#aaralyn

Aaralyn carefully approached Virgil. “I apologize if this question seems ridiculous. But... you’re not a merman who had to leave his pod too, are you?” she asked, sitting on the sofa next to him. She sat like she still had her tail on land with her knees and legs pressed together.

Virgil scrunched his eyebrows. “It’s not a ridiculous question, given your life experience. But no, I’m not. Why do you ask?”

She scratched her jaw. “You... you have purple hair. I’ve never seen a human with purple hair. Only merfolk. I didn’t know humans could even grow purple hair.”

Virgil grinned and brushed his violet bangs out of his face. “Nah, kid. I dye it.”

“Dye?”

“I put a certain kind of ink into my hair and use chemical reactions to bind it to my natural color and change it.”

“Oh.” She looked down at his laptop. “What... what is that?”

“This? It’s my laptop,” Virgil answered. Her expression was still blank and confused. “It’s a computer that I can take around with me.” Still nothing. “Okay, um... hey Pat! Come explain what a computer is!”

Patton appeared under the archway that led back to the boys’ rooms. “Okay. So. A computer is a machine that humans have made to streamline work.” He plopped down on the loveseat and crossed his legs. “You can use the keyboard to type instead of write and it’s way faster---when you’ve practiced and you’re typing the ‘right’ way. And we have this thing called the internet that we can use to send things to each other.”

“Like... like a phone call?”

“Similar concept, but using different kinds of signals. See, light has a spectrum, and a lot of that spectrum is invisible.”

“I know how light works,” Aaralyn said.

“Oh good. That’ll make this easier. So the longest lightwaves we can’t see are radio waves and we use those to listen to music.”

“You use light to listen to music?”

“Yeah. We send signals with light that translate as sound. And computers work much the same way. Sending signals that get translated into whatever’s on screen.”

“That sounds complicated,” Aaralyn said.

“It can be,” Virgil agreed. “But you don’t have to know all the specifics. Here. Let me show you something on YouTube. You’ll start to get the hang of it pretty quickly.”

“Uh... okay,” Aaralyn muttered.

“So... you’re aware of the fact that we have a mermaid girl sleeping on our sofa, right?” Virgil said to Patton.

“Yes of course. She’s sweet, don’t you think?” Patton said.

“If by ‘sweet’ you mean ‘scared spitless’ then sure,” Virgil agreed, putting one hand behind his head. They were both lying on Patton’s bed, facing opposite directions. Patton had the biggest bed of the four roommates because he a) wanted enough room for all of his stuffed animals, and b) wanted to be able to share with his roommates whenever they had a sleepover in each other’s rooms. 

Patton was the eldest of the roommates (though some people were surprised by that) by a few months and saw Logan, Roman, and Virgil as either his sons or his brothers. Virgil was a month younger than Patton. Logan was two months younger than Virgil, and Roman was three months younger than Logan---making him six months younger than Patton. Patton liked taking care of them.

“Virge, she saved my life,” Patton said. “Don’t let your anxiety dissuade you from making friends.”

“With the mermaid,” Virgil deadpanned.

“Yeah!”

“Pat, I dunno if you’ve noticed, but anxiety is kinda my thing.”

“That it may be, but Aaralyn poses no threat to us,” Patton said.

“Did it ever occur to you that you’re altogether too trusting?”

“Duh. But it’s better to believe the best in people.”

“Sure if you want to break your heart every other week,” Virgil muttered sarcasically.

“Virgil Ethan O’Mara,” Patton admonished tiredly. “I don’t get my heart broken every other week. And Aaralyn isn’t going to break any of our hearts.”

Virgil sat in silence for a moment, just thinking while Patton painted Virgil’s toenails alternating violet and black. “Well she won’t romantically, that’s for sure. But what if you get attached to her and she leaves back for the ocean? You’ll cry for three days,” he said.

“Hm,” Patton grunted, concentrating more on his paint job than his thoughts. “You’re probably right.”

“Mmhmm,” Virgil agreed.

“But,” Patton argued, “it’s better than never letting anyone get close to you.”

“I don’t do that,” Virgil protested.

“You do a little,” Patton said.

“I let you, Roman, and Logan get close,” Virgil said.

“Yeah after the four of us shared a dorm suite in college,” Patton pointed out. “And we barely saw you. You stayed at the library till midnight almost every night and I swear you never even came in through the doorway.”

