summary: so lyla lay on her back and she stared at the stars and she realized that drowning felt a lot like going home -— lylacentric, lylazac ; for coppertone wars' twelve days of christmas challenge, level four, part four!
WARNING / it might make a lot more sense if you've watched series one and two of mako mermaids - contains spoilers; so some background information, is the following — (lyla, nixie, and sirena are all mermaids - they're all part of the pod, but are banished when land boy zac is let into the moon pool and transforms into a merman; they spend the rest of season one trying to befriend him and get him alone so that they can get rid of his powers. however, zac and cam find out that the girls are mermaids, and have been lying to them all along, and don't trust them anymore) - that's basically season one, (:
diamonds and dewdrops
lyla hartleys
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It starts off as a simple enough morning.
The patrols have already been set out, and Lyla hums a four-noted tune repeatedly, staring out at the land - splashes of water recede and there's a brief lapse for low tide. Jewels and flowercrowns rest upon the banks of the Moon Pool, celebratory branches and twigs for the presentation of the moon rings for graduating novices.
She likes to think that she doesn't belong as a novice - in a way, Lyla doesn't want to have wait for the next three years, daily attending mermaid school and never being able to actually do anything but be on patrol during all of the celebrations. She's well aware of the consistent explanations that her and the rest of novices were given daily - to engrain it into their minds and burn it under their eyelids, no doubt - but Lyla didn't see the point in following the system.
She takes a few laps around the perimeters of the Pod, and stares up at the stinging brightness of the Sun; voices - human voices - are heard and Lyla rushes back to the Pod. The bracelets and the moon rings and the jewel necklaces are untouched, but she notices Nixie and Sirena and then the sudden appearance of a land boy. The three of them try to hide said land boy in any place that they can - maybe drown him (maybe he's suicidal or something unfortunate like that, but they've never been good with understanding humans) or shove him in that random corridor over there and blame the infiltration on another novice patrol squad.
But it's not going to work - and they get caught, and left behind. Nixie and Sirena stare back at Lyla as though it's all her fault that they've been banished from the Pod, left to live life all alone - and what's the point in that? In response, Lyla simply braids flowercrowns, hums four-noted tunes, and pinches the flesh between her thumb and index finger until it turns white.
"Land boy's the only reason why we ended up getting banished from the Pod," Lyla comments a few minutes later. "It's not entirely my fault, but I am sorry. But, focus on the real matter here - let's give Land Boy hell."
.
Approaching Land Boy becomes a lot harder than previously assumed.
It turns out that approaching humans randomly looks a little odd - Lyla doesn't really listen to Nixie and her silly little version of common sense, and walks right up to the table - from afar, it doesn't seem as though this boy could have done the harm that he had done to the three of them that he ended up doing nonetheless - but Lyla forces herself not to care about things like that.
"So, you're that lifeguard, right? You teach swimming down at the YMCA," she speaks quickly, the words coming out in a jumble as new terms stick at the back of her throat, swallowed quickly. "I think that I've seen you a few times down by the ocean." It's not a complete lie - Land Boy has a familiar face.
Instead of replying, the brown haired girl responds, "Excuse me? I'm not sure what you're trying to do here, but stop it. Zac's taken - by me, Evie." She looks at Lyla as if Lyla doesn't understand anything. "Just stay away from him - stay away from us." Lyla doesn't move. "Zac, let's just get out of here; what do you want with him anyway?"
Lyla's not sure if the right thing to say is the truth - so your boyfriend is a mermaid and I need to get him alone so that I can drain out his powers and maybe end up killing him - and decides upon something simpler, "I need um, swimming lessons?" Zac raises an eyebrow, Evie glares at Lyla as if she wants to kill her, and Nixie and Sirena just come up from behind and excuse their mentally ill sister from the situation.
.
And then everything gets a whole lot worse from there - there's the trident and then Cam trying to take power over everything and everyone and Zac finding out that the three of them had been lying the entire time) and Lyla doesn't think that her life will be quite the same anything.
