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When Jay Ferin’s father told her she was going to be in an arranged marriage, all hell broke loose.
Everyone in the Ferin household could hear their screaming matches, back and fourth for hours about the good of the family and is that really what you think of me, dad?
It was safe to say that Jay was absolutely pissed and completely inconsolable. She had just turned 18, so excited to begin her life as an independent adult only to be told that she had to hand her dreams away to some stranger of a guy who probably thought that he would own her.
Apparently, he was the “Champion” of the Undersea or whatever that meant; probably some stuck-up prick with an ego after being treated like royalty his entire life. As much as Jay did her best to fit in, the Navy seemed to be dominated by men who thought they could control her life. If it wasn’t for her mom and her older sister backing her up, she never even would've been able to properly transition. She was happy that her father saw her as his daughter instead of his son, but the fact that no matter where she found herself someone would always find a way to control her life made her want to scream and punch something.
Her mom and her sister were always there to back her up, but this time her mother just looked at her with sympathetic eyes and told her that she was sure her father would pick a very respectable young man for her and her sister was currently out on a rotation on the borders of the Undersea. Ava sent her sister letters that described how she’d seen the Champion a couple of times and how he seemed like an earnest guy, but Jay wouldn’t believe it until she saw it.
No one could be given that much power, that much idolization, and not let it get to their head. Her best example was her own father after all. A month or so passed and the daily yelling matches subsided into snark comments and stubbornness. She was still incredibly angry, but she just didn’t have the energy to fight every single day about it.
The first time she met her soon-to-be-husband (god, saying that made her feel gross.) was at a dinner party that her father had invited the Undersea leaders too specifically so Jay could “get to know them” or whatever that meant. Unfortunately, that required her to ditch her comfy tank top and invention-grease-smeared pants for a red halter dress that flowed loosely around her knees.
When she stood in front of her mirror that night and looked at herself in her dress, she wanted to feel good, to feel pretty but the context she was wearing it under made her stomach churn. Tears threatened to spill down her cheeks, this whole thing made her feel like a damn object and it was ruining the fact that she actually felt beautiful in that dress. She’d wiped her tears, hugged the stuffed animal that her uncle Drey had given her before he died, and went downstairs with the resolution to be as bitchy and unwantable as possible. Fuck the Champion, she was her own woman.
When she met the Champion that night though, she was a bit surprised. She expected him to walk in with a more headstrong attitude, from what she’d been told he was essentially the greatest religious figure of the Undersea’s society yet he still walked into the dining hall completely silently with his eyes scoping the room like a prey animal. When Jay stood in front of him he was shorter then her, coming up to around her shoulder height when she was wearing heels. He had a sharp face and curly dark blue hair that framed his face, decorated with little seashells and pieces of shiny metal intricately woven into his curls. Orange stripes and swirls adorned his skin and ran down from his neck to his arms, peeking out of the suit he was wearing. They both looked like they would rather be anywhere but in front of each other.
She’d stood her ground though, staring down at him with a piercing gaze and an unrelenting neutral look of disdain. He sat across from her at the table, occasionally looking to the purple triton next to him for advice on what fork to use. Jay was asked a couple of questions but she answered them curtly, the quicker she could escape this interaction the better.
At one point she stared straight at Mr. Champion (she really should’ve asked what his name was) who kept his own neutral look. His face shifted and it seemed like he attempted to smile at her, but she scowled straight back. She didn’t want him for a second to think he had any power over her.
That dinner seemed to pass in a blur of awkward questions and nudges from her father to be more polite (“If you’re going to be a lady you have to be polite like one.”) and only served to make her angrier about the whole situation. At the end of the night when she was itching to go back upstairs to her room, Mr. Champion approached her, looking back at the people he came with seeming for the reassuring nod they provided him and then looking back at her. He stood awkwardly for a moment before he coughed and said “You, um, you look–you look beautiful tonight, er, miss Lady Ferin.”
They both cringed at how awkwardly it had come out, and it didn’t help her dwindling self-esteem that he didn’t want to be here just as much as she also abhorred it. Her father nudged her and whispered to hug him and she bristled, stiffly placing her arms around him in a quick hug. He reciprocated poorly, his hands awkwardly floating around her waist and they both stepped back quickly.
After that both their parental units (were those his parents? There were three tritons that surrounded him protectively but none of them looked particularly similar to him.) seemed satisfied with their interaction and they began to exchange formal goodbyes and thank-yous. Jay was dismissed and immediately ran up to her room, not looking back at the strained situation she’d found herself in.
