Chapter Text
“Oh my god, how long does it take for you to blow up a tube?” Aquaria hollered to the frantic pink blob up the hill. Apparently Brie wasn’t content with keeping herself afloat on her own, so she insisted on grabbing something to sit in.
Through huffs and puffs, Brianna shouted back, “Just a sec!” and went back to work trying to put all of her oxygen into the tube.
Aquaria rolled her eyes but couldn’t wipe the smile off of her face. Sure, her girlfriend was a doofus sometimes, but she was her doofus. Her cheesy thoughts were interrupted by the wave created after Brianna flopped into the inner tube. The grin on the human’s face was manic, especially coupled with the bags of junk food she was clutching on to for dear life so as not to get them wet.
“So, how long has it been since you’ve had some high-quality, high-processed human food?”
“I mean, other than last summer? The closest I’ve gotten was the cookies you sent that one time. That was really nice.” Brianna looked pleased with herself upon hearing Aquaria’s approval.
“But I’m sure that Jinkx snuck a few on her way over,” Aquaria added. The pride on Brie’s face transformed into exasperation faster than she could grab all of the cheez-its in the pantry.
“Are you kidding me? I trust her with the most important thing to me and she DEFILES the artistry that is my baking? Now that’s disrespect.” Her jaw hung open and her eyes bugged out of her head: she looked like she had witnessed a murder, so of course Aquaria had to giggle.
“Don’t worry too much babe, she still brought me your letters every week. And I made sure she got every word right that I wanted to say.”
“What about the ones that… you know… “
Aquaria gave Brie a playful shove, causing her to drift slightly away. “Relax, if a letter was ‘too saucy’ in her words she gave it straight to me. I know you trust her, so I do too.” She pulled her girlfriend’s tube closer to her so she could push herself out of the water to kiss Brie on the forehead. The only reply she gave was an “mmph,” since her mouth was stuffed full of cheez-its.
“So, do you want to swallow your food, or…”
“I’m just glad that everything was alright with communication. I know how hard it was for you to build your trust of us back after all that you went through,” Brianna finally spat out, mouth free of detritus. Aquaria tried to hide the way her face fell and her stomach twisted, just for a moment, at the mention of the past. It was done, and she was safe and in love. What more did she need?
“Oreos.” She opened her mouth, waiting for Brie to slot them into her mouth.
“I can’t believe you sometimes.” Brie complied nonetheless, taking two of the cookies out of the package and placing them on Aquaria’s tongue.
“Ank ooh.”
“You’re welcome.” Brianna turned around to put the leftover garbage into the cupholder of the tube. She wasn’t about to pollute the home of her very favorite mermaid.
Out of the corner of her eye, Aquaria noticed the fondest expression creeping its way onto Brianna’s face. A slight smile, with eyes hiding something beneath the glossy brown surface. Mischief, love… or something in between? She couldn’t tell.
Aquaria locked eyes with her girlfriend, watching the way the breeze made the few stray strands of blonde hair dance around her sunlit face, and she could have sworn she heard her breath hitch just a little bit as she felt the air thicken with the girl’s intoxicating beauty. She gulped, swallowing the remainder of the oreos.
Brianna reached her hand out to caress Aquaria’s smooth skin. The mermaid’s eyes darted down to the point of contact, then back up to meet with Brianna’s. She rubbed soft circles with her thumb, the warmth of the creeping-down sun showing itself in her gentle smile.
“I wanna watch the sunset with you,” Brianna finally murmured. Aquaria nodded vigorously. “Remember our first one together?” she continued.
“Of course.” Aquaria smiled at the memory. It was at the end of the first week they started getting to know each other, with Aquaria always swimming back home at the first signs of dusk. As she was turning around to dive back in the water, Brianna had called out to her and pleaded for her to stay a while: after all, the sky was clear and the breeze was warm. She had tentatively dragged herself out of the water onto the beach towel the girl had laid out for her, thinking of how wrong it was to be this close to a human, but her heart beating drums to a future love song. Beneath the pink and orange swirls, Brianna had not-so-subtly been scooting closer to Aquaria the entire time, just so she could rest her head on her shoulder.
