The Mermaid Disease

3/Changing

As Kelsea drove home, she couldn't help but think how much she didn't want to see her father immediately after she returned. She blamed her dad for causing a maniac biting her leg (because who else's fault could it possible be?). Any other day she would have confronted him about the stupid scheme he was trying to pull. The last few days had emotionally drained her, so she anticipated forgiving her father in a day or two to move on with her life.

The pictures she had gotten developed rested in a messy pile in the passenger seat. The out-of-focus picture with the person lied on the top. She should have thrown it away.

Of course, Kelsea's plan to avoid her dad ended quickly. She pulled into the driveway and he greeted her first as she walked through the door.

"Did you see the pictures?" he asked. Not "how was your day?" or something along that line. Kelsea blinked. Eric waited eagerly for her response, evident only by the wild glint in his eyes. His face was otherwise calm and his voice unwavering. "Well?" he prompted.

"Yes, I did. They were okay," the girl said with a shrug. She reached into her backpack, grabbed the pictures she had tossed in less than a minute ago, and handed them to her dad.

She attempted to move past the man, but he blocked her path and exclaimed, "This is it! The one I took of the monster in the cave, right before I blacked out!"

"Interesting," she said, not sounding at all interested. "I'm going to do homework now."

"Take a good look at this picture, Kelsea. I know it's blurry, but if you see something in the water that looks like this thing, stay away. The creature is dangerous." He held the photos towards her and she took them.

The wild shine had gone out of his eyes and had been replaced with a seriousness Kelsea hardly ever saw from her dad. What game was he trying to play? In her great confusion she could not help but to say, "I met a guy pretending wearing a fish tail down by the docks earlier." She pointed to the photograph in discussion. "I think he looked like this, but it's hard to tell because the picture is so blurry."

Whoops. Did she just indulge him in his weird delusion?

If Eric looked serious before, he now looked dead serious. His eyes narrowed and he let out a curse. "Did it say anything?"

"He said your deal is complete and not too much else." It probably would not have been wise to say he had also bitten her, so she omitted that part.

The color drained out of the blond's face in a split second. Kelsea had no idea what to make of the sight of her dad. He appeared too afraid to be pulling a prank. Maybe an elaborate hoax was being played on him? But who would go to through all this trouble? Either the Glasses had gone crazy or some maniac puppeteer was trying to make them dance.

"I'm going to do my homework now," Kelsea repeated.

"Yes," Eric said softly as he nodded. "Go do your homework."

After fleeing to her room, Kelsea journaled, read a bit, and finished all her work. Then came dinner, which consisted of turkey burgers, steamed veggies, and small-talk with the family. The rest of her Monday was – in a word – uneventful.

Things took a turn for the worse Tuesday morning. At precisely six o'clock Kelsea rolled out of bed to get ready for school. No more than five minutes later she sat on the floor of her bathroom retching over the toilet.

"Mom," Kelsea cried hoarsely between dry heaves. "Mom!"

Instead of Kelsea's mom, Victoria showed up first. (Or at least she hoped it was Victoria, the medical student, and not her other sister, the law student. She couldn't tell because her head was in a toilet bowl.) "Oh Kelsea," the twin (Yup. Vicky.) sighed as she held her younger sibling. She placed her hand on Kelsea's head. "You're burning up. Let's get you back in bed. I'll grab the ibuprofen."

Kelsea groaned as she pushed herself off the ground. She felt like shit. Actually, that would be putting it too lightly; she felt more like shit that had been trampled on by a horse and then left in the blistering heat. Her head pounded. Her throat felt scratchy. Hell, even her legs itched, especially around the bite mark.

Victoria escorted the teenager back to her bedroom and rushed out of the room to get medicine for her sick sister. Kelsea stumbled towards her bed and rolled in the fetal position on top of the covers. She felt too hot, too cold, too uncomfortable to move.

