Page 11 of Seashells and Daiquiris

Silence. I pull back and check to make sure she’s still on the line, to which I see the seconds continuing to count upward.

“Oh, great, it latched to you, didn’t it?” She finally asks.

“You know?” I avoid stepping on any cracks, which is not my usual superstition but at this point I can’t handle anymore curses.

"Everybody knows about the curse, Freddie. It's Crescent Cove. A sea witch ripped a man's heart out and cursed it into a shell. I mean, on one hand, that’s basically a normal Thursday for us… on the other, gossip like that spreads far and wide in a small town.”

I start to breathe a little heavier as I go up an incline. “Okay, so he’s not lying to me then?”

“No… does it really shout your thoughts at him?”

“Dove, it told him I want to climb him like a tree. And that I want to be harpooned by him!”

I state that with such gravity that I’m a little shocked when a huge laugh rolls out of her, only to join her when I realize how funny that actually kind of it.

“Girlie, that’s hilarious. I mean, I am so sorry. But Liam is a good guy. He’s kind of used to it at this point. Hey, look at it this way, at least you have a really good excuse to kiss a super hot merman.”

“So you know about the kiss, too?”

“Yeah, again, everyone knows about it. Except for outsiders.”

This makes me feel a little less crazy. I can handle sacrificing one kiss, under a full moon, with a sexy merman. “Tell me about the sea witch. Like is this just something I ignore until the next full moon and then I’m good?”

Dove takes a breath. I hear something in the background—a door closing, maybe her stepping into a quieter room. "Her name is Thalassa. She's old magic. She and Liam were together for a while. From what I've heard, it was intense. He loved her in that big, reckless, all-consuming way, and she wanted to own that. Not share it. Own it. But she has a selfish side that Liam didn’t like—my best friend is cousin’s with his sister, so that’s how I know, again, small town—and so he broke up with her.

"So, she took his heart. Literally pulled it from his chest and sealed it in a shell. The curse has rules. They always do. There has to be a real way to break it, with no tricks or anything. In this case, it's a kiss from his true soulmate on the first full moon of a new season. So far none have worked, but we have learned that it does help release whoever the shell has latched to.”

“Yeah, he said the shell keeps bonding with people it thinks are his soulmate."

“Yeah, I think Thalassa might have baked that into the curse, or something.”

"So it's probably wrong about me, too."

I can’t believe how much that disappoints me. It would be so nice to think that the universe actually delivered me a merman soulmate.

“I mean, it’s statistically likely, yes.”

“Oh! Also, he seemed annoyed that the shell picked me," I say, seeing Dove’s cottage house in the distance. "Like it was bad timing."

"It probably is. The summer full moon is in a little over three weeks, and the sea folk have a gathering that night. Thalassa usually shows up. So she’ll probably be a massive pain to you if she learns he’s got another match. He hates that.”

"Great. Wonderful. I came here to write a book and now I might have a sea witch nemesis."

"Welcome back to Crescent Cove, babe. It’s a really wonderful, chill town but not everyone can be as sunny and wonderful as me.”

I laugh, but it comes out shaky. "Hey, Dove?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for letting me stay here. I need this kind of distraction, honestly.”

"Anytime, Freddie. That's what the house is for." A pause. Softer now. "And for what it's worth? The universe doesn't send you dreams about something unless it's trying to tell you a message. The shell found you for a reason. Maybe just... don't throw it off any cliffs until you figure out what that reason is. It’s interesting you’ve been dreaming of it, and it’s apparently Liam’s shell…”

“Don’t you dare suggest this is real.”

“I’m just saying! Wait, how did you even get it?”

“I bought it at Odessa’s shop. For like six bucks.”