=~•Colby's POV•~=

I sat laying in bed, wide awake, unable to sleep. 

What does he mean? Fire powers? All I did was heat up the pool's water, causing it to erupt, and light a none flammable liquid on fire...

Shit, I do have fire powers.

I pulled a pillow over my head as if that was going to stop the thoughts from entering my mind. I groan as I quietly say "What am I gonna doooo", dragging the O out.

About an hour later with no success at sleep, I turn my bedside lamp on and begin looking around my room, trying to find something to do to keep me entertained. I reach over for my phone which sat upon my nightstand, but it was dead. For a moment I do a mental scan of my room when I remember I left the charger cord at school. "Shit" I mumble as I turn over in protest.

With that I let my mind wander.

So fire, huh? Let's test that thought.

I wasted no time, quietly getting up from my bed and making my way to the bathroom where I grabbed a scented candle from underneath the sink.

The candle is Mermaid splash to be more specific, it smells like the salty sea

{I saw this candle the other day at the store and I knew I needed to add it}

Once I was back inside my room, I set it down on top of my desk before I took a seat on my bed. For a moment, I just stared at it as we had a silent starring contest. When it won I sighed, shook my head, clearing it of all the junk I had stored inside. When I was finally ready I looked the candle dead on and began focusing. Slowly reaching my hand out towards the candle as I keep concentrating. 

After a solid couple of minutes of silence, I released my concentration and shook my body out, trying to release any stress I had built up. I waited a little while before trying again, this time, nothing happened. The time after, I got the wick to burn, the candle sadly didn't light, but some smoke was emitted.

The third time, I tried to think back to what Elton had said, about controlling my emotions. 

I was mad when my powers worked best, maybe any strong emotion can trigger them

With that, I took a second to let my vision blur, allowing my memories to play like a movie inside my brain. Suddenly a picture of her flashed through my mind.

Christene

 She was sweet and pretty, really pretty... But not like, sexy, she was cute, which was something not a lot of girls wanted to be these days. She was different, smart, passionate, loyal... 

Huh... Buy how loyal can they be if they cheat on you? For 3 months, she was hiding it from me... 
I even went as far as to say the three magic words, but she could even say them back to me. Because nooo, she's in love with Heath. 

Then the pictures from the party flashed through my mind.

First, she was dancing, then she was drinking, then she was on the table, then her shirt came off. 

A tear rolled down my cheek as memories flooded back to me of what they used to say about her, the rumours that those pictures started, and what they caused. Knowing that I never wanted to make anyone do or feel anything like that again. That's why people like Brad make me sick.

Tearing myself away from the past memories, I look up towards the candle. I stand up to get a better view, it's evident that the candle wasn't lit, but I had caused all of the wax in the candle to become liquid. I don't know if that caused me to be impressed, or depressed.

 I touch the outside of the holder it's in, which my fingers are greeted by a warm sensation, not burning. I tilt it different ways and just watch the wax roll from side to side. But the wave of old memories had given me the fatigue that I craved, so I curled up in bed and soon fell asleep.

~

The next morning I woke up tired... Like, extremely tired, even more so than normal.  So I did my usual morning routine while keeping an eye on the clock, making sure I wasn't going to be late. But as I was carefully brushing my teeth, I let my other hand rise up and touch my blue coloured fringe, the blue had become a little more vibrant, it had also slightly spread.  Now that was fun explaining to the parents...
I made a mental note to ask Elton about the hair today, to see if he found anything in the book about it. 

I stood in front of my closet for about five seconds before just throwing on a pair of black jeans with my half orange, half black hoodie. Then I said goodbye to my parents, grabbed my skateboard and made my way to school. For early December, it was still warm, and still no snow. 

What am I talking about? It's LA, of course there's no snow.

(I did some calculations, and yes It should be December by now)

I skated up to school, passing Dan, Brad, Kim and Kloe as the girls gave me their cutest waves while the guys nodded. I gave them a simple nod and continued on my way, wondering if I ever looked that douche bag-y when I was as popular as them. 

