"DYLAN!"

My eyes snapped open, and I sat forward, heart beating erratically. My head, filled with foggy images of underwater life and swirling tails, tried to decipher who the voice was.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, the voice made it quite clear who it was.

"DYLAN!" my sister yelled again, opening my bedroom door. Half of her golden hair was pinned up, while the other half was curled. It looked funny, so I snickered, which only made Claire's glare intensify.

"This isn't funny!" she continued. "I can't find my hairspray! Do you know where it is?"

"Claire, why on Earth would I know where your hairspray is?" I stretched my arms outwards and yawned. "Jeez, what time is it anyways?" My eyes flitted towards my alarm clock and widened considerably. "7:40?! The bus gets here in ten minutes!"

Our parents had informed us the day before that the bus was going to arrive at 7:50 every day, which I had thought wouldn't be an issue, since I usually got up at 7:30 at my old school anyways. But of course, I forgot to set my alarm the night before. How typical.

"Yeah, I know!" said Claire. "That's why I'm freaking out! I mean, my makeup's all done and I'm dressed and everything, but I'm only halfway through with my hair and I still can't find the goddamn hairspray…"

While Claire was talking, I had gotten up out of my bed and was searching through my drawers for clothes to wear. I didn't have enough time to take a shower, so a quick brushing of my hair was going to have to do.

"Great, great," I said, hardly listening. "Look, just, check mom's bathroom." Both of our parents had left at six, like they have every morning since the start of their new job, and I figured that if anyone in the house had Claire's hairspray, it wasn't going to be my dad or me.

Claire's eyes lit up with realization. "Oh my… wow. Wow. I'm an idiot." She shook her head, and a loose lock of hair fell from the large clip. "Okay… I'm gonna go finish up now." She turned around, sighing and heading for Mom's bathroom.

I quickly got dressed and put on deodorant before heading for my bathroom. There, I turned on the tap and grabbed my toothbrush. I brushed my teeth as quickly as possible while trying to sort through my thoughts. I could still remember what my dream was about the night before, but it was getting hazier with each passing second.

The dream began back in the ocean, swimming with Tara. I hadn't seen her since Friday, when she took me for a swim, and I couldn't wait to see her again this upcoming Friday. If it wasn't for the fact that I knew I would be distracted by school for the next week, I didn't know if I would have been able to wait that long to see her. The ending of the dream was right before we finished swimming and made it to Mako Island… something that really disappointed me.

When I was done brushing my teeth, I spit out the extra toothpaste and turned the water back on, splashing my face hurriedly. Likewise, I wiped the excess water off, ran a comb through my messy hair, and ran back downstairs to grab something to eat.

I only had four minutes left. This, I knew, meant that my breakfast was going to be a short one. So, instead of making a smoothie or pancakes like I had planned, I grabbed a PopTart from the kitchen cupboards and ran back up to my room to set up my backpack.

The smart thing to do was probably pack my bag the night before, but I think we've established I don't always make the smartest of decisions. So, as hastily as possible, I threw in my notebooks and other school supplies my parents had went out and bought me a few days before, along with my iPod and earbuds. As an afterthought I tossed in my cell phone, even though there wasn't anyone really for me to call. I slung the green sack over my shoulder then, and ran downstairs where I met up with Claire, whose entire head was now curled.

"C'mon, slowpoke," she said irritatedly, opening the door for the both of us. We ran out to the bus stop, a little ways away from our house, but not too far away.

I sighed in relief when I saw the bright yellow school bus a few blocks away, picking up a kid who had to walk farther than we did to get to their stop. "God, I thought we were gonna have to walk." I reached inside my shorts pocket to grab the PopTart package. With a crinkling noise, I ripped it open. "By the way, why didn't you wake me up earlier?" The question was directed towards my sister, who was watching the bus anxiously.

"I assumed you were already up," she said. "I wasn't exactly keeping an eye out for you. I was the one who woke up ten minutes late!"

I rolled my eyes. I'd never understand why it took her so long to get ready in the morning.

As the bus rolled closer to us, I noticed that it looked a bit different than the bus I took back in Wisconsin. This one had an electric sign that read SCHOOL BUS on it, and looked more like a public transport bus I'd seen in the cities back in America than a regular school bus.

It eventually came to a stop, and the doors opened. I let Claire get on first, and then I followed.

"Good morning!" said the bus driver, a redheaded old lady, cheerily. Too cheerily for a Monday morning.

