Maybe a Mermaid Read online

  The monocle magnified her wrinkles, turning them into small mountain ranges.

  “Look, kid, your audience is never wrong. If you can’t hook ’em, you’ve either got a problem with your material or your delivery isn’t good. Now, try again—you really think this ‘Age Eraser’ will work?”

  She dropped the monocle back in her pocket and leaned across the desk, resting her chin on her hands, waiting.

  “Um … I…”

  “Chop-chop!” Charlotte barked. “What is this, a staring contest?”

  “I don’t think it will work,” I blurted. “You have too many wrinkles.”

  Charlotte threw her hands up in the air and groaned. “Awful!” she cried. “Terrible! Kids these days!” She paced in a circle behind the desk, then swung around to face me. “This,” she said, picking up the sample pack, “is the single most important product you will ever buy in your life! Not only will it smooth tired wrinkles, it will transport you—see, ‘transport’ is always a good word; people want to be transported—it will transport you to the vigor, vitality, and vim of your youth! If you don’t feel ten years younger after one week of using this marvelous cream, you can have your money back—one hundred percent guaranteed!”

  She set down the cream. “Eh?” she said. “Better?”

  “So if it doesn’t work, you’d have to give everyone’s money back?”

  Charlotte Boulay shook her finger at me. “Ah, but you won’t have to. You’re selling them what they want to believe.” Her eyes drifted to the wall behind my head. “It’s showbiz,” she said. “But it ain’t what it used to be.”

  I followed her gaze to the wall of photos. “Do you know all these people?” I asked.

  “Some,” she said. “My parents knew them all. They were hoofers. Song-and-dance folks.”

  “Did you dance, too?” I asked.

  Charlotte narrowed her eyes and her voice took on a hard, sarcastic tone. “If it made money for The Great Frank and Selina Boulay.” She said the word “great” like it was an insult. “Those two always had a scheme. New city. New plan. New humbug. People ate it up.”

  “Didn’t you like it?”

  Charlotte stiffened.

  “Of course I did!” she snapped. “It was electrifying!” An odd growling sound came from her throat. “But believe me, it gets old.”

  Charlotte started fidgeting with the broom behind the desk, twirling the handle with her fingers. Her mood had changed into something dark and sad, and I got the distinct feeling I should drop the subject, but all of a sudden I wanted to know everything. What it was like to be a “hoofer,” hanging out with tap dancers and white mice. Whether her grandfather was really a ventriloquist and a trick bicyclist. Charlotte’s world was so bizarre and fascinating, I almost felt … transported.

  “What’s a humbug?” I asked.

  Spit gathered at the sides of her mouth, and she twirled the broom handle faster. “A hoax. A trick to get people to part with their money. Don’t look at me like that. It’s not so different from your Age Eraser, if you want to know!”

  The broom clattered to the floor, and Charlotte’s stare shot through me like a laser blast from Cyclops. She pushed the Honey Bee Wrinkle-Free sample pack across the desk toward me.

  “Like I said, you sell them what they want to believe.” She paused. “I don’t feel like talking anymore. I’m an old lady and I’m tired. I think it’s time for you to go.”

  I put the wrinkle cream in my backpack, but I didn’t leave. Charlotte Boulay was the weirdest, most interesting person I’d ever met, and I wanted to see what she did next. Besides, I was certain she had snuck into the room through some kind of door, window, or secret compartment. I wasn’t going to take my eye off her until I saw her go out the same way.

  Charlotte took a handkerchief out of her pocket, turned her back to me, and started furiously cleaning the glass on a picture of a man eating a cigarette. Her orange bun jiggled on the back of her head.

  I didn’t move.

  She turned her head halfway around to look at me, then quickly snapped her attention back to the wall.

  I waited.

  She held the handkerchief in midair.

  “Well?” she said to the wall. “Why aren’t you leaving?”

  “Why aren’t you leaving?” I asked.

  She put the handkerchief in her pocket and turned to face me.

  “Because I live here.” A curly strand of hair had slipped out of her slick bun, and it bounced on top of her head like an orange question mark.