“What other way would I get into the dorm?”

“The window.”

“I’m not Spider-Man, Patton. And you were rooming with Roman across the bathroom from me and Logan’s room so how would you know if I came in through the door or not?”

“I just never heard it open!”

“That’s because Logan was either asleep or busy so I would open it quietly to be considerate.”

“Fair,” Patton relented. There was a moment of silence. “But you can’t deny that it’s kinda cool that we have a mermaid sleeping on the couch.”

“S’pose,” Virgil said.

“There! Done!” Patton announced. Virgil looked down at his toes.

“Good job,” Virgil said.

“Thanks!” Patton beamed.

Virgil looked around, realizing that Patton was using his phone to play their music quietly. “Hey, where’s your laptop?” he asked.

“Oh I put a movie on to help Aaralyn sleep and teach her more about how they work and set it on the coffee table,” Patton said.

“You’re excited to have someone new to take care of, aren’t you?” Virgil said flatly. Patton kicked his feet up on Virgil’s abdomen.

“I can neither confirm nor deny any allegations without approval of the voice of reason in this house,” Patton said.

“Hey Logan! Tell Patton he has your approval!” Virgil called.

“Patton, you have my approval,” Logan said from his room next-door, sounding distracted.

Patton gave Virgil a look. “Of course I like taking care of people, Virgil,” Patton said. “Doesn’t matter if they’re new or not. But I owe her for saving my life and if that means teaching a mermaid how to be human, then I’m going to do that.” Virgil reached for Patton’s box of nail polish and found his sky blue and gold.

“Okay.” He uncapped the sky blue and pinched one of Patton’s toes to bend it just enough to paint. Patton flinched out of the way with a squeak. “Hold still, you goof,” Virgil said as Patton’s toes squirmed out of the way of Virgil trying to paint them.

“It tickles!” Patton protested.

Virgil rolled his eyes. “C’mon, Pat. It’s not that bad.”

Patton squeed and giggled. “Stopstopstop! It tickles!”

“Hold still!” Virgil pressed, trying to trap Patton’s ankles under his forearm.

Knock-knock! Knuckles echoed off the door.

“Come in!” Patton cried, yanking his feet off Virgil’s lap.

A head of long hair poked through the door. “Is... everything okay? I heard loud noises.”

“Aaralyn! Yeah. Everything’s fine. Virgil was just trying to paint my toenails but it tickled too much so I was laughing.”

“Oh. Okay. Sorry to bother you. ‘Night.” She moved to leave.

“Hang on!” Patton protested. The door stopped closing behind her. “Do you want to paint your toenails? Or your fingernails? You’re always welcome to join us.”

“Thanks but I... I should really go back to sleep. See you in the morning.”

“See you in the morning!” Patton said. The door shut the rest of the way.

“You gonna hold still now?” Virgil asked.

Patton took a deep breath. “I’ll try,” he said with a grin.

“Shopping spree!” Roman shrieked the next morning. Aaralyn awoke with a jolt, her hair a slightly tangled mess around her head. It was so long and thick that some of it got spared from being too messy, but there was so much hair that most of it was snarled.

“What?” Aaralyn mumbled tiredly. “What’s going...”

“You and me, little lady, are going on a shopping spree!”

“What’s that?”

“We’re going to go out and get you a bunch of human clothes since Aphrodite-knows you don’t have any,” Roman explains dramatically. Virgil looks up from his bowl of cereal with a rather dead expression.

“But not before breakfast, Roman,” Patton admonished.

“Uh... okay?” Aaralyn said.

Patton approached her. “You hungry, kiddo? Virge and I were trying to be quiet so you could keep sleeping---”

“Until someone---” Virgil cast a frustrated glance at Roman, who was the pinnacle of chipper-morning-person-already-ready-for-the-day as he hummed loudly and made himself breakfast. “---decided to be noisy.” 

Roman just shrugged. “When you gotta, sing, Chemically-Imbalanced Romance, you gotta sing!”

“Roman, what have we said about name-calling?” Patton scolded.

Roman rolled his eyes but didn’t apologize immediately. Just continued with his own cereal before glancing at Virgil. “Sorry,” he said. Virgil grunted but didn’t verbally say anything.

“So,” Patton said to Aaralyn as she sat up properly, “you hungry? Wanna try some toast?”

“Some what?”

