Teenage Mermaid

"I'm in the middle of my lesson," Mrs. Hanover growled. "Where do you think you're going?"

"It's an emergency!" I said.

I hadn't recognized Earthdude when he'd first entered class, with his dark-blue hair, black Abbey Road T-shirt (just like my CD!) and torn jeans, instead of dark-red hair and a wet suit. But when I saw those velvet lips, that chiseled jaw, I knew I had my Earthee! He was quirky and totally lunar, changing his hair color with the changing tide. I laughed when he didn't

"Find your seat!" Mrs. Hanover commanded. "You're disrupting my class."

Mrs. Hanover walked back toward her desk, but I didn't move and she bumped into me. Her pointer dropped to the floor.

"Child!" she said with an evil glare, bending her titanic body over, leaving a clear path to the door.

I raced out of the classroom and into a hallway filled with glittery white-and-blue students wearing huge feathery hats and carrying musical instruments that sounded like bellows from a whale. I pushed my way through. Which way had Earthdude gone? Left? Right?

I chose left and raced down the stairwell, where a teacher was holding the door open for her musical students. "Did you see a guy in a black shirt with blue hair?" I asked desperately.

"The guy kicking the lockers from one end of the hall to the other?"

I nodded my head with a cheeky smile.

"I told him to get a drum," she said, pointing toward the exit.

her opinion mattered. And she had seen everything through those angel blue eyes.

I had to get away. The beach was my only solace, my surfboard my only friend.

I ran to the back of Seaside High, where I finally found the stadium. Thirty Earthteens sprinted around the track. Everyone was wearing white shirts and blue shorts. And not one of them sported blue hair.

I saw a group of students sitting on the steps.

Exhausted, I tried to catch my breath. A girl sitting on the first step was engrossed in a book.

"Did you see a guy with blue hair?" I asked her. She shook her head, not taking her eyes off the book. Seaside's white-and-blue band could have noisily

"What time is it?" I asked.

She held the book with one arm and extended her other, exposing her watch. Eleven forty-five.

I couldn't see the ocean from here, but I could feel it calling me. I had been so close to completing my mission, and now success seemed so far away. I couldn't spend any more time scouring the Earth. My necklace and my Earthdude had disappeared.

I only had one choice. I had to go home! Tell Waverly all my new experiences - Earthdudes in blue jeans, Earthdudettes with different-colored toenails, and me walking through a crowded corridor instead of swimming through a winding tunnel. But worse, I'd have to confess to the crime of borrowing and losing a family heirloom. Take all that was due me, and remember my Earthly experience with melancholy, far underneath the waves in a frigid boarding school in the Atlantic.

I could feel the ocean's waves inside me. I took off my shoes and walked down Seaside High's warm paved road, wanting to feel all there was to feel through my Earthly feet for the last time. I found the warm, grainy sand comforting, yet sad. I was leaving my dreams behind, as I made my way down the sandy beachfront. I passed the lifeguard stand and raced along the tide, not letting it catch my feet. Out of

I wondered if I would now be a famous merexplorer, celebrated throughout Pacific Reefs history as the one who made it back, winning awards, featured on talk shows, pictured in encyclopedias - but knowing in reality that I'd only be able to tell Waverly of my experience. I stood up and, for one final time, gazed back at my new world and all its beauty - Seaside High peering over the hill, palm trees extending their branches to the sky, happy tourists sunning underneath the glistening sun.

And outside Mickey's Surfboard Hut - one Earthdude with illuminating blue hair!

It couldn't be.

I raced back over the rocks, jumped onto the warm sand, and ran as hard as I could.

"It's me!" I proclaimed, waving my arms. "It's me!"

Out of breath, I finally reached my Earthdude, who stared wide-eyed, like he was drowning again.

- glistening underwater, sparkling through an algebra classroom window, and giggling in Hanover's class. Now she was standing in front of me almost out of breath herself.

What could I say to her now that I had the chance? I had waited what seemed like an eternity to see her again. Hadn't I made a fool of myself enough today?

Still, I was elated. While she recovered her breath and pushed back her hair, I wished it were my hand exposing her perfect face. A million questions raced through my mind. Had she seen my ad? Where was she from? What was she doing in the ocean yesterday? I could barely believe that this beauty had

"You know who I am, don't you?" she asked forcefully.

I now realized why she was here. Not to let me thank her, like I'd originally intended, but just to get her necklace back.

I nervously fingered the chain in my pocket, as if I had ripped it off from a jewelry store. "I waited at the stadium. Did you get my note?"

"Yes, but I overslept. I looked all over school for you," she said, agitated. "But I thought your hair was dark red."

"I change it every week."

"Is that normal? Do you change your name every week, too?"

"It's normal for me. But my name's always Spencer."

"Well, Spencer, can I have the necklace?" she asked suddenly.

If I returned it to her now, I'd lose her. She'd show up for school tomorrow, hand in hand with Calvin Todd. I'd be destined for the rest of my high-school days to watch her sparkling smile radiate toward him at football games as he scored touchdowns and more. I only had one choice. "You saved my life, and I don't even know your name," I said urgently.