"Morning," I replied, albeit not as enthusiastically. Her accent was also a little shocking; it was a lot thicker than most of the people I'd heard so far (which, to be fair, didn't consist of many people… mostly hotel staff, the clerk at the nearby grocery store, and, of course, Tara).

My eyes scanned the bus, looking for a place to sit. Most people already had their spots, from already being almost a semester into the school year. Luckily, there was a seat with only one other person in it: a dark-haired, dark-skinned girl who was too busy listening to music on her phone to notice if I sat next to her. So, I did.

I cast one quick glance at the girl before plugging in my own headphones, as I heard the bus rumble into movement again. Her thick, dark hair was braided to the side, and her full lips mouthed the words along to her music, or so I was assuming. She also had a pen in her hand, one that she was using to draw some sort of picture in a square box, underneath another square box, like she was making a comic. In one of the boxes, she had drawn what looked to be the upper torso of a girl. Another thing I noticed was the pen marks all over her hands… the only one I could read well read Empty Laundry Basket.

Okay… so it might not have been a quick glance, and she may or may not have noticed that.

Her chocolate eyes peered up at me. She unplugged an ear bud as she asked, "Why are you staring at me?" She didn't say it rudely, which only made it worse.

I coughed and looked away. "I wasn't staring at you."

"Yes you were."

"No I wasn't."

She looked over me scrutinizingly. "What's your name? Are you new here?"

"Uh… yeah. I'm Dylan."

The girl's eyebrows knit together. "Dylan…? Hey, have I met you before?"

"Not as far as I know."

"Dylan… Dylan…" she repeated my name, pondering. "What did you say your last name was?"

"Well, I didn't really say…" I saw her look and hastily replied, "It's Parker."

"Like Peter Parker?" said the girl excitedly, completely forgetting about her interest in my name.

"I… guess?" I blinked a few times. "Australia has Spiderman?"

"...You're kidding me, right?"

"Hey, I don't know! I've been in this country for a total of one week."

She looked me over once more before sighing and extending her hand. This one was also covered in ink. "The name's Kendall. Kendall Pratt." A small smile adorned with tinted chapstick addressed me.

"Uh, cool. And, well, you already know my name…" I reached out and shook her hand; she had a surprisingly strong grip.

My eyes settled on Kendall's phone, which was still plugged into her headphones. "Hey, what song are you listening to?"

"Oh, it's not music."

"Then what is it?"

"It's a podcast. A school thing, really. Nothing interesting." Kendall smiled genuinely, flipping over her phone. Something about the action seemed protective and nervous, so I immediately tried to catch a glimpse of the podcast name before she flipped it. The only words I caught, though, were "Underwater" and "Podcast", which basically told me she was studying something for some science class.

"What're you listening to?" She gestured towards my iPod.

"Um…" I looked down at the touch screen to check. During my conversation with Kendall, I had completely forgotten I was even listening to music. "Step, by Vampire Weekend."

"I don't know if I've heard that one," said Kendall curiously. She angled her head to get a better view of the screen in my hands. "Is it good?"

"Yeah. Wanna hear?" I grabbed the earbud that wasn't in my left year and handed it to her. She stuck it in, and I started the song over. I felt my smile widen as she raised her eyebrows approvingly.

"It's pretty cool," she admitted. Kendall took her own earbuds out and stuck her phone into her bookbag. "Hey, since you don't really know anybody here, you can sit with me and my friends if you want at lunch."

"Really?" I was surprised by how nice she was, especially since she came off a little grouchy at first. But then again, who isn't grouchy on a Monday morning? "Wow, thanks." As an afterthought, I added, "Who're your friends?"

"Well, I don't have a lot," she said. "But they're super cool. There's me, obviously, then Ruby, and then Ta-"

"Hey!" said a voice in the seat behind me. I turned around, coming face to face with a boy around my age, with blue eyes (the color of Tara's, I noticed) and hair darker than mine. He was grinning. "You're the new kid, right?"

"Yeah." I looked him up and down. "Who're you?"

"I'm Derek McCallum." He nudged his head towards Kendall. "I'm her BFF's twin brother."

"Ruby?"

"No, Taralyn." The other friend, I made note of.

Kendall scoffed. "Come on, Derek. You know she hates being called that." Kendall's head turned towards me. "Anyways, you'll meet her at lunch. She can be a bit headstrong, especially towards strangers, so you've got to keep that in mind. Not everyone's as nice as me."

"You? Nice? I obviously haven't known you long enough."

