#beck fluff | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

noramoons · 11 months ago

Text

what lies beneath | k.hj

pairing: kim hongjoong x g/n reader

genre: siren au, artist!reader

includes: angst, some fluff

rating: T/13+

warnings: language, slight horror themes, mentions/descriptions of food, Family Issues as a plot point (💀)

word count: 13.5k

summary: there’s a pair of eyes blinking up at you from below the pier. you think you know who (or what, really) they belong to—but you might be too afraid to admit it.

You had been sure of several things before you spent the summer at the beach with your cousins.

One, that you were not an "outside" person. You couldn't stand fishing, you hated lying underneath the sun to tan—you could swim well enough, you supposed, to keep yourself afloat—but that was it.

Two, that there was nothing more embarrassing than being a tourist in a town you'd practically grown up in.

And three, that sea monsters of any kind were absolutely, completely, 100% fictional.

It was fun to pretend as a child, sure—you remember plenty of summers playing in the ocean with your friends, or listening to your uncle tell scary stories to you and your siblings about the creatures he'd seen in his time in the navy or deep-sea fishing—but that was it. Pretending. You knew that just as well as the rest of them did.

Which is why it's now somewhat embarrassing to be back here—spending yet another summer with your extended family, and now seeing your younger cousins now running up and down the side of your uncle's small pontoon boat. "Fish-man!" one of them cries out, pointing towards the water. "I saw it! I swear!"

The other one nods. "He was huge!"

Your uncle laughs from the wheel behind you. "I bet he was! I always heard they like to catch the sides of the waves the boats make for speed—can't get too close, though, or they'll get chomped by the propellers!" He makes a chomping gesture by opening and closing his fist, and your cousins giggle.

"You heard?" you ask, turning around from the seat near the bow. "I thought you always said you'd seen those fish-men with your own two eyes back in the day, Uncle."

He smirks at you. "Those were the deep-sea days. I've never seen any creatures this close to shore, but who knows?" he shrugs, winning at you. "Maybe we'll get lucky."

Right. You resist the urge to roll your eyes as you turn back around, the spray of the saltwater coming up on either side refreshing enough to distract you from the stories your cousins are now hurriedly making up behind you.

The rest of the day is decidedly less painful; your uncle is considerate enough to let you stay on the boat when he anchors it on a nearby island, so you're able to at least attempt relaxing while your cousins run amuck on the shore. By the time you're finally pulling back in to the dock behind your uncle's house on the bay, you can already see the hues of pink and orange growing in the sky as the sun begins its descent beneath the horizon.

Your cousins make a mad dash for the house once they're within leaping distance of the dock, and you let out an exasperated sigh when you realize it's just you and your uncle left on the boat. You know exactly what that means—all the work's been left to you.

He grins at you. "You remember how to tie her to the dock, don't you?" As if this hasn't been your job on-and-off for the last ten years.

You offer a faint smile in response, but you keep yourself from saying anything negative while you pull out the ropes from beneath the seats, tying them into the knots you know from memory around the poles on the dock. You don't want to complain in front of your uncle—he's never been anything less than kind to you, especially letting you stay at his house this summer out of nowhere when you told him you needed a place to stay for a while, even when it's been over five years since your last summer here. No questions asked, although you're sure he's curious.

You might tell him the truth. Eventually.

His voice suddenly interrupts the stream of thoughts in your mind. "If you've got it covered, I'm gonna head inside and start on dinner."

You nod absentmindedly, tucking the last rope into the beginning of its knot. "What are we eating?"

He smiles at you. "Guess you'd better hurry up and find out."

You roll your eyes at him, but in your sudden rush to finish the knot, you don't complete it nearly as tightly as you should—and you can already feel the boat drifting to one side from the loose knot.

You sigh at your own impatience, but you start the knot over again anyway, pulling on the other ropes to line the boat up with the side of the dock again before you start, checking the angle into the water to make sure it'll be as close to perfect as possible so you can hurry up and go inside, and it's then that you see it.

There's a face in the water—and it isn't yours.

No. You're seeing things. After a long day in the sun, you know it's not unheard of for your eyes to play tricks on you looking into the water. You draw your focus back to completing the knot, shaking the unusual thoughts out of your head of what you know you couldn't have possibly seen.

When the knot's finally complete, you cast your gaze into the water beside the boat one final time—and you realize, in stunned horror, that you'd been right before. There is a face, a face you can just barely see in the water as you peer over the edge of the dock—and it isn't your reflection. No, the angles of the jawline, the cheekbones, the chin are all far too sharp and precise to be yours. To be human.

