Chapter Text
There are not many people who understand the might of water. They see an expanse of mesmerizing waves, being puppeteered by the moon. They feel a relieving splash of it on sun-warmed skin. They are lulled to sleep by the sound of it lapping against the shore. Each of these moments speak to the water within ourselves. It guides us to moments of serenity.
But there’s chaos in it as well; unpredictable and relentless.
At ten years old, Henry is changed forever when the serenity and chaos of the Mediterranean Sea saves his life.
____
Alex has been swimming in aimless circles attempting to burn off his excited energy for about fifteen minutes. Since he woke up this morning, his belly has been doing little flips while he waits in anticipation for his favorite day of the year. The trick with flips and spins is to fix your gaze in a certain point and always come back to it after spinning. Alex has become something of an expert.
“Will you stop that? You’re making me dizzy just looking at you!” June calls out from where she is perched on an algae covered bolder, examining her fingernails in boredom.
Alex huffs, letting out a burst of bubbles. He stops his circles and lets his body float down slowly to rest next to his sister.
“I’m just excited is all.” Alex whines.
He plucks a piece of seagrass and tickles June by the underarm with the tip. Caught off guard, she screeches and launches her body into a flip, her iridescent pink tail sparkling with the movement. Alex always finds himself staring at his sister’s tail. Sometimes he feels jealous of how pretty it is, parts of it are so light pink they’re almost see through.
“Alex!” June shouts when she spots him with the offending piece of seagrass. “Ugh, you’re so annoying!”
“Funny that you only started finding me annoying since you turned thirteen. Remember when you used to be fun?” Alex goads. “I bet you’re not even coming to see the sparks later.”
She shoots him a dirty look, which means Alex is right. She crosses her arms across her chest defensively.
“I’m going with my friends. I’m not a guppy anymore, unlike you.”
Alex’s Dad always says that June gets her sass from their Mother. Alex gets his indignance from her. He feels his ears go hot. Sure, he may only be ten years old, but he isn’t a little kid anymore. He’s sick of his sister making him feel less, just because he’s younger.
Alex’s dark eyebrows are drawn together in anger and his jaw is clenched.
“I am not a guppy.” He grits out, his tail rising slowly and whipping down in anger.
She swims teasing circles around him, her dark hair flowing freely behind her. “I don’t know, that sounds like something a guppy would say.”
If he’s one thing, he’s as stubborn as a sea goat. He’d do almost anything to prove a point.
“Yeah? Well, Mom and Dad said I can go all by myself this year!”
June scoffs in disbelief, “I’ll believe that when I see it, little bro. Have fun tonight!”
Alex is left there, seething, watching his sister’s retreating form as she swims away from him and towards the anemone field where her best friend, Nora, lives.
The thing is, Alex lied.
Their parents never told him he could go to the sparks by himself. Usually he looks forward to going with them every year. It’s been tradition for as long as he can remember, to go and watch the colorful explosions together as a family. A new year. A fresh start. An unlimited stretch of possibilities before them. It’s a hopeful time of year.
Except June becoming a teenager seems to mean that those simple times are probably over.
Alex is having a hard time accepting that.
The blue bulbous lamps of glowing algae are beginning to bloom as the water becomes darker, night quickly approaching. Alex hates when it gets dark fast. It cuts his time to explore in half. He prefers the warm whirlpools of summer, with the endless sunshine.
He follows the trail home, using the time to come up with a decent enough excuse to use on his parents. He wants to prove to June that he’s not just an annoying little brother. He can be cool and adventurous. She’ll be begging to hang out with him eventually. He just has to be better.
Alex pauses outside the door to their house, hand braced on the handle. He can hear his parents arguing inside. They’ve been doing that a lot lately. He can’t figure out what they’re fighting about though. For some reason, he has the sinking feeling it’s about him… He’s been trying his best to make himself smaller, less of a nuisance.
He takes a deep breath and pushes the door open, “Hi! It’s just me!” He hollers, hoping it’ll interrupt their fight. “I’m grabbing my stuff and meeting Liam at the sparks!”
The lie rolls off the tongue easily. His parents, being so wrapped up in whatever secret turmoil they’re stewing in, don’t even know that Liam is away visiting the Adriatic Sea with his family for the new year.
“Have fun!” His dad shouts back.
“Be safe!” His mom adds.
They don’t even attempt to convince Alex that they’d prefer to go as a family. They’re probably secretly relieved they won’t have to pretend everything is fine for his sake.
He puts his head through the loop of his farlooker and lets it rest against his chest. He’ll need it if he wants to do a little bit of spying on the townsfolk at their parties or the rich humans on their boats.
