I blush before I can stop myself. “No,” I say, shaking my head. “I don’t know him.”
“Oh? They said—”
“They misunderstood. I just know his name; he told me before he passed out on the beach,” I explain swiftly. Now that I’m a little calmer, I can lie better.
“Ah. So you went into the ocean to pull a complete stranger out of the water? What a hero,” the doctor says genuinely, putting a hand on my shoulder.
“Thank you,” I answer, and force a smile. No, I didn’t go into the water. I stayed on the shore while Naida pulled him out. She’s the one who really saved him.
“Well, feel free to stay if you want. I’m sure he’d like to meet you,” the doctor says. He tucks his clipboard under his arm and walks away, leaving me alone in the waiting room. The television goes to a commercial, something about a magically absorbent towel. Outside, a pack of nurses laugh loudly. I would like to meet him, too—the real way, not the way I already have.
But I’m afraid he’ll ask about Naida. I’m afraid he’ll know I’m lying, that I didn’t really save him, not alone, anyway. I’m afraid of how much I know about him—even worse, how I liked so many of the things I saw, like his middle school talent-show performance or the way he worried about asking his first girlfriend to prom. And I’m afraid I won’t be able to hide the sheer quantity of memories I read. It’d be easier to walk away, to keep him at arm’s length. He’s just a boy, just like any of the boys Anne and Jane pick up. Just leave him here.
It’d be better for everyone if I just went home.
CHAPTER FOUR
Lo
“You stole him!” Molly screams at me. Bubbles slip from her lips; her eyes are red, her hands clenched in fists. “He was mine!” Her voice is like lightning caught in the walls of the Glasgow. Fish dart away as she grabs onto a decaying stair rail so hard that it rips away from the spiral banister. She drops it and screams again. I’ve never seen one of us so angry before. The other girls try to comfort her, save the old ones, who regard her with mild curiosity from just outside the ship’s body, like she’s nothing more than an interesting bit of coral or a strange tide.
“He didn’t love you. There was no need to kill him.” I try to sound calm, even-keeled, like Molly is nothing more than an insolent child. But I’m shaken; I feel like I could dissolve into the water around me.
The girl. The girl on the shore knew my name. Naida.
While Molly curses at me, I turn the name over in my mind. The memories it sparked when I first heard it are dull, faded now, and I’m having trouble bringing them up. But the name, the name I can remember if I just keep repeating it. I don’t know why I care. Naida is long gone. And yet over and over, I keep saying it, don’t let go—
“Do you, Lo?” Key asks.
“I…” I look at Key, who draws closer to me. We look so different than humans, don’t we? I’d forgotten till I saw the girl, but now, compared with Key… you would never know we were once like them. What did my hair look like when I was Naida? What color was my skin? I look down at my arm, at the milky-blue color. Key’s is milky-green. But when we were humans, we must have been bronze or golden or some sun-kissed color. I haven’t thought about these things in ages, yet now I stare at my forearm in wonder, in sorrow that I can’t remember what it once looked like. Who can’t remember her own body?
“I was telling her that you didn’t want the boy’s soul anyhow? You sound like one of the old ones, Lo. Should I hold on to you if a hurricane passes through?” Her words are teasing, but the humor doesn’t reach her eyes. I do sound like one of the old ones—they don’t listen. They don’t care. They’re as quiet as the sand, letting the water push them around like branches of seaweed. Getting their attention is hard.
But I don’t feel old. I feel like I did when I was new, when I was younger than Molly, even. Naida. Naida. I can’t forget it again. Naida.
They’re staring at me, waiting for me to answer. “No. No, I didn’t want his soul. I just see no point in needless death,” I say, waving my hand in Molly’s direction. It’s not a lie. I don’t care about the boy—I liked his eyes, the way he looked at me, but right now I care about my name. I care about how a human girl knew my name…. Did I know her when I was like them? Please, Molly, let it go. I just want to focus on my name—
Naida.
“He might have loved me. It might have worked,” Molly hisses. Her hair is red—or, it was red. It’s now faded and darkened by the sea. Still, it’s the most vibrant hair among us, and it blossoms around her face. It never mattered to me before, but now I scan my sisters, picking out the differences, the tiny differences between us. Darker skin, longer torsos, fuller lips. Only the old ones look the same, like the ocean beat their differences out of them, made them all equally beautiful. I’ll look like that eventually. And so will Molly. I look back at her, suddenly envious that her hair is still so red. I notice calluses on each of her left fingers. What did she do as a human to earn those?
“I’m sorry,” I tell her, drawing closer. “I didn’t mean it. Forgive me.” When a sister asks forgiveness, there’s really little choice. We have to forgive one another, the old ones say, because none of us can get by alone. We don’t lie to one another, we don’t hold grudges, we don’t hate. It wouldn’t make any sense to.
“It was my one chance. My only chance to escape. I could have gone back! I could have fought, could have gotten revenge for what happened to us….” Her words are mournful, but her face is not. I raise my eyebrows—I don’t understand what she means by revenge, and from my sisters’ confused expressions, neither do they. It’s something we’ve forgotten, and it’s hard to care about things you’ve forgotten, I suppose. Molly sees this and exhales, shakes her head like we’re too stupid to understand. Just as I’m about to ask her to explain, she swims closer to me, and the water around her feels hot. I watch, waiting, wondering if she’s too young to understand forgiveness. Was I ever this young?
“Forgive me,” I repeat. Molly stares at me for a long time. Her eyes flicker, pools within the ocean that seem so shallow, yet so dangerous.
“It’s a good thing, Molly,” one of the other girls says. “It wouldn’t have worked anyhow, and now you can be happy with us. Your sisters.”