My Weird Secret Life

Chapter 8: Prison

      I awoke with a cold sweat (you would think impossible underwater), I had a dream about last night. No surprise there. Everything the queen had threatened me with, Rob and his crew, what they would do to Auntie A and my parents. The queen and Rob must be in communication somehow. They both mentioned a little prince that would be watching me. I started hyperventilating, I couldn't handle this pressure. I'm pathetic! A day in the ocean and I was already in jail. That's gotta be some kind of record. I gripped at my chest trying to catch myself. My breathing unfortunately, only quickened. My heart started to thump painfully in my chest. The first time I had had one of these fits Auntie A had been there by my side, explaining to me I was having a panic attack. She had told me the easiest thing to do to get rid of them was to think of funny things. I thought of Luna and Una and how we reacted to my turning of a mermaid. I snorted and my breathing slowly came back to its normal pace.
I looked around our cool cell that was now Kai and I's new room. I leaned over to Kai's temporary spot on the floor. His perfectly picturesque face with his brown skin shone golden in the sun. I bet all girls his age fell for him. He looked a few years older than me, maybe 15, 16. He started to wake up and I flattened out completely on the bed clam. When I heard him yawn, I closed my eyes. I'm not sure why I wanted to hide I was up first. Maybe it's because I played the same game with Auntie A, she would come into my room and guess if I was genuinely awake or not.
I could feel Kai's eyes boring holes into me. A big bunch of my hair fell in my face precisely at that moment. It started tickling my nose and I had such a strong urge to grab my hair and wrap it in a ponytail. The mysterious boy who I was rooming with, brushed the black/white hair out of my face behind my ear. A kind gesture. I attempted to open one eye just a whisker to see what he was doing now. But instead I opened my eye fully and I saw Kai lean forward a little bit and I freaked out. I couldn't help it. What was he doing? "Ahhh!" He swam up to the ceiling so fast that he smacked his head against it bending his neck in a seemingly painful way. "Why in the ocean did you scream!" He yelled angrily. I shook my head rapidly,"I didn't mean to, I just did it. You were leaning towards me so I freaked out." "I was trying to get up." He said going into defense mode. He continued,"until you screamed and blew out my eardrum." Kai rubbed his head and neck and I bit my lip in embarrassment. I physically felt the tips of my ears burn red like fire. Which was ironic considering we were in water.
      There was a long pause as Kai recovered and my ears paled to their normal brown. That's when I spotted the food in the corner,"Can we eat?" Resisting to glare at me, Kai reluctantly spoke up,"Yeah, sure, the foods over there in the corner." We both headed over to the food at the same time and this time he did glare at me. I kept my distance and sat on the clam bed. "Ok, what kind of food is there?" He searched through the food. "There's only cereal," "Why don't all us 'prisoners' eat in the same area? Like the cafeteria or something, they must have a lot of prisoners considering how the problems start in the first place." Kai chuckled,"We only have food together during lunch." "But why?" Kai shrugged,"They have to prepare the food? I don't know, it's not like the foods all that anyway. There's Fruit Shells, Honey Bunches Of Corals, and Pearl Jacks," I rolled my eyes and smiled. These names were ridiculous. "I'll take the Fruit Shells, please. What's on that list the guard gave us?"
Kai watched me carefully and swam across the ceiling, floated down and cautiously picked up the paper from his spot on the ground. He replied,"It says something about our jobs. You are a servant," I cringed. Excuse me? I am not, may I repeat, am not being a servant. What is time going backward? Kai continued. "I'm being trained as a soldier." A soldier? "Do - are there wars?" I asked slowly. "More guard than soldier. But with how the kingdom is going might as well be preparing for a war." I didn't ask any further questions.
"Is there a spoon?" I asked in the silence. Kai swam to the bed, bent down and pulled out a spoon,"Here." My mouth dropped open in a confused way. "Why - why was there a spoon under the bed?" Kai looked up," 'Cause there was one, there's always one in this cell." Was this a special cell? One he had already been in before? Was I rooming with a criminal?! I observed the spoon searching for visual dirt. I twisted my face in disgust, had Kai used this spoon before? As inconspicuous as possible, I wiped the spoon with my hands. Maybe that would be cleaner than the former?
"We better hurry up before the guards come to get us for our jobs." I said as I slurped up the rest of the cereal. It wasn't that bad if I was being honest. Kai scoffed,"Yeah, unwillingly," he commented.
      "I have a question for you." Kai looked up from his cereal finished gulping and said,"Hit me." I fiddled with my fingers. "Why were you running from the guard?" Kai looked at me opened his mouth and closed it. "I was, well, escaping. I've been here before, but for no reason. I never do anything wrong, I swear. That guard just likes to pick on me." "Oh," I looked up, thinking of anything to say. Instead for a few minutes we just sat in silence. But in a way the silence felt ok, like we had bonded. But that sounded stupid. "So um, do you have siblings?" Kai asked desperate for the silence to be over. "Not that I know of." I said. I pulled my tail up and hugged it close to my chest.
      About 10 minutes later a guard showed up. "I'm here to pick you up for your jobs. If you read the list you would know what I was talking about." The guard paused looked at both of us wide-eyed and yelled,"Do you know what I'm talking about?" I stared and Kai was doing push ups so he wasn't paying attention. I answered,"Yes, we read the list." Kai stopped doing push-ups and flexed. I snickered and the guard started talking about our duty's and responsibilities. I ignored him and turned my focus toward Kai. He mimicked the guard and when the guard looked at us he would sit down with his hand on his chin and nod then agreed to whatever the guard had said. I tried my absolute hardest not to make any reaction, but you see my situation.
      It was fifteen minutes later until the guard took us out the cell. Another guard came up behind him and took Kai. The one lecturing us squeezed my arm and dragged me away. I felt like Kai was my only friend at the moment and now I was being dragged away from him.