Nights like these - she stares up at the stage, watching Sirena and David perform in perfect synchrony; a staccato hum starts in the back of their throats, rising and becoming louder and smoother in rhythm. She sees Zac's face pass by the shop, and turn sour upon looking at her - Lyla takes a deep breath, which soon turns into ragged breaths which stick at the bottom of her throat, as the beauty of the notes turns into thin wails resembling what was once a sweet voice rises into the air. Fingers grip the surrounding walls, limbs trash, as she wishes the torture would stop.
The only torture is that everybody else is happy - so very happy with their own little worlds, and Lyla's just left on the sidelines; she leaves during the middle of the song, exiting abruptly with the sharp creak of her chair and everybody looks at her as though she's mentally ill.
The riverbeds were flooded, little stalks of brown and golden reeds quivered in the rush of current, as water spilled downwards and sideways, soaking the grasses of the riverbank wet. She spends hours by the reef near Mako Island - when everything had gone wrong in what seemed like eons to the previous date, and she can see an inkling of hope rising in the distance - colors blending together as the sun sets, and she submerges herself into the cold, icy water which seems to be resenting her presence, as if Lyla doesn't even belong here, in her home.
Over in the distance, upon the town that had ruined her life, water pours from the sky in large torrents, ink-stained teardrops which splatter upon the pavements and Lyla thinks that she can twist her hand a little further, and make the situation worse - just like Aunt Rita had told her. Houses draw their shutters shut, block up their chimneys and bar themselves in for the day; the sky becomes a murky grey, and the land an ocean of rainwater and debris; Lyla continues the storm until the pain in her hand is too much, and suddenly she's trembling and falling into the depths of the water (but she can't drown, or die, which makes it even worse).
She sees a young child through the town, curving past the winding streets and up the hill; her blond hair flies in the wind, and the teardrops harshly push upon her thin raincoat - Slipping into a pair of bright yellow galoshes and carrying a matching umbrella, the young girl leaps down her porch steps and sprints towards the prism of colors reflected in the water collected in the street's gutter. She splashes into the center, dispersing the imitation rainbow, and stands ankle deep in the wavering pool, smiling warmly up at the real one arching across the sky.
Lyla makes the storm even worse - it can't be right, everybody else being so happy when she feels ready to die.
The crackling and hissing doesn't seem to cease, at least not for a while, nor would the all encompassing, foul smoke. It hangs over the mysterious seeming town like a blanket, choking the people silly enough to walk out in the middle of a storm. Its source was far worse, blazing out of control in flashes and flares of heat and light and brilliance. The trees trembled before it, for even their might was eaten in the flames - Lyla doesn't know how she could make the situation worse.
Everything looks more beautiful in the middle of a storm, Lyla supposes; she dries herself upon the dock before her fin becomes feet, and she almost looks like a normal human being - she walks up the hill with a light skip in her step, yet shattered glass greeted her return, littering the path to the door, while a few shards clung to the wooden frame of the window. The door hung ajar, gaping like an open mouth, and Lyla realizes that she's not welcome - not at Aunt Rita's, who's not even her aunt in the first place, and nobody really cares about her anymore - in a way, maybe nobody ever did.
.
Lyla thinks that if she had the chance, she would return to the Pod.
She would listen to all of the rules of mermaid school and memorize the mind-numbing incantations; she would try harder at being a better novice, and remember her position. Lyla would braid bracelets with glee in her voice - she would be patient and wait for her turn to become a graduating novice; she would earn her moon ring - she would do everything that a normal mermaid person was supposed to do, because right now, Lyla doesn't think that her life could get any worse than it already is - Zac (and Evie and Cam and everybody else who doesn't really matter that much) already hates her, and now they know the truth.
It's only a matter of time before everybody finds out that Lyla isn't a normal human girl — she can already imagine being put at a tank in an aquarium, being stared at by thousands of people, a live display; nevertheless, she thinks that if Zac thinks that he could get away with telling their secret, he's wrong about that - she'll bring him down along with the rest of them (it's the only fair punishment, she thinks).
Winter comes after the second incident - as if it could get any worse.