“I will! See you later.” He closes the door behind him and takes off towards the surface.
Alex can’t deny that he is a little upset. He looks forward to this day every year and everything seems to be falling apart around him. It’s hard to focus on fun when your older sister thinks you’re annoying, your best (only) friend is away, and your parents are fighting. He digs deep, trying to find that carefree mindset he had growing up. He does an experimental flip, going head over tail, catching glimpses of the red and blue shining with the silver of the moon. Admittedly, it does make him feel a little better. He proceeds to flip and spin his way all the way to the surface.
When he breaks through the water his head is spinning just a little and his belly is roiling. A childish giggle escapes him as he takes in the crisp salty air. All of his problems remain below the surface. Alex once heard a phrase— out of sight, out of mind. He decides that will be his approach to tonight.
Alex props himself on a protruding rock that allows his tail to stay in the water but gives him a better view of the impending show. Some sailboats bob in the water, anchored and waiting, many of them will set off their own sparks. People on the nice boats usually have money, which means they buy the brightest and most colorful sparks and set them off from their boats.
“Let’s see.” Alex says to himself, raising his farlooker up to his eyes. He turns the wheel with his pointer finger, slowly adjusting the focus until the coast comes in clear as if Alex were close, not in the middle of the sea. “We got anything good tonight?”
He lazily moves his tail in the water, enjoying the ticklish feeling of it rippling around the movement.
“Lots of people this year.” He muses, watching the people dance on the shore in the light of something called a bonfire. Humans loved them, especially on beaches at night. Alex can understand why. They seem pretty fun.
He moves on to spy on a bigger sailboat, the only one that’s adventured far out into the sea. He adjusts the focus on the longlooker since the boat is much closer to him than the people on the sand. Alex can hear music floating on the breeze. He flicks his tail, keeping time with the beat. He doesn’t know the song, doesn’t know any human songs actually, but he attempts to hum along anyway.
There’s a family on the deck, a man and what looks like his oldest son, are setting up the sparks. They’re bent over the set up and smirking at each other conspiratorially, the dad clearly teaching the son the proper way. He pans over to a younger boy and girl whose arms are linked as they spin around, dancing to the music. The girl’s long red hair is fanned out around her as they continue their dizzying romp. The boy is around his age, all wild blonde hair, curled slightly at the ends from the salty air, and a gleeful smile that makes Alex want to smile. He feels something weird flicker in his chest as he lingers on, watching the boy. He looked like how sunshine felt.
Alex wonders if he would look that happy if he learned to dance.
He hears the echo of people counting down from ten on the shore, but he can’t take his eyes off of the boy. He’s never experienced the sparks through a human’s eye before.
Alex had always been curious about humans.
Three.
Did they see things the same way? The world in all its vibrancy.
Two.
Did their emotions, happy or sad, bring them to tears the way Alex’s can’t?
One.
Were there people who captured their curiosity, mimicking the pull of the moon on the tide? Could they ever feel that for him?
Boom!
A series of explosions light up the sky, in turn, illuminating the boy’s face with hues of red and blue, the colors similar to Alex’s own tail. He’s never cared for his tail, but the vision of the boy doused in those shades makes him reconsider.
The boy and his sister jump up and down with excitement, pointing to the sky and shouting things Alex can’t hear. He can’t help the smile that comes to his own face as he watches the happy human family celebrate with kisses and hugs.
Alex looks up as more sparks fill the inky night sky. He can’t quite explain the feeling he gets when he watches them cast out a net of colorful sparkles and slowly twinkle back down to nothing, but it makes his insides hum.
A gust of wind makes little cold bumps rise on his exposed skin. He drops his longlooker to his chest and rubs his arms with his hands. It’s colder and windier than most years, especially for the Mediterranean Sea. He hardly noticed the humans bundled in thick looking clothes. He sticks his hand back into the water and relishes in how warm it feels compared to the air.
Alex decides to head home.
He turns to take one last glance at the perfect, happy family and the blonde boy who so fascinates him. But the screams and explosions ring out before he can see what’s happened.
“Oh seashells!” He curses.
Alex is frozen in place, too shocked to do anything besides stare in horror. The boat is engulfed in flames, sparks going off every which way. The wind is licking the flames higher, catching onto the fabric of the sails. Alex has never seen a boat fire before, only heard of how dangerous they can be.
He dives into the water towards the soon to be wreckage. There was no way Alex would leave that innocent family to die. There has to be something he can do.
