Chapter 15
Gillian
Bolstered by our donut brunch, I head to my shift at the aquarium with a spring in my step and every confidence in my decision to move.
Signing the papers made our plans feel more real.
I expected that to make me more nervous than it does.
It's one thing to dream of swimming out into open waters when I've been lurking in the safety of my sister's protection, like a kelp forest sheltering me from predators and harboring plentiful prey.
The reality of actually venturing forth is different.
My inner octopus is delighted at the idea of our new territory.
Sure, it's scary, but it's the exhilarating type of fear, like cresting a huge wave on a paddleboard, or visiting the haunted Halloween trail the zoo puts together as a fundraiser.
They go all out with decorations and special effects machines and shifters in realistic zombie makeup lurking in dark corners.
This is like that. The type of scary that is worth the fear for the joy.
Still, my shift in the touch tank is a welcome mental break from endlessly turning all the coming changes over in my head. In my octopus skin, I don't dwell on my human concerns. I let myself act on my octopus instincts, relaxing into the pristinely maintained water.
I allow a few of the calmer youngsters visiting the exhibit to brush their fingers over the smooth sides of my fore arms. I even reward the most patiently attentive few who hold still enough to seem safe by curling the tips of one arm around their little fingers.
They giggle at the ticklish sensation of my suckers sliding over their human skin.
Thanks to the handwashing station monitors, they taste blandly of the wash-station water.
The exploratory, getting-to-know-you touching is nothing like how I touch Winny.
I don't cling to them, savor every trace of flavor.
There's nothing intimate about it at all.
'Of course not.' My octopus shoves my human awareness aside for even comparing the two things, flashing the difference between a handshake and a handjob into my mind.
'I know, I just…' I don't know how to finish that sentence without sounding hopelessly besotted. Too bad I don't need to finish it to read my own mind.
'Mooning over our mate won't make the time pass any faster.' My octopus all but rolls her eyes at me, pressing at me to let her handle octopus matters the way she lets me take the lead in human matters.
She's not wrong, so I slip down under her octopus thoughts. Food is hiding near the vents. A bit of forgotten shrimp we think. ‘Make sure it’s not a co-worker,’ I warn.
She sends a mental image of jetting ink at me for stating something so obvious. ‘I can tell a fellow shifter from food, thanks.’
Our arms ripple through the top layer of sand as we crawl along the floor of the shallow pool in search of the treat and we forget all about human worries until later.
Later being after my shift ends, when I meet Trudy and we pick up the kids from the lab’s daycare to take them to open swim together before dinner. My news about the big move is on the tip of my tongue the entire evening, but the right moment to announce it never quite seems to come.
Not until we're all sitting together at the dinner table and the kids are mostly done eating as we chat. Trudy has been gushing with speculation about a new antibiotic her team isolated in mucus samples from a newly discovered species of fish. And her boss just confirmed she officially got the grant funding to approve pursuing the next phase of Trudy’s research.
"If our early results hold, this might lead to a whole new class of antibiotics to fight superbugs with.
And that's just the start. Newt expects that we'll find dozens more of these types of fish now that our grant to send a team of shifter biologists to explore the region in our aquatic forms got approved.
" Trudy twirls her fork in the air in emphasis.
She's so excited her chromatophores are practically glowing aquamarine.
Marina finishes her apple slices and stabs another one from Willem's plate. He's a year and a half older than the girls, and their most frequent target for snack heists like this.
"Hey! That's mine!" Willem protests. He shifts his second forearms into place, waving them defensively to guard his plate from further predations. Meanwhile Nadine sneaks past his guard from the other side to wrap the tip of a sneaky octopus arm around more of his apple slices.
"Nuh uh, prey belongs to who eats it," Marina taunts back, menacing Willem with her fork.
He whines, "No! It's mine."
Nadine's little tongue pokes out in concentration as she stealthily drags her purloined apple slices back to her plate while Marina feints toward Willem's plate with her fork tines pointed at him. The tactic keeps their brother distracted long enough for the girls to pull off their theft.
"That's wonderful news, darling. I'm sure you'll be the first into the abyss once your team works out the details.