The cold burns her flesh, and her eyes become glassy, stained teardrops falling onto the clear reflection of a textbook - Rita decided that they actually needed to join school, if they were going to stay longterm - while her nose and cheeks turn a frosty red. Lyla decides, and reassures herself that these are all the side effects of winter with a tinge of bitter failure on her tongue.
The first day of school back from winter break — Lyla doesn't quite understand what the point of not going to school year-round is going to achieve, and there's no added side benefit besides the fact that the three of them (mostly her) won't have to see Zac's smug face daily and Cam's stupid smirks. She sits awkwardly in classes, feeling more alone than ever without Nixie and Sirena by her side; there are random students around her who grumble about eight-straight schedules and SAT examination prep classes with private tutors, about so and so broke their heart last weekend and how that new, ugly girl has the worst taste in fashion.
Lyla doesn't quite fit in - she never really has; she doesn't have a family back in the Pod like Sirena had Aquata, and she stares at a deserted lunch table, listening to the chatter and giggles of the rest of the students. They're all so normal, and happy, as if they don't even have a worry in the world; Sirena and Nixie wave her over from a neighboring table, but Lyla turns around, heading for the bathroom.
She thinks that it'll be okay to leave school a little earlier — after all, being the "niece" of Principal Rita doesn't seem to have too many disadvantages as of yet, besides the fact that the only reason that people would ever talk to her would be to know what the answers for the next finals are, and whether or not Aunt Rita was in a good mood that day (somehow, good moods reflected upon the difficulty level of their examinations) — and maybe retreat back to the Moon Pool, the only place that Lyla thinks that she's really ever felt at home.
Since the last Full Moon, she's almost felt drawn to the place - it's shining rocks have more of a mystery than ever, and she stares into the depths of the water, wondering how deep she could stay without ever having to come up to the surface. In the water, Lyla feels as though she could do anything, as though she's better than all of the rest of the stupid, little humans with their happy lives and shining knights in armor and everything else that she hates about the human world.
It's not as though she's not the only one who's not accustomed to the human world, but Nixie and Sirena seem to be do faring better than her.
Sirena has David - a boy from a shop who fawns over Sirena as though she's one of those rare pearls found at the bottom of the sea - and seems to be completely in love with her; she has the most beautiful voice, and those pretty bracelets that all of the other girls in school seem to be in love with, and immediately start talking to the girl who has a boy who's in love with her and flowercrowns in her hair - she's sort of one of those girls who would walk into the school, and pick up the liles and dandelions from the teacher's desk and start braiding them in her blonde locks (and nobody would mind).
And, it's not as though Sirena has troubles - there have been times when she's had to get into minor squabbles with David about not going swimming, or going to the beach, or going anywhere in the proximity of the beach (though there's been times when Lyla has been watching from the distance, and see Sirena disappear into the ocean with David with her - so she thinks that Sirena has let the secret out). Even Nixie has certain friends with snappy attitudes and individualistic personalities - she doesn't have a boy, not quite yet, but Lyla thinks that Cam will eventually think something more of Nixie than just a pretty face - and she's not completely alone, too.
Lyla seems to be the only one who's entirely alone.
.
It's not like her to completely give up - Aunt Rita comments on this one day.
Lyla comes home early from school, missing a few unnecesary classes along the way - such as German (when would she ever need to speak in that language when English was universal?) and biology (she had already mentioned her disgust for the dissections of rats and other creatures) and she stares at the vials of liquids and the pile of fluffy snow that had caused so many insignificant problems so many weeks ago, and she thinks about how time moves by so quickly, and how she wishes that time could be eternal, that something so beautiful could just last forever and always.
(But it's not like the human world for something like that to happen - dreams and naive believers are crushed).
At least from what Lyla's seen; she periodically braids together her hair until it becomes knotted into tangles, and she thinks about cutting it all off - there's the sign of an entry near the front door, the sharp piercing of a doorbell, and Lyla races upstairs (any distraction is a good distraction)
notes | i wanted to write something for the mako mermaids fandom since i just finished watching season two and for some reason, i never fell in love with eviezach - this is for the coppertone wars' twelve days of christmas challenge, level four, part four! the song i chose was don't panic by coldplay, (: