Steph-the-cheerful is back! I apologise for my un-me-like behaviour last chapter.

DISCLAIMER (To the chorus of Destiny's Child's 'Survivor'):

If you're a Twilighter,
you want me to sign stuff
I gotta tell you:
I'm not Steph Meyer

You wanna know a-
-bout the vampires
Well, folks, you can ask me,
But I'm not Steph Meyer.

Two verses this time, to make up for last week...

...I can HEAR Cinnamon Selkie groaning.

8 Climax

Met by a tidal wave of water and a chorus of ecstatic voices all extolling the virtues of water, Esme's first impression was that her children had formed some sort of ritualistic cult. After all, their behaviour was typical Emmett activity, but so unlike Rosalie, who happened to be in the middle of some rather energetic splashing, herself.

"Rosalie, dear?"

Rosalie hid a grimace. (Alice was nudging her.) Inwardly, she sighed. If she had her way, she would rather not be here at all. But she had to do this to make Bella think 'human' again. Otherwise, living with Edward would become completely unbearable. And so, outwardly, she giggled. "It's water, Esme; look!"

Edward, privy, of course, to the inner workings of his sister's mind, was doing his best to ignore her discountenance. "Yes, Esme. See?" He splashed some water over Bella, who giggled artlessly and splashed him back.

As Carlisle, dumbfounded, repeated, "Jasper?" and Edward and Bella continued splashing each other, Alice carefully and daintily executed a double back-flip, landing back in her place, but scattering water all over her family in the process, and Jasper let his eyes roll back into his head, toning down the happiness feelings.

Finally, after his mouth had been hanging open for not a few seconds (and in vampire time, an eternity) Carlisle closed it, swallowed, and shook his head.

"Would somebody like to tell me what's going on?"

"Here it comes," grimaced Rosalie under her breath.

"Well, Carlisle," said Edward. "It's like this—"

"We're mermaids, Carlisle!" interrupted Bella excitedly.

"Oh boy," muttered Rosalie, much to Emmett's (for once, contained) amusement.

"Ready, Jasper?" murmured Edward.

"Don't worry, it'll work," Alice whispered encouragingly.

"Gotcha," said Jasper, in almost inaudible tones.

"You… think you're mermaids," said Carlisle in disbelief. Esme looked on shrewdly, but didn't say anything, much to Rosalie's relief.

"No! Don't be silly, Carlisle. We are mermaids!" Emmett told him. "There's a difference."

"You're kidding me," said Carlisle.

"Why would we do that?" Bella wanted to know.

"Get ready," said Alice to Jasper alone.

"But you aren't mermaids!"

Jasper, having managed to drop the 'mermaidy' feeling some time ago, gathered the full force of Carlisle's conviction, ready to turn it on when needed.

"Yes, we are," said Emmett, and splashed for good measure.

"No, you're not!" said Carlisle.

"Yes we—" Emmett, having been nudged by Edward, abruptly changed his tune, much to Rosalie's relief. "Oh. We aren't?"

"No," said Esme.

"Oh. Come on, guys," said Emmett, and got out of the spa. Rosalie followed his example, gratefully, intending to snag her husband, ply him with a mop and bucket, and make him help her clean up before Carlisle came back down. Normally, she didn't clean up, but when it was a choice between that, and facing the wrath of Carlisle—again—she'd choose the former every time.

(Esme, who was by the door, snagged him first, however, and said quietly, "Now, you're going to explain all this to me later, aren't you, Emmett?"

"Yes, Esme."

"Good choice."

Emmett and Rosalie left the room.)

Alice said, for Jasper's benefit, "We're not mermaids, Carlisle?"

"No."

"Really?"

"No."

"Really?" said Bella incredulously, and not altogether accepting of this new idea.

"No!" said Carlisle and Alice.

Jasper aimed his collected 'feelings' at Bella and let rip, starting gently at first, as Carlisle's emotions were very strong at the best of times. In fact, this strength was what he, Edward, and Alice were counting on to bring Bella to her senses—Jasper's powers just didn't seem to be that effective for Bella, whereas it had taken all his control just to start feeling human again.

"Really?"

Though he could hear his girlfriend weakening, Edward sighed. This really was going on for far too long. Jasper had better succeed soon, if only for the sake of his brother's peace of mind.

Edward was far too impatient to have his girlfriend back.

"Bella. You're not a mermaid."

"Oh," said Bella, in an anticlimactic way. "Really?"

"No," sighed Carlisle.

"Oh."

There was silence as everyone waited for something else to happen.

"Well, what are we all doing in here, then?" said Bella simply.

Nobody really had an answer to that.

The End.

Oh, come on! You didn't think I'd let you go just like THAT, did you? Tune in, same time, next week. I haven't finished writing the epilogue yet, but IT WILL BE DONE by next Monday.

EDIT: Oh. My. Gosh. FORTY REVIEWS! FORTY REVIEWS! I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS!

I just went to post the chapter and I SAW THE NUMBER OF REVIEWS ON THE STUFF I'D WRITTEN ALREADY! I LOVE YOU GUYS!

... see, this is what you get when you cross an overly-hysterical first-time fanfic writer and a lot of GORGEOUS people. I'm abusing caps lock again, aren't I? But I'm so EXCITED! Like I said, I love you guys.