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Patrick’s starting to run out of room on his boat.
It started out pretty tame. The antlers, then the jacket (snazzy - Patrick’s trying to brainstorm a way to clean it up). Not the usual catch, but not the most unthinkable things to find in the ocean. Lots of stuff ends up here - intentionally or not. It wasn't until he pulled a drum out of the water a few days ago that he started to get concerned. And the thing he's just fished out - it’s a lot bigger.
Really, he should’ve invested in a bigger boat. Even for just one person, the space starts feeling a little cramped after months at sea. To be fair, any boat would get claustrophobic if you stayed on it long enough. There is, quite honestly, one singular reason why Patrick has this boat instead of anything else, and that reason is that this boat has a piano.
The piano is all Patrick needs. He could be at sea for a year and not mind too much, because at least he has a piano, and a place where he can sing without anybody hearing.
That last bit is important. True, Patrick misses being on land a little. But going back would mean back to his family. Explaining why he left at seventeen. Explaining that he failed, and no one wants to listen to his music, sorry, he was making a fuss for nothing. No thanks. Patrick will stay on his boat and catch his fish and make music where no one is watching.
No one except Frito. Yes, he named the seagull Frito. It’s cute, right? Patrick thinks so. He thinks the seagull is cute too. Living on the boat is easy. It’s also pretty monotonous. He felt like bringing a dog on board would be mean, so he thinks maybe the universe is looking out for him, just a little bit, because it delivered him a little friend who sits on his shoulder and eats his breadcrumbs and squawks along to his music. So Patrick’s fine. He has his boat, his piano, and now he even has a friend! The only thing he doesn’t have is space. He stares at his newest catch, and he thinks space is the least of his worries.
“Hey,” it says. Patrick jumps.
“You can talk?” he stammers. It has the audacity to roll its eyes. “What kinda question is that?”
“Well I’m sorry, I’ve never met a mermaid before, forgive me for not knowing the rules,” Patrick shoots back. That’s right. Because what he’s just caught isn’t an odd bit of taxidermy, a stylish article of clothing, or piece of a fairly pricey instrument. He’s caught a mermaid.
Actually, the correct term might be merman. From the waist up, he looks like a regular dude. Mostly. He’s got tan skin and a dark poof of hair with startling streaks of red that match the scales running up his hands, which have little claws at the end. Tattoos are drawn over his arms (pleasingly toned), his collarbones (very appealing), over his…crotch? Patrick’s having a hard time with that one, because the spot that would normally be, like, pelvis just turns into the shimmery reddish scales of a large and intimidating fish tail, capped with purplish fins. No other organs in that area. Very interesting.
The mermaid laughs at him. He has sharp teeth. Shark teeth, Patrick’s brain helpfully supplies.
Actually, those aren’t shark teeth another part of his brain fires back. He doesn’t have the symphysial bars, or any anterior teeth. It looks like human teeth, give or take a few extras.
Shut up! Patrick hisses at the part of his brain that stores an alarming amount of information about marine life. (That voice had actually been pretty loud when he decided to buy a boat and become a fisherman. Surprise surprise. At least one part of his brain is happy with this.)
“So I’m the first mermaid you’ve met?” the mermaid says. “I’m taking your mer-ginity? That’s cool.”
“Mermaids have a social concept of virginity?” Patrick says, shocked. “Do you guys have Christianity too?”
“Christians didn’t invent the concept of virginity,” the mermaid says disapprovingly. Patrick rolls his eyes. “Well, no, I’m just confused as to how you would arrive at that point. You’re a fish. Do you even have sex? Don’t you just spray your sperm all over the place and hope for the best? No penetration necessary?” He pauses. “Unless you have more of a clasper situation, which I guess-”
“Woah!” The mermaid wiggles his way out of the netting, flopping onto the deck with a crunch . Patrick winces, but he seems unbothered. “Take me out to dinner first. Maybe then you can take a look at my clasper situation.” He winks at Patrick, but his eyelids are clear. It’s extremely disconcerting. That doesn’t stop Patrick from blushing. The stories about mermaid sex appeal were true.
“Never mind! I’m sorry for bringing up the claspers. I have more important questions. Like, mermaids are real? and, MERMAIDS ARE REAL?!, and do you know what narwhal tusks are used for? Human scientists still don't know.”
“The only tusk you need to worry about is the one in my pants,” the mermaid says. Patrick scoffs. “You’re not wearing pants. Where do you get these lines?”