The closer he gets to the ship the hotter the water gets. Everything around him is tinged amber in a way he’s never seen before. Pieces of the ship begin breaking through the surface with loud dunking echoes and a cascade of bubbles following after each piece.
“Alex!” He hears June scream from somewhere behind him. “Watch out!”
He chances a glance up to see the mast, broken in half, all jagged edges, coming straight for him. Alex attempts to speed up and spin out if the way completely but miscalculates.
He cries out in pain as the wood pierces through the flesh of his right shoulder. For just a moment, his vision goes white but he continues barreling forward. The wound is pulsing, blood trailing behind him. Something breaks through the surface, different and smaller than the ship parts.
It’s the little girl.
She’s flailing and screaming in the water, streams of bubbles coming from her open mouth.
“I’ve got her! You guys keep going!” Nora shouts from behind.
June is at his side now, her size and strength outweighing Alex. He is silently thankful because he can feel himself slowing down. They break through the surface and the world above is utter chaos. Up close, Alex is almost deafened by the roar of the fire. The only thing he can hear over it is the shouting of the man on the deck, the father of the children.
“Help us, please!” He begs from the railing.
He’s holding the limp form of the youngest boy in his arms. The oldest boy is clinging to his mother’s sleeve, on his way to also losing consciousness.
“The children can’t swim! They’ve taken in too much smoke!” The father warns.
“Drop him down and I’ll bring him to shore!” Alex calls up.
“Alex, your shoulder.” June hisses in warning.
He pushes all the pain to the back of his mind, locking it in a secret corner, he allows his adrenaline to take over.
“I’ve got this.” He reassures June. “You take the other son.”
June nods sharply, eyes determined.
“I’ll dive under to catch him better. Whenever you’re ready!” Alex instructs the stranger.
He submerges himself again and takes a shaky breath in. In his peripheral vision he can see how the water around him is steadily turning crimson. Alex doesn’t have time to worry because the boy breaks through the surface, completely still, eyes closed, sinking down like an anchor, into Alex’s open arms. He swims up as fast as he can so the boy doesn’t take any water into his lungs. Once they’re safely above, Alex maneuvers him so that the boy's arms are around his neck, his chest pressed to Alex’s back.
“Argh!” He grits out when the dead weight of the boy’s elbow digs deep into the wound on his shoulder.
To Alex’s relief, they’re approaching the shore, even though his speed has grown sluggish. He lets the tide drag their bodies the rest of the way in. There’s a crowd of humans awaiting their arrival. The humans know Alex’s kind exists, but merfolk don’t like to make a habit of exposing themselves this way unless it’s dire.
Alex uses his last bit of strength to flip the boy onto his back.
“Hey!” Alex smacks the boy's face lightly, attempting to stir him. “Wake up. C’mon, wake up. You can’t die now, you’ll make me look bad!”
A low groan escapes the stranger, “Huh?”
The people are swarming around them in a tight circle. Alex’s breath begins to quicken as the adrenaline fades from his body.
“Tha’s a bad joke, Pip.” The boy’s voice is raspy and quiet from the smoke. His lashes flutter as he slowly blinks open to reveal eyes as blue as a summer sea. His brows draw together in curiosity, head tilted to the side.
The edges of Alex’s vision begin to blur and fade. There’s flashing blue and red lights reflecting across the sky.
The sparks look different…
He feels so confused. He wonders how much blood he’s lost. If Alex had to guess, he’d say a lot.
“You’re not Pip…” The boy’s words are warped and syrupy to Alex’s ears, before Alex’s whole world goes dark.
“Alex?!” June screams as she comes ashore. “No, no, no, no!” The words are a litany that turns to a wail.
The rescued and safe family members she dragged to the beach are forgotten, her focus completely narrowed to Alex’s lifeless body supine on the sand, next to the blonde boy. The tide is lapping uselessly at the royal blue edged crimson of his fins, keeping him from turning human, even though he’s out of the water.
“‘S he okay?” The boy asks June weakly.
Her words get stuck in her throat.
Is he okay?
And that’s the thing, she doesn’t know if he’s okay. All she knows is that her baby brother is hurt, a gaping, angry wound marring the map of his body, and he needs her.
“Let me help.”
The boy is on his hands and knees tugging Alex closer to June so she can get him home and get the medicine man.
“Thank you, thank you!” June grabs hold of Alex and brings him close. She takes solace in the feeling of his deep breathing against her chest. He was hurt but he was alive, and that’s all that matters to her.
As she turns to dive below the boy clears his throat. His parents are standing with other humans who are bundling him in a shiny silver blanket.
“Tell him,” he bursts into a coughing fit, “tell him I say thank you, that Henry says thank you.”