I hold Canosa's gaze and think of love, of what it is and what it means to me. I think about how it reminds me of a shiny lure at the end of a fishing line, iridescent and sparkly. How clever it is, making you bite, only to discover that it has a hook. A treble hook in my case. The first sharp point is for mom, who left me; the second one is for Papa, who never loved me; and the third one is for Hunter, who fell victim to my siren voice. All three are big, fat lies that I bit into, desperate. I'm stuck under a layer of self-pity, wanting to get out, no matter what it takes. Just wanting to belong. Barely a second passes as I think through this. Images flash through my mind, and I'm trying to make sense of them, hoping an answer will come to me. The courage to make a decision.

I study Canosa and somehow I think she's the angler, the one hunting me, the one who threw in the fishing line and is now pulling me out. What's it gonna be, catch and release, or sell? Or will you eat me, gut and sinew and all? But I know she'll only giggle, together with her sirens. They'll all laugh in my face. Poor Ailen Bright, they'll say, you still believe in love? Oh, you naïve little girl, grow up already. How stupid of you, how pathetic. Silly almost. People were not made to be loved, they're food. And they're right. I'm a siren now, I belong with them. They're my family, whether I want it or not.

I stand straight, determined.

"Where are you going?" Hunter asks, alarmed, as if he read my mind. He props himself up and stands.

I breathe in and breathe out, then I make myself do it. "You picked the wrong girl, okay? Go find somebody else. Somebody normal. Living." I throw out each word through pressed lips, breathing hard, gagging on self-hatred.

For a moment, the whizzing through the door stops, and I know I have minutes left before my father makes his final attempt and breaks in. The door is only so thick, it shouldn't take him long to cut through.

"What do you mean, picked? I don't want somebody else. I don't—"

"You're full of shit," I say quietly. "Stop painting a rosy picture in your head and look at me, look at who I am. I want out of these walls, I want out of this skin. I want out! Don't you understand?" I wail. "I have no choice!"

"Ailen Bright—" Canosa begins.

And I yell, "Shut up!"

She continues mocking me. Hunter continues his plea for me to stay. My father starts up his whizzing again and now there is a gap in the door, rotating chainsaw blades poking through it. He's cutting a circular hole.

"Leave me alone, all of you!" I holler, backing away from Hunter who comes at me with outstretched arms. I break into hysteric sobs, looking up at the ceiling, into the hole above me. I see a little bit of the cloudy sky peeking through.

"Mom, if you hear me, answer me! Why did you leave me? Why? Was I that ugly? That unlovable? Did you love me at all? Tell me, did you love me?" I wait, but there is no answer. Not even an echo in this stupid, soundproof place. I regret that I never asked her this flat out, now I'll never know for sure. She was not the type who said "I love you" at every bedtime; she never said it at all, that I remember. Still, I don't believe what Papa always tells me, I know he's lying. I wasn't an accident. My mother wanted me. She did! Didn't she? Was I simply an inconvenience? An unwanted blue stripe on a cheap, drugstore pregnancy test?

"Was I, mom? Is it true?" I ask, looking up.

"Kill the siren hunter, and I'll tell you," Canosa says, steps closer, and with inhuman strength rips off the metal rope from my wrists and feet. There is mockery in her voice again, like she knows. She knows that I'll probably never muster enough courage to kill my own father. My typical instinct kicks in, to run, to run away from it all.

I'm free. Twisted in pain, I jump toward the ceiling, head first, propelling upward, a hard line of muscle and disgust. I'm not good enough. Not good enough for my mother, not good enough for my father, not good enough for Hunter, and not even good enough for Canosa and her sisters. I can't even kill a siren hunter, like she asked me to. What am I, after all of this? A half-dead girl? A half-alive siren? Whoever I am, I don't want to be me anymore.