“It’s just bread but crispy,” Virgil said.

“Bread?”

“Just trust us, it’s delicious. Little butter, little Crofters, and it’s heaven,” Roman said, dramatically flinging his spoon up like he was holding aloft a weapon. It flung an arc of milk drops across the table---one landing on the back of Virgil’s hand. He wiped it off on a paper towel without even changing his expression and put another spoonful of cereal in his mouth.

“What’s a Crofters?” Aaralyn asked.

From the archway that led back to the boy’s bedrooms, a loud gasp was heard. “YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT CROFTERS IS?!” Logan shouted.

“... No,” Aaralyn said. “Bear in mind I grew up in the ocean.”

Logan appeared in the archway. “That’s fair,” he said. “Crofters is a delicious jelly.”

Aaralyn pursed her lips. “I never liked jellies much. May I forego the Crofters for now?”

Logan opened his mouth to protest, but Patton cut him off. “Of course, kiddo. Just means more for Logan later. Right Logan?” Patton pushed his glasses up his nose and looked over at Logan. Who thought for a moment.

“That’s true,” he said.

The four roommates got ready at slightly different paces. Roman was almost completely finished, Virgil was still in his pajamas, Patton was dressed but his hair was a mess, and Logan’s tie was skewed and too loose for his job. He said he’d fix it later. Aaralyn just watched them, learning their dynamics.

Roman found an old dress in his costumes trunk that Aaralyn could wear shopping---it was a princessy dress from a musical Roman had been in several years ago but it would do. Roman wasn’t even sure why he had it but he didn’t care to think too much about it.

Patton and Virgil insisted on joining Roman in taking Aaralyn on a shopping spree. But for very different reasons.

Patton thought it would be fun, and Virgil wanted to keep Roman from choosing overly glitzy clothes that weren’t practical.

Logan went to work, leaving the four of them to head to the nearest mall. Logan hadn’t wanted to join anyway.

At the mall, Roman went hog-wild, dragging Aaralyn into stores, looking around, and pestering her about what she liked. Virgil tried to get him to chill but Roman was having none of it. Aaralyn didn’t seem to mind. She smiled and answered quietly, occasionally admitting she had no idea. “We don’t really have a lot of options underwater. Human clothes tend to drag so I’ve never considered styles much,” she said when Roman asked which neckline she preferred---crew or V.

Virgil was the only one allowed to go into the bra store with her because he was being quiet. So Patton and Roman went to go find other ideas for her.

“I don’t imagine men wear these,” Aaralyn remarked as they browsed.

Virgil shrugged. “Some might. I don’t,” he said.

“Hmm.”

A saleswoman approached them and quickly redirected their efforts, fitting Aaralyn for a size and steering her around to find several different kinds to try on. Virgil awkwardly trailed behind, saying nothing and letting the woman guide the girl who clearly had no idea what she was doing.

After spending a good forty-five minutes trying on various styles in a fitting room---with lots of confused comments Virgil could hear---she found one she liked. They got it and quickly left the shop.

Roman and Patton were waiting for them on a bench outside. Roman immediately took control of the rest of the trip, talking excitedly about some of the things he found that he wanted her to try on. Patton laughed and kept Virgil company while they trailed behind a rather wide-eyed Aaralyn and a chatty Roman.

Aaralyn was fairly certain they worked their way through the entire mall by the time Roman decided Aaralyn had a suitable wardrobe “for now.”

“Finally,” Virgil muttered. “Now we can go home.”

“Wait. You’re not coming in with me?” Aaralyn asked.

“Decidedly not,” Virgil said.

“How come? The ocean isn’t dangerous if you’re with a mermaid. Even a podless one,” Aaralyn said.

“I don’t trust the ocean,” Virgil said. “Among... other reasons.”

Aaralyn scrunched her eyebrows, but didn’t press it. “Alright. Enjoy your music. I’ll be back in a half-hour.”

“How are you going to tell the time if you’re underwater?” Virgil asked.

Aaralyn turned to look at him with one eyebrow raised above the other. “By the position of the sun, duh. I’m not going that deep,” she retorted before stripping off the sundress Roman bought for her (“I just saw it and thought it was beautiful!”) and sprinting into the waves. After a moment the fluke of her tail flicked out of the water, smacked the surface, and disappeared under.

Virgil flopped onto his lounge chair, put his headphones over his ears, and pulled out a book. A mystery novel that Logan had lent him and he’d been meaning to read for a while.

