Chapter 2 - “DON’T CALL A DOCTOR”
Daniel stood motionless with his phone in his hand.
“Explain.”
Emma walked quickly toward the living-room windows and pulled the curtains closed.
“Emma.”
“Please lock the doors.”
“Not until you tell me what the hell is happening.”
Margaret carefully lowered herself onto the sofa with Lila still in her arms.
The baby's silver-blue tail moved gently against Margaret's dress.
There was no crying.
No pain.
Lila seemed fascinated by the shimmering scales.
That somehow made the situation more disturbing.
Emma turned.
“I don't know everything.”
Daniel laughed once, without humor.
“You knew enough to stop me from calling a doctor.”
“My mother warned me.”
Silence.
Margaret looked up.
“Warned you about what?”
Emma hesitated.
Daniel stepped closer.
“Our daughter just transformed in front of us. This is not the moment for half-truths.”
“I know.”
“Then start talking.”
Emma looked toward Lila.
“When I was little, my mother had strange rules.”
Daniel frowned.
“What rules?”
“I wasn't allowed to swim alone. I wasn't allowed to sleep at friends' houses if they had pools. She wouldn't let me take baths unless she was nearby.”
Margaret felt her stomach tighten.
“And you never thought to mention this?”
“I thought she was paranoid.”
Emma rubbed her arms.
“After she disappeared, my father told me she had been mentally unstable.”
Daniel's anger softened slightly.
“Your mother drowned.”
Emma looked at him.
“No body was ever found.”
Everyone fell silent.
Margaret knew the story.
Emma's mother, Evelyn Ward, had disappeared at sea when Emma was nine.
A boating accident off Maine.
Emma rarely spoke about it.
“What does that have to do with Lila?” Daniel asked.
“I don't know yet.”
Daniel lifted his phone again.
“Then I'm calling someone who might.”
Emma stepped in front of him.
“Daniel, listen to me. If we take her to a hospital like this, what happens?”
“They examine her.”
“And then?”
Daniel said nothing.
“They call specialists. Specialists call other specialists. Someone records it. Someone photographs it. Someone leaks it.”
“That's speculation.”
“Our daughter's legs are a tail!”
Emma pointed toward Lila.
“This isn't something a hospital keeps quiet.”
Margaret hated admitting it, but Emma had a point.
Daniel paced.
“So what do you suggest? We pretend this is normal?”
“No.”
Emma looked at the grandfather clock.
“We wait.”
“For what?”
“For her skin to dry.”
Margaret looked sharply at her.
“How do you know that matters?”
Emma closed her eyes.
Because she had said too much.
Daniel noticed too.
“Emma.”
“I remember something.”
“Remember what?”
“When I was six, I fell into our neighbor's pool.”
Her voice became distant.
“My mother pulled me out before anyone else saw me.”
Daniel stopped moving.
“And?”
“I remember her wrapping towels around my legs.”
Margaret's hands tightened around Lila.
“Why?”
Emma looked down.
“Because I think this happened to me.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You think?”
“I was six years old. My father told me afterward that I'd hit my head.”
“And you believed him?”
“I wanted to.”
A small sound came from Margaret.
She looked down.
The scales on Lila's tail were changing.
Drying.
Fading.
Before their eyes, the fin slowly divided.
The long shape separated.
Within minutes, two ordinary baby legs rested beneath the pale-blue dress.
Margaret almost cried from relief.
Daniel rushed forward.
He touched Lila's feet.
Warm.
Normal.
Emma sank onto the sofa.
Margaret looked between mother and daughter.
“You knew the water mattered.”
Emma didn't deny it.
Daniel picked Lila up.
The baby smiled at him.
His expression broke.
For several seconds, he simply held her.
Then he looked over her shoulder at Emma.
“You kept this from me.”
“I didn't know it was real.”
“You knew enough to be afraid.”
“I spent twenty years convincing myself it was a childhood nightmare.”
Daniel's jaw tightened.
“If there's anything else—anything at all—you tell me now.”
Emma looked terrified.
“There is something.”
Margaret leaned forward.
Emma took a shaky breath.
“My mother left me a box.”
Daniel frowned.
“What box?”
“She told me never to open it unless my first child changed after touching water.”
The room went silent.
Margaret whispered, “Where is it?”
Emma looked toward the staircase.
“In this house.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You brought it here?”
“I've carried it everywhere since I was eighteen.”
“Where?”
Emma answered quietly.
“Under our bedroom floor.”
Daniel began walking toward the stairs.
Emma grabbed his arm.
“Wait.”
He turned.
“What now?”
“There was one more thing my mother said.”
Emma's face had become pale.
“She told me that if the change ever happened…”
Her voice trembled.
May you like
“…I should assume someone would eventually come looking for the child.”
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