The Summer of Chasing Mermaids by Sarah Ockler Page A

waited for Kirby, Sebastian dried his gear with napkins and continued to fill me in on the lore of his beloved mermaids, a subject on which he was a living encyclopedia. He knew everything about them—mythological origins, the difference between mermaids and sirens, all the ways in which the recent string of so-called mermaid documentaries were fraudulent and even detrimental to genuine ocean conservation efforts.
    He was cleaning the lenses on a pair of binoculars that covered most of his face when he stopped suddenly, looked at me seriously across the table. “Atargatis is real, you know. I saw her once, but only for a second.”
    For weeks now I’d walked the shore day and night, and I’d yet to see her myself. But I believed him; the legend was tragic and beautiful enough to be real.
    â€œWe were on Noah’s boat last year,” he said, “and all of a sudden, she was just there . Sitting on these rocks, like nothing.” His voice had dropped to a whisper, and his eyes were twin moons, round and glittering with awe. “Noah said it was probably a sea lion. But Christian believed me. I knew it was her because of the starfish tattoo.” He touched his throat, and my scar tingled beneath the shell necklace.
    I scribbled on a napkin and slid it across the table.
    Is she evil?
    Sebastian shrugged. “No one knows.” He dunked the ice cream in his root beer, pondering as it bobbed up to the surface. “Probably she’s so sad, she doesn’t even remember how she got there.”

    When Kirby arrived, she was surprised to see my lunch companion.
    â€œLast I saw you,” she said to me, squeezing water out of her hair, “you were heading out for a beach walk after church. How’d you snag such a cute date?”
    Sebastian rolled his eyes. “It’s not a date. We were looking for mermaids.” He crawled under the table, popped up on my side of the booth, then announced randomly, “Elyse is gonna help Christian win the regatta.”
    Kirby’s eyebrows shot straight up into her hair as she sat down across from us. “You’re gonna who with the what now?”
    â€œTwo chickpea surprises, two orders of fries-es.” Noah arrived with our lunch, set the plates before us. Kirby immediately ­quieted, but her smile was impossible to hide. Noah mirrored her joy and, without words, returned minutes later with a vanilla latte, her favorite.
    When he left us again, I drew a heart on a napkin, encircling their initials: NK + KL .
    Kirby snatched it off the table and shoved it into her bag, lasering me with a pointed glare. “Anyway, about this regatta business . . . you can’t just sign up for that, Elyse! What were you thinking?”
    On another napkin, I wrote:
    He asked. And I want to help save the houses.
    Kirby sighed, but if she was worried about losing her home, she didn’t let on. “Why would Christian ask you for help? He’s obviously just trying to get in your . . . your you-know-whats.” Her gaze drifted to Sebastian, then back to me. “You need to be c-a-r-e-f-u-l, that’s all I’m saying.”
    â€œChristian’s a good sailor,” Sebastian said. “He’s always careful.”
    Kirby smiled, brow furrowed as she tried to find a more cryptic way to warn me about the elder Kane. But before she figured it out, the door swung open, bringing with it a stiff breeze and a pair of beautiful fish caught in a net.
    Vanessa and Christian.
    They tumbled in through the doorway, rain soaked. Christian had his arm over Vanessa’s shoulder, hers was looped around his waist, and he whispered something in her ear that made her laugh.
    They looked for all the world like a couple who’d sooner drown than be separated, the kind that could finish each other’s sentences and share inside jokes with just a look. More than lovers, they were friends. The closest kind.
    I wondered how