Despite the early morning sun shining through the window, Katie was not ready to get up yet. Her nose scrunched and she twisted to bury her face in her pillow. It was a Saturday and there was no school, so she had every intention of sleeping in.
Just as she was starting to drift off again, Katie felt the mattress dip and then a blast of hot air hit her in the face. She cracked her eyes open to see a pair of pale blue eyes staring at her. She had not been expecting anyone to be so close and it startled her. Katie shot up in bed and bonked heads with Riley as she did.
The other girl fell backwards with a noise of complaint and then groaned loudly as she cradled the side of her face. Katie winced and brought a hand up to rub her aching forehead. “Riley? What are you doing in here?” she complained.
Riley flicked her colourful fins in Katie’s face and huffed. “I wanted to wake you up, not get bludgeoned by your rock of a skull,” she protested. She rolled over so that her tail was draped over Katie’s legs. She could feel the prick of the other girl’s scales through her thin blanket and she sighed. So much for sleeping in.
“You scared me, why did you not say something instead of leaning over me like that?”
Riley shrugged. “This was more fun,” she teased. Her tongue poked out between her fangs and she grinned cheekily.
Katie scowled and threw a pillow at the Mer. “Go back to sleep,” she complained as she flopped back in her bed and pulled the blanket up to her ears.
“No! Katie, come on! Get up!” Riley whined. Katie could feel her kneading at the blanket and sighed. “I am so bored and mom says we cannot go out to sea until you are up. So WAKE. UP!”
The pillow Katie had previously chucked at Riley now came down on the side of her head. Riley lifted it and whacked her again, and then a third time. On the fourth blow, Katie grabbed hold of the pillowcase and ripped it out of Riley’s hands as she sat up. “You. Are. So. Annoying!” Katie laughed as she smacked Riley back with the pillow.
Riley’s cackling laughter soon filled the room and Katie could not help falling into a fit of giggles alongside her. Despite her annoyance at being so rudely woken up, Katie could not find it in her heart to be angry. She had been living with her adoptive mother, Sophie, for the past two years now. Katie had once considered the woman an aunt – as she and her father had been very close and Katie had grown up around Sophie – but when her father died, Katie’s own mother had abandoned her on Sophie’s stoop and driven off. But Sophie had also been taking care of Riley for years before Katie had come to live with them. She had found Riley injured and washed ashore when she was a toddler. Though she had tried to look for any sign of parents or a pod, she had never found where Riley came from and could not send the girl back alone once she was healed. Riley was their best-kept secret – Katie did not even know about her until she was a little over six years old – but they had become fast friends over the years. It was hard to stay angry with her very best friend, even if the eleven-year-old Mer was a pain in the butt most of the time.
Once their laughter abated, Riley jutted her lip into a pout and flicked her fins. “Please, Katie?” she whimpered. “I want to go out on the reef. I will tow you around and we can swim really fast,” she offered.
Katie smacked her with the pillow once more. “I do not need you to ‘tow’ me,” she scoffed. “I can swim just fine on my own.”
“Exactly,” Riley countered as she stuck her tongue out again. “You only swim ‘fine’.”
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Katie scoffed again and flopped back on her bed. “Just for that, I am going back to sleep.”
She watched from the corner of her eye as Riley’s expression morphed from amusement to dismay. Her eyes widened and her lips parted, and she lurched forward and shook Katie’s shoulder. “No, Katie, wait,” she protested. “I-I am sorry. I did not mean it. You do swim well, honest. Please do not go back to sleep. Please, let us go swimming, it will be fun!”
Riley leaned a little further over Katie, and Katie lunged up and wrapped her arm around Riley’s neck and pulled her down against the bed. She rubbed a fist against Riley’s skull while the Mer’s tail lashed and she tried to tug free. Her breathless laughter pulled another giggle out of Katie, and she released her friend with a shove. Riley’s face morphed to panic and she scrabbled her hands against the blankets as the push nudged her too close to the edge of the bed and she lost her balance. Katie only laughed harder as Riley fell with a muffled thump and wound up dragging the blankets off the bed with her.
Katie crawled forward and laughed harder at the moving lump of sheets as Riley squirmed out from beneath them. Her golden hair was ruffled with static and stray pieces were sticking up everywhere. Riley huffed to blow her bangs out of her eyes and then she scowled up at Katie and stuck her tongue out. “Bully,” she called up.
Katie shrugged and grinned. “You started it,” she reminded. She jumped down off the bed and dropped her weight onto her friend. Riley was shoved flat on her back and Katie pinned her arms and smirked down at her. “Give in?” she teased.
Riley bared her fangs and bucked her tail. “Never,” she hissed back. Katie wanted to think she had the upper hand, but then Riley’s tail curled around her one leg and when she bucked her hips again, Katie lost her balance with a yelp. Riley rolled them over until her heavy, muscular tail was pinning Katie down and she began tickling her.
Katie squealed and tried to shove her friend off. “Riley!” she protested between breathless gasps and laughter. “Riley, stop it. No. Tickling is cheating!” she howled.
Riley’s grin widened and she waggled her brows. “Do you give in?” she taunted.
“You’re such a cheater!” Katie complained as she continued trying to squirm away from the assault. “Stop it!”
“I had better not have to come in there!”
Katie and Riley both froze at the sound of Sophie’s voice from down the hall. They exchanged a look and Riley immediately reared back off of Katie. Katie sat up and fixed her sleep shirt. Then she threw her arms around Riley just in time for the knob to wiggle and her door to swing open. Their mother stepped into the room with a quirked brow as she stared at the two of them with mussed hair, on the floor, hugging.
Katie stared up at her with doe eyes. “We were just…telling each other jokes,” she lied. “Riley laughed so hard she fell off the bed, so I came down here. We weren’t wrestling or anything.”
“Uh-huh.” Sophie’s brow rose higher and Katie sighed.
“We were wrestling,” she caved. Riley elbowed her. It did not matter though, Katie knew Riley would have caved if she had not. Their mother was wonderful, but she could also be scary, and neither of them could lie to her for an extended period of time or with any true seriousness.
Sophie nodded her head and then jerked it towards the doorway. “When I told you that you needed to wait, Riley, I did not mean come in here and wake Katie up. Now go, and let her get ready. You, up and moving now please,” Sophie instructed.
Katie sighed and rolled her eyes before nudging Riley. “I could have slept in,” she grouched.
Riley inclined her head. “True, but now you get to spend the day out on the boat and the reef!”
Sophie chuckled and shook her head. “You behave as though you never get to swim, Riley. The cove is literally out our back door, and you act so water-starved, you’d think I force you to stay landlocked.”
“The cove is boring,” Riley whined. “I have already explored it all.”
Katie gave Riley another playful shove. “You are relentless.”
Riley lifted her chin and puffed out her chest. “Yes I am,” she agreed.
Katie could only stare at her before she cracked up laughing once more and fell over backwards, clutching her sides as she began to wheeze.