The Summer of Chasing Mermaids by Sarah Ockler Read Free Book Online

helped Lemon and Kirby carry the remaining dishes to the sink, and then I slipped into the shade beneath the sea glass tree, my favorite sculpture in the gallery.
    Built along the north-facing windows in a dark corner, the tree was made from driftwood, bone-white branches that jutted out from a tall trunk. Tiny pieces of sea glass in blue, green, brown, andwhite hung from invisible wires like leaves that never fell.
    The jewel-colored bits clicked together softly as Christian exited through the deck door, leaving his birthday party guests behind.
    I pressed my forehead to the window and tracked him down the staircases, down to the sand below. He walked along the shore, past his house, unconcerned about the rain and the blue-white electricity streaking across the horizon.
    I imagined his footsteps in the wet sand.
    Dark, fading. Dark, fading. Dark, fading.
    He disappeared in the mist.
    My throat tightened, a feeling like tears rising, but they didn’t spill. They never spilled anymore; I always stopped them. Crying never brought anything back from the dead. It only felt like the ocean trying to drown you from the inside out.
    The men were back to talking investments, oblivious, but as I watched the lightning gather and spill on the horizon, I knew their bet had set things in motion. Irreversible, impossible things. Dangerous things.
    I also knew how to patch up an old boat. I knew how to sail.
    But inside my head, the only place that could still hear my words, the echo said no. It said that I shouldn’t be thinking about the Kane family, the sticky web of it. I needed to keep my head down, help Lemon at the gift shop.
    Not try to save the house from these dangerous, destructive forces. From men more powerful than the ocean.
    I needed to collect sea glass. Keep my room clean. Do the dishes without being asked. Write poems and lyrics that no one would ever read, pretend I’d one day be able to sing again.
    But maybe . . .
    You’re too afraid, the echo taunted. You’re a fool to even think it.
    I closed my eyes.
    There was a time, not so long ago, I’d take a stage before hundreds of people. Grab my sister’s hand, move the crowd without a second thought. Now, everything in me felt frozen and stiff, the stage bravery no more than a memory.
    Natalie would’ve known what to do. She would’ve told me the truth. Held my hand, caught my tears when I let them fall, even if she’d been the one to put them there.
    But she was gone.
    I was gone.
    Behind me, someone flicked on an overhead light, and I opened my eyes, catching my reflection in the glass. For an instant, a heartbeat, a breath, I thought it was my twin sister.
    I pressed my hand to the window, and her fingertips met mine exactly. We spoke in unison.
    Oh, gyal. What am I supposed to do without you?

Chapter 5
    â€œSome say it’s the entrance to hell,” Lemon said, “but you shouldn’t worry too much. It’s probably just a legend.”
    Water surged against the rocks near Thor’s Well, white froth ­sizzling in the wave’s retreat. It was the morning after, and I’d awoken with the realization that it hadn’t been a dream. That my boat was no longer mine and the house that had stood so firmly before the sea could be reclaimed just as easily.
    And now I found myself in Cape Perpetua at church. Lemon’s version, anyway.
    Hell? I mouthed. It was the first time I’d accepted Lemon’s weekly invitation, but it was starting to make sense why Kirby always turned her down. The sun hadn’t even risen yet; the sea was cold and gray, and the jagged black rocks around us looked blue in the soft light.
    â€œThink of it as a sacred doorway. The entrance to the underneath,the realm below the sea.” Lemon tucked her auburn mane into a ­headscarf and yanked on the knot. “Ready?”
    I glanced at my naked feet. Not wearing hiking boots to traverse volcanic rock was a recipe for