He blinks up at you, far too innocently for someone—something that has been holding its breath underwater for at least the past five minutes.

You don't know how long the two of you stare at each other. It could be minutes, hours—you really aren't sure. You're finding yourself practically lost in the eyes of the being before you, dark and abysmal and inviting all at the same time—this, you imagine, must be what drowning feels like. Completely helpless.

It's then that you realize your ankles are touching the water. That's strange—you'd been sitting atop the dock just a moment ago. When did you get in the water?

You feel as if you've just awoken from a dream. You don't know how you've gotten here so suddenly, but you've definitely moved—you've turned around to face the dock, and your arms are the only thing keeping you above the water, your legs submerged up to your knees.

You quickly scramble back out of the water and heave your body back onto the dock, making sure all your limbs are still attached before staring back into the bay beneath you, looking for that face beneath the water again—but it's gone. Whatever it was has completely vanished, leaving nothing but the soft lapping of the waves against the shore in its wake.

Your mind races to find an explanation. You've been in the sun for hours. You must not have had much sleep last night. Your cousins are driving you insane and they've finally pushed you past the brink. One of those, surely, has to be the answer for whatever the hell you've just seen.

It's all you can think about during dinner—you hardly touch the clam chowder your uncle had prepared. He notices the small helping you've poured for yourself when you sit down at the table, and you see him frown out of the corner of your eye. "Feeling alright, Y/N?"

You nod quickly. Too quickly. "I'm fine. Think I might've been out in the sun for too long today—I'll probably just get some water after dinner and head to bed."

He nods, visibly relaxing at your words. "Ah. That certainly can happen—I saw far too many colleagues faint back in the day after a long shift. It's brutal, that sun. That reminds me of one particular instance, actually—couldn't have been less than twenty years ago, I'll bet, when..."

He launches into another fishing anecdote, much to the delight of your cousins, while you continue to mentally spiral for the duration of dinner, locked in your own thoughts and what you know you couldn't have possibly seen. Your behavior, however, means your uncle doesn't mind at all when you go up to your room early—and when night finally falls and everyone else has gone to bed, no one notices you creeping back downstairs, either.

You have to know. You'll never be able to go to sleep tonight if you can't confirm whatever the hell you saw in the water earlier.

Your stomach interrupts your thoughts, piercing the quiet living room with an unfortunate grumble.

"Shit," you swear softly to yourself. You're hungry—it's no wonder. You barely ate dinner, and you only picked at a few snacks on the boat earlier. It certainly won't assuage your fears if you scare away whatever that thing was if your stomach growls the minute you step outside.

You quickly grab the first thing your eyes land on out of the first shelf in the refrigator—an apple, before finally striding over to the door and making your way back outside as quietly and nimbly as you can.

You practically run back to the edge of the dock, peering into the inky blackness of the water illuminated simply by the moonlight, only to find your own reflection staring back at you. There's nothing.

And you want to be reassured by that fact. You had to have been seeing things earlier, then—a result of the afternoon spent under the blistering sun, doing things to your eyes and your mind, and yet—

You have to check. You'll just dip a toe in, maybe—you're already barefoot, anyway. Nothing bites at your toe when you do, sitting down at the edge of the dock and letting the waves lap at your skin.

Well. You suppose to be really sure, you'll have to get in the water. It feels much better now than it did earlier today, you think as you lower yourself in up to your waist, still holding onto the dock with one hand, apple in the other. You don't remember the water ever feeling this good—this inviting. You wonder what it would feel like to go all the way up to your neck. Maybe even to go all the way underwater, to feel it enveloping every inch.

That last thought particularly entices you, so you let go of the dock, holding your hand (and the apple) above the water while you submerge the rest of your body beneath the waves. You wonder how long you can hold your breath underwater. Does it even matter, though? It wouldn't be so bad to stay here like this forever—

"...What is this?"

You're broken out of your thoughts by a muffled voice above you, piercing the silence and suddenly reminding you how long you've been underwater. Panic sets in almost immediately as you kick toward the surface, gasping for breath when your head breaches the waves again, breathing in sweet, fresh air as your arms attempt to tread water.

Well—arm. Singular. Someone else is holding on to your other arm, you realize far too late—the arm that's currently clutching that poor, stupid apple. A hand is wrapped around your wrist, and you feel dread sinking through your chest when your eyes follow the hand back to its owner. Perhaps that dread is why you aren't at all surprised when you once again lock eyes with the creature from earlier, this time his head and chest above water.

He looks at your sputtering form, unsurprised, before turning back to stare at the apple in your hand, head tilting to the side. "What is this?" you hear him repeat. His voice is incredibly raspy—as if he hasn't used it in years.