“Yeah, I read a lot of dime novels,” the mermaid says.
"Mermaid dime novels?”
“How would we make dime novels? It’s wet down there. It’s the ocean.”
“How does a mermaid get his hands on a dime novel?”
“I have my ways.” The mermaid props himself up so he’s sitting upright. “Anyways, what’s your name? I’m Pete.”
“Pete? Really?” Patrick says, disappointed despite himself. “Not anything more, unusual maybe?”
“Oh, god, you're not a mermaid chaser are you? Because if you are, I’m tossing myself right back overboard. I’m sorry I’m not exotic enough for you…”
“Wait, that’s not what I meant!” Patrick waves his hands frantically. “I was thinking about whale noises! Honestly!”
Pete looks at him consideringly. “If you say so. What’s your name then? I never caught it.”
“Patrick.”
“Hey, we match! Two p's,” Pete says happily, clapping his hands together wetly. “So what brings you out here, Patrick?”
“I’m fishing,” Patrick says. “What else is there to do in the middle of the ocean? No offense,” he adds, because he imagines mermaids do stuff other than fish. Underwater kickball? Wait, you need legs for that. Damn. He’s bad at this.
“None taken. The ocean can get boring sometimes. Why do you think I was hanging around your boat?” Pete says. Patrick gasps. “You were swimming by my boat on purpose? That’s so dangerous! What if I decided to speed up suddenly, and you got caught in the motor? You could have gotten seriously hurt!”
“I appreciate it, but I’m not a manatee, I have brains-”
A violent squawking erupts from the other side of the boat. Patricks whips his head to the side just in time to see Frito fly out of the cabin and latch onto Pete’s face, pecking madly at him. Pete screams, flailing around on the deck.
“Frito, no!” Patrick shouts. “You’ll hurt yourself again! And the hot mermaid!”
Frito ignores him, flapping aggressively at Pete’s face. Pete’s tail thrashes around, whipping into the crates and rope tossed on the deck. The wood splinters and cracks, water sloshes off Pete, and Patrick watches, panicked.
“Stop fighting!” he cries, jumping forward and grabbing hold of Frito. He pulls him off Pete, enduring the wings beating his hands, and flops back into the deck, panting. He sets Frito on his chest, patting his head. “Pete’s cool. Pete’s the first human-shaped thing I’ve talked to in months. Let’s not antagonize Pete, ok?”
Frito looks at Pete with narrowed eyes. Pete glares back. Finally, after several seconds of prolonged staring, Frito chirps. Pete blinks.
“Wait, really?”
“Squawk!”
“Woah man, I’m sorry about that.”
“Squaa.…”
"Sounds rough. I think I know a guy. I’ll try and hook you up, ok?”
“Ark!”
Frito hops out of Parick’s hands and over to Pete. He sticks a webbed foot out and they exchange some sort of…handshake? Frito turns back to Patrick and nods in approval.
“What just happened?” Patrick asks.
“I’m a mermaid. We can talk to sea creatures. That includes seagulls - see, it’s in the name!”
“That makes as much sense as anything else,” Patrick mutters.
“Yeah, and by the way, his name is Joe. Not Frito.”
“You have a name?” Patrick blinks down at Frito - Joe? “Sorry. I had no idea.” As if he had any way of knowing in the first place.
Joe makes a sort of shrugging motion and bumps his head against Patrick’s chin. Patrick supposes this means he's forgiven.
“Also he’s - well, I’ll let him tell you when he’s ready,” Pete adds, trailing off when Joe raises his wings threateningly at him.
Patrick frowns. His seagull has been keeping something from his? His life is sad. Really sad.
“Anyways,” Pete says. “I didn’t come up here to talk to the seagull. I came here to talk to you.”
“You didn’t come up here, I caught you,” Patrick says. “Also, why? You probably see hundreds of boats come through here. Mine isn’t that interesting.”
“Mermaids have really good hearing. I’ve been hearing things. Patrick, if I didn’t know any better, I’d think you had a siren stowed away on this little boat.”
Patrick laughs. “So you think the motor of a borderline-antique fishing vessel sounds like siren song? Mermaids are so interesting!”
Pete frowns. “I’m not talking about the motor. And I’m not talking about the rigging, the nets, or the trawls. I’m talking about the voice.”
Patrick reaches over and pats Pete on the head. “Are you sure you're not just hearing voices…up here?”