Jay didn’t cry often, her father yelled at her so frequently that she’d just learned to absorb his words and move on, no tears needed. But tonight as she hung that red dress back in her closet and flopped onto her bed she let silent tears run down her face. Her parents had gotten married so young and the last thing she wanted to do was become like then. She loved her mother with all her heart but she didn’t love her dad anymore and it was obvious. Would that become her? Trapped in a loveless marriage with a man who thought that he could own her? When she realized her place in this world as a woman she was so excited to fall in love, to have her first kiss, but would she have to share that with someone she didn’t love? Would that be taken away from her?
For the first time since she was a small child, she sobbed herself to sleep that night.
————————————
From that night to her actual wedding day, she didn’t see him again. She did however learn that his name was Gillion Tidestrider, not Mr. Champion. She had had four full months to process the fact that she was being married away to some foreign fish prince, and her opinion on it changed day to day.
Some days she thought she could live with it, she could hope for the best and that was that he would leave her alone and they could wait a couple of years then silently divorce. On other days she stared daggers at everyone around her, easily shanking the training dummies to bits during her navy training days and becoming hostile to anyone who attempted to console her. Her opinion switched frequently.
It dawned upon her though the day before the wedding. As in truly, genuinely, got through her mind that she was doing this whether she wanted to or not. Her mother had rallied for just the smallest amount of autonomy to pick her own dress and she did, a floor-length light blue dress that ruffled around her exposed shoulders. It felt sickeningly performative.
Her wedding day was a blur, it was supposed to be the happiest day of her life yet everything seemed to pass in vague motions as she was ushered to wake up and she and her family drove to the seaside gardens where she was to get married. She saw everyone in their fancy clothes running around and making sure that everything was perfect but it just didn’t feel real.
Not when she got into her dress, not as her mother braided flowers into her hair, and not when there was a soft knock on the door of her dressing room. She assumed it was one of the people her father had hired to make the wedding run smoothly so she called out for them to come in.
The person she saw in the mirror standing at the doorway wasn’t a helper though, they wore clothes that she had very distinctly seen on other undersea folks. She had seaweed-green hair with an undercut on half of her head and big splotches of purple and pink that covered parts of her head and neck. She was very, very pretty.
When she spoke it was very soft, somehow a mix of her hair and voice reminded Jay of gentle ocean waves.
“Ah, hello, are you…Jay? Gillion’s fiancé?” She cringed at the title but nodded and turned to face her.
“Yeah, do you need something?”
The triton paused, her hands clasped in front of her and nervously rubbing her fingers. “Could I speak to you for just a moment?”
Jay thought for a moment, nobody had asked her permission for anything all day, it was kind of refreshing. “Yeah, feel free to sit if you want.”
She closed the door behind her, taking a seat on the small couch sitting parallel to the mirror Jay was getting ready in front of in the small dressing room. She looked out of place and Jay couldn’t blame her, she had bright blue and purple skin amongst warm orange-coloured decorations and dull beige wallpaper. “I’m Edyn, by the way,”
She reached out a webbed hand to shake, and Jay took it. “I’m Gillion’s older sister, I don’t get to see him frequently so I was quite excited to hear that I was invited to this wedding. I can’t imagine this is an….ideal....situation for either of you but I have to assure you my brother is a wonderful person and an incredibly kind soul.”
Jay snorted, taking somebody’s word still wasn’t enough for her to want to marry them. “I'll believe it when I see it.”
Edyn simply politely nodded, taking a moment to find her words. “I can’t imagine what it’s like to be in your place right now, we are from vastly different cultures and realms but we are both women who agree that this is a terribly outdated tradition,”
“Amen.” Jay whispered.
Edyn gave her a small smile, yet still continued with her serious tone. “But unfortunately there’s no say that we have in this. Regardless, I came here to request—no, ask—that you treat my brother with kindness. If you guys choose to elope and separate or divorce that is none of my business and I support both of you but please, I beg, Gillion has not been treated kindly in this life and I failed him, I couldn’t save him, so I’m asking you please show him that theirs a world outside the ocean. I’m not asking you to love him, just to help him realize he’s free.”
There was great emotion in her voice and it stunned Jay a little bit, she wasn’t expecting that at all. “What….what happened to him?”