She rolled her eyes, and I was glad she recognized I was kidding. "Ruby, though… she's more rude than anything. She'll probably snap at you all lunch long."

"That's a fact," Derek piped in. Kendall glared at him.

"Do you mind? We're having a conversation."

I looked between the two. "Why do I get the feeling that you two don't like each other?"

At the same time, Kendall responded, "Because we don't," while Derek said, "Because we have a history." I decided to focus on Derek's comment.

"A history? Like… you guys dated?"

Kendall scowled- something that looked almost wrong on such a smiley face- and looked away from Derek. "Unfortunately."

Derek sighed. "Whatever. It was in, like, eighth grade." His eyes squinted. "That doesn't even count, really."

I could take the hint that this was a subject to avoid, so I cleared my throat and steered the conversation elsewhere.

"So, anything I should know about now that I'm here? You know… school wise?"

Kendall tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Well… I suppose there's the malfunctioning toilet in the C Hall Girl's bathroom, but you wouldn't really need to know about that… let me think…"

"Oh!" said Derek. Kendall made a face that clearly expressed her feelings towards Derek still talking. "You should know, that our Biology teacher Mr. Fray is super strict, and that your first impression with him will mean a lot more than with other teachers."

"He's also super sexist," said Kendall informatively.

"He is not," scoffed Derek. Once again, both of their attentions had been directed towards each other. "You're just saying that 'cuz you like being Miss Social Justice Warrior."

"No I don't," she said angrily. "That's just what he is. He dress-codes girls all the time and never does with the boys. And even Maggie in the office doesn't agree with what he says is inappropriate for school, and you know that she's, like, the strictest office aide!" Kendall's eyes were filled with fire (well, not literally. That would have been cool). "Plus, he once told me that he only enforced it for the girls because girls were too distracting." She wrinkled her nose. "Do you know how creepy that is? He's a 50-year-old, married man. He shouldn't be "distracted" by a teenage girl's shoulders!"

"Yeah, well, I think he's sexist towards men!" fought back Derek. "Everytime girls are talking in class, he doesn't even care, but the second a guy does we get detention!"

"It's impossible to be sexist towards men!" Kendall replied, almost shouting. Luckily, the obnoxious noise of the other people on the bus covered it up. Unluckily, it didn't have that effect to me, who was sitting not even a foot away from her. "You can be prejudiced towards men, but sexism is based on oppression, you dumbass! And men, in general, aren't oppressed!"

"I think you're literally just saying this to find a way to argue with me!"

"Am not!"

"Am too!"

"AM NOT!"

"AM TOO!"

"AM N-"

"Hey, guys?" I said, cutting off their argument (if it could even be called that… I didn't understand half of what they were talking about). "If you don't mind, I, uh, think I'll leave you both to whatever it is that you're doing and just go sit over there." I pointed towards a seat that had been emptied when the two boys sitting in it moved to different seats.

"Oh, okay," said Kendall, calming down slightly. "See you at lunch?"

"Yeah, sure."

"I'll see you at lunch too," Derek added. Kendall glared daggers at him, and I turned away from the impending altercation. A part of me had a feeling it wouldn't be the last time I'd see one of those again.

Leaning my head against the window, which rumbled along with the moving bus, I sighed, my breath created moisture on the dirty glass panel. I reached inside my backpack and took out my school schedule.

Pre-Class- Homeroom with Mrs. Sladky

1st Period- Biology with Mr. Fray

2nd Period- Mechanics with Ms. Jenner

3rd Period- French with Mr. D'aramitz (or, would it be Monsieur D'aramitz? I wasn't quite sure…)

4th Period- Geometry with Mr. Donovan

Lunch Break…

And so on and so on.

I could see the school ahead of me losing distance, and I braced myself for my first day of school in Australia. Even while distracted by this, though, I couldn't help but let my mind wander back to Tara.

I wonder if she goes to, like, mermaid school or something… I thought to myself. Images of seashell chairs and dolphin teachers came to mind, straight out of a kid's cartoon. Lost in my daydreams, Derek had to lean over and nudge me when kids started getting off the bus.

"Hey," he said. "Time to go."

"I got this," snapped Kendall. She stood up and slung an arm around my shoulder. I was surprised with her strange comfortability with doing that to a technical stranger. "Come on, Dyl. Time to go." With one last glare at Derek, she led me off the bus.

"Dyl?" I questioned. Kendall blinked.

"What? Do you not want me to call you that?"

"I don't know. It makes me think of dill pickles."