  I bit the inside of my cheek and held my ground. “I want to see how you came in,” I said.

  Charlotte stepped out from behind the desk and positioned herself next to the mermaid lamp. It cast a spooky light across her face, giving her nose and chin sharp angles that hadn’t been there before.

  “Little girl,” she said slowly, her eyes piercing mine. “I would like you to leave now.”

  My knees went wobbly, but I stayed.

  “Suit yourself,” she said, quiet as a whisper. Charlotte Boulay reached out a bony hand and closed it around the mermaid lamp.

  Click.

  The room went dark.

  14

  THE BLACK BEAR

  By the time I felt my way to the door, pulled it open, and let the sunshine flood in, the front office was empty. The mermaid lamp smiled innocently, but there was not one trace of Charlotte Boulay.

  I forced myself to take slow, normal steps back down the path until I hit the woods. Then I sprinted toward the Showboat cabins, my backpack slapping against my shoulders, blood pounding in my head. What had just happened? I liked that Charlotte was dramatic and unpredictable, but when she flicked off the light, I felt like I’d run into Mr. Sinister in a dark alley without Storm or Wolverine anywhere near to help.

  I stopped to catch my breath at The Black Bear. A wooden statue of a bear cub stood on his hind legs near the porch of the cabin. His paws were outstretched like he was waiting for someone to set a big tray of honey in his arms.

  My hands were shaking, so I stuffed them in my sweatshirt pocket and sat down on the ground, leaning my head against the wooden cub. I felt a little silly, getting spooked by a dark room, but my heart was beating like a rabbit’s. Breathe, Anthoni, breathe. Think happy thoughts. I couldn’t think of any. I had to go with the basics. Ice cream. Mint chocolate-chip ice cream. Mint chocolate-chip ice cream in a waffle cone. A chipmunk scurried out from behind a tree and grabbed a pinecone a few feet away from me. I watched him shove piece after piece of it into his mouth, his cheeks stretching like lumpy balloons.

  A loud snap sent the chipmunk skittering away, and I jumped to my feet. Something shuffled on the far side of the porch.

  I picked up the heaviest stick I could find and backed up slowly, until I had a view around the corner of the cabin. There was definitely something there.

  “Meow,” it said. But it wasn’t a cat. It was a person, crouched low to the ground, with a tree branch in front of his face.

  “Hey!” I yelled, braver than I felt.

  DJ let out a yelp and jumped into the air. He held his cast in front of his face for protection, then slowly let it down. The freckles on his face had become one giant tomato-red blotch, and he gave me a look somewhere between a grimace and a grin.

  “That was freaky,” he said, clearly embarrassed.

  “You scared the wits out of me!” I yelled. “What are you doing? Following me?”

  The boy shrugged. “A little.” His freckles got even redder.

  My mouth hung open. What kind of person sneaks around spying on people in the middle of the woods?

  “I saw you go up there,” he said, pointing at The Showboat. “Did you see her? Is she as scary as they say?”

  “You live here. Haven’t you seen her?”

  He shook his head. “Not once, and I’ve been living in my aunt’s house for a whole year—right over there.” He pointed into the woods, away from The Black Bear and The Showboat, b
ut the trees were too thick to see any sort of house.

  We stood there awkwardly. DJ dug a line in the dirt with his toe.

  “Sorry I scared you,” he said. “The kids around here make it out like she’s half vampire or something.” He paused and studied his dirt line. “They’re probably just messing with me ’cause I’m not from here.”

  “She’s not a vampire,” I said, “but she is strange.”

  He brightened a little. “Good strange or bad strange?”

  Great question. “I’m not sure yet.”

  “Wanna see something weird?” DJ asked.

  “Okay.”

  “You’ll have to hold your nose.”

  DJ stepped onto the porch of The Black Bear and jiggled the screen door until it creaked open.

  “Are you allowed to go in there?” I asked.

  “Kind of, well, not really … but no one’s using it.” DJ felt along the side of the door until he found a key.

  “How’d you know that was there?”