Pete puts his hand on top of Patrick’s and lifts it off his head, clasping it between both of his own. He’s cool to the touch, still slightly wet from seawater, and his hands are rough from the scales dotted across his skin. They’re not like any hands Patrick’s ever held before. Pete looks right into Patrick’s eyes. Patrick feels himself blushing. He thinks the weeks at sea are getting to him.
“Patrick. C’mon. The voice I’ve been hearing? It’s you. Obviously. Don’t play stupid with me.”
Patrick scoffs. “I wouldn’t classify mediocre piano playing and substandard warbling as siren song, but if that’s what makes you happy, who am I to stop you?”
Pete stares at him. He looks at Joe. “Is this guy for real?”
Joe does an impressive job of rolling his eyes for a seagull, and Patrick feels like the unfortunate protagonist of a children’s movie. Pete the mermaid is still holding his hand. Patrick’s traitorous, touch-starved psyche tries not to find this the most exciting thing that’s happened in months.
“If that’s what you want to believe, I won’t stop you,” he defers. Pete sighs. “Patrick. Patrick. You’re lucky. If you weren’t the cutest fisherman on this side of the Atlantic, I’d probably be gone. Poof! Into the ocean!”
“You think I’m cute?” Patrick says.
“I feel like I said that already. Didn’t I say that already?” Pete asks Joe. He hops away, don’t get me involved in this clearly communicated. “I wouldn’t break mermaid law to see you if you weren’t cute.”
Patrick’s heart stops. “You’re breaking a mermaid law right now? For me? Are you going to be in danger? Am I gonna have to keep you in a cooler? A bathtub? I don’t have a bathtub!”
"Chill! I was joking!” Pete says, nuzzling Patrick’s face with his own. “We don’t have laws like that. Why do you think there are so many mermaid movies?”
Patrick frowns. “I don’t appreciate that! I was worried for you! The last thing I want to happen to the hot mermaid I just met is the death penalty!”
Pete sighs dreamily. “You think I’m hot too? This is the greatest day of my life.”
“I worry for you,” Patrick says. “Is everything ok at home?”
“It’ll be better, once I take you to meet my folks. They’ll be so happy I’ve found a respectable young man.”
“I’m not scuba certified. I doubt that will happen.”
“Just wait.” Pete leans forwards, and presses his lips to Patrick’s temple. An electric zing goes through him, and he gasps. Pete grins smugly. “See? Mermaid magic.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? You didn’t say magic was involved until just now,” Patrick groans. Pete frowns at him disapprovingly. “I’m a mermaid. Obviously magic is involved.”
“That’s not obvious. Maybe it’s just biological or something. Maybe you’re just a weird whale. How would I know that?”
“I’m going to ignore the extremely offensive things you’ve said to me. Look, if a mermaid and a human are soulmates, then mermaid magic will let me grow legs and walk the earth! And I guess you would get a mermaid tail too. If you wanted.”
“Soulmates are real too?” Patrick tugs at his hair, distressed. “This is too much. I was an atheist thirty minutes ago.”
“I’m an atheist too!”
Patrick stops having a crisis to stare at Pete. “You’re a magical mermaid. Is that even allowed?”
Pete shrugs. “Nothing’s happened to me yet. Look, I’m not saying you’re definitely my soulmate, I’m just saying, why don’t you stick with me and find out, huh?”
Patrick squints at Pete. “You’re being very unclear about this whole ‘mermaid magic’ thing.”
Pete waves a hand. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll give you some real magic. Look here.” Pete digs a claw into his tail. Patrick winces, and then Pete’s pulling a scale away from himself and offering it to Patrick. “There. You could use this to make a lot of crazy potions and elixirs and stuff. Please don’t do that. Consider it a token of my affection!”
“Token? That’s surprisingly archaic,” Patrick says to cover up the fact that he’s actually touched. Pete’s scale is pretty, the size of his palm. Patrick wonders what he’s going to do with it. Still, he smiles at Pete. “Here. You can have this,” he says, tugging his brown cap off his head and offering it to Pete. It doesn’t feel equivalent in value at all, but Pete’s eyes light up nonetheless. “Patrick! Of course! I accept this gift!”
The way he says it makes Patrick think he may have locked himself into something more serious than he logically should have, but at this point, he doesn’t care. Let him get cursed by weird mermaid magic. If he gets to see Pete again, he’ll count it as a win. Pete plops the hat onto his head, squishing his curls down. He beams at Patrick. Patrick’s helpless to resist. He smiles back.