The triton’s multicoloured face flashed with sorrow, for someone who Jay guessed wasn’t any older then 26 she carried unbearable amounts of grief in her eyes. “That’s not my story to tell. I just—I hope—be good to him; I don’t know how much more he can handle.”
Those words struck a chord in her, she understood that. Some days she herself wondered just how much of the navy’s push-and-pull she can handle before she finally snapped. Jay gave her a solemn nod, an unexpected bond being formed.
“I’ll do my best. He’s a grown man and not my responsibility to coddle, but I’m not an asshole either. If he’s really the kind man you say he is, I’ll make sure he’s safe from whatever hurt him and leave after.” Jay reassured.
It definitely helped and Edyn looked more relaxed, a minute amount of stress coming off of her shoulders. She stood up and bowed, swishing her thin purple tail in a gesture that Jay could only assume was triton in nature. “I’ll be going now but thank you for hearing me out, blessed be the wedding.”
And with that, the elusive sister of Jay’s too-be husband left. She checked the clock and saw she had around thirty minutes left before the ceremony and sighed, going over in her mind what Edyn had told her. The more small details she learned about this man the more she thought she’d be considerably more curious to learn about him if they weren’t being forced to get married.
Her anger had morphed into a strange mix of bittersweet resignation, a thousand scenarios running through her head as to what her future would look like now.
——————————————
Jayson squeezed his daughter on the shoulder reassuringly and it made her want to puke. She was standing right outside the entrance to the church waiting for her cue to go forward. In a way she never could’ve predicted her life seemed to flash before her eyes; her childhood idolizing her sister Ava, her parents non-stop fighting, and the way she watched them slowly fall out of love.
She saw a future that she’d imagined for herself before all of this as well; one where she’s grown up and graduated from the junior navy program and perhaps met a handsome lady or man who had nothing to do with the navy and could sweep her off her feet while still respecting her headstrong attitude towards life. Before she knew it she was being pushed forward and her feet were moving.
The doors opened and everyone stared at her while Jayson unfortunately kept her moving. She gripped the material of his uniform because it was the only familiar thing she could feel under her fingertips. Family she’d never even heard of were staring her down and she was expected to look happy?
She couldn’t even bare to look at Ava, or her mother, or Gillion as she took her spot in front of the altar. She ignored their faces and felt fat tears roll down her eyes.
Eventually, the vague sounds of the priest giving his instructions drifted through her ears and Gillion awkwardly took one of her hands, holding her at almost arms length. Her heart pounded away and her vision was blurry from dread as she vaguely remembered saying her well-practiced vows that were pre-chosen for her and drilled into her mind and then the moment she’d loathed since the moment she’d been told about this. They kissed.
In an attempt to be somewhat respectful, Gill placed one hand on her waist and one on her shoulder, it felt like very brief and odd pressure as they uncoordinatedly smushed their lips together and immediately and quickly drew back.
Everyone cheered, but the world felt like nothing to her anymore. Her first kiss, and yet it was with a stranger who didn’t even love her.
That moment replayed after everyone was done cheering, it replayed when the party started and everyone gathered to eat food, it replayed as aunts and uncles that Jay didn’t recognize or care about came up to congratulate her.
Neither her nor Gillion spoke a word to each other the entire night. As soon as they were done posing for pictures his hand rapidly left her waist like it burnt him. His expression was neutral, and she almost recognized a similar far away-ness that she felt herself.
At one point Ava came up to her and she couldn’t help but smile when her older sister slung her arm around her, joking about how she was a lesbian but Gillion was a damn good catch.
The newlyweds continued to not speak to each other all night, and it set Jay a little bit on edge. She knew she was instigating it as well by not trying to talk to him but it was so much easier to stay away, far from the complexity of the situation, and safe under her older sister's arm.
Night inevitably came though, and the wedding came to a close. People said goodbye and farewell and Jay begrudgingly got into the carriage with Gillion that was meant to take them both to their suite for the night.
With the vague light of the lantern hung from the ceiling of the carriage was the first time she’d really looked at Gillion so far this night. She caught his gaze a couple of times and noticed little details on his suit but she was finally looking at the whole him.
He seemed nervous too, as soon as he was away from the very public eyes of the two families his demeanor changed. It went from all smiles and enthusiastic nods to fidgety hands, clawing at the collar of his suit subtly.
She silently observed his little tics the entire ride there, wondering who would be the first to break their silence. They kept looking at each other, catching each other's eyes briefly, but never actually speaking.
