London and Adam met in a chat room on the Monterey aquarium website. There’s this webcam set up in the shark tank, and you can log in and watch the sharks and talk to the other people who are watching the sharks, too. There’s a bunch of regulars. London supposes she is a regular, since she’s on it all the time. She doesn’t always talk to people, but she likes to have the live stream in the background when she’s doing homework or writing her petition emails to stop animal testing or regulate zoos. She even used to watch the shark cam sometimes at school, although she had to stop once Anastasia Peters found out and started calling her Chum, like the gross fish guts fishermen use to lure sharks, and then of course all the other girls in her class started calling her that, too. All the girls London goes to school with are bitches.

One day, when London was still grounded after the whole getting arrested thing, she got a private message in the chat room from a user she had never seen before.

SHARKBOY: Are you a mermaid?

PONYO: Huh?

SHARKBOY: Your name. Isn’t that from a movie about a mermaid?

PONYO: Yeah.

PONYO: How do you know that? No one knows that.

SHARKBOY: I like movies.

SHARKBOY: So are you?

PONYO: What?

SHARKBOY: A mermaid!

PONYO: No, I’m just a regular girl.

SHARKBOY: You don’t seem like just a regular girl.

PONYO: Shut up and leave me alone.

She ignored him after that because she assumed he was making fun of her, which was her default thought whenever anyone talked to her, no matter what they said, because it was usually true. But then as soon as she logged on the next night, he started talking to her again.

SHARKBOY: Hey, regular girl.

PONYO: Go away, I’m busy.

SHARKBOY: Busy watching sharks swim around?

PONYO: No. Homework.

SHARKBOY: You are not. You’re probably reading National Geographic or something.

PONYO: If you must know, I’m researching aquariums in Canada. I want to work at one someday.

SHARKBOY: I work at an aquarium.

PONYO: You do not.

SHARKBOY: Yes, I do! I work at this aquarium.

PONYO: You work at the Monterey aquarium?

PONYO: Doing what?

SHARKBOY: Research, mostly.

SHARKBOY: And I look after the sharks.

PONYO: So you’re like an old man?

SHARKBOY: I’m 25!

PONYO: Like I said.

SHARKBOY: So I guess you’re some kind of little kid then.

PONYO: I’m 16!

SHARKBOY: Like I said.

He wasn’t online the next day, or the day after that, and London found herself wondering where he was. He was annoying, but at least he was kind of interesting, not like those other people on the chat room who just kept wanting to talk about their kids or their cats.