“God, sorry! Turned the light on accidentally.” I blink the glare away to find Kavya, her phone out, pointed toward me and Ross. My heart falls straight out of my butt. Video footage. I look around and see she’s not the only person with a phone pointed at the scene. At the crashed Trojan truck, at the man getting carried out of the front seat by paramedics, at the shooting fire hydrant, and Ross, drenched, their fin flipping wildly. Now Kavya has video proof—half of Hollywood has video proof—that mer exist.

Kavya snaps her fingers, pulling me out of my horror and grabbing the attention of people around us. “Hey! You! And you! We need help!”

She’s pointing at three costumed superheroes. Spider-Man, Batman, Iron Man.

Batman says in an overly gravelly voice, “We’re not real heroes, lady. We’re actors.” Then he turns on his heel and runs away, cape flying behind him.

“Got it,” Kavya says, but it’s more to herself than the fake heroes. She pockets her phone before looking at me. “That will do. I can make the right video with that.”

I’m trying to remain calm and not let the terror at what could happen to Ross soak through my voice. Kavya wouldn’t hurt Ross. She’s not like that.

“Kavya, please. I know this seems wild, and it is, it totally is, but you can’t show that to anybody. This never happened.”

But what does it matter, really, if Kavya never shows a soul? There are hundreds of other people surrounding Ross with their phones out. There’s no way to control this. Our best bet is to hide Ross in their bungalow until the Journey is over. I’ve got to get them out of here.

I bend down, one arm on Ross’s back, the other sliding beneath where I imagine their knees would be if they had legs. I lift up by my knees, Ross in my arms, doing the wedding carry I’ve seen in so many rom-coms. If only this was that sort of lighthearted moment and not the life-or-death frenzy we’re in now.

Ross clings around my neck when I start crashing through the crowd, their tail smacking against anybody who gets in the way. Angry cries of “Watch it!”, “What the fuck?”, and one that sounds a lot like “Attention whore” follow us, but I don’t stop or apologize to anyone. We’ve got to get out of here.

Kavya is right behind, and the shouts and sirens and panic don’t let up until we turn the corner onto the street where Kavya’s parked.

Now that there’s a moment of calm, I whip around, the momentum from Ross’s tail nearly making me fall. “Kavya, I’ll explain everything. But you’ve got to promise me you won’t tell a soul. Please.”