The Driftwood Mermaid - part 2

   In the water, maybe ten feet away, was a piece of colored driftwood, waving a single branch at Tommy. Maybe a piece of wreckage from a painted sailboat, that washed ashore from so very far away. Somewhere mixed in with the salty ocean spray on his face, there were tears now. Soon, however, he wiped them aside with his hand, and returned to the soul-killing, fake-toughness that got him through his strange life.
   At home, Tommy’s mom was snoring loudly. Their little beach-house property had two rooms and a small kitchen, and a fenced-in lot about fifty feet square. He got himself ready for bed, and in the morning everything was the same, except his mother had stopped snoring. He made his own breakfast (peanut butter and jelly), and packed his own lunch (same). He remembered to lock the door so as not to get yelled at, and off he went, still feeling low about the “driftwood mermaid”.
   Tommy daydreamed his way through school, then went down to the beach. Maybe he’d tell mom about the mermaid, maybe not. She wouldn’t mock him, he knew that. No matter how drunk she got, she never made fun of him, and yelled at him only out of frustration, or in abortive attempts to be a nurturing and protective mother. Deep within, her intent was pure, and Tommy knew that. He knew she wasn’t mean, only in great pain. He remembered how they had once laughed, and played weird games with strange made-up names and rules. She had taught him about the world, his father, herself, and what he could expect. There was no way out for mom, and they both knew it. She still tried occasionally to make him laugh... on her way out. On her way down.
   He didn’t see his mom at her usual spot, so he sat down to wait for her. He stayed there until the sun sank behind him and the evening tide washed in. He wondered if there would be surf-lights tonight. “Or fake mermaids”, he added, with a sneer.
   Tommy’s mother had died the previous night of either a stroke or a heart attack. The coroner would tend toward the former, then spend quite some time finding out which it indeed was. Tommy found her when he went home. It was “lucky” he went to check on her, or she’d have laid there even longer, but he could see something was wrong. The blanket was on the floor, and she was all weird and twisted. There was no snoring, and when he got closer, no breathing either. And her eyes were wide open.
   He put the blanket back on her, and went to the little kitchen. He made himself another sandwich, put his little jacket on, then he went out, remembering to lock the door. Tommy headed for the beach, eating his sandwich as he walked. He went to the spot his mother had frequented, and sat down to watch the crashing waves. The tide was going out now, but it was still high. In the waves, he saw the surf-lights twinkling. He watched them for a very long time. In fact, he fell asleep right in that spot, and slept there until dawn.
   Sometime during the night, Tommy had a dream about a mermaid, who looked at him kindly as she was pulled out to sea by the receding tide. She never spoke, she just looked at him until she disappeared.
   But she never turned into driftwood either.

The End
copyright 1997-2004
Penrose (W.S.Rose)