“That was when I realized how short you are,” Aquaria chuckled. Being next to her on the beach finally gave her perspective, as opposed to the two of them floating in the water. Brianna had such an active personality packed into such a small body, and that night was when Aquaria realized how much she admired her. When the setting sun brought out the shine in her black scales, when the waves teased the torn edges of her fins, when Brianna finally reached out to clasp their hands together (and she was terrified to do it, not that she’d ever let that show), when she had looked up at her with wide eyes and red cheeks and quick breaths, when she made that split second decision--
“I kissed you,” Brianna said, “for the first time that night. It was honestly so unlike me, but I thought I was freaking you out by pressuring you to hang out with me, so I guess it was the best decision I’ve made that could’ve gone either way really. I mean, how was I supposed to know that you--”
Aquaria shut up her girlfriend with a gentle kiss. “Babe, it’s okay. I’m so glad you asked me to stay.”
“Oh, me too! I really thought I was reading things wrong. I’m happy you ended up staying too, not just for the night. Like, with me. So, um. Thanks.” Aquaria was entertained by how flustered her girlfriend got when it came to the topic of her. Not much tripped the unstoppable Brianna Heller up, so knowing that she got to her was a little boost of confidence. And love. Lots of love.
Aquaria grabbed Brie’s hands, swinging them from side to side, as if she was conducting a symphony of seaweed and foam. “So, am I still gonna sit on a towel for the second-first-sunset?”
Her girlfriend gave her a devilish grin. “Oh, no. This year we’ve got an upgrade.” The last syllable had barely left her mouth before she turned to try and sprint out of the water as quickly as she was able to. Aquaria shook her head and snorted; that girl always had a surprise up her sleeve. But hey, whatever excited her, excited Aquaria, too.
Brianna didn’t take nearly as long as she did with her attempt to inflate the tube, so to Aquaria’s surprise she came pattering down the hill much sooner than she imagined she’d return. Instead of a tube, however, she fumbled to carry two pastel pink beach chairs that were just large enough to be awkward for her small frame to handle.
Huffing and puffing, she finally set the chairs down next to each other, right at the edge of where the waves meet the sand, lapping and curiously venturing. “So,” she said, catching her breath, “I bought chairs.”
“I can see that,” Aquaria snickered. After a beat of noticing the confusion on her girlfriend’s face, she added, “I love them. I think they’ll be great.” That was enough to satisfy Brie, who then approached Aquaria to help her out of the water and onto the sand.
“Grab my hands,” she said, knowing full well that the mermaid hadn’t forgotten the procedure of getting onto dry land.
“One, two, three, kick--” Aquaria flipped her tail in the water, creating a gentle crest and propelling herself forward into Brianna’s arms, who walked backwards to catch herself from the momentum of the kick. Chests pressed together, Brie maneuvered herself so she was able to set Aquaria down in a comfortable sitting position, and soon joined her in the chair to her left.
“Just like old times, huh?”
“Brianna, I don’t consider last year old times. But yeah, it’s just like last year, except better.”
Brianna grinned. “I knew the chairs were a good idea!” She dangled her hand in the space between the chairs, waiting for her girlfriend to bridge the gap by clasping their hands together at last: muscle memory put to use at the reunion. She sealed the wordless contract with a gentle squeeze.
“You were right again, as always.”
“Are you sure you’re alright? Remember if you even start to feel a little bit uncomfortable, I’ll get you right back in the water, I promise, I know how terrible it is when--”
Aquaria shifted her body in the chair to face Brie. “Hey. I’ll be fine. No more problems, okay?”
“Okay.”
As the sun floated lower down, the watercolor spectrum of the sky expanded its boundaries to pinks and lilacs and wisps of a soft yellow that made the beach feel like a true home. The only sound was the swaying rhythm of the waves washing back and forth, making Aquaria’s fin glisten ever so slightly.