The door opened, and Kelsea's mother walked in with Victoria. "She can't go to school today," Kelsea overheard. She perceived a cool hand on her forehead. Heard tsking. "I'll call her in sick." Footsteps. Forced into a sitting position. Swallow pills. Taste like gold. Sleep. Dreams. Water. Fins. Golden eyes.

-x-

Kelsea hummed in protest as her mom gently shook her awake. Her mother joggled her a little bit harder. "What?" she groaned.

"You need to wake up and eat," her mom replied, pointing to the soup she had left on Kelsea's nightstand.

The girl yawned and began to stretch. The movement caused her to become aware of how much everything still hurt and itched. She must have grimaced because her mom got that classic "concerned mother" look.

"Are you feeling any better? You don't feel nauseous, do you?" Jane Glass put her hand on her daughter's forehead. "You are a bit warm, but your temperature has definitely gone down.

"I'm fine. Stop fussing," Kelsea said. "Getting a little food in me will probably help." Or she hoped some soup would help with her itchy throat; it wouldn't be good for much else. At least her nausea and fever were mostly gone. Her mom seemed satisfied with the answer. She asked a few more general questions before leaving Kelsea alone with her soup.

Kelsea swallowed a few spoonfuls of soup (which needed more salt) before her cell phone began vibrating. She reached over to grab it and found that her friends had blown up her phone with texts. They had created a group text, so there was an absurd amount of jokes speculating what had happened to her. She texted everyone back that she was sick. (No, she wasn't dead or going to die. Please tell her what she missed in her classes.)

The blonde girl grew bored after awhile, so she left her bedroom (slowly) to go to the living room. Elizabeth and her mom were already in the room while Kelsea's dad was presumably at work and Victoria was nowhere to be seen. Kelsea plopped down on the couch next to Elizabeth, who was watching a wedding show. The movement caused Kelsea's mom to look up from the book she was reading from the armchair she sat in.

"Hello there, Kels," her mom said. "How was the soup?"

"It needed salt," the girl replied matter-of-factly as she pulled her legs up on the couch and placed them on her sister's lap. Victoria stuck her tongue out and moved to push Kelsea's legs off her when she saw the bite mark. She grabbed her little sister's leg and twisted them so she could get a better view.

"Wow, what in the world did you do to your leg?" Victoria asked.

Kelsea scowled. She was not about to tell people that a merman had bit her leg and risk sounding absolutely insane. "I was by the docks yesterday and got scratched. That's all." She moved so that her legs were tucked under her and the puncture wounds could not be seen.

Victoria raised an eyebrow. "Okay, whatever you say. Please tell me that you didn't scratch yourself with something rusty."

"No. I don't have tetanus," Kelsea said with an eye roll.

"Just checking," Victoria said, raising her hands in defense. "Although you should put something on that."

"When are Freddy, James, and Hank getting here?" Kelsea asked her mom, quickly changing the subject. She hoped her brothers were still coming for her dad's birthday over the weekend.

The older woman replied that Hank planned on arriving on Friday and James and Freddie would drive in early on Saturday. Kelsea could live with that.

Victoria nudged Kelsea with her elbow. "Let's pray that you aren't sick when they get here or else we're going to have to quarantine you to keep everyone from catching the ick."

"If I'm contagious then there's a good chance you already caught it from me, so we'll be stuck in quarantine together. Lucky you!" she said. Victoria sighed.

-x-

By the end of the day, Kelsea's fever left and her mother declared her safe to go to school the next day. "Maybe you ate something bad," her mom said and promised to send her daughter with homemade food to school.

Kelsea woke up on Wednesday feeling completely fine. She didn't have nausea, so her morning was already much better. The girl grabbed a thermometer from the bathroom and took her temperature to be on the safe side, and found that she measured a hair under one hundred degrees Fahrenheit. She swallowed an ibuprofen and went to school with no problem.