Midair, arms stretched into a line over my head, I want to smash to pieces. I imagine myself as a slimy mess, which is exactly what I am. I can't die properly, can't seem to find a way to do it for good. I should've taken a gun with me, I should have taken a gun! Too late.

My head passes ceiling level and I burrow into the tunnel of dirt. Momentum carries me a few more feet and then I stick out my arms and legs to arrest my jump, staying still for a second. Then, I push off and fly upward again, spitting out bits of clay and stone that dribble on me, brushing roots away from my face. My body probably resembles a jumping caterpillar, contracting and shooting up again, through the mass of broken acoustic paneling, rubber sealant, plastic, foam board, bent roof trusses, and several feet of torn-up concrete. I'm horrified at the image of Canosa eating through it. How the hell did she do it with her teeth?

But the chance to finish my thought is lost. I make a spectacular exit out of the hole and onto our front yard, covered with bright green grass and flanked by feeble bamboo shoots, Papa's attempt at beautifying the front of our house. He'd paid an exorbitant amount of money to some fancy local gardener just to have his natural and ecologically sound, Seattle-styled, designer landscaping now ruined—looking like a giant mole hole, all brown and torn up.

I cough and sputter soil and mud, crawling on all fours away from the hole. I stand and stagger toward the bushes that separate our yard and the neighbor's. His trees stand dark against the gray afternoon sky. The usual. No rain, no sun, just a typical September day.

My jeans are a mess. Hunter's rain jacket that I'm wearing is torn, covered in filthy muck. I dust myself off, shake dirt out of my hair, and brush my face, suddenly unsure of where to go next. Moist air fills my lungs together with that earthy smell. So grimy, it's almost crunching on my teeth.

"I hate it, I hate it, I hate it," I say through gritted teeth. "How can I make myself cease to exist?"

"Walk back to Papa, why don't you, silly girl? He's a siren killer, he'll make you disappear, will he not?" Canosa climbs out of the hole behind me. I spin around to face her.

"You again. Will you leave me alone?" I retort. She scowls at me and tugs me toward the bushes. Even though her face is dirty, it's lovely when framed by the greenery.

"Let go of me, I don't want to..." I begin, but then hear the whizzing of the chainsaw stop. Then, I hear a faint crash, a few curses, the opening of the creaky garage door, and, finally, soft footsteps.

"Stupid." Canosa smacks me on the back of my head. It doesn't hurt, but it floods me with shame. "Stupid and rude. Follow me, and keep your mouth shut." She digs her fingers into my arm and pulls me through the bushes into our neighbor's yard. She glances back at me, and I feel guilty for yelling. She saved me, after all. She saved me, and I didn't even thank her.

"Ailen? Ailen, stop!" I hear from behind and below, and then a shot of a focused sound wave hits the ground behind me, sending up a puff of dirt. We duck, fall on the grass, and roll. I hope that nobody sees us and none of the neighbors decide to call the cops, because I really don't feel like throwing another scene and killing people right now. On top of that, I'm sure that wherever we go, we're going to attract lots of attention. Canosa looks like a naked corpse that just crawled out of her grave, after having spent a good hundred years or so there. I don't look much better. My jeans and jacket are torn to the point where I'm almost as naked, and as dirty as her. Except my hair is short and it sticks out this way and that in matted, nasty clumps.

"When I tell you to go, you stand up and...go!" Canosa whispers in my ear and pulls me upright. I don't fight her anymore and simply follow, talking in between breaths.

"Where are...the others? Teles...Ligeia...and, what's her name, Pisinoe? Did you...guys...all make it...out, or..."

