Author's Note: This is an entry for the
2021 April Fools Day Contest
.
Disclaimer: The following is a piece of fiction. Fiction (in case you don't know) means it's made up, not real, a bunch of lies. The characters in the story are all fictional too, meaning they don't exist. While non-existent, if they existed and had an age they would be over 18.
Kyle watched as the long white arm pulled the comb through dark tresses. The comb looked like it was made of abalone shell while the hair fell down in dense waves concealing almost all of the bare upper chest underneath. Kyle was pretty sure he'd caught a glimpse of her tits earlier as she got up on the rock. They must be small, though, if for no other reason than her lack of any bra. Disneyesque seashell or otherwise.
"You shouldn't call me a mermaid. I'm not one," she said, still running the comb through her now-drying hair as she sat on the sea-wet rock.
Kyle couldn't help but sound skeptical. "Not a mermaid. Seriously?"
She frowned at him. "Yes, seriously! Really, you guys are so insensitive. Do you always go around contradicting people even if they clearly know better than you what they're talking about?"
"Sorry. You do have a point." Also a tail, Kyle added mentally. The latter lifted out of the sea and splashed down again.
Kyle had been staring at the mermaid since she'd emerged from the sea, hoisting herself onto the rock next to the one where he'd taken refuge after his kayak got swept away from him. He had to admit it had been a stupid idea to go kayaking when he knew the weather might turn, but who would have thought it could turn so fast and the wind blow him so far out?
He'd managed to stay with the kayak for what had to be nearly two hours, but finally he'd gotten dumped out and wasn't able to swim back to the watercraft before the wind took it out of sight. It was sheer luck he'd found this rocky reef and was able to climb onto the largest protrusion before he'd tired out and drowned.
Kyle had a general idea of the direction of the coast. But he was also certain he couldn't swim that far.
When the mermaid had come out of the water he'd at first thought he was hallucinating. But he felt rational and awake, and it wasn't like he'd been out here all that long. So apparently mermaids really did exist.
The mermaid didn't have a scaley fish's tail though. Her lower (rear?) half was much more like a dolphin's, slick and smooth. The very dark green of that part contrasted sharply with the pale, almost bluish skin of her torso, arms and face.
"Okay, what do I call you then?" Kyle said.
"Are you asking my name or asking what I am?"
Her voice was odd, kind of a deep liquid murmur. Appropriate for a mermaid, he had to assume. "Um, both, I guess."
"You first."
Kyle blinked. "Uh, my name is Kyle, Kyle Aberdeen, and I'm a human. Your turn."
"Hi, Kyle. I'm Mrrrshaa."
"Marcia."
"No, Mrrshaa. Try rolling the r sound, and make the middle more sibilant."
"Maaarsha?"
The mermaid grimaced. "Okay, call me Em. You can probably handle that better. As for what I am, I'm a person."
Kyle barked out a laugh. She looked a little offended.
"Sorry," he apologized. "It's just that sounded a lot like things girls have told me at times I was, uh, looking a little too hard."
"No problem. I guess I should explain that when I say I'm a person, I just mean that's what we call ourselves, people. Sea people, if we have to spell it out."
"Makes sense," Kyle said. "What do you call people like me, then?"
"Land people, if we're being polite," Em said flatly.
"You speak awfully good English for a sea person, Em."
"Satellite TV and Blu-ray movies," she replied. "We get all sorts of things off ships that sink."
"I never thought about that," Kyle said. "How come land people don't know about you?"
"You do, obviously. You even put us in movies and things," Em said. "You just think we're imaginary."
"Okay, let me rephrase that. How come we don't know you're real?"
"Your ancestors knew we were real. If you don't anymore it's probably because you land people have such short attention spans," Em said. "And of course we don't show ourselves to any of you these days. Much too dangerous."
"Dangerous? How?"
"Oh, I don't know, let's ask the baiji," Em said. "Oh wait, we can't, they're extinct. Say, how about we ask the vaquita instead. Good luck finding one, they're almost extinct. Maybe the Hawaiian monk seal?"
Kyle waved a hand for her to stop. "Okay, okay, I get it."
"No, I don't think you do. What do you think would happen if a sea person showed up in front of a bunch of land people? If they didn't shoot bullets they'd definitely shoot photos," Em said. "Then what? Hordes of you guys in boats descend on the location. Some are just hoping for a look, others want to catch a specimen. A live sea person would be worth a fair amount of money, right? Even a dead one would, out come the guns again."
"Then the military and scientific expeditions arrive. Ear-splitting sonar, undersea craft and unmanned probes, and poor porpoises you've brainwashed into switching sides. You'd make our lives hell."
Em sighed. "For centuries we've had to make absolutely sure we don't remind your kind we really do exist. Not when there's any chance of it spreading."
A distant alarm bell that had started ringing in Kyle's head when Em first said "we don't show ourselves to any of you" now became very loud.
"Oh fuck. You're showing yourself to me because you know I can't tell anyone," Kyle wailed. "I'm going to die, that's why you don't care if I see you!"
Kyle hugged his knees and began to weep. Em slipped off her rock into the water, swam to his larger outcrop and heaved up onto it behind him. Her cool arms went around his shivering chest. "Shh, shh. You're not going to die, Kyle."
"I'm not?" he sobbed.
"You're on a major route for the whale-watching boats, silly. It's already high tide so these rocks will stay above water, and in four hours at most the tours will start sailing past," Em said. "That's why I'm here now, I can take time to comb my hair before they show up."