Sink Or Swim

Willow T.

"I knew it!" I cursed. "I knew it!"

"It was an accident," Coco reassured. "It's not your fault,"

"No no no. We almost killed Lynne!" I snapped. "She literally just came in, and she already had a near-death experience."

"No, I almost did," Daphne cried from the other room.

I swam over to Daphne. "It's... not okay. But at least she lived.." I said sheepishly.

"It was gonna go perfectly.." She sobbed. Daphne's usually pretty face became a colorless sad sight. She seemed to be overflowing with guilt.

"No, it wasn't," Coco said. "Lynne had no idea.."

Now all of us was crying.

"I- I- hope" -Daphne sniffed loudly- "That she remembers us."

"I hope- I hope she doesn't hate us," I said. My throat felt like it was choking me. I imagined Lynne on the hospital bed, unconscious and afraid.

Hot tears sprung on my eyes. My breaths were shaky. My vision was blurry. 

Then my sadness turned into hate.

This whole plan was fabricated by Coco. I went along with her plan, for some reason that plan sounded reasonable. That, I admit was my fault. However, Daphne should've saved Lynne. She was available, she was perfectly capable of swimming down to Lynne. The plan was that Daphne would only pretend to be knocked out. But noo, Daphne wasn't paying attention and left it all to the newbie. I was there too, but I was too far away to do anything. I was nowhere near the beach and our backup person was Daphne.

But I kept these thoughts to myself.

I knew if I said anything, they would accuse me of doing the same thing Daphne did. Then things would get complicated.

I took deep breaths. Keep calm. Keep calm. She's alive. She's alive.

But I'm still not trusting Coco with another plan again.

ABOUT ONE YEAR LATER

"So, Coco, what's the plan?" Daphne asked. Lynne had gave up a big fight against Coco's new plan but she eventually gave in.

"Sh, not now," Coco whispered. "Not here,"

We were at school, in fact, our last year of school. School worked differently here. After your Exte, school would end and you could start on high school, which served as college here.

"My house?" I played along. I just wanted them to come over.

We were in gym class, and the teacher was explaining to rules of some game to us.

"Yeah. And Seabucks," was Coco's reply.

"Okay," I nodded.

"Okay." Coco said.

"We'll talk more after school," Coco whispered.

"Yeah," I whispered back.

E:

The whole group was now at Seabucks.

"Another plan?" panicked Lynne. "I thought we had a deal: no more plans, especially from you!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah," Coco brushed off. "That was then, this is now."

Daphne huffed, "I can't believe we're agreeing to this."

Then everyone sipped their frappe.

"Face it: no one wants to be a full human or mermaid, we want to be both: it's our birthright." Coco said. "And the Exte is coming soon."

"Yeah? What are we supposed to do about that?" asked Krystal. Krystal was Kalissa's mermaid name, and we bonded with her a lot.

"We escape, of course," Coco said matter-of-factly.

"What?" I blurted. "Are you joking?"

"Keep it down," Coco hissed. "That's why I have a plan, remember?"

I wanted to do it. I wanted to so bad. It sounded too easy when Coco introduced the idea. To just escape the Exte, and keep both our tail and legs and continue to be a halfling. Forever.

But I know it can't happen.

We won't have anywhere to go. They might catch us. Where will we live? How will we live? 

How will we survive?

"Coco, this can't possibly work. There are a million problems." I worried.

"I'm winning you over, I see," Coco grinned.

I blushed with determination. "No, you aren't, Coco. The last plan you had failed to the ninth degree. So yeah, we are not doing whatever you're thinking of." I smiled to myself. I just saved our lives.

"You didn't even hear my plan yet!" Coco fought.

"What is it then?" A very impatient but excited Krystal said. I inwardly groaned. Krystal still had no idea of the last plan we had, so obviously this plan sounded awesome.

"Whoa whoa whoa! We're just gonna go with this, with no thinking?" I whisper-screamed.

"Calm down, Willow," Coco sternly ordered me. I reacted immediately. I knew that Coco was using her magic gift on me. Everyone had a magic gift whether magic is in your blood or not. Everyone had a gift, and Coco's gift was to manipulate feelings. In this case, she was using them on me to make me calm.

The feeling of this fake calmness was hard to explain. My mind kind of went blank and I found it hard to speak. Tears traced my eyes as my body tried to force Coco's magic out.

"Willow?" Lynne asked me. "Are you okay?"

I set my jaw. My back straightened. I bit my tongue and nodded slowly.

"Coco," Daphne chuckled. I saw that Daphne figured out what Coco did to me. "What have you done?"

"I made her calm to the calmness degree. She needs that, she's such a worry-brain." Coco snorted. "No big deal."

"When will it wear off?" Krystal laughed. Somehow everyone thought my condition was funny.

"I dunno. About now?" Coco mumbled.

I shook my head. Everything was coming back to me. "COCO." I shouted.

"WATCH OUT SHE'S GONNA BLOW!" Coco screamed. Everyone grabbed their drink and dashed away.

I hated them. I took my drink and followed them.

>:(

"The plan? Oh yeahh, the plan!" Coco recalled. 

I rolled my eyes at her. "Well what is it?"

"So at our Exte the people cast a spell on you to make you a citizen or not, right?" Coco referred to us.

"Yeah," Lynne said. "What doe that have to do with anything?"

"So.. that means if we put a spell on ourselves, their spell won't work on us!" Coco exclaimed. "Like a magic shield!"

I interrupted her. "Well people tried that before. The official people use royal magic, so it's almost unbreakable."

Coco clicked her tongue. "But, we have a royal right here," -She nodded to Krystal- "and if she combines her magic with Willow's, it'll work!" Her words were true. Even though Coco's plan last year ended badly, it did do us one good: we know that Krystal was a royal.

"Wait." Krystal said quickly. "I don't even know much magic."

I smiled hopelessly. "See Coco?"

Then Coco smirked. "Willow will teach you!"

"What?" Krystal and I cried.

"Class starts next Saturday. Have fun!"

:O

edited in 11/22/15!!!