"What happened to you Ellerinn?"

I hear the shock and distress in Jared's voice—fear even. I slink further into the water, ashamed, and starting to really realize what's happened to me. I look down at myself, the fin running down my back, the wing-like fins coming off my arms (which at this point, I realize that they are really wings, not just fins), and the long stretch of iridescent scales that covers almost my entire body. The adrenaline that was running through me is dissipating—all of a sudden, I am afraid of myself, of what I have become. I look back up at him.

"I—I—I don't know," I stammer quietly. "I honestly don't know." At this point, I'm starting to panic a little bit. Why me? What happened to me? Why did this happen? How did it happen? How can I make it stop? So many questions and thoughts are running through my head, I can't keep track of them all. I look away from Jared, back at the surface of the water. This can't be happening. This is all just a bad dream. I'm going to wake up in my alley shelter any second now.

Calm your mind, Ellerinn; I hear Mr. Xavier's calming voice in my head. It has a warm, soothing tone that helps me relax a little. Calm your mind. This is why I'm here, to help you with all of this.

"You guys are all freaks!"

My head snaps back up and I see Jared tearing off the dock and away from the beach. Somehow, I leap up onto the dock in an attempt to chase after him.

"Jared! Please don't go!" I flounder, literally, on the dock forgetting once again that I don't have legs.

"JARED!"

But it's too late. Jared is long gone, past the sand and already halfway across the empty parking lot. I bang on the dock in frustration.

"Why did this happen to me?! I have had enough to deal with in my life! I don't need this! I don't want it! Why me? WHY?!"

I can't hold it in anymore. I start sobbing—no, bawling, and pounding my fist on the dock. Anger, rage, frustration, despair, fear, and ultimately, loneliness, course through me and my emotions. So much emotion erupts inside me, emotion that I had kept bottled up inside with the intention of never letting it out, never letting anyone else see it, never to be hurt again. It all comes rushing to the surface, and I don't even care anymore.

I really am a freak. My hopes of ever having a semi-normal life are dashed, like the waves upon the rocks below me. My only friend has deserted me when I need him most.

"Ell—" I hear Jean begin, but she is stopped by Mr. Xavier.

"Let her be for a while."

I lay there on the wet dock, bawling my eyes out probably for a good 5-10 minutes. It's not until I finally start to wind down that I realize that I've been covered in a blanket. How long has that been there? I ask myself.

"Good call, Warren." Storm's voice slowly breaks through my dying sobs. I sit up on my elbow and look back at myself, wiping tears away from my eyes. I don't see anything different except that I'm covered in a huge fleece blanket. I sit up more and that's when I notice it. I can hardly believe my eyes!

"Well Ellerinn," I hear Mr. Xavier say, "It appears that your gift is triggered by contact with water. Fascinating."

I move the blanket around a little to get a better look, and sure enough! I'm shocked to once again see my own legs instead of a tail. I wiggle my toes. I have my own legs back! Then I realize why I've been covered in a blanket—my clothes are all gone. And I'm cold.

"Th-thanks," I say, shivering, "Thanks for the blanket." I pause for a bit, calming down, "Storm, I heard you say something to Warren a second ago. Something like 'Good call.' What did you mean by that?"

"When we were rescuing Tyler and you were stuck in the wall of ice, Warren noticed that some of your tail was sticking out. Just before he flew up with Tyler and the cat, he noticed that the same bit of tail had shrunk and pretty much shriveled up. Seeing that made him wonder what would happen if you were to dry off, if you would change back to your normal self."

"Like in that one movie, 'Splash'?"

"Yes, just like that."

"Hmm. Good to know." I look around "Hey, where is Tyler anyways? He was here a second ago."

"Jean and Bobby took him to the hospital," Mr. Xavier answers, "to make sure he didn't sustain any injuries or other damage during his stay at the bottom of the ocean. His cat is still here though, fascinated by Warren. I think it's because of the wings." He chuckles ever so slightly.

I look over and sure enough, there's the cat playing with the tips of one of Warren's wings. I guess he's a cat person because he seems to be having just as much fun teasing the cat as the cat is having playing with the feathers of his wings. Wow, I didn't notice until just now how big they are. They must keep him really warm at night.

