The Twice Lost Read Online Free PDF

sending an e-mail.
    And even if he could call Luce, what would he say to her? That he was sorry; that he was still in love with her? They’d only have the exact same problems as before. It was ridiculous to think the two of them could have a future together.
    His phone let out a burst of percussion and Dorian jumped. Just for a fraction of a second he was possessed by an irrational fantasy: that she’d somehow turned human again, that she missed him too . . .
    It was his friend Steve, already talking as Dorian answered. “. . . got to come over! You are not going to
believe
this!”
    Dorian groaned inside, but he kept his voice calm. “Believe what?”
    “You’re the mermaid guy, right? There’s this video. It’s
got
to be fake, but—”
    “You mean on the Internet?”
    “What do you think? But, dude, she’s got short hair. Just like that one you used to draw all the time. She looks so
real.
”
    Dorian was already on his feet. His knees were trembling.
    “Dorian? Are you—”
    “I’ll be right there.”
    “It’s
got
to be fake, but it really looks . . .” There was something strange in Steve’s voice, Dorian thought; it was a little too soft, too floaty.
    “I’ll be right there, okay? Ten . . . ten minutes.”
    Then he was sprinting, the gray road and tattered spruce trees veering around him, billows of mist parting around his face.
    There were a lot of mermaids out there, Dorian knew. He’d met a few of them personally, and some of them besides Luce must have short hair. But this particular mermaid was also reckless enough to let herself be filmed . . . His heart surged and his stomach cramped, but he kept running at top speed all the way back to the village, his sweat instantly turning clammy in the fog. Then he was dashing up the low wooden steps and his outstretched hand slapped hard against Steve’s door.
    He had to knock a few times, more and more loudly, rocking with impatience. “O
kay
. . .” Steve finally called from inside, and shuffling steps approached. The door swung open and Dorian looked in, across the living room and down a hallway and through another open door. A sliver of the computer in Steve’s room was visible. Even that partial glimpse was enough to set Dorian’s heart thudding quicker than it had from his run. Steve’s face had a stunned, foggy look to it. The rims of his eyes were red, and he didn’t even say hello as he caught Dorian by the elbow and hauled him down the corridor. As they got closer to the computer screen, the video stopped.
    Steve’s hand was already reaching out hungrily to hit
Replay
as he skidded into his chair. Dorian stood behind him.
    The video started normally enough. A few people jostling around on a dock, laughing, taping one another, and then turning the camera toward a pair of seals lounging on a sandbar off to the right. A little girl in a red windbreaker came wandering into view on the beach below. She kept looking back over her shoulder, obviously watching something, maybe under the dock, that the adults hadn’t noticed.
    Then, off-camera, a woman screamed, and for half a second the camera lurched madly as she grabbed for it. There was a flash of blinding sun as the lens veered skyward. Voices were crying out: “My God! Nick, look!” and “What on earth . . .”
    The camera swung sharply, pointing down into the shallow water, and Dorian’s insides wrenched at the sight of the silvery jade green tail whipping ten feet below the surface, the jagged dark hair. He heard himself crying out involuntarily, but Steve didn’t seem to notice. He was staring too hard at the image, at the rippling grace of the mermaid’s movements. But, Dorian thought, mermaids could usually swim much faster than that. Was she showing herself on purpose?
    Incredibly, she broke the surface twenty yards out, right in a diamond-bright patch of reflected sun. Dorian wanted to shout at her, to tell her not to be so crazy.
    Incredibly, she glanced back.