"Shut your trap!" Canosa yells, and more shots fire right at my feet. Like a frightened bunny, I jump. Clutching Canosa's hand, we dash in-between the trees and into my neighbor's yard, trampling his blooming azaleas and breaking his rhododendrons. I'm stupidly hoping that Mr. Thompson's not home and won't see us. But, of course, he's home. He's a retired Navy Officer, on the neighborhood watch committee, and an eager ear for Missis Elliott's stories. I can hear his soul for the first time, a mix of military movie shouts, golf clubs hitting the ball, and what sounds like the skin smacking that you hear in bad porn—at least, that's what me and Hunter heard when we saw some on the net once when we were stoned. Brrrr. It feels like it'll taste mushy, his soul. Mushy and rotten. I suppress an involuntary gag. I hear him slam his front porch door, gasp, and give his usual tirade.

"Oh, Jesus, sweet Mary!" His voice shakes with that elderly timbre, almost singing, but not quite. "How dare you? She's damaging...my garden! Roger, your daughter is damaging my garden! Every week I clean out cigarette stubs from my flowers, and now this? I'm calling the police! That's right, I am! I'm calling them right now, right this second..."

But I'm already several yards away, focusing on Canosa's white hair, and still holding her hand. We make it to Missis Elliott's garden, and I trample her flowers with hateful glee, knowing that what I'm doing is very wrong, but not giving it a second thought. I let that mad siren bloom in me like a terrible, destructive force. Lamb-chop, the poodle, sees us and starts barking hysterically from behind the window, his white mane shaking in that dandelion fashion.

"Shut up, you little shit!" I yell, and hear his tiny muzzle clamp shut behind the glass. His soul has one single repetitive sound to it—the squeak of a rubber ball.

"My voice!" I pant behind Canosa. "It works on animals too!"

She doesn't answer but keeps pulling me, as if saying, Duh! I feel stupid. And I wish Missis Elliott was here, so that I could command her to do something nasty. But, she's nowhere to be seen. Bummer, next time, I decide. I'll come for you and I'll show you how to properly care for people. Right now, I have only one goal in mind, and that's to belong. I'm filled with hope that I have finally found where I belong for real. With my siren sisters.

There are no more shots, but I hear the Maserati Quattroporte engine come to life. Canosa pulls me over the garden's fence and we skim down the familiar forty stone steps that separate the upper and lower Raye streets. At the bottom, we stop to look for cars and dash across. It feels like déjà vu. Only, this time, I'm not going onto the Aurora Bridge like I did this morning. This time, I'm going under. We hop over the pavement and plop onto the hilly incline, sliding on the grass and making it to the concrete pedestrian walkway that lays perpendicular to the bridge, cutting right across its underbelly.

We slink into its shadow.

I cringe from the racket of the traffic passing overhead, the mechanical engines and added cacophony of human souls breaking up the sleepiness of my neighborhood. Canosa flits in between supporting anchors, her hair flapping behind her like a torn and dirty sail. We sprint down, to the water.

I slip on the wet grass and nearly fall, but she keeps pulling me, without turning her head. We cross one more road, and then another. We weave through honking cars and gawking drivers, heading toward the marina where Papa's Pershing yacht bobs gently on the waves to the crying of seagulls and the jingling of the other yachts' masts.

Canosa lets go of my hand, pushes off the wooden pier, and dives. I follow, hitting the lake with my head, gulping in cold water, and reeling in its smoothness. I feel my gills open and begin pumping oxygen into my blood. A silence washes over me at once. The lake licks the dust from my hair, and soothes me, quiets me. It feels so velvety and serene, as if it hugs me. I float. This is my gigantic bathtub, my therapy, my home. I flap my legs and speed toward the bottom of the lake using Canosa's matted mane as my guide. Her whole body emits a faint glow that shines through the murkiness of the dark water. A few fish squirt by us, and kelp stalks shimmer in their forest. Suddenly, I'm happy at the prospect of seeing the other sirens. I guess I've missed them. We don't need to pity each other and nod our heads and say that we understand. We get it without words.

We sing.

I wonder if they all survived my father's attack at the Pike Place Fish Market, and if they're okay. I wonder how they became sirens in the first place, if what I've read in books is true or not. I decide to ask them when I see them.

"This is where I belong," I say into water.