  He raised a shoulder in an uncomfortable shrug. I know there are people who can’t help blushing, but this kid’s face went from white to red and back again faster than a blinking stoplight. He didn’t answer. Instead, he pulled the neck of his shirt up over his nose, held up his cast, and said, “Ready?”

  As soon as the door swung open, a sour, musty smell wafted out of the house. It hit me so hard it brought tears to my eyes. I threw my hand over my nose.

  “What is it?” I yelled through my hand.

  DJ ran straight for the back bedroom. I knew I should leave. Not only were we breaking and entering, but anything that smelled that bad couldn’t be worth it. Still, I held my nose and followed him into the cabin.

  DJ shut the bedroom door behind us.

  “You have to get through the front fast,” he gasped. “It doesn’t smell as bad back here.”

  I took my hand off my face. He was right.

  “What is it?” I asked. “A dead animal?”

  DJ shot me a serious stare. “I don’t want to find out,” he said.

  The Black Bear was the mirror image of The Blue Heron. The room we were standing in was identical to Mom’s room. The same wicker furniture, the same moose wallpaper—but the window was on the opposite side of the bed. DJ tried to push at it one-handed. I helped him open it, and he sucked in the fresh air dramatically.

  I looked around the room. “I take it you wanted to show me some rocks?”

  The bed and the dresser were covered with small piles of rocks. Some were organized by size, but others seemed to be grouped together by color or shape. There had to be hundreds of them in the room.

  “No, that’s my collection,” DJ said. “My aunt said I had to get it out of the house, but I didn’t want to leave it outside. That’s why I figured out how to get in here.”

  “I don’t blame her. It’s a lot of rocks.” I picked up a handful of black-and-white speckled specimens.

  “Those are intrusive igneous granite,” DJ said. “They crystalized from magma millions of years ago. But check this out.”

  He walked to the closet and opened the door. In the corner hung three massive fur coats. One of them looked like it had come straight off a bear.

  “I think those were swanky back in the day,” DJ said. He reached under the coats and pulled out a round, dusty hatbox with a butterfly on top.

  “Ta-da!”

  He lifted the lid with a flourish. Beady black eyes and sharp yellow teeth grimaced up at me. I yelped.

  “I think it’s a scarf,” DJ said with a grin. “Isn’t it disgusting? I screamed like a three-year-old when I saw it. But don’t worry. It’s not alive.”

  He draped the long animal pelt around his neck, and held the head out for me to see. The thing was basically a long, furry strip of skin that had been sliced right off the back of an animal. With the head still attached. I touched the hard, black nose and ran my fingers down the pelt. It was silky soft and absolutely revolting.

  The butterfly box was lined with newspaper. I grabbed a handful to wipe off any rabies germs I might have contracted.

  “There’s more stuff in here,” I said.

  DJ leaned closer as I pulled out some yellow ribbons, a crocheted butterfly, and a collection of tiny glass animal figurines. I set them on the floor and reached for the last item in the hatbox: a black-and-white photo in a silver frame.

  DJ dropped the dead animal head.

  The photo was shot at a beach. A tall man, a woman, and a tiny little girl smiled huge, movie-star smiles. The woman and the girl wore identical bikini tops and their hairdos matched perfectly except for the star-shaped barrette holding back the girl’s bangs. The woman and the man stood on each side of the girl, lifting her by the arms so she dangled in the air between them. If you only saw the top half of the frame, it would be an everyday, cute family photo. The bottom half was a different story.

  Instead of legs, the little girl had a shiny, scaly mermaid tail. Not like a costume you would wear for Halloween. Like a fish.

  There was writing on the top of the photo. In small, loopy cursive, it read: May 17, 1933. Introducing the world to our greatest discovery—Baby Charlotte, the Boulay Mermaid.

  DJ whistled through his teeth. “Is that her?” he asked.

  I studied the photo, trying to recognize Charlotte Boulay’s angled nose and chin on the little mermaid’s chubby face. Charlotte had told me her parents liked hoaxes, but the picture didn’t look fake.

  “It’s almost like they photoshopped it,” DJ said. He picked up the animal head again and shook it back and forth. He made the beady eyes look straight into mine.