~

I sat in science class, practically half-sleep while Ms. Gant taught her lesson, I was trying to stay awake to fill in the notes, but my eyes weren't having it. I felt completely powerless...

I went to bed at a decent hour last night, wtf is up with me today?

By the end of the class I barley had half my notes done, and apparently, it was evident because Jessie noticed. "Tiered?" She asks me, not looking too good herself, the bags under her eyes were almost as dark as mine. 
"I don't know how you do it" I joke as she smirks and grabs a cold brew star bucks drink from inside her bag. 
"Smart" I tap my forehead. 
"You didn't finish your notes?" She questions as she leans in closer to get a better look.
"Yeah, I'm surprised I was even able to fill out any of this, I'm so fucking tired and I have no clue why" I shake my head. 
"wanna meet up after school today? I can explain the lesson to you so you don't fall behind" Jessie suggests as she shrugs. "How about 4 at the Half Moon cafe?". 
"Yeah, sounds good, as long as I don't crash as soon as I get home" I joke as she smiles. 

~

"Colby? Colby. COLBY!" Elton swats at the back of my head as my eyes snap open. 
"Huh? What's happening?" I ask as I lift my head from where it was resting on top of the lunch table. 
"I've been looking through the book, you asked me to look up your weird hair problems" Elton shakes his head as Sam slides a little bit closer to me from where he was sitting. 
"What's going on today? You're tired, a lot more tired than usual" The blonde asks.
"I've got no clue, my mind is just mush" I roll my head back, cracking my neck, trying to get the kinks out. I watch Corey shiver as I crack my neck and say "That's freaky bro".

"Here it is, so during your first full moon your hair will begin to match your tail's colour, the brighter the colour and the speed it spreads at matches how strong you are at controlling your powers. Only the strongest mers have all cloured hair" Elton reads before closing the book. 

I touch my blue tips anxiously and twirl them around between my fingers, all I can say is "That's crazy".

"All of this is, to be honest" Corey adds before he's cut off by a girl yelling a couple of tables down. 

"Leave me the hell alone Craig!" She shouts as she starts to walk away with her lunch tray. As she's just about to pass our table, a guy, presumably Craig, races up to and grabs her waist, she keeps her balance as her tray contains one of the mistery soups of the day and a full cup of water. When he doesn't let go after all of her begging and squirming, she throws her lunch tray and all of its contents at him, "Suck on that!" She exclaims before marching out of the cafeteria. everyone watches as the food goes everywhere, some of it even reaching us, some hitting Corey on the back, and as fate would have it, some of her water splashing onto my exposed arm where my sweater sleeves were rolled up.

"Fuck..." I mutter as the rest of the guy's clue in on what's happening. 
"Go, GO!" Sam raises his voice as I jump up and start running, I could feel Sam try to follow me but once I left the cafeteria he got lost in the crowd. 
I run through the school's halls, my mind racing as I try to remember where everything is, I know it's been over 3 months since I've transferred here, so I'm not really new, but it's a big school and I still get lost. 

I end up at a crossroads where I take a right, running right into someone as I round the corner, sending the both of us tumbling to the floor. I land on top of them, bracing myself to explain why I had a tail. 

But when I forced myself to open my eyes, I looked down at Jessie awkwardly half laying on me after our crash, and, my legs?

I'm in shock, but before it gets too awkward I let out a quick "Hi". 
"Hi" Is all she responds with, her cheeks burning red as she realizes what's happened "Oh god, I'm-I'm so sorry, I wasn't looking where I was going, I'm so sorry" She rambles while she scrambles off of me.  
I get to my feet and our eyes meet as we simultaneously let out a nervous chuckle. 

"Don't worry about it, I was going really fast," I tell her as I nervously rub the back of my neck.
"That's odd, cause in science you looked like you were about to pass out" She wonders.
"I guess I got my second wind" The lie slips out so easily.
"Good, are we still on for after school?" 
"Yep, yes of course" She smiles at my answer.
"Good, well... I'll see you later" Jessie waves as she turns to walk away. 

Once she walks out of hearing range, I finally released a breath of air I didn't know I was holding. Glancing down at the dry skin on my hand that had been splashed with water not that long before, my mind starts to spin. 