“Oh my gosh, I just remembered a great story that I never told you about growing up with my pod,” Aquaria gushed. Brianna looked up at her, eyebrows raised in a do-tell motion.
“So you know how it’s technically against the rules to make any human contact? Well, when all my friends started to grow up, they had their boy crazy phase,” she said, rolling her eyes, “so they’d always break the surface when the human boys had their surfing classes.”
“Oh, so that’s why you never went with them.”
“I’m getting there! Anyway, one of my best friends, Kameron, was really cute.” Brianna jokingly scoffed at that, but knew that she had Aquaria’s whole heart. “She was popular and just really loveable. She’d always go with her other mermaid friends to scout out the cute guys and I never wanted to go but still got jealous, since I thought she liked hanging out with those girls more than me.”
“Lemme guess: spoiler alert, you had a ‘totally platonic’ crush on her?”
“That’s not the point,” Aquaria said, but felt her face turn red nonetheless. “So one day, she asked me to go with them and I said yes because I loved hanging out with her and seeing her happy. They’re all gossiping about Jack or Adam or whatever skinny boy is gonna be trying to surf that day. We swim all the way up to the surface, peek out from behind a rock, and see-- get this-- it’s the girls’ class that day.”
“Aquaria, is this the story of your first hookup, because if it is…”
“Jeez, Brie, you’ve got your mind set on one thing! Not that I mind.” She cleared her throat and nervously glanced off to the side. “Um, where was I… oh yeah, it’s the girls’ class, so they’re all really disappointed. But me, useless as I was, I didn’t see an issue. I was all like, ‘oh great, this will be so much more interesting since they’re more like us!’ I can still see the weirded-out expressions that the other girls gave me when I said that,” she mused, chuckling.
“Kameron was the only one who stayed with me because she wanted me to be comfortable and safe, since everyone else dashed once they realized they wouldn’t be getting the tan pecs they wanted. I guess I was really bad at hiding the dopey grin on my face because Kameron put her hand on my shoulder,” she said, changing her facial expression in preparation to do her southern accent, “and said, ‘Aquaria? I’m pretty sure I know why you stayed. And just so you know, I don’t care if you like other mermaids. But these human girls aren’t for you.’” She gave Brianna a knowing look.
“Well, she was right! Stay away from humans before one steals your heart,” Brianna said like an overzealous pastor.
“You’re actually the worst.” Aquaria picked up her hand and kissed it. “Oh wow, look at the sun now!”
While the girls had gotten lost in Aquaria’s reminiscence, the sun had sunk into the ocean, painting a scarlet stripe down the center of the water, with shimmering orange scattered throughout the rest of the deep blue.
“Just like the first night,” Brianna breathed as she turned to face Aquaria. She carefully got out of her chair and perched herself on Aquaria’s lap with the utmost care, walking her fingers up the glossy scales of her tail to the curve of her bare waist, making her shudder.
“Just like old times,” Aquaria replied, noticing a hint of freckles forming on her girlfriend’s nose from being out in the sun. Before Brianna could lean forward, Aquaria placed a delicate finger on her lips, to shush her silence.
“This time, let me.”
She pulled Brianna’s head up to hers and tentatively pressed their lips together. It didn’t take nearly as long to find familiarity as it had that first night: they definitely got better with lots of practice. She moved one hand to Brie’s face and let the other trace a map of the dips and ridges of her figure, making mental notes of the spots that made her gasp when brushed just right. It was a change for Aquaria to feel Brianna melting under her hands: the other girl was so often naturally in control that moments like this rarely popped up. Not that either of them minded a change, since Brianna let go any worry about making more mistakes and let Aquaria refamiliarize herself with her body. Just in case.
Aquaria moved to start ghosting her lips against Brianna’s collarbone, hearing the sighs escape her lips whenever she lightly bit and thinking that it was because of her, that she was the one making her this helpless.
By the time the sky turned dark, their silhouettes were still one warm shape, framed by the starry horizon, eternal for the night.