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"What … as he?"

"His father was a human sailor His mother was a siren Which means you are part siren"

A siren? No way Not ot kicked out of eighth-grade choir, whose dor in the shower And sirens were beautiful--Iafter theled for words, but all I could co"

She laughed, hard, her head flung back, eyes dancing Part of it was the stress, but part was pure huh to catch her breath she said, "No, baby, you really can’t sing" She wiped tears from the corners of her eyes "But while soh music, the call itself is psychic A female siren calls males to her to fulfill her needs, even to their doom"

"But--"

She continued as if I hadn’t spoken It was as if the words and e up inside her and, now that they’d been loosed, there was no stopping thee you instead of killing you because he was male The ho found you in that alley, out of all the alleys in the city, did it because you called hi with other women because you’ve co ootten along with ood friends, Dawna, Vicki…

Gran didn’t say a word, just raised an eloquent eyebrow

"Vicki was my best friend"

"Vicki was a lesbian, Celia"

"Well, yeah, but she was a woman"

Gran nodded once, then raised those foret along really ith Dawna Really, really well, and she doesn’t like woe of pity along with the humor "Is she, by any chance, post probleot to do with anything?"

Gran gave me a level look "Name one close female friend you have who is both heterosexual and fertile Just one"

I thought about it Hard

Silence stretched between us for probably two est ently "In fact, et almost completely neurotic, almost to the point of insanity, around you, particularly if ht about it There had been incidents in college, at parties Men always rush forward to open doors for irls Hell, not teeks ago there’d been a scene at El Jefe’s between ht s, too I didn’t like to think about them It’s always just confused me Yet if I was a siren, it all made sense But was I? Was I really? "How could I know for sure? Is there a test kit in the phar?"

"Whenever you’re in real need, you call men to you, and they do whatever it takes, at whatever cost, to help you"

Now that I had an answer for

"Then why didn’t I call someone to help me when Ivy and I were kidnapped? God knoe needed help"

Tears filled her eyes, her grip onuntil it was actually painful "Oh, honey If only you had come into your power But you hadn’t hit puberty If you had--"

If I had, ht not have been tortured Everything … my entire life … would have been completely and totally different If only I’d been a few years older?

I sat there, stunned Myinto any seht It was as ifsuddenly did