My first reaction was to punch the girl, but how do you punch someone upside down and falling?
I had no problems considering punching a girl my age for making fun of me, unlike the damsel I'd rescued. Her I'd punch if she wasn't wearing a dress. Mom says dresses are off-limits and you must treat girls in dresses like ladies. Personally it wasn't so much the dress as how clean she was, as pretty much every girl I'd ever met wore a skirt. Instead I figured it was how they did their hair and their smell. Though that could be something in being clean. Until now I measured it all on Mar. On Sundays she dressed up ‘real nice’ and other days, seeming the same but hauling oats and milk sweating with my brothers.
Then, well, she'd just kissed me. If you want to call an upside down brush of the lips a kiss. Considering brushing lips with any girl beside mom and Mar should be considered a kiss in my book, then it was.
Mar was a bully, and since I was no longer the ‘baby’ she'd stopped kissing me. I didn't mind so much, because then I could wrastle her, though as of yet she only let me get her – which was never. I still tried.
So I thought I should wrastle this girl too, but she'd kissed me. That broke the rules. I was into new territory. What also broke the rules was I was now under water. How you supposed to dash if there was no up or down?
While I wrastled my thoughts she sat back observing me, the way her head had the light over it I took to be up. But I had no way in orienting, and I felt if I was carrying a bale of hay attached to all my limbs. Being my first time underwater I didn't know what to expect, but it wasn't what I had imagined. I'd always assumed rivers, streams and lakes were for the fish, but I was enjoying this and it was much cooler, and wet all over in a delicious way. Not as messy as playing in the rain.
She zipped from one side of me to the other, she made it look so easy. I tried moving my hands as she did and in some time was able to get my head upwards. We were looking face to face. “That’s good” she said, “I knew you could do it.”
“Who are you?” I asked, wanting to know who I was about to smash.
“Who am I?” she trilled. And she laughed doing a backwards flip in the water to come back up looking at me.
“How'd you do that?” I asked trying to imitate her, but managed only in flapping my arms up and down, and slow at that. My sleeves were heavy making it difficult to do anything.
“If your going to swim you have to remove some of these things,” and she darted about me pulling until she'd shucked me like corn tossing my things onto the dock to dry. She sure was smart, it was just like a bath and I was free to try to somersault again. I didn't do any better, just flapped my arms faster.
She giggled, “Let's do some basics first,” and she demonstrated pulling herself along like a frog. “Now you try.”
In a little while I was doing a close approximation, feeling proud of myself, but cracked a yawn. “Tired?” she asked. I yawned again in answer.
Together we swam to the dock and climbed up it to dry off in the sun. I awoke alone, hearing a shout, looking about from my perch on the few good boards at the end of the dock. Her wet silhouette still visible on the wood.
“Jackie!” It was Pop. “Here!” I called back scrambling for my clothes.
Next: Mermaid Kisses 2.0
Note: This post was resurrected from my old site. It may not be the one that showed up on the site. The date of publication here is from when it was added to this site.
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