She wrinkled her nose, something I noticed she did quite often. "You're right. That won't do at all." Kendall slipped her arm off of me. "Oh well. Let's go inside."

My eyes trailed towards the large brown building looming over me.

Well, this will be fun, I thought sarcastically.


Turns out Kendall was right… and so was Derek. I don't know about being sexist towards whoever, but I could tell you that Mr. Fray was a total dick.

I swear to God, the man glared every single time a girl's top slipped, and you could see her bra strap. It was like he had bra-vision or something. It was actually very creepy.

And what Derek had said was sort of true. Yes, he never called out girls for misbehaving, but he never called on them to answer questions either. It was like he was completely ignoring their existence, not giving them preferential treatment like Derek had assumed.

Wow, I thought to myself as I saw the crotchety old man snap at a student who was answering another student's question on the assignment, threatening them with a detention.. I'm so glad I only have to be with this guy for half a year. Any more would be physically painful.

The nice part about the class was that my Biology partner was Kendall. Turns out, she didn't have a partner since there was an odd number of students, and for some reason no one wanted to work with her. I didn't figure out why until I listened to her mumble on about the cruel treatment of dissection animals for half the class. It wasn't unexpected, though. I had pegged her early on as the activist type.

"So," sighed Kendall as we finished up our lab report. She had given up only seconds ago on her mumblings when she accepted the fact that talking to herself wasn't going to change anything. "What do you have next period?"

My mind wandered to the schedule sheet I had to constantly check up on every few minutes. "Uh… Mechanics? With Ms. Jenner?"

She scowled. "Ugh. Derek has that class."

I raised my eyebrows and turned to my sheet, filling out the last answer. At least I think it's B… or is it A? "I hope you don't mind my asking," I said casually. "But how come you know what classes Derek has?"

"Well, he is my best friend's brother. I've got to know these things."

"Mmhmm. Sure."

Kendall's eyes narrowed. "Why? What exactly are you hinting at?"

"Nothing."

We turned in the sheet and spent the rest of the time talking about the school. The lunch- pretty subpar, or so I've heard. The teachers- mostly okay, except for the few extremists (apparently Mrs. Hallows- a teacher I had the fortune to not have this year- didn't understand the whole concept of not-bringing-your-religion-into-your-teaching). And even the students- within one forty-five minute class period I learned the name of each and every kid in my Biology class. Well, except for that one guy with the afro… I couldn't remember if his name was Marko or Marcus. But I figured if I called him Mark I'd avoid any awkwardness.

Mechanics was fun. Derek really wasn't as bad as Kendall painted him out to be, and I even met one of Derek's friends, Jake. There really wasn't a lot of stuff I had to do besides talk, since the class was just finishing up a project Ms. Jenner said I wouldn't have to do. And mainly what we talked about was girls.

I got caught up to speed on all the latest hookups in the school. I didn't know most of the names being mentioned (actually, the only one that stood out was Don, a kid in Biology Kendall oh-so helpfully pointed out to me that had a thing with some girl named Therese), but I understood the gist of what they were talking about.

I didn't know anybody in French, but across the room was a girl I swore looked familiar. She had pale blonde hair, freckles, and light eyes. It looked as if her one facial expression was one of utter disdain, the way she kept rolling her eyes at people and sighing. I know I probably came off as a creep (great… again. What a surefire way to set up my social status on the first day of school) but I couldn't stop looking at her. It was like I'd seen her somewhere before, but I couldn't place my finger on where. I guess I knew how Kendall felt earlier that day.

Just when I was completely exhausted from all the learning, lunchtime finally rolled around.

Something cool about the school's lunch period was that we got to eat outside. I never was allowed that at my old school, which was a plus for me now. The first thing I did when I walked outside, lunch tray in hand was look for familiar faces. But the familiar faces found me first.

"Hey Dylan," said Derek, walking up besides me. "Wanna sit next to me today?"

"I already promised Kendall I'd sit with her… maybe tomorrow?"

Derek looked away, irked. "Yeah, that's okay. I'll still sit with you today."

"...With Kendall, too?"

He shrugged. "She needs to get over her thing she has about me."

I sighed and continued walking around the yard, looking for Kendall. Hopefully, I thought to myself, Derek and Kendall can get over their issues for one lunch period. It dawned on me that, if I was sick of their actions after knowing them for only half a day, everyone else must be ready to just stick the two in a closet and wait for them to sort their problems out by themselves. I wouldn't be surprised if that was a solution her friends had already tried.

