Coral pondered, then answered, “A shark on land.”
“You can’t change it, cheater. A shark on land would be dead.”
“Exactly!”
He chucked a fry at her arm.
“You’re wasting them.”
He shrugged. “So we’ll get more. There will always be more.”
Had he been referring to the fries or something else entirely? She didn’t ask, instead joining in his game of fry-tossing.
He pulled out his harmonica for a while after that. His seamless playing became the perfect background to her writing.
“You’re good at that.” She rolled her neck and flexed her hand. “Where’d you learn?”
“Some stuff Ojii-Chan—my great-grandfather—taught me before he died. The rest I winged.” He set the instrument down and nodded to her notebook. “How about you?”
“Winged it. I’m that awesome.” Her own fleeting confidence startled her, but Coral didn’t take the words back. “I’m ready to cool off. Up for a swim?”
They grabbed their things and Merrick followed her down to the water. Coral walked into the ocean fully clothed. She welcomed the coolness of the waves, relished each lap at her skin.
A full minute passed before she noticed Merrick had stopped short of the line separating wet sand from dry sand. He stood there, hands in his pockets and brow furrowed.
“Come on!” she called, splashing a bit of sea toward him.
He half smiled but didn’t budge from his place on the shore.
She watched him closely after that. They would meet at the beach or near the beach. The water called to Coral, especially as the days grew warmer. Her clothes stuck to her skin and she had to pull her hair back in a braid or a knot by noon. But Merrick never joined her in the water. He never even dipped his toes in.
Was he afraid? An awareness overcame her. Merrick had faced his fear the night of Red Tide.
It was the first time Coral questioned if her sister’s theory about humans had been wrong.
A new wave of grief rolled over her, but this one was not caused by a memory of her sister. Coral missed Merrick. She had pushed him away.
Why did she run from him when she clearly wanted to head in the opposite direction? Maybe she didn’t know how. Or maybe it was too late to alter old habits.
A shadow passed over her and Coral’s heart sang.
“There you are. You’re a hard person to track down, you know.”
Merrick stood a foot away, hands on his thighs, panting. “Is this where you’ve been hiding? Beneath the pier?”
She shrugged. “It seemed like the best place to avoid you.” She bit her tongue at the forward admission. She’d been avoiding him. Would he be angry? Offended?
“And that’s where you’re wrong.” He wagged his eyebrows and stared her down.
What in the ocean was he up to?
He backed away then, slowly.
Coral touched her parted lips when Merrick kicked off his flip-flops and walked backward into the sea.
She stood, brushing off the sand from her legs and knee-length shorts. She hadn’t bothered to wear shoes, as usual. When she joined him in the water, the waves kissing their knees, she asked, “I thought you had ocean-phobia.”
“I did.” His honesty stormed her defenses. “I’m a grown man who never learned to swim. My father loved the ocean, so it was my way of rejecting all the things he wanted for me that I didn’t want for myself.”
Coral drank in every word. She related and wanted to say as much, but when Merrick turned to her in the water and peered deep into her eyes, her voice vanished.
“You love the ocean.”
She nodded. How did he manage to see so much of her when she didn’t say a thing?
“Those first weeks after we met, I’d watch you. Fearless. I wanted to join you, but I let my fear control me. So I enrolled in a swim class at the community center in town. I wanted it to be a surprise.”
She swallowed back the emotion threatening to break her. “You did join me, though. The night in winter. My sister?” So many questions surrounded her heart. “Why?”
“Because of you. I saw you and I knew . . .” His hands moved back and forth over the moving surface.
“Knew what, Merrick?” Did she want to know the answer?
“I love when you say my name.”
“Merrick,” she said again.
“I wish you’d tell me yours.”
Her mouth turned down. “You know my name.”
“Coral. You don’t respond right away when I say it. It’s as if that’s not your name at all. You don’t trust me completely yet. You’re afraid. And that’s okay. I’ll wait. However long it takes. I’ll wait for you.”
With the sea swirling around them, they drifted far away though they stood perfectly still. The Disease warred within Coral, pushing and pulling her in all directions. When Merrick’s hands found hers beneath the surface, she pulled back. But Merrick stood there. Waiting for her to let him in.
“I need time.” She didn’t know what to believe. Would she betray her sister if she fell for a human?
“Time is what I’ve got. How about six o’clock tomorrow?”
“What are we doing?” The corners of her mouth twitched.
“You’ll have to trust me on this one.”
Though it went against everything she thought she believed, she had grown to trust Merrick in the small moments. In the still minutes when time ticked by and he waited.
And waited.
And waited.
Maybe the waiting would be over soon.
Coral hoped by then she would have more answers than she did now.
Thirty-Two
Brooke
After
The college campus is greener than I expect, especially for the end of July. It’s hot, but not so hot everything’s dead. If anything, the heat adds to the vibrancy of it all.
And green, I decide, is my favorite color today.
Wide lawns and aged trees wait between old buildings with so much history in their bones, I think I might have traveled to another time period.
But this is now. Deep breath, shoulders back. I can do this.
“I’ll be right here when you’re done,” Jake says.