Eventually, they got to the doors of the inn and climbed up the steps to their room silently, Jay wanted nothing more then to just flop onto a bed and just curl up and forget everything about today.
When they entered the room though, a new wave of dread hit her. Oh god, there was only one bed.
It shouldn’t have been a surprise, typically married couples sleep in the same bed, but she hadn’t shared a bed with anyone since she was young and had sleepovers with her sister and oh god the implications hit her all at once.
If he tried to do anything more then just sleep with her she would be shanking him with a fork.
The room itself was very nice and had one bed with a large canopy over it, a desk, couches, and beautiful purple curtains and decorations everywhere. She would’ve loved to enjoy the luxury if not for the uneasiness spreading through her chest and making her hands feel all clammy and she just couldn’t stop the feeling.
She’d been holding the feelings of anger and panic and rage in for the entire day and her body was finally lashing out against her, tired of the suppression and dull but powerful burning sensation of panic. Her vision blurred and her breath picked up and the whole world seemed to swim under her feet until she was considerably closer to the ground.
Her vision slowed long enough for her to realize she was roughly leaning up against the edge of one of the couches, slowly registering that the wheezy sound she was hearing was coming from her own mouth and the warmth she felt rolling down her cheeks was once again tears.
She suddenly felt two vaguely cold hands on her back and she flailed at them. “Don’t touch me! I’m fine! Just—just…give me a moment.” She choked out.
“Miss Lady Ferin, I think you should sit down,” Gillion’s accented voice was soft, and cut through the fog in her brain. She definitely made sounds but they didn’t form into coherent words, just loose protests to leave her alone.
Regardless, strong arms looped themselves around her and gave her something to lean on as she was guided to sit on the couch.
There was something placed into her hands that was smooth and soft, reminiscent of the texture of soft silk. She automatically squeezed it close to her chest, letting herself indulge in the comfort of texture. She sobbed into it, letting every emotion that had plagued her out.
“Hey! Hey—Are you okay? Miss Lady Ferin?” Gillion's voice called out from somewhere next to her, a vague hint of panic.
She cried further, hiding her face. “I can’t, I can’t-” she hiccuped, “-I can’t do this. I can’t be the wife he wants me to be! I can’t live this life!” A particularly painful sob wracked through her body, making her tighten against whatever was in her hands.
She felt it shift slightly and be pulled back. It instead was replaced with a slightly wet hand covering hers, resting on her thigh. “Can you breathe with me Miss Ferin? Unfortunately humans don’t have gills but I believe you’re able to get deeper breaths through your nose?”
She heard the exaggerated sound of him taking a deep breath in and letting out and she attempted to mimic it. It took a couple tries, but her breathing began to slow down to a controllable pace and the hand that she remembered was on her back was rubbing slow, calming circles. “Good, I’m sorry and I wish I knew how to comfort humans,” He said sheepishly.
She rubbed away the tears in her eyes, taking a few more deep breaths to get herself under control. “Are you feeling better now?” He asked.
She let herself focus back on her vision, honing in on the blue hand with orange swirls on it that was placed in her lap. She slowly lifted her head, looking to the side where Gillion was sitting. He wore a very worried expression, his brows furrowed, and something between mild confusion and empathy painted in his deep green eyes.
She didn’t have the strength to push him away, just slowly relaxing her fingers and letting go of his hand. “I’m okay, I’m sorry for freaking out on you like that.” She was embarrassed, she hadn’t cried that hard since she was told Ava was leaving to live on permanent rotation.
“It happens to the strongest of us all. Even a champion like myself has my moments of sorrow too,” If she heard that from anyone else it would seem rather pretentious, but something about the tone Gillion spoke in made it feel earnest. “Can I ask what you mean though, by….‘can’t do this?’”
Jay wanted to groan, the projection of her father that lived to criticize her in her brain telling her she’d been married for a couple of hours and was already fucking it up. “It’s hard to explain, I’m not gonna make you worry about it too.”
“If it’s about this…arrangement our families have put us in, I’m sorry that you’re in this situation. If it was up to me I wouldn’t have married, nor did I ever see myself wanting to marry anyone in the first place. I require nothing out of this relationship physically and I want you to be as comfortable as possible. In fact, if you’d like to buy a house, perhaps by the sea, you could live there and do your duties and I would not bother you unless it was for the sake of social appearances.”