He’d been reading for fifteen minutes by the time Patton pulled up and ran down to the little secluded beach near Sirens’ Shoal. “Where’s Aaralyn?” Patton asked.

“Swimming,” Virgil said.

“I thought you were going to keep an eye on her,” Patton said.

“I am.”

“So why aren’t you with her?”

“I don’t trust the ocean.”

“She’s a mermaid, Virge. She wouldn’t let anything happen to you!”

“Mm,” Virgil grunted. “No thanks.”

“You don’t want to see the ocean the way she does?”

“Not really.”

“Why not?” Patton asked.

Virgil snapped the novel closed. “Because I can’t swim, Pat!” he snapped. 

Patton took a step back, bare foot squishing through the sand, and nodded. “Sorry,” he said, lowering himself onto the sand and beginning to make a sandcastle. Virgil watched out of the corner of his eyes for a moment. Finally he sighed, set his book off to the side, and joined Patton on the sand, helping him build.

Out in the sea, Aaralyn was searching the ocean floor for broken coral and empty shells. It was soothing to her to be down there. To be home. Even if it was devastating that she’d never go home to her pod ever again.

“Hey Aaralyn!” a familiar voice called through the water. She turned. It was an old friend.

“Hi Jewel,” she said.

“Where have you been?” Jewel asked. “No one’s seen you for two days!”

Aaralyn sighed, a long stream of bubbles shooting out of her mouth and wiggling toward the surface. “I got caught in a fishing net. Hauled into a boat. I got legs. I can’t go home.”

“How’d you get out?” Jewel demanded.

“I lied to the fishermen. There were three of them on deck. They didn’t see me until my tail disappeared and asked how a girl got caught in a net. I told them I was out for a swim and it snagged me as it was getting pulled up. They cut me out of the net and I jumped back in. I dove so deep they wouldn’t see my tail and swam for shore immediately. Jewel, I was so ashamed. I... I can’t go home.” Aaralyn sunk onto the sandy floor and buried her face in her hands.

Jewel floated across from her. “You could just... not tell anybody. Come home. Say you were following a giant jelly again.” Jewel paused. “You do... want to come home, right?”

Aaralyn’s tail squirmed. She rubbed the gills on her right side. “I guess,” she mumbled. “But... I...”

“But what?” Jewel pressed, sounding frustrated.

“But I found...” She sighed. “There’s these humans. I told them what happened. They... they took me in.”

“Aara, listen to me. Humans can never be your family!”

“But... but... you haven’t met them! They’re nice to me. They care about me.”

“They’re humans Aaralyn! Humans around these parts only care about themselves. Wake up and smell the kelp! Once the novelty of finding a mermaid on the beach wears off they’ll abandon you!”

“Not these ones.”

“You don’t know that!”

“No, but... for now they’re teaching me how to be human. And if I can’t go home, then the human world will have to become my home. I can’t survive in the ocean without a pod, Jewel.”

“So come home with me. Just don’t tell anyone that you got dragged onto a fishing boat. The legs stigma is so old-fashioned and overrated. It wasn’t your fault so it doesn’t count. It’s not like you went on land to run away with a human man.”

“Someone in the pod would find out eventually,” Aaralyn said. “And then what? My punishment would be even worse. I’d rather bow out now. Gracefully. Accept our cultural custom and leave.”

Jewel turned angry. “You were SO CLOSE, Aaralyn! You were going to be the next leader! You could have been the queen of several pods! How can you just throw it all away?!”

Aaralyn shrugged. “I messed up. I’m owning my mistake.”

“Without you, that deceitful eel is going to take your place. You know he was the next one Melody was considering.”

Aaralyn sighed. “How about I explain to Melody what happened and advise her to appoint someone else? She listens to me.”

Jewel clenched her jaw. “Fine,” she grumbled. “But I think you should just come back with me.”

“And I think that’s a terrible idea. I’d get thrown out even worse later. C’mon. Let’s go talk to Melody and then I’m going back to the land.”

“Aaralyn’s been gone for a while,” Patton observed.

“She’s a mermaid,” Virgil pointed out. “She doesn’t have to come up for air.”

“Yeah but didn’t you say she told you she’d be back in a half-hour?”

“Yeah.”

“Well... it’s been over an hour,” Patton said, looking at his watch.