Thirty Nine Minutes (COMPLETE)

Chapter Thirteen: Swimming in Coffee

The smell of coffee made its gentle way into Helen's nostrils, and roused her from the cotton wool currently plugged into her brain as a result of the copious alcohol she'd shared last night…

Shared with Neil. Helen sat up from the couch and peered into the kitchen, feeling and looking every part like a guilty teenager. Neil stood with his back to her, wiping down the counter with a cloth.

This was her home. What was Neil doing cleaning her kitchen? She watched him for a second or two before he inevitably turned around and discovered her. He had already turned on the coffee maker and was naked from the waist up. Helen flushed at the sight of his toned back.

A half naked Neil sent her synapses firing. Had the atmosphere and booze got the better of them? Memories of the night before were fuzzy, but Helen was pretty sure things had remained chaste.

Pretty sure, anyway. There was a good way to find out. She shuffled into the kitchen.

"Good morning!" chirruped Neil. "Coffee? Where do you keep your cups?"

"Left cupboard." She filled a tumbler with water and began hunting for the aspirin. "Say, Neil? Did we, you know, get up to anything last night?"

"Are you kidding me? Far too drunk to even try. We both crashed pretty damn early." He grinned and shrugged, his eyes baggy but inexplicably twinkling in spite of his tired expression. "Besides," he continued, "I assumed your interests were, you know, elsewhere."

The insinuation was practically palpable, and Helen rolled her eyes. "My interests are noble, I assure you," she chided.

"I'm not sure his are." He smirked and continued pouring coffee. Helen couldn't deny it, Craig was becoming something of a common occurrence in her thought processes. Her own feelings towards him were getting a little complicated. She hadn't seen him for weeks, but that didn't stop how she felt in her heart. It had already sprouted and constricted the flow of rational thought. She couldn't lie to herself or indeed to Neil much longer.

Neil sat beside her, resting one ankle on his knee and leaning back into the plush cushions. He was still bare chested, and also, she noticed, bare footed. She bit her lip. "So, what's the plan?" she asked him.

"I can get your passport ready by Thursday. Craig will be transported next week via private jet. Let me write down the itinerary for you, but it's on you to organize your own transportation. You ever been to Italy?"

"I've never even left the country before." Helen hadn't done much of anything before, and thought herself happy and content before a half cetacean man came barreling into her life. It had sparked something in her. Adventure perhaps, or excitement, maybe even magic.

Helen always had believed in magic. Since she was small, and her mom had confided in her at bedtime of all the creatures yet to be discovered by humans, Helen had lay awake at night, imagining just what she too could discover. Perhaps now she was being offered that chance.

"I'll book my flight tomorrow."

"Good," said Neil, "here, for expenses." He reached into his jacket pocket and uncovered a rather bulky money clip. Helen took it, wondering whether or not to enquire about its origins.

The days dragged on and on. Neil came round only one more time to drop off her passport and show her a picture of Craig taken at waist height. It was clear the security had been beefed up considerably around him. The picture was blurred, and was mostly just a silhouette, but it had sent her heart spiking regardless. Only when the curtains were drawn would she take it out from the bottom drawer, imagining being back in that large space beside his tank, or dangling her legs into the water as he swam somewhat absently around her. Helen missed the smell of chlorine and the coffee; an unusual but comforting cocktail.

The night before she travelled, sleep failed to come. Helen stared up at the ceiling, at the crack in the plaster her landlord had promised to patch up eight months ago. She scrunched her eyes shut, but to no avail. She huffed and threw herself out of bed. Coffee.

The coffee dripped slowly and deliberately into the bottom as Helen repacked her suitcase, deciding which was the most efficient way to fold her clothes. It was monotonous, tedious, but it kept her brain distracted at least. As she rolled up one of her blouses for the third time, the image of Craig in his tank came to her once again. An unbidden knot tangled in her throat, unable to be swallowed.

*****

The tank was small.

Craig had pressed himself into a corner, terrified of the black water beneath his body, and rapped against the canvas top, but it fell on deaf ears. All he could hear was an undulating rumble that surrounded him and rippled through the cold water. The temperature had plummeted and he'd been supplied with nothing to protect himself with, just four glass walls surrounded by darkness. They hadn't even provided him with a light.

Mr. Kotohiki had been even colder than usual. No one came to talk at all anymore. Rebecca hadn't even brought him coffee. Life had become hellish, and then they were surprised when he had retaliated? Humans didn't make any sense to him.

Except for Helen. She had shown him a different side of people. She had spoken to him like she did to anyone. At the thought, his tail rushed with pins and needles and he pushed once again against the thick fabric roof of his tank. "Let me out!" he called, but no one answered. He just wanted to know where they were going, or even where he was. His only bluff at acting stubborn had been called, and now no one spoke to him directly at all anymore. He had never felt so powerless before, and it was only in hindsight had he realised just how at other people's whim he was. It was now normal practice to attach weights to him and drag him into the depths of the diving pool, strapping the breathing apparel to his face if he started to panic. Nothing was his choice anymore.

He pressed himself back into the corner, fighting back tears and anger. "Help me," he whimpered through gritted teeth. "Please, someone. Get me out of here."