Page 68 of Bewitched By the Sea Monster
Onyx.
“Alistair!Can you….no, you probably can’t, huh?Uggggggh, what am Idoing?”
Being crazy.
That was what I was doing.
I’d snuck out of the cottage while Jackson showered and got himself ready for dinner.
Well, I hadn’tfullysnuck. I’d told him I was going for a walk. (“Really, babe? Now? Well, whatever. Be careful.”That had been his exact response). I just hadn’t disclosedwhereI was walking to: the dock. I’d gone clean across it, even as the sloshing water underneath made my stomach flop and grumble. And I now stood alone in the middle of a fog so gelatinous, it seemed to have swallowed up the rest of the world.
The head of a wave struck the edge of the dock, spitting a wad of foam and muck onto the edge of my skirt.
I squeaked and glared at the fizzing glob oozing over the graffiti print. “Ugh,great.Guess it’s a good thing I didn’t change yet.”
“Pippi?”
My heart leapt into my throat when Alistair’s voice filtered between my ears.
“Alistair?” I called again. “Can you hear me?”
“I can.”
Something was wrong.
His words were thicker. Slurred, almost. Not in the way people got when they’d had one drink too many. This resembled a watery lisp that stained a voice after a prolonged bout of crying. And his emotions were muted, as though the tears had drained him dry.
Oh, Alistair.
As a smaller wave swilled at the posts of the dock, munching on the wood with all the power of a chihuahua chomping on a tree trunk, a heavyplopsounded to my right.
I turned my head that way.
Alistair’s orange eye cut right through the fog. So vibrant, it could’ve been a beam of light shining from a boat or a lighthouse.
The sight of that large luminous eye would’ve been petrifying—a scene straight from a horror movie—if I hadn’t known that harsh stare belonged to the kindest of creatures.
“Are you alright, Pippi?” he asked.
“That’s actually the question I was going to ask you,” I said.
“You s-screamed,” Alistair continued.
“I…Oh. Yeah. No. That wasn’t a scream. Well, itwas. But just because my skirt got wet. Nothing else.”
“You l-look…” he stuttered. Sighed. “There is a word for this…your…coloris not the same.”
“My color?”
“Your face.”
Which didn’t help, until he added the next bit.
“It doesn’thavecolor.”
“Oh. Pale? Is that the word you were looking for?”
“Yes!” He exhaled. “Pale.You look pale. And is that not…for humans…it means they’re not well?”