" Lincoln shifts one of his octopus arms into being to hug his mate, leaning in to kiss my sister softly on the temple.
He doesn't even have to look as he uses another of his octopus arms to pluck the fork from Marina's toddler fist before she can stab her brother over his fruit.
He doesn't miss a beat as he chides the kids.
"Nadine, give Willem's apple back to him. "
"Ugh, do we gotta?" Marina whines.
"Hey! Nadiiiiiine! No fair teaming up like that!" Willem whirls around to snatch the apples still on Nadine's plate back for himself. Nadine, ever the troublemaker, smirks at him as she devours the slice in her hand, crunching happily.
"Yes. You girls know the rules." True fixes each kid in turn with one of her serious mom looks. Marina reluctantly drops the slice Nadine just handed her onto Willem's plate. "If you want a second helping of apples you have to finish your fish sticks first."
"Sisters are the worst!" Willem sulks as he pokes at the grubby breading crumb covered fruit his sisters returned to him.
"Hey! Some sisters are the best," I interject. "And we make the very best aunties, here, let me wipe the crumbs off for you." I reach for his apples and make a show of fixing them for him when he shoves the plate toward me.
"Bet you and Mom didn't steal each other's apples." Willem pouts, but he eats the crumb-free food that I hand back to him.
"Oh, you'd be surprised. We have our squabbles from time to time, but knowing she has my back is worth all the little annoyances that come with sharing a territory when you're small. Sisters, and brothers, are special like that."
Trip gives me a speculative look. "Hey, Aunty?
Is that why your octopus doesn't want her own territory?
Mr. Newt says static octopuses from our species usually don't share space with other adults.
Not even our mates, but for most shifters, our aquatic sides have enough human socialization to make eggceptions.
Is that cause mates make eggs?" He wrinkles his nose at the idea.
"Not egg-ceptions, dear. Exceptions. Nothing to do with eggs, though that was a good connection. It means special cases that don't fit the usual rules. Like how we make an exception to bedtime so we can all stay up for our Solstice vigil," Trudy corrects him gently.
"As for territory, we're shifters and that means we have a lot in common with static octopuses, and static humans, and other species of shifters, but we have our differences too.
We aren't entirely driven by instincts or controlled by either side of our nature. We’re still us, no matter which form we're in, thank goodness.
We all make the best choices we can for every part of us," Lincoln explains.
He gazes adoringly at his kids with only a hint of sadness as he says it and I can follow that line of thought straight to how awful it would be if we weren’t free from the biological constraints of static octopus reproduction.
I don’t want to think about a life without any of the shifters at this table with me in it either.
"Oh, Mr. Newt was talking to your group about sea creatures today?
How interesting," I say, giving Trudy a pointed look.
Trudy raises a brow at me. I can read an entire conversation into the way she's looking at me.
Holding this moment open for me to tell the kids about my decision to move out. It's a perfect segue. Too perfect.
Heck, if I didn't know better, I'd swear my sister put the kid up to mentioning it. Or…not the kid. Oh, tides, did she really ask her colleague to teach the kids about octopus habitats so they'd be thinking about what our territorial nature might mean for me?
Of course she would do something like that.
It's not a bad way to approach it, framing my upcoming move as something my octopus side needs makes it very clearly not about wanting to leave the kids.
It's still going to upend the family structure they've always known, so I expect hiccups, but this way there shouldn't be any doubt about my motives or my unwavering love for them.
"What else did he say?" Trudy asks, giving me time to process and pick my words.
Trip shrugs. "I don't know. We're good at hunting, but that's obvious. You gonna eat that?" He points to the single remaining bite of Willem's fish.
"Nope. It's all appley now." Willem makes a yuck face and shoves it toward his brother.
"You know, that's such funny timing!" I chip in with false brightness.
I flash a look at True that tells her I know exactly what she did and why, and the look of understanding we share makes me feel like we truly are back on even footing.
"I was just talking to your mom about how my octopus side wants a territory of her own too, but I was worried about how much I'll miss you kids when I find one. "
"You will?" Willem asks.