We eventually found Kendall sitting next to- wow, when would the surprises end?- that same girl from my French class. They were talking to each other in hushed whispers, and Kendall looked slightly concerned.

"Who's that?" I asked Derek.

"Hmm?"

"That girl sitting next to Kendall."

"Oh, yeah, that's Ruby. One of Kendall's friends. Remember?"

Ruby.

"Come on," I said to Derek. "Let's sit over here." We sat down our trays across the table from where Kendall and Ruby were sitting. They didn't even notice we were there.

I swear I didn't try to, but I couldn't help but listen in to their conversation.

"... I went after her though, even though you know how much I hate you-know-what…" said Ruby. Her voice was a jolting shock of familiarity, just like her appearance. Especially her hair. Every time she swiped it off her shoulders, I had a major case of deja vu...

Kendall was a lot better at keeping her voice quiet, so the only things I heard from her were things like, "...Worth it…" "...Doing better…" "...Do you know…" "...Where is she now?"

"Bathroom," said the blonde, in a louder tone. It looked like their secret conversation was over.

I quickly tucked my head in, staring intently at my food. To the right of me, I could tell Derek was doing the same thing. This made me smirk; looks like I wasn't the only one listening in.

"Oh!" said Kendall, surprised when she looked across the table. "I didn't even notice you guys sat down. How long have you been here?" Her tone didn't convey nervousness, but it was obvious it was there, hidden.

"We just sat down," explained Derek. "Why?"

Kendall shot him a glare. "That's none of your business. And besides, I wasn't asking you." Then she turned to me. "Anyways, glad you caught us. I was going to look for you, but I was busy with Ruby." Her head turned towards her friend, who was looking at her phone. "Wait, have I introduced you to her yet?"

"Well, no…"

"Oh, I'm so sorry." She gestured between the two of us. "Ruby, Dylan. Dylan, Ruby."

Ruby had looked extremely disinterested in whoever had sat down at her table until she heard my name. At the mention of me, her head snapped up to meet mine.

"Dylan?" she asked, raising one perfectly plucked eyebrow.

I was unnerved by the recognition in her eyes. Like maybe I was familiar to her too. "Have I met you somewhere before?"

She looked at me, concerned, for quite a while. Kendall and Derek watched the exchange with more than a little confusion.

"...No," Ruby finally said.

I blinked. "Are you sure?"

"Quite."

Kendall squinted while looking at me. "I dunno, Rubes. Maybe we have met him before… I mean, doesn't his name sound familiar to you? I thought so earlier today..."

Ruby nudged her friend almost imperceptibly. "No, Kendall. I don't know what you're talking about. Maybe you're thinking of Derek. Their names are kind of similar."

"No… no I'm not…" Kendall's eyes widened, as if something had clicked inside her mind. "Wait a minute, didn't Tar-"

"I need to go to the bathroom," said Ruby suddenly. She slipped her phone into her pocket and latched onto Kendall's arm before she could continue talking.

Kendall still looked confused. "Uh, okay…" As Ruby dragged her away, she looked back towards Derek and me. "Catch up with you guys later!"

Derek raised his eyebrows slightly when they were gone. "Why do girls always do that?"

"Do what?" I dipped one of my french fries into a pool of ketchup. My mind was preoccupied, thinking about Ruby's weird behavior…

"Go to the bathroom together. It's kind of weird… and I'm not sure why Kendall even had to go with her. I thought I heard them say my sister was already in there…"

A small smile played on my lips again. "You were listening in too, weren't you?"

I wouldn't say that Derek blushed, but he definitely looked embarrassed. "Uh, maybe…?"

I shrugged. "Well, I did too. Can't say I heard too much of the conversation, though."

Derek sighed. "They've always been really secretive. Well, not always, but ever since… oh, I don't know, last year?" He looked down at his lunch. Half of the burger sitting on the tray was already eaten, and I wondered when he had found the time to already eat that much. "Especially my sister. We used to be so close, you know? That's kind of the thing with twins." His face then shrivelled up into a grimace. "We even dressed the same in elementary school."

"That," I said. "Is something I would have paid to see."

He laughed. "Yeah, well, I made sure to get rid of the remaining pictures of that time period my mom likes keeping in scrapbooks. They're horrifying."

"I can imagine."

"You know, you're lucky the first one of the group you met was Kendall. She's the nicest of the group, and probably the only one who would even let you close to their inner circle."

"How could Kendall be the nicest?" Although, compared to Ruby, she was like a blinding ray of sunshine. Even during one of her rants about society.

