What the Water Gave Me

Chapter Thirty-Six

They’d been swimming for hours and Steve still hadn’t spotted anywhere good to rest for the night. The whiteboard in his face every few minutes didn’t help. He certainly wasn’t near where he used to be and he realized after a while that he really was using the siren as a bodyguard. With him next to Steve, Steve could go anywhere he wanted without worry. He was like insurance. Nothing would dare attack Steve with weird whiteboard siren doing his far too energetic circles around him.

Well, whatever, Steve thought. I guess I’m not gonna complain. Not too much, at least.

That’s when a small cave caught his eye and Steve felt relief wash over him. Finally!! A place to stop and sit down! He swam towards it with renewed vigor, but before he could go in, the siren blocked the entrance and held his arms out. Steve peered over his shoulder at what looked like a perfectly fine place to stop.

“No, wait,” the siren wrote quickly. “I just decided caves are a bad idea and I don’t want to take you in here.”

Steve gave him an annoyed face. Take me in there? Steve thought. You aren’t ‘taking’ me anywhere, I picked this spot.

“They’re dangerous!” The siren wrote. “These things cave in all the time, you know.”

This is stupid, Steve thought, and he started to try and push past the siren, but he was shoved back. He glared and took the board.

“I just want to lay down for a few hours!!” He wrote angrily. “What’s wrong with this cave?”

“Unsafe,” the siren wrote back.

“Liar,” Steve replied and then the siren’s expression hardened.

“You aren’t going in here period,” he wrote.

“Then what am I supposed to do?” Steve wrote and threw his hands up.

“You could sleep here, just right here,” the siren said, pointing down at the sand below them. “I’ll stay up and watch out for you.”

“And I just trust you?” Steve asked and the siren bit down gently on his bottom lip with sharp, pointed teeth, and nodded a little.

“Bodyguard, remember?” He wrote slowly and Steve rolled his eyes.

But really… What else was he supposed to do? Steve glance down and eyed the sand. If a siren didn’t want him going into a cave, then there was nothing he could do about it, and he wasn’t going to die on this proverbial hill.

Giving up, Steve sunk down to the sand and curled himself up tightly beside the rock at the mouth of the cave.

After a second of thought, he reached up for the board and the siren passed it down to him.

“Are you going to drag me back to that rock?” He asked and the siren sunk down next to him in the sand. He watched his shoulders rise and fall and then he shook his head. “Why not? You seemed to like keeping me helpless.”

The siren took the board now.

“No, it wasn’t like that,” he wrote. “Please, don’t think that.”

What else am I supposed to think? Steve thought spitefully.

“I felt bad about it, I did,” the siren continued. “But I told you before, I was just at a loss. You would have left me otherwise. And I’m sorry. Really, Steve.” The siren looked up at him and held his eyes. “Really. I’m sorry.” Steve let out a fast breath of water. He wasn’t sure he was ready to forgive just yet. The siren went on. “I don’t want to make you feel like you have to escape from me. I don’t want you to be a prisoner. I want you to be my friend.”

Steve took the board now and glared at the siren.

“You really don’t know how to make friends,” he wrote angrily. “Tip number one is don’t fricking beach them and keep them captive and cram some story about humans down their throats.”

The siren gazed at him sheepishly. He took the board back now slowly.

“You can’t tell me you would have just willingly stopped and talked to me, though,” the siren wrote. “I didn’t have much of a choice. You already thought I was a monster. I had to make you listen.”

Steve ground his teeth back and forth.

“Maybe you’re right,” he wrote back. “But maybe you should also take into consideration other people’s feelings. Maybe I didn’t want to listen. Maybe what I want is just as important as what you want and you can’t just force yourself on me like that and expect me to just thank you later.”

When the siren read this, he put his face in his hands and sat there for a few minutes, ashamed, until Steve prodded him again with the board.

“You wanna apologize one more time?” He’d written.

“I guess made a pretty bad first impression,” he responded.

You think? Steve thought.

“It’s hard remembering that this is your first impression,” the siren continued, his shoulders slumping. “It’s hard remembering that you don’t love me anymore.”

Steve frowned at him. Oh, boo hoo. Cry me an ocean.

“But I’m sorry,” the siren finished. He looked up at Steve. “I’m really, truly, sorry. I didn’t have the right to make you listen.”

Steve took the board back one more time, feeling his eyes begin to droop with exhaustion. “You’re damn right,” he wrote. “And don’t think you’re off the hook yet because this conversation isn’t over and I’m not finished with you. When I wake up tomorrow, you better be right here wide awake because I’m gonna rip you a new one.”

The siren smiled weakly and gave him a crisp salute. Steve relaxed onto the sand and shot the siren a warning glare before closing his eyes and falling into a really well-needed rest.

He dreamed about having legs, but he didn’t remember it when he woke up.