Why didn't I change? Maybe it's a delayed reaction, does that mean I'm just gonna transform in the middle of class? 

My stomach begins to churn at the thought. Taking a moment to calm my breathing before I go back into the cafeteria. Pushing through the crowd, I watched the boys gave me questioning looks as I slowly regained my spot beside Sam. They all sat in silence for a moment before Sam spoke up. 
"So? What the hell happened?" He asks eagerly as they all collectively lean in.
"That's the thing, nothing happened. I ran through the halls, trying to find an empty room when I crashed into Jessie-"
"Jessie again? Damn you guys are really connected, huh?" Elton huffs as he leans back a bit. 

"Anyways, I never turned. It's like... It's like I've been drained of my powers" I tell them as I talk with my hands. 
"It was one drop of water, cafeteria water at that, I wouldn't doubt if the principal came out and told us it wasn't actually real water" Corey lightly laughed at his own joke. I glance over at Elton, then to his backpack which was seated beside him, with the book inside, then back up at my uncle as I give him my sad, fish boy, puppy dog eyes. Elton catches on to my plans and stares me down. We continue in this staring contest until he finally breaks, sighing heavily. 
"Fine, I'll do some research tonight when I get home" He rolls his eyes as I smile brightly. 

~

I had just skated home and I was hot, wearing a big sweater in the afternoon sun still got me really hot and sweaty. I was home alone since my parents don't finish work until later, so I went upstairs and ripped my hoodie off, sitting shirtless in my room for a couple of moments. I still had about an hour before I had to leave to meet up with Jessie.

I sat in my desk chair for a while, aimlessly scrolling through the social medias before and an idea popped into my head, causing me to get up and make my way into my washroom. I looked into my reflection for a couple of minutes, thinking about today's events and how my life had changed since moving to LA. 

Before I could convince myself any further I quickly turned the faucet on and just stuck my hand under the running water. Letting it sit for a second before I pulled it back out, examing my sparkling wet hand.  Then I got ready, towel in sight, body ready to fall, I even took a seat on top of my toilet so I wouldn't fall when my legs disappeared. 
After a couple of long anxious minutes, I waited as nothing happened. 
"What the hell is wrong?" I pinch both my legs to make sure I wasn't dreaming, which sent a sharp pain through my legs. 

In protest I stood up, dropping my pants and turning my shower on. I stepped inside, into the cold water stream that had yet to heat up. After a couple of moments, I held my arms out by my sides as if asking for the inevitable. 

"COME ON!" I shouted as I cranked the notch the other way, by doing so I could already start feeling the temperature in the water change, from cold to hot.

I stood there until my skin burned, the heat causing my skin to turn a light shade of red. 

I stood in the water stream and put my forehead against the wall of my shower. I don't know what I was feeling, I was overwhelmed. I was... sad. I tried to hold back the tears that threatened to fill my eyes as my realization dawned on me. 

I was powerless...

A normal human.

But you can't stop the inevitable, I let out a shaky breath as my eyes started to dwell, the tears soon rolling down my cheeks, mixing with the water that was still pouring over me. 

At a certain point, my body started to feel weak, probably due to a large amount of heat it's been exposed to. So I turned the water off, watching as each little drip of water dropped from the blue fringe that hung over my face, as if it was taunting me, reminding me of what I was. 

~

I skated to the coffee house in silence, with my bag on my back and my earbuds in my ears I made it there just in time to catch Jessie walking up to the front door. 

"Hey!" She greets with a smile, stopping just before she opens to door. 
"Hey," I say as I grab my skateboard off the ground and look up at her, only now making eye contact. 
"A-Are you okay?" She asks as worry fills her voice, I give her my best nod in response when in my head, I'm mentally kicking myself. 

Shit, is it that noticeable?

Of course, it is, I saw myself after my shower breakdown, my eyes were all puffy and red and my cheeks were all pinky. 

