Teeth by Hannah Moskowitz Read Free Book Online Page B

soon, and I don’t think she wants to see you after she humiliated herself in front of you at dinner.”
    “Why’s she afraid of that boy I saw?”
    “So it is a boy.”
    “You know about him.” It’s a statement, not a question.
    “As much as I care to know about anything in . . . the ocean.”
    God, the way she says “the ocean,” I half expect to hear lightning crashing in the background.
    She says, “My mother doesn’t talk about him, but I know things she doesn’t expect. And I’ve seen your boy a few times. I don’t think he knows I can see him.”
    “He stays by the dock, I think. He’s not my boy.”
    “I can see the dock if I angle myself just right on the balcony. I don’t think he hides as well as he thinks he does. But I wasn’t quite sure he was a boy, with his skin. I couldn’t tell what he was. A boy?”
    I shrug a little. “He’s not a fish.”
    “He doesn’t have any legs.”
    “Why was your mom humiliated?”
    Diana rests her forearms on each other. “Long before I was born, my mother liked to consider herself the kind of person who would try anything. I’ve stumbled across tales from her wayward youth. All these men she’s bedded.” Diana looks over her glasses at me. “All these nonmen she’s bedded.”
    “Your mom’s big secret is she slept with women?”
    Diana coughs in the back of her throat until she turns it into a laugh. “Broaden your mind, Rudy. You just saw a half Enki, didn’t you?” Then her face gets a little more serious. “Why do you think we’re afraid of the ocean?”
    “You don’t seem afraid.”
    “Do you ever see anyone swimming?” She shakes her headand plays with the pristine cover of Runaway Bunny . “We can’t kill off those fish fast enough, really, if you ask me.”
    “Wait. What are—”
    She smiles. “If I tell you everything now, what will make you come back?”
    Well.
    You will, for one.

eight
    THE FOURTH TIME I SEE FISHBOY, HE SCARES ME OUT OF MY MIND.
    Except it might not really be the fourth time. Ever since he cut our fishing line, I’ve thought I’ve seen glimpses of him every time I step outside, and a few times I’m sure I’ve seen the tip of his fin or a bit of blond hair poking out of the water. Even when I look through the thick bottle glass of my bedroom window, the ocean so blurry I can’t make out the peaks of the waves, I think I can see a hint of a tail weaving in and out between the rocks. Diana’s right. He’s a shitty hider. It’s almost like he’s trying to be seen.
    Although, now that I think about it, I don’t know why he really cares if people see him. He’s clearly not huntingthe fish—he’s the very opposite of hunting the fish—so I don’t know why everyone would be so bothered to know he’s in the water. And if he’s eavesdropping on us all the time, he must get sick of people calling him a ghost. It must suck for people to think you’re already dead when you’re not.
    He must get so fucking lonely.
    So why does he hide?
    And why didn’t he hide from me?
    And if he doesn’t want to reveal himself to us, I don’t know what he’s doing here. If I were him, I would swim so far away from this island. But he’s always here, lingering by the dock and the cliffs.
    He still ducks under the water or underneath the dock when he sees anyone approach, so he’s clearly not waving his presence around like a flag. But now that I know he’s here, I don’t understand how I lived here this long without seeing him. I don’t understand how he’s only a legend to everyone on this island, why they don’t try to talk to him, or catch him. Not to hurt him, to touch him.
    Except then I go to the marketplace and see them obsessing over any new rumor they can imagine up, and I get that they don’t spend more time trying to verify them. They move from thing to thing too quickly. Last week a rumor went around that Ms. Klesko cheated on her husband, and it swept us all up like a hurricane. Even my