"She… has her moments," was all Derek had for an explanation.

I let it go at that and continued eating my food. When I was finished, I looked up towards the doors to the school, the doors Kendall and Ruby still hadn't returned from.

Even when the bell rung and it was time to go back to class, I didn't see them. While on my way to my next class (Economics), I thought long and hard on why they acted so strange around me. I had known that Ruby was familiar, but for the life of me I couldn't figure out why she'd want to hide that.

I was distracted for the rest of the day by that very thought, and the bus ride home was pretty uneventful, since it looked as if Kendall had gotten a ride home, and I knew Derek was at basketball practice. When I arrived home, Claire was just bubbling with excitement, trying to tell me every single detail about her first day at school. I, however, took it upon myself to hide in my room, lock the door, and plug in my earphones. It quite effectively tuned out the sound of annoying younger sisters.

Outside the window, there were dark clouds moving in. I vaguely wondered in it was Tara's doing, but dismissed that. Not every storm is going to be the friendly neighborhood mermaid, Dylan, I told myself. After that, I looked over the small amount of geometry homework I got and finished it as quick as possible. Not before long, Claire was pounding on my door so much I had no choice but to address it.

"What?" I snapped at her. She rolled her eyes, in a typical 13-year-old girl fashion.

"It's time to eat, cheese-brain." That was one of Claire's personal favorite insults towards me, one that she liked to use when teasing me about my fondness of living in Wisconsin. I only glared at her.

"Fine," she said when I didn't respond. "Don't eat then." She shut the door behind her and started walking downstairs.

I stood in the doorway for a moment before sighing and following her. "I never said I wasn't hungry…" I mumbled softly.

The kitchen table was all set up when I got down there. Mom was looking over some spreadsheets, Dad was serving up chicken casserole, and Claire was on her phone. She snuck a smug glance at me when I sat down by her.

"So," said Mom, looking up from her work. "How was school for you two?"

This was all the invitation Claire needed (in fact, it was more than that).

"Oh, it was amazing!" my sister gushed, and proceeded to tell every detail of her day in painful detail. This wasn't all bad, though, since it gave me the peace to eat my dinner without my parents questioning my first day during it.

To be honest, even I wasn't sure of what to make of my first day… or all of the days to come.

After dinner we put away dishes as a family. I decided to at least talk to my parents a little, but my dad was leaving the house before I could talk to him.

"Why's he in such a hurry?" Claire asked before I could.

Mom sighed. "It's this new job. We've barely started, but there's just so much to get done." Her eyes flickered towards the living room windows. The darkness outside was growing increasingly… well, dark. "There's gonna be another storm sometime in the next few days, and we need to start recording fish school patterns during the storm weather…" She chuckled. "It's not something you can do overnight."

She turned back towards us and smiled. "But don't worry, we're getting our work done."

"Alright," I said, starting to leave. "Sounds good, I guess." But before I could manage to get away…

"I never got the chance to ask you Dylan; how was your school day?"

I sighed audibly.


(A/N: Okay, so, for any of you confused by the timeline, here it is broken up: Sunday- Dylan arrives in Australia and spends the night in a hotel. Monday- moves to new house and sees mermaid. Wednesday- is helping move things around house and finds locket. Thursday- the storm, where he meets Tara again. Friday- goes for a swim with Tara. So, when they made plans in the last chapter to meet up the next Friday, they meant in one week. Sorry I didn't make that clear, but that's why he's at school before he sees her again. Also, my little jab at Claire for taking so long in the morning is very ironic since I take an hour in the morning, so, don't be offended by that if you do take long in the mornings lol. Take note of the fact that I'm not quite sure how Australian schools run or when their sport seasons are or whatever, so if this isn't completely accurate, please forgive me.

Another thing I want to address is that I've uploaded a story called What Changes Us that, right now, is basically a prequel to Girl in the Water. It has the girl's transformation, and later on, as I add more chapters, more events that happen in their daily lives. It won't focus on Dylan too much, since it's centered around the girls. I really hope you guys will check it out…

One more thing, I promise… I just want to apologize for taking so long. This summer's gone by so fast and I honestly hadn't noticed until today that it's been over a month since I last updated! I'm gonna try and be more consistent with my writing from now on. Also, don't forget to Favorite, Follow, and Review. I usually try responding to reviews as well, so there's a plus.)

(PS- I don't own Spiderman, Chapstick, or anything else I've mentioned in this. All I own is my mind, and even that is questionable.)