I look towards the parking lot, to see if by some chance Jared had come back. No such luck. With a sigh, I turn back towards Mr. Xavier. "So, this school you've mentioned—what exactly is it? And where is it?"

"Its full name is Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. It's a school where people with special gifts, like you, Tyler, and all of us here can live and learn in safety from those who would try to hurt us—human or otherwise. It's also a place where mutants—those of us with these special gifts—can learn more about their gifts, how to control them and how to improve them. My students get an education that is just as good as, if not better than, any other school in the country. Some of my first students, including Jean and Storm, are now instructors. As to the where, it's across the country in New York."

"New York? That's really far away. What brings you all out here to Oregon then?"

"I have a machine called Cerebro that amplifies my telepathy and helps me detect and locate mutants. I hope I don't sound like a stalker by saying this, but I've actually been keeping an eye on you for some time now, ever since this past November. Something happened to you at that time that interested me, but I didn't make contact because there was a little bit of a crisis at the school."

November, what happened in November? I rack my brain, trying to remember. The last several years have pretty much all melded together so it takes me a second to remember.

"Oh," I say quietly, remembering. It was an unusually cold night, accompanied by even more unusual snow. My area rarely gets much snow, let alone snow in November. I had a really bad nightmare that night about one of the foster homes I had been in. I woke up violently and realized my pillow, or rather what I used for a pillow, was on fire. I shoved it outside and it extinguished quickly because of the snow. I wondered how it had caught on fire, and more importantly, why I had not—especially when the coffee can I use to contain a small fire was nowhere near my pillow.

I didn't really think much about it though until a few weeks later. I had started a fire in my coffee can and I went to blow on it to get it going better. Imagine my surprise when not air, but fire came out of my mouth! It wasn't much, but enough to scare me. And enough to get the coffee can fire really going. For the next few weeks I got extremely paranoid that I would set fire to the next thing I blew too hard on. I was terrified. Some of the same "What's happening to me?" thoughts passed through my head then just as they are now.

I began to figure out how the fire thing worked and while I used it hardly at all, I did become less scared of myself. I told no one though, not even Jared. I couldn't stand to have one more person I cared about turning on me, calling me a freak, and leaving me alone.

And yet here we are. Almost a year later, and that very thing happened anyway. Jared found out I was different, and he freaked and ran.

"Do any of you have a cell phone I could borrow?" I ask quietly. I need to see Jared. I need to talk to him. I need to tell him that even though I'm different, I'm still me, we can still be friends. Surely he'll understand, right?

Warren walks over and hands me his.

"Thank you." I dial Jared's number as I stand up, wrapping the blanket closer around me. It's a little cold now that the wind's picked up.

No answer. I leave a message, trying not to cry.

"Hi Jared, it's me, Ellerinn. I—uh, I need to talk to you. Please don't leave me alone. You know more than anyone else that . . . just . . . please. Don't leave me alone. Don't abandon me. You're my only friend. Please. I really need to talk to you. Please meet me at Memorial Park. I'll be on the swings. Please Jared. Don't leave me."

I finish my message, walk back to the dock, and hand the phone back to Warren. "Are you going to be around for a while? Your school sounds interesting, but I need some time to process what happened today."

"Yes, we'll be around," Xavier answers, "we will have to fly back tomorrow night though. If you decide that you would like to come back with us, you can meet us at the airport by then."

"Alright, thank you." I answer. It's time for me to head "home". If I'm going to see Jared, I need to look decent. Lucky for me, I still have one good pair of jeans and a few extra shirts.

I made my way downtown and dart between the pet store and the gas station. As I turned the corner behind the car wash, I see my deaf neighbor, or as much of a neighbor as a homeless person can be, but he's focused on something, probably trying to "block alien mind probes" again. He's a little kooky in the head—he's convinced that aliens abducted him ten years ago and they keep trying to contact him, but he's still very nice. He shared some food with me one time when I really needed it. Not many people in our situation would do that.

Anyways, I change into some real clothes and head over to the park. I sit down on one of the swings and wait.

And wait. And wait.