Suddenly, Pete whips his head around, head tilted as he listens to a frequency Patrick can’t discern. “Oof. Sorry. I have to go now. Band practice.”
“You have…band practice?” Patrick says, vaguely shocked. He tries not to imagine a bunch of mermaids playing in a submerged garage, with fish hook septum piercings. It doesn’t work. He snorts a little.
“Yeah. I’m the turtle shell player. And the singer, I guess, but my vocals aren’t great. Watch this.” Pete opens his mouth and lets out an ear-splitting scream. Patrick winces. “That’s…how mermaids sing?”
Pete sighs forlornly. “No. That’s how I sing.”
“I see,” Patrick says, troubled. “I’m sure you’re great at…turtle shell?”
Pete shrugs. “I’m about average.”
“Then we’ll have to have a jam session,” Patrick says, not bothering to think about the logistics of that at all. Pete’s face splits into a grin. His tail starts wiggling. “It’s a date!” He lunges towards Patrick, pressing a wet kiss to his cheek. Then he’s flipping himself overboard, back to the ocean that he came from.
"Wait! When am I gonna see you again?" Patrick calls, but Pete's vanished. Patrick’s legs give out and he thumps down onto the wet deck. He looks at Joe. “What a day, huh?” he sighs, already wondering how long he's willing to stay in this patch of ocean to wait for Pete.
A loud crash makes him scream. He scrambles up, away from the figure that’s thrown themself onto Patrick’s boat. It’s…another mermaid? He pushes himself up to make eye contact with Patrick. He has yellowish scales and long spines that flow out of his orange-striped tail. He looks like…
“Woah. Lionfish,” Patrick mutters, awed. The mermaid nods at him. “Yep. Name’s Andy. Pete told me you’ve got a curse problem?”
Parick’s lips shape around the words ‘curse problem’ silently. He moves to tell Andy that he has no idea what he’s talking about, sorry, when Joe squawks and flutters down in front of him. Andy tilts his head consideringly, and he nods. “Right. I got this. Just stay still, ok?”
He makes a few odd gestures with his hands, humming, and then there’s a flash of flight and Joe the seagull is gone, replaced by a human man. He jumps and does a fist pump. “Yes! Yes! Andy! You saved my life, man! C’mere!” He bundles Andy up into a hug, laughing. Andy smiles and pats his back. “Sure thing. That was a nasty curse you had.”
Patrick’s jaw is on the floor. “What the shit?” he says.
Joe turns around. “Oh, hey Patrick! So, I’m Joe. I was cursed to be a seagull by an evil sea witch. Yeah, it’s a long story. Thanks for taking care of me! Love you.” Joe makes a heart with his fingers.
Patrick closes his mouth. “Whatever. Like my day can get any weirder. Nice to meet you for real, Joe.”
“I gotta go now,” Andy says, slipping over the hull of the boat. "Band practice." He pauses to look over his shoulder at Patrick and Joe. “See you later.” He falls back into the water with a splash. Patrick and Joe race over to the railing to watch him disappear into the waves.
Patrick sighs. “This morning, I was wondering if I would eat biscuits or crackers for lunch. Now, I’m wondering if there’s any way to get a mermaid's number. I didn’t sign up for this.” He rubs his thumb over the scale and slips it into his pocket. At least he knows it wasn’t all a dream.
Joe nudges Patrick. “Look!”
Patrick looks. A few yards away, poking up out of the surf, is Pete. “Bye Patrick!” he calls. “I’ll see you tomorrow! Same time! Don’t go anywhere! Got it?”
Patrick stares. A grin splits his face without any say-so from his brain. He cups his hands around his mouth. “I’ll hold you to that!” he shouts back. Pete makes a high pitched clicking sound that’s…actually pretty grating, but also kind of cute, so who cares? They wave at each other, then Pete is disappearing beneath the surf once more. Patrick stares at the ripples in the water and sighs.
“You’ve got game, Patrick,” Joe whistles, impressed. Patrick elbows him. “Shut up. Do you know how to fish?”
“I know how to eat garbage and steal fries from babies?”
Patrick sighs. “Right. Well, first you need to…” he trails off as something in the water catches his eye. “Hey, why don’t you practice on that?”
Joe squints. “No way. What the heck is that doing here?”
Patrick shrugs, unspooling a roll of fishing line. He eyes the giant letter F knocking gently into the hull of his boat. “Let’s find out.”
He swears he sees something winking at him from under the waves. Patrick smiles. Tomorrow. Life at sea just got a lot more interesting.