I waited for a very long time for Yugi to come out of the shower, and I grew quite bored. I was occasionally tempted to snoop about Yugi's possessions, but luckily, I resisted the urge.
When Yugi finally emerged, I realized what had taken him such a long time. He had cleaned up all of the sand from the bathroom. I had made most of the mess, remember, so I was ashamed that I had been impatient. "Sorry that took so long," Yugi apologized. "Are you ready to eat now?"
I wasn't very hungry, but there was a strange, itchy sensation in the back of my throat that I hadn't felt before. I didn't know whether this foreign feeling was related to food or not, so I just nodded and followed my new mentor to the kitchen.
Merpeople don't prepare their food very much. I'm sure that the most elaborate meal you've had was ether sashimi or seaweed rolls. But humans go through enormous amounts of trouble to make their food taste certain ways. Yugi dished up a plate and handed it to me. I sat down, because standing was making me tired, and placed my food in front of me.
I had no idea what I was about to eat. Yugi set his plate down too, along with two cups full of some bubbling brown liquid and two strange metal utensils with prongs on the end. "It's not very fancy, but Grandpa and I aren't very experienced cooks," Yugi said sheepishly. Grandpa entered the room shortly, got his own plate, and then sat down with us.
I knew that I should have eaten something at that moment for respect's sake, but I was feeling a little nervous about putting these strange things inside my body. I watched as Yugi and Grandpa picked up their utensils and skewered their food. Both of them were watching me carefully. Slowly, uncertainly, I picked up my own utensil and stabbed one of the golden, flaky objects on my plate. They are called tatter-tots, and they are made from a vegetable called a potato. I gazed at the strange object for a while, and then I shoved the thing into my mouth and chewed quickly to get the experience over with.
This tatter-tot was so full of flavor, it made my mouth burn. It was much saltier than anything I had tasted before, and it had a strange sort of oil that covered my tongue. The outside of it crunched when I bit into it, but the inside was soft. And the most unusual thing was that the food was warm.
I've told you that water becomes steam when it is heated. But when other things are heated, they don't become steam; they burn. And the burning emits something called a flame, which is very bright and painful to the touch. One of the ways that humans prepare their food is by putting it in or near a flame, so that it becomes hot.
I'm not quite sure what the expression on my face was, but Yugi seemed pleased when he saw it. "Yugi, get a knife for your guest. He's not Joey," Grandpa chided. Yugi excused himself momentarily from the table and returned with two silver knives. He handed one to me, although I wasn't quite sure what we would be using it for. Were we supposed to battle for the food with these knives, or something along those lines?
Humans have made dining an extremely complicated experience. We merpeople eat with our hands, and humans do too, sometimes, but they have also invented at least four other utensils to eat with. The fork, the utensil with the prongs, can be used either to stab food or to scoop it up. The knife, which Yugi had just handed to me, is used to cut large pieces of food into smaller, bite-sized pieces. There are also spoons and chopsticks, but I won't explain these now.
Yugi stabbed a piece of chicken (a certain kind of animal) with his fork to brace it while he took it apart with his knife. I could not fathom why they wouldn't just pick up the chicken and bite it like a normal person, but I made efforts to be respectful, and I too cut apart my food with a knife.
The more tatter-tots and chicken that I ate, however, the worse the itching in my throat became. I was utterly confused. But about halfway through the meal, I saw Grandpa pick up his cup full of brown liquid and swallow a mouthful of it. I was shocked. I assumed that the liquid had been something like boiling oil—was it really something to ingest?
Bravely, I picked up my cup and imitated Grandpa. The "boiling oil," actually known as soda, is one of the many things that humans need to drink to survive. You see, merpeople live in water, so we don't need to drink anything. But humans live on land, and they need to put water into their bodies by drinking liquids like soda. The bubbles in the drink felt strange on my tongue, but the soda tasted very good, and it helped the itching in my throat. I drained half of the glass in a second, which amused Yugi very much.
"Thirsty, huh?" Yugi asked. I nodded, and I made sure to remember the word that Yugi had used.
When we finished eating, Yugi took the plates and the cups from the table and washed them off with water and soap, like a little shower just for the dishes. Grandpa was about to leave, but Yugi stopped him. "Um, Grandpa," Yugi began, "Atem doesn't really have a place to stay. Don't you think that we should help him out?"
