A Mischief of Mermaids (18 page)

Poppy turned to see the real mermaids, led by Coralie, moving in swiftly.

Ariadne swept into the midst of the mermaid show and grabbed a soda from Mermaid Crystal.

Kali used her tail to sweep aside the tea table and knock a cup from Mermaid Shannon's hand.

Coralie swam in fast, furious circles, creating a vortex that upended the props the performers had been using. The tea table tipped over and sank to the bottom of the lake. The crate of sodas overturned, freeing the bottles which then spun end over end in the underwater currents. The guitars and footballs and Texas state flag all floated to the surface of the water.

And then, at last, Poppy saw Franny. She gleefully swam through the chaos, turning somersaults, her blond hair flowing behind her.

Nerissa swam up fast on her left. For a moment, it looked as if they might collide—then, with a quick movement of her tail, Franny changed direction and headed straight toward Poppy as the crowd on the glass-bottom boat applauded and cheered.

This, Poppy knew, was her moment. She swam down to the air hose, keeping one eye on Franny.

All she had to do was take a nice, deep breath of air, then move in front of Franny, get her attention, and hold up the mirror. If even a little bit of the old Franny remained, she wouldn't be able to resist looking in it. . . .

Poppy stubbornly refused to think about what would happen if none of the old Franny still existed.

She got to the rock formation and reached for the hose. . . .

But at that very moment, Ariadne came toward her, smiling with glee as she chased a terrified Allyson. As she swam by Poppy, her powerful tail flexed and slapped Poppy in the face.

The force of it knocked Poppy away from the rock formation. What was worse, it knocked the air hose out of her mouth.

She made a grab for it, but it was too late.

She held her breath and watched as the hose floated away.

Her heart pounding, Poppy tried to swim back to the rocks, looking frantically for another hose. But it was too late. Her lungs were bursting. If she didn't get air soon, she could drown. . . .

Swim for the surface if anything goes wrong
. That's what Chloe had said—and that, of course, was the smart thing to do.

But then Poppy saw Franny, just a few yards away, still doing flips and somersaults and twists as the crowd applauded.

I have to get over to her, Poppy thought. I can hold my breath for a few more seconds. I just have to grab her arm and let her see me—

At that moment, just as if Franny could hear her thoughts, she turned and met Poppy's gaze.

With her last bit of strength, Poppy pulled the mirror from her waistband and started to swim toward Franny—and then, someone grabbed her arm and yanked her up.

Startled, Poppy turned to see Chloe pulling her to the surface. Chloe was pointing up, toward the sun and the sky and the air, and nodding encouragingly.

Everything's going to be all right, Chloe seemed to be saying. Just hold on. . . .

No! Poppy thought, struggling to get free. This is my last chance!

She glanced down just in time to see the little mirror spinning toward the bottom of the lake, flashing back glints of sunlight as it fell deeper and deeper into the water.

Wait! Poppy thought to herself. I have to get the mirror; it's my last chance to save Franny—

Chloe may have looked slight, but she was stronger than Poppy. It only took a few seconds for them to make it to the top. In fact, they went so fast that Poppy could feel her mermaid tail, which had never been that secure in the first place, slipping off her legs.

Poppy took a big gulp of air. Her feet were still caught in the spandex, so she kicked it off. It rose to the surface, where it floated on the water, nothing more than a piece of stretchy orange material covered with a few spangles.

“What do you think you were doing down there?” Chloe asked sharply. “You could have drowned!”

“You . . . don't understand,” Poppy gasped. “My sister . . .”

“Hold on,” Chloe said under her breath. She waved to the audience, who had turned away from watching the underwater action to stare at this new plot twist.

“Don't worry, folks, we've got a newbie here,” she called out cheerfully. She held up the tail and added, “And she's going to have quite a tale to tell when she gets home!”

Everyone chuckled, then turned around to continue watching the underwater show.

Poppy blinked water out of her eyes until she could see clearly once more. And what she saw was Rolly standing at the railing of the glass-bottom, his fishing pole in hand. He was not trying to get closer to the viewing area. Instead, he was staring fixedly at the waves, every line of his body tense.

