“Auntie Calily, mermaids are real!” Izzy exclaimed, jumping up and down.
“Uh-huh,” I replied, my head bobbing up and down in time with the enthusiastic 7-year-old. I looked up at her harried mother, my friend, Natalie, who followed her into the living room. “Mermaids?”
Natalie stopped short just behind her hyperactive daughter and shook her head as she flopped down into the armchair across from me. With a sigh, she waved at her daughter, who was still bouncing up and down in front of me, “Yes, Isabella met a mermaid and decided to go on an adventure.”
“An adventure? With a mermaid? Do tell,” I implored, trying to hide my chuckle as I beckoned my play-niece to me. She rushed over to me, taking my hands–her eyes glittering with excitement.
“I was on the beach, and Wolfie kept looking in the water. I told him to come back so I could bury him in the sand. But he wouldn’t come. He just kept staring and staring and staring and staring. I marched over there and pulled him by his collar, but he wouldn’t move,” Izzy blurted out in a one-breath story.
“Okay,” I replied, as the wiry child hopped onto my lap. I wrapped my arms around the little girl who gleefully swung her red cowgirl boot-clad feet, then paused.
“Then I saw it,” Izzy continued, her expression turning serious as she turned around to face me.
“What? What did you see?” I asked, mock intrigue plastered on my face before glancing over at Natalie and winking. She rolled her eyes as Izzy continued.
“It was a shiny she-shell. I mean sea-sell. I mean s-e-a s-h-e-ll. Yeah, sea sell. You know what I mean. I looked at it in the water, but I couldn’t see it so good.” She leaned in closer, moving my hair away from her ear, cupping her hand, she whispered, “I went into the water to see better.”
“Oh!” I exclaimed, nodding with understanding that Izzy was not supposed to go into the water by herself. Izzy glanced over at her mother to see if she heard our secret. The look on Natalie’s face confirmed that she had and did not approve.
Izzy nodded briefly, glancing at her mother again before she continued. “I heard this song.” Izzy began humming the melody. “And I went further into the water. The shiny sea-sell kept moving away, but I wasn’t going to let it get away. I kept going and going, and the water kept getting higher and higher. I could hear Wolfie barking, and I was going to tell him to be quiet, but then I swallowed some water.”
“Oh, no! Are you okay?” I was truly concerned at hearing that part. I looked over at Natalie, who struggled to keep the strain off her face. I could tell Natalie felt guilty for not watching her more closely. “You know that isn’t safe to do,” I chastised Izzy.
Izzy nodded. “Uh huh. I know. Daddy saved me.” She made a big arm movement as if pulling something up out of something. “Daddy picked me up so I could breathe. I saw her then.”
“Saw who, sweetheart?” I asked taken aback by the whole story.
“The mermaid. She peeked her head up out of the water. Then she was gone,” Izzy finished moving her unruly curls out of her face.
“Oh, are you going to stop there, little elf?” Natalie asked her daughter, who ducked her head at the chiding.
“There’s more?” I asked in disbelief.
“Oh, yes, there is more,” Natalie replied as Izzy found her hands really interesting all of a sudden. “Mmm hmmm.”
“Now I am dying of suspense. What happened?” I asked, tickling the little girl in my arms, trading my gaze between the mother-daughter duo. When Izzy shook her head–her cheeks turning pink–Natalie continued with the story.
“Uh huh. Well, later that day, when we were at the pier, someone got a bright idea.” Natalie cut a look at her daughter, who ducked her head beneath my arm. “She stood on the end of the pier, took a deep breath, and jumped into the ocean below. You can imagine how shocked we were, and how scared.”
“Mom, I didn’t mean to scare you and Daddy,” Izzy protested.
“Apparently, she was determined to go in the water and get answers, no matter what it took,” Natalie explained. “When we were able to recover her from the water, she regaled us with a fanciful tale of the mermaid who looked like her but with long braids. She kissed her so she could breathe underwater. They swam around, and she gave her a treasure before returning her to the surface, where we could find her,” Natalie finished.
“What did she give you?” I asked Izzy, definitely curious. Izzy grinned and pushed her sleeve up to reveal a shimmering gold bracelet woven around an aquamarine stone. I also noticed that her skin shimmered in the light that resembled makeup in the pattern of fine scales. “Wow!”
“Exactly, the bracelet won’t come off, nor will the scales on her arm,” Natalie sighed. “All because…”
“Mermaids are real!” mother and daughter said in unison.
Mad Woman Rambles 