The Secret Lives of Fish - a sequel to The Thirteenth Year

Ch 2 - Home

Cody was ready to go, all the possessions he owned wrapped in a makeshift seaweed satchel slung across his back. Yet, he was suddenly nervous. With no way to know how long he had been gone for, he didn't know what kind of situation he would be returning to. He stared down at his tail again, the iridescent blues dulled down to deeper colors within the ocean depths. He had gotten so used to having a tail, even if he wasn't absolutely perfect at swimming with it. The fins on his arms felt like he had always had them and he couldn't remember what it felt like to not have them. The only thing strange to him now was his new found pudge of blubber and how pale his skin had become. He didn't see the sun down this low and his hard earned tan was long gone. His hair was also nearly to his shoulders, and he even had some stubble on his face.

He didn't look at all like the human he had once been. He was every bit the merman he had become. While the longing to return to the surface swirled within him, now that he knew he could return home – he was hesitant. His parents would accept him no matter what. He had no doubt of that. But what about Jess, or Sam? It had all been fine in theory, but he had seen the awe on their faces when he had shown his new tail to them the moment after he had changed. He'd been so full of energy and exhilaration after his transformation that leaping from the sea had seemed like the right thing to do. He'd replayed that moment of parting in his mind over and over in the last twenty-four hours. He'd still seemed partially human. Now... now he was more fish than man.

All his unknown hesitations weighed him down to the cold and dark ocean floor. He needed space to think. At a lazy, distracted pace he swam off to his favorite reef, keeping his thoughts to himself as he mulled everything over. His mother had made it clear to him that the transformation to get his legs back would be painful. He wasn't even really sure if it was possible, and he had sensed his mom hadn't known either. His situation must have been from the oldest memory stories. Why would a merman even ever want to go back to land? He really was an oddity.

What was better? Stay in the ocean with his mother and hope one day that he fit in with his own kind? That some mergirl would take pity on the strange creature he was? He was so solitary here among his own. On land he'd been popular and well liked. If he went back, he worried about the emotional and physical hurt that may come from going home. He staid stretched out on the sea bed until the deeper blues of night settled around him. No one had come to disturb him, probably on request of his mother. She knew this was no easy decision, and that it was also his to make. He hadn't felt this conflicted about anything, even when he first realized that he may not be fully human. Then he had been nervous, sure, but as he had changed he'd known he had no real choice but to embrace what he was becoming. Finding out he was a merman was like finding a side of him that was whole and comfortable in his whole skin. Now he was questioning everything. If he went back to land, would he be able to pass as human? Would he feel like a tuna without a school? Was he more human, or more merman?

It was well into the deep, unrestful hours of the night when he knew what he had to do. He had a home on land to return to, and he needed to take the risk of going back. He would always be a merman, but he missed that place where he'd been raised. He missed his friends and even school. His parents were there to help him, and he could only hope he had a friend in Jess, and Sam as well. It would be hard and painful, but he needed to go home. The longing he felt for the world above simply couldn't wait any longer.

-TSLOF-

The swimming back to the cove he'd grown up in was the easy part. He knew his way back home like a whale knows the place it was born. He knew the same sense of home would lead him back to his mother when needed. It was another reminder to him of the strange, otherworldly creature he had become. He drew electricity in his palm to light his way and no predator dare approach him in his sense of urgency.