She lowers her voice a little as she takes a step closer, her eyes scanning my face as she asks "Have you been crying?". 
"What? No! What would make you think that" I say as I step back, away from her. 
She takes that as a sign, "we don't have to study, I just thought you wouldn't want to fall behind after you almost fell asleep-" I cut her off. 
"Jessie, I'm fine!" I say a little too sternly, so I try to soften the blow with "I'm just feeling a little sick. But I still wanna study" I try to sound as eager as I can.

~

It had been about a half an hour since we sat down and cracked our books open, Jessie had explained everything I missed during class and let me copy the answers to the handout, but she said I had to do the homework on my own. If we weren't discussing one of the questions we sat in semi-comfortable silence as we both worked and sipped the caffeine beverages that we had purchased prior to sitting down. 

When the hour mark rolled around Jessie looked over at me, I pretend not to notice as she tilted her head. "I can tell you're not happy". 
"well I mean, science is a sucky subject, I don't even know-"
"No Colby, in general, What's going on?" She interrogates me as I sigh. 

"Have you ever had something?" I ask as she raises an eyebrow at me. 
"Yeah, I've had lots of things" I playfully roll my eyes at her response. 
"No, but like, something you don't necessarily like, but once it's gone, you don't know how to keep living without it?" I wonder as I look over at her, noticing that her eyes aren't 100% blue, that they have a slight green tint to them.

 Jessie plays with he thought in her head for a moment. "Yeah, I know what you mean".

She takes a moment before adding, "I think we've done enough studying... I think I know something that will cheer you up"

~

(Sorry I switch from third person to Colby's POV in this chapter...)

After exiting the Cafe, Jessie leads Colby through the city for about 5 minutes until they come across a store called 'Alley Cats'. (Shout out to everyone that gets the reference ;)

Colby takes a few steps ahead of Jessie so he's able to hold the door open for her, a bell above the door jingles. "Ma Lady" He warmly smiles as she nods her head, thanking him as she walks in ahead of him. 

=~•Colby's POV•~=

Once we enter the store I could tell right away that it was a pet store by the smell, it wasn't bad, it just smelled like animals. Also the large wall of fish tanks and all of the necessities, you'd need to buy when owning a pet, was a kinda dead giveaway. 
Jessie walked up to the main counter where a girl sat, she was about our age and she had her head in a book, but she noticed Jessie once she approached the desk. "Hey! Jessie" The girl brightness up as she comes out from behind the counter and the two hug. The girl worker had wavy/curly brown hair and she wore blue jeans with a red baseball tee that had the logo of the pet shop on the front, as well as her name on the side.
"Alley, this is Colby. Colby, this is my friend Alley" Jessie introduces us as we shake hands. 
"Nice to meet you, Alley, you have a really nice store! Is it named after you? Wait, do you own it?" I ask with curiosity as she giggles a bit at the question. 
"It's actually my mom's store, she bought it around the time I was born and named it after me!" Alley proudly smiles as she looks around the store. 

"Colby over here has been having a pretty bad day, so I thought I'd cheer him up" Jessie leans on the counter as she winks at Alley, causing the brunette to smirk. 
"I've got just the thing to turn that frown, upside-down" With that, she lead us over to a pen in the middle of the store. Jessie stepped over the barrier and sat in the middle, gesturing for me to do the same. So that's what I did. 

"How is this supposed to help me?" I deadpan. 
Even though I wasn't asking Alley, she responded. "Oh, you just wait"  Then she opened a door I can only assume lead to a backroom. 

We sat in silence for a moment before Alley's incorporeal voice asked us to close our eyes, I watched as Jessie's blue-green eyes closed before closing mine. I could hear the sound of Alley's footsteps as she walked towards the pen, followed by the sound of her putting something down, then told us to "Open up!". 

My eyes slowly opened, readjusting to the fluorescent light of the store as they focused on what laid in front of me. I unintentionally let out a little gasp at the little puppy that is now in my presence. "Her name is Sally, she's a golden retriever" Alley informs us as she kneels down beside the encloser. 