As Poppy treaded water, she saw Mr. and Mrs. Malone spot the boat's captain and eagerly push through the crowd to corner him in the stern.

Quickly, she ducked down until only her nose was above water, hoping that her parents hadn't seen her. After a moment, as she watched her parents begin talking excitedly to the captain, she realized that she needn't have worried. Poppy swam closer to the boat so she could hear their conversation.

“Have you ever seen anything extremely unusual at the bottom of this lake?” Mr. Malone was asking.

“You mean, like junked-out old cars?” asked the captain. “Because some people will dump them here, even though it's illegal.
And
dangerous.
And
environmentally unfriendly—”

“Terrible! And so thoughtless!” agreed Mrs. Malone. “But we were thinking of something a little different. Perhaps you have—oh, I don't know—spotted pieces of mysterious spacecraft?”

The captain's smile disappeared. “Er, I don't think—”

“Maybe twisted chunks of metal that happen to glow in the dark?” suggested Mr. Malone.

“No, I would have remembered that,” said the captain, trying to edge away.

“Or possibly evidence of interstellar crashes?” Mrs. Malone added brightly. “I've heard that tiny alien corpses sometimes bob to the surface a few days after an incident. The government covers it up, of course, but the stories always get out eventually—”

“Ah, I think I need to correct our course a few degrees . . . if you'll excuse me,” said the captain, hurrying off.

Even in the midst of her worry, Poppy was struck by the idea that she really had to admire her parents. They never gave up their quest for evidence of the paranormal—but they were always searching for the wrong thing and looking in the wrong direction. . . .

Like right now, for example, they were missing their daughter, who had turned into a mermaid and was performing a triple flip half gainer on the other side of the boat to oohs and aahs from the crowd.

As the applause died down, Poppy saw Will and Henry push their way through the crowd to stand behind Rolly at the railing.

Will looked at her, raising his shoulders and lifting his hands, palm up. He mouthed the words:
What happened?

Poppy cautiously swam toward the boat, keeping her head as low as possible in case Mr. or Mrs. Malone happened to glance in her direction. When she got close enough, Will and Henry pulled her up and she landed on the deck, accidentally splashing a family who were craning their necks to see through the glass bottom of the boat.

“What went on down there?” Will asked under his breath.

“I'm sorry!” she whispered. “The plan didn't work! Franny saw me, but it was like she didn't even know who I was—”

She gulped and felt tears come to her eyes. “I think”—she paused and blinked hard—“I think she's forgotten all about us.”

“Okay, don't cry,” said Will.

“I'm not crying,” Poppy snapped. “I never cry, you know I never cry—”

“All right, fine, just don't do that weird thing where your eyes get all wet,” said Will. “What happened to Nerissa?”

Poppy gasped. “I don't know,” she said. “Isn't that terrible? I'm a terrible friend! I was so focused on trying to get close to Franny and hold up the mirror, I completely lost track—” Her voice wavered embarrassingly. Poppy stopped and blinked several times.

“Okay, okay, don't get all upset,” said Will quickly. “We'll just have to move on to Plan B.”

“Will!” Poppy felt a surge of annoyance, which was a good thing. Anger, she knew, was a way to fend off other emotions, like the feeling you were about to cry, which of course she wasn't because she never did. “There is no Plan B! We only had one plan, this plan, Plan A—the one that just ended in disaster!”

“Maybe if we all waved to Franny?” Henry suggested hopefully. “Maybe if she looked up and saw us all? Maybe that would work?”

If Will had made that idiotically optimistic suggestion, Poppy would have treated it with the scorn it deserved. But Henry was her friend, not her brother, so she tried to be polite.

“Yeah,” Poppy said dully, her shoulders slumping. “Maybe . . .”

“Poppy,” said a voice at her elbow.

She glanced down to see Rolly, still staring intently at the water.

“Yes, what is it, Rolly?” she sighed.

He pointed. “I think I can see Mugwump.”

