Vicious Deep by Zoraida Cordova Page B

he’s always Mr. Calm-and-Collected-and-Ready-to-Analyze, but all I want is a little bit of panic. I want him to scream, to run away from me, because I’m a freak. I’m beyond a freak. I’m unnatural. I want to bang my head against the tiles. I want to find a shrink who’ll medicate me until I’m no longer a hazard to myself and others.
    Mom grabs a towel and wraps it around my tail.
    I. Have. A. Freaking. Tail.
    Dad pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose and hooks his arms under mine. They count to three and heave me into the tub with a splash. I’m suddenly nauseated, because I think of the times we’ve been fishing and we unhook the fish and throw them back in the water.
    The water overflows with my weight. The tub is one of those grand claw-footed kind. It’s big enough for two people, which by the way, since it’s my parents’ bathroom, is gross.
    I let myself sink up to my shoulders and dangle my arms over the edge. My fins hang out over the brim, curling and uncurling. I wonder where my feet go? I wonder where my dick does! Holy crap. I’m about to start flailing around when my mother kneels at the side of the tub and dips her hand in. “Is the water okay?”
    â€œIs the water okay? How about if I’m okay?”
    â€œDon’t you talk to your mother that way.” Dad never uses that tone with me, because other than having shown up home at the ass-crack of dawn a couple of times, I don’t do anything to give them heart attacks like my friends do to their parents.
    Mom leaves the bathroom, and I’m afraid I’ve hurt her feelings. The water helps the dryness that’s making my skin feel like I’ve been lying out in the sun all day. I submerge myself completely. I hold my breath, but it doesn’t matter, because I’m still breathing. The shock of it makes me miss a beat of air when I sit upright.
    Dad notices my surprise and finds Mom’s mirror that magnifies pores three times. He hands it to me. I used to sit in this tub for hours playing with that thing. On my pores, I mean.
    I hold it up to my neck. It’s a hard angle, but there they are. The slits are shut now, lined by clusters of translucent metallic-blue scales. I throw the mirror to the side. It hits the wall and shatters.
    â€œBad luck, Finn,” he says, trying to joke.
    â€œEverything about that statement is unfunny.”
    My fins uncurl and knock the tray of bubble soaps into the tub. Under the water pressure, the bubbles fill the bath in seconds. I can smell the minuscule specks of metal in the water from the pipes it’s traveling through. I can smell the chemicals in the soap more than the rose scent it’s trying to mimic. I can smell Dad’s amazement mingling with something like regret, like fireworks after they’ve all exploded.
    â€œSay something,” he tells me.
    â€œSomething.” I chuckle.
    He’s quiet for what are probably seconds but feel like forever.
    â€œDo you remember when I was ten,” I start, “and Vicky Millanelli had that birthday pool party?”
    â€œYou kept wanting to leave,” he says, “because you were the only boy who showed up.”
    â€œShe only invited people she liked, and she didn’t invite Layla. So all the girls started chasing me around, trying to kiss me. They were all wearing these matching pink-and-purple arm floats. So I jumped into the deep end of the pool, where they couldn’t follow me. I just sat there at the bottom with my legs crossed, watching them scream and freak out. I don’t remember wanting to come up for air. Vicky never invited me to her birthday parties again.”
    Dad pulls off his glasses and rubs the bridge of his nose. “Her dad called me to get you. You didn’t even notice what you were doing.”
    â€œI never liked her much anyway.”
    Mom comes back with a Mason jar of sea salt. She runs her hand on my