"Candy, I wanted to ask you something first. Before I give you back the necklace," I began, my grip slipping on the surfboard as I tried to muster up courage. "I'd like to pay you - "

"I don't want money," she insisted. "I want my necklace."

"But I want to thank you, properly. After school . . . Take you to the pier for dinner . . . Then I'll give it back."

She didn't respond, but impatiently looked toward the ocean.

"What's your favorite restaurant?"

"I can't stay for dinner," she blurted out.

I glanced around, wishing Chainsaw were here. What would he say now? Then I noticed the Starbucks on the pier. "Then how about a cup of coffee now, on the pier?"

She looked up with sudden interest. "I've never been on the pier before."

"There's a first time for everything," I said, leading her to my favorite hangout.

- I mean Spencer - make him feel he's not indebted to me anymore, and at the same time catch a few more Earthly sights, smells, and tastes. After half an hour, I'll say, "It's been great, thanks, gotta go." He'll hand over great-grandpa's necklace, and when he looks away for a second, I'll dive safely back into the water.

I was overwhelmed by the pier's magical brilliance. Previously I had only glimpsed it from the rocks below or viewed it from the ocean, miles away. And now it was within my reach. A huge white wheel with red and silver dangling chairs stood in the distance,

I wheezed from climbing the stairs and leaned on the boardwalk railing that overlooked the ocean, trying to recover my breath.

"What kind of coffee do you like?" Spencer asked kindly, leading me into a shop with a freakish mermaid on the sign.

Latte, Frappuccino, cappuccino. The funny words I read meant nothing to me. I didn't even know what coffee was! "I'll have whatever you have," I said.

"Two double lattes," he ordered.

I'd never thought I'd even visit Earth for a minute, much less a day, and here I was standing in a shop ordering drinks!

I ran my fingers over everything - drinking cups, bottles, hardened treats inside beautiful papers. I gazed at objects shaped like sponges and sea cucumbers beneath a glass counter.

"Want something?" he offered, close behind me.

"Do you?" I asked, looking for guidance.

"Sure. But you pick this time. Anything in the store," he said proudly.

I was overwhelmed with choices and scanned the counter. There were mudlike squares displayed on a dish, a jar filled with red and white striped tubes.

"I'd love some tips!" I exclaimed.

"You're hilarious!" he said, as he and the perky counter girl laughed at my choice.

"Two scones, please," he ordered, pointing to a puffy sand-colored orb inside the case.

He led me outside where we sat on a wide wooden bench facing the ocean. I ingested my Earthly world at the same time I ingested my hardened spongy scone. Children ran along the beach, a young couple splashed each other in the water, two elderly Earthees walked arm in arm, an athletic man ran along the shoreline with his panting black dog.

"So tell me everything," Spencer began between bites. "Were you swimming or surfing the other day? Where did you live? Why did you transfer? Where do you live now?"

"Uh . . . I live west."

"By the planetarium?"

"Closer to the beach . . ."

"Oh . . . by Yates Bluff."

"What about you?" I asked, as a seagull called out overhead.

"I live with my dad in Pacific Cliffs."

"What about your mother?"

"Do you ever see her?"

"No. In fact, I never even got to say good-bye to her."

"You never got to say good-bye?"

"She ran off with a used car salesman. My dad wanted her to trade in our Chevy and she traded him instead. Now we only buy new cars!" he said, laughing.

"But that's so sad. Where I'm from nobody ever leaves anyone - "

"I pretty much raised myself with the help of my friend Chainsaw, my surfboard, and a Blockbuster card."

"A Blockbuster card?" I asked.

"What's your story, Candy?"

"Uh . . . me? I like to swim, my parents get majorly on my nerves, I hate high school. And I have a best friend, Waverly. But my life is so boring! It's not worth asking about. Can't we just sit?" I asked. "It's been a long day."

"Oh, sure," he said, leaning back and staring off toward the ocean.

"Besides, I'd rather know about you. Do you hang here often?"

"Not during school. But don't worry. Seaside's a tourist trap, so no one really can tell who's who if you skip out of class. A major mistake, if you ask me, to

I stared up at his chiseled face, the light in his eyes. I'd been so distracted with these spectacular Earthly sights, that I failed to notice the spectacular sight right in front of me.

Spencer caught my gaze and, embarrassed, I turned away. "Well, Spencer . . . it's been . . ."

"Don't you like your coffee?" he asked, breaking the white plastic rim of his own cup into tiny pieces.

"Uh, sure," I said. I took a gulp and almost choked.

"Are you okay?"

"It tastes like mud!"

His eyes sparkled when he laughed, as if I had said the cutest thing he'd ever heard.

"I'll get you some water," he offered with a smile. "You sit tight."

"That's okay. I have to - " I began. But he bolted off.

I leaned back on the bench and pulled my legs up and hugged them with all my might. Spencer was really special. I felt drawn to him the same way I felt drawn to the ocean. I wondered what it would be like to sit in class with him every day, have him teach me to surf, lie in the grass and look up at the puffy clouds. But he'd be returning with my water and I'd have to get my necklace and leave.

I felt a tap on my shoulder.

"Yeah, Spencer?" I said, turning around.