She followed his gaze. It was harder to see the mermaids underwater from the railing, but occasionally a scaly, spangled body would flash by, looking for all the world like a giant fish.

“Sure,” she said, her thoughts going back to her parents and what she was going to tell them about how and why Franny had disappeared. “Good for you, Rolly. You finally found him.”

She didn't see Rolly's small eyes narrow and become even smaller and more intense.

“Yup,” he said with resolve. “And I'm going to catch him.”

With that, he reached back with his fishing pole and snapped it forward. The fishing lure sailed across the water just as Franny somersaulted through the air.

“Aggh!” She clapped her hand to her head, then belly flopped back into the water.

Rolly pressed his lips. “I wanted to catch
Mugwump
,” he complained. “Not Franny.”

The fishing line whirred as Franny dove down into the water.

“She's going to break my fishing line,” Rolly said, disgruntled. “Franny always spoils everything.”

Poppy's eyes lit up. “No, she doesn't, Rolly,” she said. “In fact, this is perfect! You're doing a brilliant job. Just be careful”—she reached over to take the fishing pole from Rolly—“not to lose her.”

Rolly twitched the pole away from her. “Leave me alone,” he said, his eyes fixed on the spot where Franny had disappeared. “I
know
how to fish.”

He began reeling in the line. Poppy watched, holding her breath, as the line stretched out. If the line breaks, she thought, Franny will be gone. . . .

Just as she thought that, the line went slack.

Poppy heard Will and Henry groan. Her heart sank.

And then Franny burst out of the water, only a yard away. She glared at Rolly.

“You are the brattiest little brother in the world!” she yelled. “I was having fun and now you've ruined everything!”

Her eyes flashed as she caught sight of Poppy. “And I can't believe that you put on that silly costume and made a spectacle of yourself in front of all these people! It's bad enough that Mom and Dad embarrass me on a daily basis, but now you're doing that, too. I don't know how I'll ever make friends when I have a family like this—and just look at what you've done to my hair!”

At that moment, Nerissa burst through the surface of the water. “Sounds like someone has remembered who she really is,” she called out to Poppy. “Can we not finish off our plan, then?”

Poppy glanced at Will, a huge smile on her face. He was grinning, too.

“Bad-tempered, self-centered, and vain,” he said. “That's our Franny.”

“Yeah,” Poppy said happily. “She's back.”

“I
'll never think about mermaids the same way after this,” said Poppy.

“Neither will I,” said Henry.

“If I'm really lucky, I'll never think of mermaids ever again in my whole life,” muttered Will. “I don't know what it is about Austin, but it seems like there's always something weird happening here that ends up causing us a lot of trouble.”

“Oh, come on, stop complaining,” said Poppy happily. “Let's go find Franny.”

Together, they ran to the mermaid changing station. They could hear the show mermaids talking in loud, agitated voices inside.

“But where did they come from?” Chloe asked plaintively. “I didn't even know there
was
another mermaid show in this area!”

“And why would they ruin our show like that?” asked Shannon.

“Maybe someone wants to put us out of business,” said Allyson. “Maybe that guy, what's-his-name, the one with the diving pig.”

“Or maybe this was all a publicity stunt dreamed up by Bud McCray,” Crystal suggested darkly. “It would be just like him to hire another mermaid crew on the sly and not tell us what he had planned. . . .”

Just then, Franny came walking up the path from the lake. When she caught sight of Poppy, Will, and Henry, she stopped and gave them a quizzical look.

“Oh, hi,” she said.

“Are you okay?” asked Poppy. “You sound . . . different.”

Franny cocked her head and frowned. “I feel different,” she said slowly.

“What do you mean?” asked Will.

“I thought . . . I almost imagined . . . I could have sworn, well”—Franny laughed lightly, embarrassed—“I feel as if I've been living as a mermaid for the last few days.”

There was utter silence. No one knew how to respond to this.

“How strange,” Poppy said at last.

“Very odd,” commented Will.

“Peculiar,” said Henry.

“I know.” A tiny crease appeared on Franny's forehead. “It must have been a dream,” she said. “But it seemed so
real
. . . .”