Page 81 of Bewitched By the Sea Monster

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“How doyou always seem to know when I’m s-sad?”

“I just do. I’ve always been able to tell with people.”

It’s…

What’s the word?

Restless?

No. It’s not strong enough.

Maddening?

Yes.

Maddening. It’smaddeningto have a word within my reach—a word I canseebut can’t grasp. The more I try, the more it slips.

There is a word. For what Pippi feels. What sheis.I know it.Knewit…once. But now it keeps slipping.

And shedoesn’tseem to know.

Which makes the maddeningworse.Because I can’t speak…tellher that she isn’t alone in those feelings. I can’t…wane-warn—I can’twarnher of how easily she can be hurt.

Perhaps she already has been hurt.

I snarl into the waters, wishing they were hard. A solid object to strike my head against. Maybe that will stop the words from slipping. Or force all of them to slip, so I stop fighting for the ones I half remember.

Iknowwhat she is.

I want totellher.

But Ican’t.

And it’smaddening.

Maybe that’s why the dream comes to me, after my restless body stills into a restless sleep. Because I can’t stop thinking of her. Can’t stop worrying. Can’t stop seeing her hurt, with me in the waters, unable to help her. Unable, even, to give a proper warning.

Useless.

In the dream, I am not useless.

I am human again. I walk the land beside her. I speak easily.

And she is lovely. Smiling at me, her face lit by…

The sun?

No.

The light is too soft to be from the sun.

It’s the other orb. The one that sits in the sky in the dark hours.

Moon.

Moonlight.

Her face is lit bymoonlight.

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