I watched this interaction carefully. I could tell that Grandpa wasn't about to lend an entire room of his house to a stranger without a fight. But I could also tell that Yugi wanted me to stay here very much.
"I'm sure that Atem has a home under the water with his own family," Grandpa defended. "Besides, I'm sure he'd rather be with his own people where he's comfortable than stay here."
"But I'm sure that he wants to immerse himself in our culture so that he'd be able to write his book better," Yugi replied masterfully. "And it's the least that we can do for someone in need, right, Grandpa?" This was like a duel of words. Yugi had blocked Grandpa's defense, and now he was going in for the kill.
Grandpa seemed unsure, and Yugi pushed harder. "Atem's not going to get into any trouble, and I'll make sure that he doesn't eat as much as Joey," Yugi continued. "Maybe he'll even help you in the shop." Yugi glanced at me, and I nodded fervently. Grandpa sighed. He had lost the battle, and he knew it.
"Alright, he can stay," Grandpa said. I could practically see the celebration in Yugi's mind, and I shared his joy. Living with human beings would allow me to learn much more about human culture than if I was only an observer from the sidelines.
Yugi grabbed my hand and led me to his room. "You can have my bed," he said. He hastily ripped the fabric off of his bed and tossed it in a heap on the floor. Then he pulled identical strips of fabric out of a nearby drawer and began putting them on his bed.
What Yugi was doing is a ritual of sorts. The fabric on the bed is called sheets, and they are changed regularly to promote hygiene. Yugi was changing his sheets ahead of schedule out of respect for me. "And you can borrow my pajamas until you buy new ones," Yugi said.
"Pajamas?" I asked.
"Well, you wear pajamas when you go to sleep," Yugi explained. "And when you get up, you change back into day clothes." I would not recommend wearing pajamas during the day time unless in certain special circumstances. I once wore my pajamas into a restaurant because I was in a hurry, and I was promptly asked to leave. Even within the category of day clothes, there are some things that are not appropriate for formal situations.
So far, I'm sure, the human world seems extremely complicated to you. And this is true—humans have an enormous number of customs and traditions that one must adhere to carefully. If you are planning to visit the human world soon, you should become familiar with these customs, but don't worry. Most humans will forgive you if you make a small mistake, because they understand that you are not completely familiar with their ways.
Yugi handed me a pair of navy blue pajamas, and I had learned enough to know that I should change in private. "I'll put these on in the bathroom," I said. Yugi seemed pleasantly surprised that I knew this much already.
When I returned to Yugi's bathroom to change, I noticed something that I hadn't noticed last time. On the wall, there seemed to be a perfect picture of me. When I moved, the picture moved with me. When I frowned, the picture frowned. I reached out and touched this magic picture, and it reached out and touched me back.
This magic picture is called a mirror. It has a reflective surface. If you've ever poked your head out of the water and looked at yourself in the sea, you know what I mean.
In this mirror, I saw myself for the very first time. I had some idea of what I looked like chest down, of course, but I had never seen my face. It was such a strange feeling, watching myself watch myself, that I had to look away for a moment just to regain my bearings.
I changed into my pajamas as the sun began to set. The sun, which had before been yellow, turned gold and orange and red and even purple and green. I watched it from the window as it fell behind the buildings, faded to blue, and disappeared. Little white stars started to dot the night sky. I must have been standing there watching the sunset for longer than I realized, because Yugi came and knocked on the door.
"Atem?" he asked. "Are you okay in there?"
I opened the door with a sheepish look on my face. "I'm sorry, Yugi, I was just watching the sun," I said. Yugi seemed surprised.
"I guess that we take that for granted," Yugi said. "I guess that we take a lot of things for granted." Yugi walked into the living room, where he was preparing another bed on the couch, and I followed him. "Just the idea of you writing that book makes me think about all of the things that humans don't even notice anymore," Yugi continued. "I'd love to read it once it's finished."
And I realized that Yugi must have been as curious about my world as I was about his. It was a shame that he would never be able to see my home like I saw his. It was a shame that he would never be able to write a book like this one. I thought that it was unfair that we merpeople could experience humanity, but humans could never experience what it's like to be one of us. And I foolishly wished that I could show him everything that I took for granted, so that he could be as in awe of my world as I was of his.
