Hey! Sorry it's been so long. But anyway, here's the next chapter. Chapter 3 should be up ... some time. I promise I won't leave the story in the middle. I don't like it when people do that. :P

"Demitri, there you are!" A little angelfish swam up to the teenage merman sitting in the middle of a tiny grotto under the ocean. He was holding an empty pouch in his hand and was watching a starfish creep across a rock nearby.

"What are you doing?" the small fish asked. When he didn't respond, the fish swam up into his face to get his attention. "Hello?"

"Sorry, Adella," Demitri said, pushing his dark brown hair out of his face. Finally, he looked at the little angelfish. "It's just…"

"It's that girl, again, isn't it?" Adella interrupted. "Demitri, it has been a week. Just forget it."

"But, I can't get her out of my head. She just looked so familiar," he admitted. "Plus, she took the ring."

Adella was the only fish he had ever talked to about the ring and how he got it. Although, she had never really liked the fact that it had happened. Through the years, she had tried to make him forget about it and drop the ring into a bottomless pit but he never listened.

"Think of it this way. You saved some girl and found the ring. Now a girl saved you and she took the ring. Consider it even and forget about it."

"I can't," he told her with his head in his hands. He sat there for a moment until something clicked inside his head. "Adella that's it!"

"What's it?"

"That's why she so familiar! She's that girl!" Demitri quickly began to swim towards the surface.

"Hey!" Adella grabbed the end of his tail to stop him. Or at least get his attention. "Hold it! Where are you going?"

"I have to see her again," he said swimming around her.

"Demitri!" Adella went swimming after him. Without me there he's bound to do something stupid, she thought to herself.


"Demitri," Adella gasped as she finally caught up to him. "Do you have to swim so fast?"

"Why not?" he responded, oblivious to how tired she was. He looked around at the underwater features to make sure he was in the right place. He didn't notice until she collapsed on his shoulder. "You okay."

"Sure."

"Why don't you stay here?" he suggested.

"Okay." After the long swim, Adella didn't have much energy to argue with him. She drifted to a nearby coral to rest.

With a deep breath, he swam towards the surface. His head broke the water and his eyes peered around the rock he had chosen as his hiding place.

It was the right beach, not very big with rocky cliffs separating it from the rest of the island. There was a small patch of trees off to one side of the beach. A worn path led through the trees and away from the beach. It was the only way to get to the beach. Where the path met the beach, there was an old wooden bench and sitting on it was the girl who had saved him only a week ago.

She had her legs crossed Indian-style and a notebook rested in her lap. One hand held the book steady while the other held a pencil. Her long dirty blonde hair hung freely, blowing in small breeze. Every once in a while she would look up to stare in his general direction, but she never seemed to notice him.

Suddenly, he had an urge to talk to her, he didn't know why. But, just at that moment, a boy walked up the path and sat down next to her. He shrunk back behind the rock. He decided he would wait until the boy left.