Wednesday bled into Thursday, and Thursday into Friday. Her temperature hovered just below one hundred degrees, but did not go over. She still had the itches around her leg and throat. The bite mark had turned into a frustrating reminder of the incident that got her it because the punctures were not healing properly. For some reason, they darkened to black. And on top of all that, everything she ate needed salt. Her friends thought her insane for adding more salty to the salted fries served at lunch.

After school on Friday (which felt entirely too long since Friday was the last day before Spring Break) Kelsea went home and saw a motorcycle parked by her house. She ran inside to find Hank in the middle of telling on of his wild stories to her family.

Henry "Hank" Glass was the tallest of the Glasses, standing over six feet tall. He was twenty-five years old and had the energy of a five year old. Once upon a time his hair had been completely dirty blond, but in more recent times he had dyed the tips of his fauxhawk a bright blue. He claimed it brought out the blue in his eyes.

"She told me it was gonna hurt like hell," Hank said, "and, man, it really hurt like hell but I think it turned out fucking awesome." Just lovely, he had gotten another tattoo by the sound of it.

"I am surprised that Mom hasn't tried washing your dirty mouth out with soap yet," Kelsea said, causing her brother to get startled and jump. After regaining his balance, he turned around and tackled his sibling.

"She tried, but the short old lady couldn't reach high enough," the young man joked, winking at his mom as he said so.

Since he was bent down to hug his little sister, his mother had an easy time thumping him on the head. She said, "I am more than tall enough to twist your ear, Henry Glass. Don't make me do it."

Hank straightened himself up and ruffled Kelsea's hair. A few pleasantries were exchanged before her brother launched back into a story about his adventures since they had last seen each other. Kelsea only interrupted every couple of minutes to ask a question. Finally, as the catching-up began to draw to a close, Hank turned to Kelsea and asked if she wanted to walk on the beach.

"I'd rather not," she said, thinking of the merman-person (would "merman/person" be a better way of putting it?), "but for you, I suppose I could."

"I almost forgot," Hank said, "you just finished interrogating me, so you probably want to go reflect upon your discoveries in your journal. Would you like me to help you make a diagram or chart presentation as well?"

"Hardy-har-ha." Kelsea crossed her arms and shook her head. "I said we could go for a walk so let's walk." She rolled up the bottom of her jeans and kicked off her shoes. She had hardly gotten the second shoe off before she started to run out of the room and shout, "Last one to the shore is a rotten egg!"

The man had to remove his shoes, so the girl had such a big head-start that she beat her long-legged brother with ease. As water and sand tickled her toes, she glanced at the calm gulf and wondered if he waited out there. No, don't be ridiculous. What were the odds that he would be lurking around her house? Tiny. Infinitesimally small. She had never been afraid of the water before, and she had no reason to be frightened now. Her dad's crap and her recent experiences had messed with her mind.

"That was unfair and you know it," Hank said as he came up from behind Kelsea. "Time to get walking, little cheater."

They talked about useless things like the weather and Kelsea's college application process. "How's your love life?" Hank asked at one point, to which Kelsea responded, "Better than yours, I'm sure. How many girlfriends have you gone through last month? Three?"

"Four," Hank corrected with a dismissive wave of his hand, "but that last one was only for a day because I got drunk and made out with her brother. His lips were prettier than hers."

The man from the docks had nice lips too.

The pair strolled about a mile down the shore from the house when Hank started stripping. Kelsea did not had time to ask the young man what he was doing before he charged into the chilly waves wearing only his boxers. "Who's the rotten egg now?" he shouted.

"Still you." No one could pay her enough to follow her brother. No doubt the water was too cold. Unfortunately, Hank did not seem to comprehend that. He swam ashore, threw his sister over her shoulder, and walked straight back into the water (despite that she was fully clothed. The idiot was lucky she wasn't wearing anything nice).

Kelsea broke free from Hank's grip and realized that she was not freezing her butt off. In fact, the water felt perfectly comfortable. Who would have thought? She could have sworn the temperature readings were well below her liking.

