Don't know where this idea came from, but here it is!

Disclaimer- I own nothing. Simple as that.

Dedication- To those who know that there is another world out there...you simply just have to look hard enough.

Interview with Marine Biologist Lynn Nette.

09-07-08

16:00 hrs

Interviewer: So can you tell us, Ms. Nette, what your opinion of the myth of mermaids is?

Ms. Nette: Myth?

Interviewer: Yes, the myth. Do you belive mermaids exist?

Ms. Nette: Yes.

Interviewer: So mermaids are real? What makes you think that?

Ms. Nette: I've seen them. I've studied them and I have learned from them. They are just as real as you or I, Mr. Byrd.

Interviwer: You've actually seen mermaids? Talked with them?

Ms. Nette: Yes I have. I can even remember my first mermaid. It ended...very tragically. I was ten years old, my family had rented a condo on the beach for a week. We could see both ocean and pool from our balcony. I remember, the ocean at high tide was not five feet from the pool deck. My brother and I used to have so much fun going from pool to ocean and back again. For about half the week, nothing happened. From beach to pool, from pool to room, that was the routine. Then the storm came.

It was a violent one, coming from the sea. It struck at night, lightning lighting up the coast for miles. I later learned that it was called an ocean-side squall, but all I knew then was the pounding rain, the constant lightning and the sound of waves crashing into the jetties and piers. We lost power with a lightning bolt that was blue. All we had were candles for light.

The next morning, it was as if the storm hadn't been. The sky was clear and the birds sang. The only evidence was all the seaweed and sand everywhere. There was sand where there wasn't supposed to be sand and sand was missing from where it was supposed to be. Seaweeds covered the jetties, mixed with dead or barely living fish. There was even some in the pool!

I was getting ready my upstairs room. There were lots of new shells on the beach; I wanted to find some good ones. Suddenly, from downstairs, my mom screamed. I dashed down the stairs, my mom grabbed my wrist and we both ran out to the pool area.

"Look, Lynny. Tell me if you see what I see." she said, pushing me towards the pool. I stood at the edge and looked over. I gasped. A girl...at the bottom of the pool! Had someone drowned last night...? Then I saw the fins...

"Mermaid..." I whispered, a small smile on my face. I had always known that they were real.

"Good. Good. I'm not going crazy." my mom said in the back-round as others started to make their way to the pool. I looked at the mermaid in the pool. She couldn't have been more than thirteen, her hair was blonde, her tail a brilliant blue. Her eyes were closed and her lips were parted slightly. I looked at her. Why wasn't she swimming?

"What is it?"

"A mermaid."

"What? Impossible!"

"Let me see, let me see!"

The adults were all gathered around with their children, just staring at the mermaid. I looked about in puzzlement. Why wasn't anyone trying to help her? She wasn't swimming. Then I realized why she wasn't. She was dead. The high levels of chlorine had killed her. I looked up at my mom with horror.

"Mom..."

"Shh, Lynny."

"But Mom!"

"Hush Lynny!"

I started to cry, knowing that one of the miracles of the world had been snuffed out. She must have been caught in the storm the night before, had been tossed about and thrown into her own watery grave. There was no oxygen in the pool water. She had drowned. The other kids started crying too, they knew too. The adults just stood around, staring at the mermaid laying in the pool.

That was my first mermaid. But it certainly wasn't my last.

Thank you for reading this. Might continue, might not. Review please!!