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Shuri has a problem.
She keeps finding herself out on the beach just before dark. There’s crisp air carrying the smell of rain and still-green grass, her hair whipping in the breeze. Easy. Relaxed. So close to the border of happiness it makes her chest clench. This—feeling, a softness, pressing against her chest and spreading down her back in a shudder. Warm and insistent as a hand, pressing, squeezing at the place where her heart is steadily beating—curling her toes, stretching out every sinew she didn’t know she had.
The call of the conch is low and mellow.
She won't fight and she won't run anymore, but she feels powerless to do anything but to call on him, and hope that it helps, that it proves something. When he walks out of the water Shuri takes a step towards him, looking down at her feet as though navigating a thin, unsteady bridge over some growing crevasse. The movement brings them almost nose-to-nose.
She tilts her face up and says, “I don’t think you’ve ever sang to me.”
“Shall I sing for you, princess?” There’s a quirk to Namor’s lips that only Shuri can elicit.
His hands are coarse from salt, warm and soft and wet as he takes her hands. By now, he knows how she likes to be touched. He knows how she likes to be held, how she likes to weave their fingers together and kiss, palm to palm and mouth to mouth— just like this.
When he pulls away Shuri tastes the brine in her throat. Another problem. Namor tastes sharp, salty, the familiar, inexplicable taste of the sea. Her lips rub together in a pucker, something in her clenches, not nearly as disgusted about it as she ought to be.
But the brine in her throat doesn’t soothe as much as Namor’s voice.
Shuri has a problem, but it’s only a problem until it becomes a familiarity.
As they float into the current, Shuri relaxes into the waves, Namor assists until she’s floating on her back. His arm is brushing against her shoulder. He wiggles his hands to give her motion, then floats beside her. They watch together as the sky above them moves, the two small clouds disappearing into the distance as the sun climbs higher and higher, reaching its zenith, until Namor’s skin starts prickling and he turns and dips underwater.
Shuri doesn’t even have a moment, finding that she’s been pulled below the waves. Not for the first time, her breath lurches—chest fluttering and light like they could float right up out of her body. With her arms and legs in motion Shuri treads easily despite the rough current.
She has a problem and she doesn’t want to think about it. Her lips taste like dinner table salt. The water isn’t a roar or a slosh, not even deafening as it covers her ears. She should be pained as her eyes stay open underwater.
Namor keeps his grip upon her waist, floating there beside her, smiling.
Familiarity makes Shuri’s shoulders seize up as he carries her to the beach, and they sit together watching the horizon disappear into the night, watching the sand whip in the wind, it’s easier.
It’s familiar. It’s routine—the flips and turns, this bizarre ache clamoring along her nerves, something close to fondness, but instead of filling up her chest it’s clinging now; creeping around and growing, slowly, like a vine. Out on the beach with the sunset and the sand Shuri doesn’t think. She tries not to think, oh does she try but it hits her every time; the life in Namor’s hands, the fit of his fingers firm and confident and what they’d feel like in her hair, along her neck, splayed to map the curve of her back.
Shuri knows she’s fallen for Namor, almost an awful realization, and she wonders how long ago it happened.
When they step into her room the beaming lights from her vanity contrast with the ambient swath of her lamps. It throws Namor’s face and body into a dewy glow. He wanders her room, curious, he touches the tablets on her desk and swipes across the surface . A lone bead is held in his other hand, glowing as it plays the day’s news cycle. He goes through her things with far too much interest, in a dazed kind of way, almost fascinated despite his usual demeanor.
Then, Namor steps to the vanity where his mother’s bracelet is set out. He plays the string for a while, then runs a finger over the vibranium stones. They’re smoother than when Namor first gave it to her, polished by the sea-salt and wind of the surf, washed clean on every stumble and splash. Its engraved little moniker is still so deep cut; enriched and permanent.
Often, he gets stuck at the full length mirror.
He leans closer and then leans back. He puts his nose almost to the surface of the mirror. Then he tugs at his eyes, his cheeks, his mouth, with the tips of his fingers; draws the skin tight and lets it slacken. He opens his mouth in what ought to be a smile but isn’t, he’s baring his teeth. Then, his wet hair, he lifts up his fringe falling down on his forehead, smooths it back against his scalp. He raises his hands and pushes his ears forward and lets them go.
Then standing to attention Namor watches silently, motionless, still. “You’re staring at me, princess.”
“Observing,” she replies, looking at him. Studying, even, then pauses, trying to think of what to say here, at the moment. “How are you with other people taking risks?”
“Risks?”
“Yes.” Shuri laughs around the knot rising in her throat. Their eyes meet in the mirror, almost blithely. “I would like your name, your true name.”
Namor answers quickly, “Ch’ah Toh Almehen.”
“Ch—ah?” She attempts, not quite stumbling over the name but not sure-footed either. “Toh Almehen.” It is easy to have her move her mouth around the sounds. “Maybe, I should have tried loving someone before you, so I’d at least know how.”
“You love me?” he whispers, tight and disbelieving.
When he turns and walks up to her, Shuri smiles, hands shaking where they begin to wrap around Namor’s bicep, nails digging harshly. But then Namor is trembling too when he touches a hand to her temple, so soft it’s like he thinks Shuri’s going to disappear any second.
“Yes,” she answers simply. “Love is a madness most discreet. William Shakespeare said that.”
“Did he? I’ll have to take your word for it.” Namor hangs back, a breath shy of putting his lips on her.
“Rhetorical question and silent sarcasm – you learn quickly,” Shuri says.
Over and over again, Namor always looks at her with an accepting nod, shoulders squared and head high. He’s fearless because he knows the consequences and embraces them. And for all the unease brought unto Shuri, he understands the dark, angry parts of her, the parts Shuri’s not sure she likes all the time. There’s a thin veneer between the emotions and urges and instinct, she knows, between something shapeless and unnamed and she could teeter right over it.
Shuri leans in, sucks on Namor’s bottom lip, and can feel the pebbles of salt with her tongue. His skin is still wet; his lips more so. Then he’s holding her closer, so close his nails dig in on either side of her ribcage and Shuri feels swallowed, surrounded by his scent and weight and taste.
When they fall into bed, Shuri spends the next few hours giving out constant explanations in an endless conversation—Namor loves to talk, refuses half-formed answers and asks profound questions and always makes clever conclusions—so by the time Shuri scrubs at her eyes with the heel of her palm, her voice is thin and tired.
Namor will talk to fill a lull in conversation, a musing sort of soliloquy that lasts until he’s interrupted or diverted.
Shuri’s almost asleep, steadily sinking into the warmth of the night , when she feels it— again and again and again, this familiarity turns into freedom. She doesn’t know what it’s like—for Ch’ah. If it’s always like this; no pressure and no pain. She’s stopped sweating with guilt when they’re alone in the gardens, or on the beach, or swimming through the most fascinating parts of the ocean.
Her chest still aches as the fear and adrenaline melt into wonder. They are never frantic in her dreams. It’s always the same imagined future, a hope instead of a fantasy. They hold onto each other for ballast and reassurance.
They go on; and on, and on.