Tingles gather at my chin as Galen lifts it with the crook of his finger. “Is your nose bleeding? Let me see,” he says. He tilts my head side to side, leans closer to get a good look.

And I meet my threshold for embarrassment. Tripping is bad enough. Tripping into someone is much worse. But if that someone has a body that could make sculpted statues jealous—and thinks you’ve broken your nose on one of his pecs—well, that’s when tripping runs a distant second to humane euthanasia.

He is clearly surprised when I swat his hand and step away. His girlfriend/relative seems taken aback that I mimic his stance—crossed arms and deep frown. I doubt she has ever met her threshold for embarrassment.

“I said I was fine. No blood, no foul.”

“This is my sister Rayna,” he says, as if the conversation steered naturally in that direction. She smiles at me as if forced at knifepoint, the kind of smile that comes purely from manners, like the smile you give your grandmother when she gives you the rotten-cabbage-colored sweater she’s been knitting. I think of that sweater now as I return her smile.

Galen eyes the surfboard abandoned against the wood railing. “The waves here aren’t really good for surfing.”

Galen’s gift is not small talk. Just like his sister, there’s a forced feel to his manners. But unlike his sister, there’s no underlying hostility, just an awkwardness, like he’s out of practice. Since he appears to be making this effort on my behalf, I cooperate. I make a show of looking at the emerald crests of the Gulf of Mexico, at the waves sloshing lazily against the shore. A man waist-deep in the water holds a toddler on his hip and jumps with the swells as they peak. Compared to the waves back home, the tide here reminds me of kiddie rides at the fair.

“We know. We’re just taking it out to float,” Chloe says, unconcerned that Galen was talking to me. “We’re from Jersey, so we know what a real wave looks like.” When she steps closer, Rayna steps back. “Hey, that’s weird,” Chloe says. “You both have the same color eyes as Emma. I’ve never seen that before. I always thought it was because she’s freakishly pasty. Ow! That’s gonna leave a mark, Emma,” she says, rubbing her freshly pinched biceps.

“Good, I hope it does,” I snap. I want to ask them about their eyes—the color seems prettier set against the olive tone of Galen’s skin—but Chloe has bludgeoned my chances of recovering from embarrassment. I’ll have to be satisfied that my dad—and Google—were wrong all this time; my eye color just can’t be that rare. Sure, my dad practiced medicine until the day he died two years ago. And sure, Google never let me down before. But who am I to argue with living, breathing proof that this eye color actually does exist? Nobody, that’s who. Which is convenient, since I don’t want to talk anymore. Don’t want to force Galen into any more awkward conversations. Don’t want to give Chloe any more opportunities to deepen the heat of my burning cheeks. I just want this moment of my life to be over.

I push past Chloe and snatch up the surfboard. To her good credit, she presses herself against the rail as I pass her again. I stop in front of Galen and his sister. “It was nice to meet you both. Sorry I ran into you. Let’s go, Chloe.”

Galen looks like he wants to say something, but I turn away. He’s been a good sport, but I’m not interested in discussing swimmer safety—or being introduced to any more of his hostile relatives. Nothing he can say will change the fact that DNA from my cheek is smeared on his chest.

Trying not to actually march, I thrust past them and make my way down the stairs leading to the pristine white sand. I hear Chloe closing the distance behind me, giggling. And I decide on sunflowers for her funeral.

2

THE SIBLINGS lean on their elbows against the rail, watching the girls they just met peel the T-shirts off their bikinis and wade into the water with the surfboard floating between them.

“She’s probably just wearing contacts,” Rayna says. “They make contacts in that color, you know.”

He shakes his head. “She’s not wearing contacts. You saw her just as plain as you’re seeing me. She’s one of us.”

“You’re losing it. She can’t be one of us. Look at her hair. You can’t even call that blonde. It’s almost white.”

Galen frowns. The hair color had thrown him off too—before he had touched her. The simple contact of grasping her arm when she fell dispensed any doubts. The Syrena are always attracted to their own kind—which helps them find each other across miles and miles of ocean. Usually that attraction is limited to water transmission, where they can sense the presence of one of their own. He’s never heard of it occurring on land before—and never felt it so strongly, period—but he knows what he felt. He wouldn’t—couldn’t react that way to a human. Especially given how much he despises them.

“I know it’s unusual—”

“Unusual? It’s impossible, Galen! Our genes don’t come with the ‘blonde’ option.”

“Stop being dramatic. She is one of us. You can see how bad she is at being human. I thought she was going to brain herself on the rail.”

“Okay, let’s say by some off chance she figured out how to bleach thousands of years of genetics out of her hair. Now explain why she’s hanging out—no, vacationing—with humans. She’s breaking the law right in front of our faces, splashing around in the water with her obnoxious human friend. Why is that, Galen?”