His honesty surprised Jay a little bit, she wasn’t expecting him to feel so similarly or to even show her such kindness. “Thank you,” she paused, trying to find a way to put her feelings eloquently. “and I’m sorry I’ve been such a dick to you since I met you. I was really afraid that I’d get stuck in a loveless-no, hateful marriage like my parents. This situation isn’t ideal but the more I talk to you, the more you seem like a better guy then I thought you were.”
She looked into his eyes, trying to give him a small friendly smile despite the fact that she must look exhausted and disheveled from crying.
“My elders surveyed many potential power alliances for me to be married off to before they settled for the Ferin family, but I’m glad they chose you. You seem like a very lovely person, Miss Lady Ferin.”
A handsome purple blush was apparent on his cheeks, and she smiled a little more. “No need to call me that title, just Jay is fine,” she unruffled her dress in her lap and stood up. “How about we both go get changed and meet back here? I don’t love you, but I’d at least like to get to know you.”
When Gillion stood he bowed to her, agreeing and stepping around the couch to go change out of his wedding suit.
When Gillion had finished changing Jay was already in her sleeping clothes, sitting on the single bed with the ornately carved canopy structure over it. The triton looked immensely more comfortable in his blue sweatpants and tight black turtleneck.
Jay beckoned him over. He hesitantly crawled over, trying to get comfy but his tail looked awkward as he sat. He made sure there was a respectful amount of distance between them.
“You can sit closer, I don’t mind,” Jay let her shoulders droop, leaning against the soft pillows. Gillions face scrunched up, and he looked at her with an emotion difficult to place to his expression. “But you don’t have to if you don’t want to, it’s cool.” She backtracked when she noticed.
“We…we’re just sleeping right? This isn’t one of those human expressions where you say something and mean something else?” He asked nervously.
“Oh? Oh! Definitely just sleeping and nothing else, I promise,” she patted the spot next to her, and Gillion happily scooted.
“Thank gods, my Elders warned me that you may be interested in engaging in certain mating rituals with me tonight and it’s not like you’re undesirable or anything! I can if you want me to! I’m just not a big enjoyer of those activities.” The triton spoke quickly and a little nervously, twitching his ear fins which she’d noticed that he did when he got nervous.
“Are you asexual?” She asked curiously.
“I-I’m not sure,” he stammered back, the topic seemed to make him slightly uneasy and she wondered why.
“It means you don’t feel sexual attraction to other people; asexuals can have sex if they want to but most prefer not to. There's even a whole spectrum of those feelings.” Gillion’s eyes suddenly became wide, and he nodded.
“Then yes, I think I would fall under such a spectrum,” he paused. “That’s very nice, I like that word. I like learning new human things even if it confuses me heavily sometimes.”
“That’s awesome, dude. I’m demisexual which means I’d be open to the idea of sex but only after I’ve known someone for a while and we’re really close so you’re not alone.” He lit up at the phrase ‘you’re not alone’, his tail giving a little wag.
She noticed red-purple marks on the end of his tail between his fins and pointed them out. “What happened to your tail?”
“Ah, the humans I’ve met seem to have a fascination with my tail so I handed it to you in an effort to possibly help you calm down when you were upset, it seemed to have helped.” He swished back onto the bed, swaying his large orange fins at the end of his tail.
Jay’s face burned a little in embarrassment, she wouldn’t have taken it if she knew that was his tail.
After a moment it seemed to dawn upon him that she was embarrassed and he chuckled, a lovely hearty sound that was so different then the stiff, forced laughs he was giving to people at the wedding earlier.
“It’s fine, I don’t mi—“
“Well, looks like it’s time for bed!” Jay quickly said. She scurried to get the covers over her and turn away from Gill so he didn’t see her blush. She heard the gentle rustling of the covers next to her and felt the tips of the tritons tail fins touching her leg; it was oddly comforting.
The candle was blown out, and the room plunged into the comfortable darkness of the night. Before she had the chance to speak, Gillion did.
“Hey M—Jay?”
“Yeah, Gillion.”
“I just had a thought. I think, in another life, I’d want to be a pirate with you.”
Jay scoffed, almost laughing. “That’s crazy, impossible even, I couldn’t ever see myself doing that of all things.”
“I don’t know, it’s just a thought that came to me. Goodnight?”
“Goodnight, Gill.” She let out a soft sigh, closing her eyes.
If nothing, she’d made a good friend that day.