Here is a line for those who like to note if they are First Time Readers (FTR) or Re-Readers (RR).

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"Once upon a time, in a land far, far away-"

"Wouldn't it just be easier to say, 'Quite recently, on a small, watery moon orbiting Mars'?" I interrupted.

"That's beside the point, Lucy," Aunt Millie said, turning her head to frown at me. "My way uses more words and is more traditional."

My younger sister grumbled under her breath and swished her pale green tail, upset that I had interrupted her morning story.

"Admit it," I said, spreading my arms in a theatrical flare like the seventeen-year-old I was, "it's overused and almost as bad as the books that start with the person waking up to an annoying alarm clock."

To emphasize my exasperation with such a beginning, I flopped backward on my clamshell bed – or rather – I tried to. Such a movement really loses its statement when it takes almost a solid minute to accomplish. The lack of gravity on this tiny moon sucked sometimes. Like right now. Being underwater wasn't helping any, either.

"This is important for Beryl to remember," Aunt Millie insisted as I still drifted towards my bed. "She may only be eight now, but in sixty years, Beryl will likely be telling this very story to her own grandchildren. You two don't realize just how historically significant this will be to the merfolk in a century or two. We're approaching the end of our first year on Sealantis!"

"Why do we have to turn it into a story, though?" I asked her. "King Trident is recording everything. Like, actual facts. He already filled forty-two waxed scrolls with the fine details. And no one is going to care about how hard it was to keep clams alive during the first few months. If they do, they can read the scrolls."

"Forty-three," she corrected. "He finished another one yesterday. Besides, Beryl wanted a story. If you're going to be so fussy, you can read one to her before you change out of your sleeping top."

Beryl sat up in excitement, curling her tail around the inner edge of her giant clamshell bed. Being forced to share a room with my sister was annoying. The coral that made up our home hadn't grown enough to give me my own room yet.

With a resigned sigh, I swam over to the bookshelf filled with plastic books and pushed my long, brown hair out of my face while I skimmed the titles.

"Let's see... Oh! Here we go! A hairy beast with temper issues kidnaps an innocent young woman and takes her hostage. While forcefully being confined in his castle, she falls in love with him!"

"Lucy! I told you to leave your werewolf stories upstairs!"

"I did! You gave her this one."

"I've never given any of you a werewolf book! Let me see that." She darted over with two quick flicks of her tail and snatched the book from my hands. "Beauty and the Beast? But that's not what... oh."

I sighed. If adults were supposedly so wise, why didn't she see the similarities since she detested werewolf stories so much? I turned to the bookshelf again, wondering if there was actually anything readable here. Printing books on plastic pages wasn't cheap, so the selection left something to be desired. It also had to be something my sister would like – and that really limited my options.

"Hmmm... What about Tangled? It's about a princess with long hair who didn't know she was a princess." My eyes widened as a thought occurred to me. "Oh! What if I was a princess and just didn't know it? I could relax all day and have my pick of food! Think about it! It happens in so many movies and books!"

"Isn't that how you live now?" Aunt Millie muttered.

"You're right! It's like I'm already practicing for a life of ease!"

"Even you know such a thing would never happen in real life. That's just fairytale nonsense. Especially since the Queen would shred Trident's tailfin if he even thought about sleeping around."

"What's wrong with sleepovers?" Beryl asked. "Me and Aquamarine have one every week."

I fought to contain a grin and utterly failed. Aunt Millie made a face, belatedly remembering the naïve, sheltered youth behind her.

Aunt Millie thought for a moment before replying, "You'll understand once you're older. Married people don't share beds with other people during sleepovers."

Beryl shot me a confused look. I puckered my lips and made kissing noises.

"Eww! I don't want people to kiss me!" she exclaimed.

I snickered, remembering that her two friends had recently pinned her down and kissed her since she hated kisses so much. She had only just started to forgive them.

Aunt Millie whacked the back of my head. "Behave, or I'm sending you out to cut the kelp back. It's taking over the pathways again. Better yet, why don't you get dressed, and I'll start breakfast?"

If I left this room, I was a prime target for unpleasant chores. "Uh, what about Beryl's story?"

"She can pick one, and I'll read it to her this afternoon when I return from choir practice. Your parents will be back tomorrow morning and can read her more stories." With that, Aunt Millie left the room.

"Thanks for ruining my storytime, Lucy," Beryl grumbled.

"You are perfectly capable of reading them yourself."

She grinned at me mischievously. "Oh, I know. But Auntie doesn't know that. Besides, it distracted her long enough that she forgot to tell us to clean our room."

Maybe the little squirt had more brain cells than I had originally thought. Turning around, I swam over to my closet. The white rock surface might have reminded a human of an oversized narrow clamshell, but no self-respecting mermaid or merman would ever mistake stone for a real shell.

That only reminded me that most of the clams we had brought with us from Earth hadn't survived the trip or didn't acclimatize to the new water and sunlight. At least some were adapting and growing, but it would be a decade or more until their shells began to decorate the sand for us to collect. Until then, shells were in short supply.

I took a deep breath and opened my closet. I only had twenty clamshell bikini tops and two silk halter tops for sleeping. Two of the shells were fading, one needed the lacing replaced, and another one was a horrendous burnt pink color that did not match my seafoam green tail at all.

It was like I had a full closet and nothing to wear.

After gazing at the selection, I picked out a nice sapphire blue clamshell bikini and swam behind a privacy divider to change. When I finished, I went back to my closet and dug into the drawers near the bottom.

Once again, I had three drawers full of accessories and none of them matched what I was now wearing.

"How am I supposed to color coordinate my clam bikini top if none of my necklaces are even close to the same color? Do I have any bracelets... Drat. Lipstick? Wait, no, blue lipstick shouldn't even exist, let alone be worn." I groaned at my terrible fortune and mismatched wardrobe.

"Why do they need to match your bikini?"

I glanced back at Beryl. "Aren't they supposed to?"

We just stared at each other, mystified. She didn't understand why they needed to match, and I couldn't believe I hadn't questioned that unwritten rule earlier.

Blind acceptance was not something teenagers were supposed to have.

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Author's Note:

Normally I post a copyright notice here. Even though this is a story of my own creation and has full copyright rights, it's so cringe-worthy that I laugh when mirror sites copy it.

For anyone reading this book on any site other than Wattpad, please, for your own sanity, head to Wattpad and check out my real stories.   💖