If you can't beat them, join them? Kelsea began to swim out towards a buoy, hoping that Hank would just follow her. Instead, when she reached the floating bell and turned around, she found him waving to her from the sandy shore. "Kels, I saw something huge! I think it's a shark!"

It would be difficult (though not impossible) to climb on top of the buoy due to the sharp barnacles growing on the side. She'd have to swim. She took a few deep breaths and then moved as quickly as she possible could towards where her brother stood waiting for her.

Kelsea didn't make it far before something wrapped around her ankle. The startled teenager released her breath and breathed in salty water while she faced down, causing her to splutter. The blonde kicked, twisted, and squirmed but she still felt it on her leg. At least she did not feel any pain and the thing didn't tug on her. The only problem was that she could not swim forward. She reached down and felt a hand. That hand did not connect to Hank so who…? Oh no.

"Hank!" Kelsea shouted. She tried her best she sound calm. "I'm going to climb on to the buoy." The man instructed her to be careful.

Rather than jerking her leg away from the mystery hand, she slowly moved back maybe a yard. She worried that there would be some resistance to her movements as she climbed on to the floating hunk of metal, but instead it felt more l ike she was helped up. The hand let go once she sat down, and she pulled her legs out of the water as much as she could.

"Are you okay?" Hank shouted.

"Yes," she replied. "Can you run inside and get me a towel?" She didn't have to ask twice before he scooped up his clothes off the sand and ran towards home. He looked ridiculous.

A familiar dark-haired head popped out of the water. "You came back sooner than I expected."

Kelsea felt her face grow hot. "Why?" she asked. Why did he grab her? Why did he bite her? Why was he here? Why?

"I told you three weeks and yet you are here less than one week later," he said. "Your gills have not even come in. It will cause some complications, but we can work around that."

Nothing made any sense. Her head hurt. Her leg itched. Her neck itched. Wait … "Did you say gills?"

"Indeed. When I claimed you as my own by biting you, I injected a venom that is coursing through your body. Your legs are fusing into a tail and you are forming gills. Vast improvements in my opinion."

She could not believe this person was simply crazy. Kelsea began to think he told the truth. "Why me? I din't ask for this. I never went to you, you came to me. I'm not going anywhere with you. I don't even know you." Her eyes watered up. She nearly moved to wipe away the tears, but she stopped herself because her hands were wet and salty. Her pitiful situation depressed her.

The merman pretended not notice the girls's struggle. "All waters are my domain," he said. "By approaching water, you approached me. I am taking you into my domain to claim a debt that is owed to me. Come with me willingly and I will promise nothing will happen to your family. Resist and I can promise nothing."

He reached up and ran a finger around the blackened bite marks he left on her leg. He murmured something ab out her healing well before moving his hand a little higher along her leg where she was bleeding. Kelsea must have nicked herself on a barnacle. He gently washed away the blood that was running down her leg, which caused the cut to sting.

The merman's actions drew Kelsea's attention to his hands. Webbing linked his fingers together. Then she spotted fins along his elbow. Her eyes flew up to his neck and she discerned gills. How did she not notice the little details before? Her dad warned her, but she ignored him.

"Fine," she said, upset. "You are a beast, a monster."

The merman brushed off the insult. "Be careful who you call a beast. You are about to turn into one yourself."

When Hank came running out of the house, Kelsea was nowhere to be seen.

November 15, 2014: The amount of time that has passed since I last updated makes me really upset. I'm terribly sorry for the long wait. I'm at college and joined a sorority so I've been pretty busy. I'm hoping that the next chapter will come out much more promptly than this one did.

This chapter is dedicated to my friend Aimee and to everyone else who has supported me. Thanks to everyone who has read, reviewed, followed, and/or favorited TMD, and a super big thank you to those who have waited so patiently. You are wonderful.

As always, thank you for reading!

-Lauren