Once they breached the bay’s protection, it was like a knife through cold butter.
Connor breathed in the sea spray and anchored himself to the steering wheel as a cold wind whipped at his hair, turning it into a tangled mess. Below him, the fishermen were talking, looking at their course, and opening a cooler packed with beer. Music started to play.
Connor grinned as Katy Perry’s voice came through a speaker next to him. He never figured they were the type. Apparently, they didn’t care about Connor’s presence in the slightest.
Dave came up the steep steps to Connor. He offered Connor a beer, which he took with the intention of doing little more than sipping for the evening. Not that it would get him drunk either way. A beer wouldn’t achieve what straight vodka couldn’t.
“Head up the north coast. There’s a bay of shallower waters we can lay anchor,” Dave directed him. He held on to the railing as Connor changed direction, bringing them closer to those grey clouds on the horizon. “You looking for a job?” Dave asked.
Connor remembered the job he’d secured in Malta for the summer. The one he was meant to go to with a group of guys from school. With Austin.
“You could help bring out tour groups during the summer,” Dave continued before Connor could say no. He forgot these men did that, too. Tours whenever they could manage to trick some tourists into thinking they would get a quality experience along the coast.
Connor paused for a moment. As often as he’d seen this trio, together or separate, starting stupid fights, throwing drinks and getting themselves kicked out of every establishment in the bay, he had never actually seen their boat close up.
“Is that what you have the sound system for?” Connor asked. And a decent engine that would offer a smoother ride for passengers.
“Mikey’s boy installed it,” Dave said.
How bizarre. “Even if I was looking, you’d do yourself no favours hiring me,” Connor said.
“Because of that fuss at school?” Dave snorted. “Not a bother, Connor. That’s the internet in outrage, not the real word. All most people care about is a pretty face to look at.” He clapped Connor’s shoulder. “Up here, come to a stop opposite that rock jutting out from the shore.” Dave left him, going down the stairs to join his… friends?
Connor parked the boat where he said, and Dave threw out the anchor. Connor turned the key, killing the engine, and the hum went quiet. He listened to waves lapping against the side of the boat, the breeze, and the seagulls in the distance. Connor tipped up his face; grey clouds blanketed the skies above.
Connor set the beer next to the wheel and walked to the railing, examining the water. They were too far from shore to see the bottom, and he couldn’t see anything in the deep murky blue. It looked cold. And as the ocean always did, it also looked strangely inviting.
Connor sat next to the railing. He tipped his face up as rain began to fall from the sky.
*
Connor borrowed Dave’s phone to text his mom when it became clear they wouldn’t return to shore before six. It didn’t bother him, but he didn’t want Edith to know he’d skipped on the lab for the day. Obviously, he didn’t tell her the truth, only that he was spending the night at his dad’s house. She was probably delighted to be rid of him for the evening. She and Nick could do a happy dance together.
Connor was soaked to the skin. It was only a light drizzle falling, but a persistent drizzle that lasted hours had the same effect as a brief, hard downpour.
The three men played cards at a table set up in the middle of the deck. The cards were laminated, though the men were as drenched as Connor. None wore any jackets or hats, and with water saturating their hair and trailing down their skin, they somehow seemed otherworldly.
The rain didn’t bother Connor, in fact helikedbeing so utterly drenched like this, but he wasn’t an older guy with glaring health problems.
“Want to join in, boy?” one of them asked. Connor didn’t know if it was Mikey or the third whose name he didn’t know. They all looked at Connor, eyes sharper than they ought to be after the number of beers Connor watched them consume. He shivered at their attention, feeling that there was more than simple fishermen staring at him.
“I’m good,” Connor said.
Dave’s smile was sharp. They turned their attention back to their game and Connor was forgotten in seconds.
He approached the edge of the deck and leaned against the railing. Connor stared at the water, trying once more to see beneath the darkness of the waves. It was impossible now, of course. The sky had darkened, and more light came from the lamps than from the sky. He reached out, his fingertips threading water. His body temperature was already lowered by the rain, so the cold of the ocean didn’t bother him.
The water next to his hand rippled. First beneath his fingertips and then a larger ripple next to his hand.
A face rose from the water.
Connor’s heart stopped.
With his sharp cheekbones and piercing blue eyes, his merman gazed up at Connor from the ocean. The tops of his shoulders breached the water line, and he flattened his hands against the side of the boat. His short hair, a dark blonde, weighed down against his face, his forehead covered.Dark blonde, not the black I’d thought before.
Connor froze, staring at the creature. The lamp at the side of the boat reflected off his face, giving his skin a blueish glow. He studied Connor, examining him with what could have been curiosity, but that was a big guess on Connor’s part. He had no way of knowing if mermen’s expressions were like people’s at all or simply looked the same occasionally.
Waves lapped against the merman.