  “But they didn’t have Photoshop in 1933,” the animal pelt said in DJ’s squeaky voice. The head came closer and the dead whiskers brushed my chin.

  “That’s disgusting,” I said.

  I put the ribbons and figurines back into the box with the newspapers, but I didn’t let go of the Boulay Mermaid. I needed to look at it longer. When I was by myself and had time to think.

  “I’m going to borrow this,” I said, unzipping my backpack. I tucked the frame underneath Josh’s floaties.

  DJ smirked at me. “Are you allowed to do that?”

  “Are you allowed to keep your rock collection in here?” It might not be a great idea, but I felt desperate to study the photo. And who was I going to ask? Charlotte?

  “I’ll bring it back,” I said. “Tomorrow. Does anyone else come in here?”

  “Squirrels.”

  I stood up, opened the bedroom door, and got hit head-on by the horrible smell. I slammed the door shut again and set my backpack on the bed.

  “DJ, if I’m coming back here, we have to find out what that smell is.”

  DJ squeezed his eyes tight, and made a pained, groaning noise in the back of his throat. Finally, he opened his eyes and shoved the nasty animal pelt back into the hatbox.

  “Fine,” he said. “But if it’s something actually dead and not skinned, I’ll probably run. Just so you know.”

  We covered our faces and I opened the door. The smell was coming from the kitchen. The cupboards were coated in dust and grime, but there wasn’t anything inside.

  “Okay,” I said from behind my hand. “It’s got to be the fridge.”

  When DJ opened the refrigerator, the smell hit us harder than one of Magneto’s force fields. The shelves were empty, but there was a milk container in the door. DJ pulled it out with his good hand, fumbled it, and dropped it. A thick, brown-green liquid oozed out onto the linoleum.

  DJ took one look at it and puked on the floor. I felt my gut convulse, and I turned around and ran. I managed to get out the door and down the porch stairs before vomiting all over the feet of the sad wooden bear cub.

  DJ flew out the door behind me and threw himself on the ground, rolling in the pine needles. He groaned, hollered, and flailed around like he was trying to shake the smell off. Finally, he writhed one last time, threw all of his limbs in the air, then floppe
d them down to the ground. He lay flat with his arms and legs splayed out, and stared up at the trees.

  “I found the smell,” he said.

  15

  CLEANING HOUSE

  “Whatcha doin’, Anthoni?” Mom asked without looking up from her laptop screen.

  “I need plastic bags. And some cleaning supplies.”

  “Under the sink.” Her fingers stopped typing long enough for her to add, “Good news: we still don’t have cell service, but I got us internet today. Now I can keep in touch with all my Worker Bees.”

  That was a relief. She needed to do everything she could to inspire her team toward a month-end sales boost. I had a brief urge to tell her about the mermaid photo and how DJ and I had broken into The Black Bear and puked all over it. A few days ago, I would have. But now that Mom had broken the Gillis Girls Tell Each Other Everything rule, I felt like breaking it, too.

  “Good luck, Mom,” I said, and closed the screen door behind me.

  When I got back to The Black Bear, all the windows were wide open and DJ had taken off his shirt and tied it around his face. His arms were sunburned, but his belly was blindingly white and he waggled his eyebrows at me above his T-shirt mask. He looked ridiculous. I dumped the cleaning supplies on the porch and DJ stretched a blue plastic glove over his cast, completing the fashion statement.

  “I’ll clean the fridge, but I’m not touching your puke,” I said.

  We used half a bottle of Mom’s Organic Grapefruit Cleanser removing ten-year-old milk from the floor and the refrigerator. DJ had to go outside and upchuck two more times, but he shook it off and got right back to work.

  It might be abnormal, but I like cleaning. Every time Mom and I moved to a new apartment, we gave it a top-to-bottom deep clean. Each room we finished felt fresh and new, filled with possibility and promise.

  Once DJ and I had cleaned the fridge and the floor, the rest of the kitchen seemed that much grimier and more depressing. I didn’t want to leave it like that. I didn’t want to leave, period. To do what? Sit in The Blue Heron while Mom sent emails to her team? I climbed onto the counter and started scrubbing the cabinets.