My mind automatically goes into baby mode "Aren't you the cutest little thing! Hi babyyyyy" I drag the 'y' out as I go and scoop her up into my arms. "Who's a good girl, you are! Yes, you!" I hold her close as she nuzzles into my chest. 
Jessie pets Sally while she's in my arms "You are a dog person right?" curiosity fills her voice. I nod happily as I boop my nose against the puppies. Jessie let out a fewf "I was worried for a second, like 'what if he's a cat person?'" She laughs it off. 

A couple of minutes later,  Allet announced that Sally needed to go since it was time for her bedtime, I tried to argue but Alley scooped her out of my arms before I could start. She then came back with a little bigger dog, an almost full-grown pug, his face was smooshed and his body was wrinkly. 

Which is just the way they should be!

"His name is Wally" Announced Alley as she placed him in between the two of us. This time Jessie and I both played with him in the pen, playing with the various toys that were laying around the pen.

Once she removed Wally, she announced that there was one puppy left for us to meet.

Moments later, Alley reappeared with the new love of my life. 

"And last, but certainly not least, my own wittle baby, Duck" She announced as she puts down a corgi. 

I could feel my eyes sparkle as he looked at me. "I think someone is in love" Jessie half whispers to Alley, purposely being loud enough for me to hear.

"Duck, my Baby Buba" I lightly laugh as I hold him up in the air like Simba from The Lion King.

~

The bell on the door jingled again as we left. Jessie turned and waved to Alley through the glass, I did the same, giving her a warm smile, followed by both of us turning and walking back the way we came.

"Thank you for that, I really needed it" I glance over at her as she smiles. 
"Oh don't worry about it. I had fun too" She replies. 

As we walk side by side, every now and then, our hands brush up against one another. But Jessie didn't seem to notice, or mind, neither did I. After about the third time when my hand brushed up against her I let my pinky curl around hers, followed by her pinky curling around mine. We walked that way until we reached Jessie's car.

"Thank you for tonight" Jessie's voice suddenly sounds shy as I notice her rosy red cheeks. 
"No... Thank you," I say as I take a step closer to her. She glances up at me and smirks happily as I take another step towards her, closing the gap between us, then leaning in and kissing her, letting my lips linger on hers for a moment before we both slowly pulled away, we both kinda giggled as we look at each other. "I'll see you tomorrow okay?" I ask as I take a step back, her hand now in mine. 
"Yes, for sure. Goodnight Colby Brock..." Her voice drifts off as I take another step back, letting our hands separate before saying "Good Night Jessie Paege..." 

Word count: 4097

~SECRET END CREDIT SCENE~

It had been a long time since the sun had set, so I had only the light from the nearby street lights to guide me as I skateboarded back home. I despised boarding a night, but sometimes that's just what you gotta do.

I was halfway home when I felt the way too familiar sensation of my phone vibrating in my pocket. I let out a groan as I reached into my pocket, looked down for just enough time to be able to answer and put it on speaker before tossing it back into my pocket and putting my eyes back on the road ahead of me "Go for Colby". 

"Hey, Colby it's me" Elton's voice echoed through the empty streets as I made a turn. 
"Yo Elty, how's it hanging?" I ask casually. 
"Nothing much? Are you in a car right now?" He asks me curiously. 
"Hm? No, I'm boarding home. Make it quick I don't wanna crash" I order.
"Okay okay. So I was doing some research on the whole, loosing your powers thing. Turns out it isn't that at all, well not really. Every month there's a full moon, where you have an overwhelming amount of power, right? But every month there's also a dark moon, which is a day where there's no moon in the sky. So for one day, you have no powers, basically you just reverting back to your normal human self" Elton explains as my eyes go wide. 
"Wait-wait wait, so you're telling me, that tomorrow I'll wake up, fish boy and all?" I question as excitement fills my voice. 
"You got that right".
"YES!" I exclaim as I throw my hands into the air, my smile spreading from ear to ear. 

It may be a hassle, and sometimes it sucks, but I've learned to love being a merman.

Word count: 4405

GUYS THIS WAS A LONG ASS CHAPTER!
I hope you all enjoyed! I had a blast writing this chapter. 

Don't forget to like and comment, show your support!

So long 

and 

Goodnight.