His lack of recognition towards you is almost irritating—as if he's disappointed that you exist. "...What?" you finally ask.

He brings another hand out of the water to tap at the apple. "This," he says. "I don't know what this is. Tell me."

You're still struggling for breath. "I...I'll tell you what it is if you let me back onto the dock."

He turns back to face you—quickly, head shifting far too quickly for something human. "No," he says, grip on your wrist unrelenting. "Tell me what it is."

Shit. "It's an apple," you say, frustration suddenly blooming in your chest. You're going to die because of an apple. Because you couldn't be bothered to eat your uncle's clam chowder for dinner. What the hell is wrong with you? If you ever get out of this, you swear on every god listening that you'll eat second helpings of every meal that man makes for the rest of your life. "You eat it."

Apparently you eat it to this creature means you can eat it—because he's lunging forward suddenly, bringing his teeth that look much more like that of a shark's than like the teeth in your own mouth onto the apple in your palm, tearing away a bite and swallowing it whole. God, you hope you aren't about to meet the same fate.

He makes a face, turning to look at you. "It's weird."

You heave a sigh. This is insane, you think. Maybe you really did lose your mind earlier on the boat—it's all your cousins' fault. Has to be. Hearing that constant, nonstop chatter about the overseas vacation they just went on (their third this year alone), and the toys the twins got for their birthdays, and the teacher at school they really don't like, has finally made you snap. "I don't know what to tell you," you say. "You said you'd never had it before. And you're stealing—I was going to eat that."

He lets go of your wrist from his damp grasp. "Hmm. You can have the rest of it, I guess."

He has let go of you. Every logical nerve in your body is screaming at you to start swimming, to pedal back up to the dock as fast as you can and scream for your uncle—but you don't. He let go of you. He had just wanted the apple.

You stare at him. You'd been right before—every feature of his is far too sharp to be human. The edge of his nose, the line of his jaw, the angles of his cheekbones—everything except his eyes. They're dark, as dark as the night sky behind you, but they're soft. They hold none of the sharpness of what you can see of the rest of his body.

You think back to the beginning of the day—to the stories of the fish-men your uncle had tried to spook your cousins with as you drove around the inlet. Damn him to hell—he was right.

You aren't sure who you're angrier at—him, for being correct about something so utterly insane, or you, for not being smart enough to realize he was telling the truth.

The creature in the water notices you staring at him. He blinks at you, tilting his head to the side. His gaze hasn't left you for a single instant, but there's something else spreading across his face now, tugging up the side of his lips in a faint smile.

"You aren't afraid," he says now, the rasp in his voice gradually beginning to ebb away.

You notice him watching your arms treading water now, apple bobbing beside you, but you don't say anything about it. You also don't say anything about how he isn't treading water but is still staying perfectly afloat—something else is propelling him to stay upright. And you think you may have an idea of what it is. "I...I don't know. I don't think so," is the only thing you can offer in response. "I don't know what you are."

He thinks for a moment. "A...a siren was what your people called us the last time we went to the surface."

A siren. You'll admit you didn't always pay constant attention in school, especially reading the Odyssey nearly three years ago, but you have a clear enough recollection of what these creatures were. Their entire purpose was to lure sailors to their deaths with their charms, wrecking their ships with a few words of a song.

"We couldn't come up to the surface very often then," he adds thoughtfully, remembering. "Too much of that black smoke in the air. That's what my father said, anyway."

Black smoke? You're confused for a moment before it dawns on you—you distinctly remember your uncle telling you that the railroad used to lie almost perfectly adjacent to the bay his house now resides on, back in the day before they'd decided to reroute the tracks to make room for the neighborhoods they were building. And if the trains the siren in front of you remembers were still billowing out black smoke...

Christ, how old is he, anyway?

"I'm supposed to drown you," he says plainly.

You furrow your brow at him. "You can try, I guess. I used to be pretty good at swimming."

He laughs at that too. The sound of his laugh is unbearably musical—light and gentle and not at all comparable to the rasp his voice had been at first, nor is it fitting for a creature who had just said he was here to kill you. "I almost did. That's how you ended up in the water—don't you see?"

Oh. Fuck. He must have been in your head, practically—convincing you to get in the water. It's what'd he done earlier in the day too, you realize—when you'd gotten in all the way up to your ankles without realizing. "How...how'd you do that?"

He shrugs. "I just hum. Some of my brothers are good at singing, but I think humming does the same thing at a much quieter rate. Harder to get caught that way."

"Does that happen to you often?" you ask. "Getting caught?"

He seems to ponder that for a moment. "No. I...I didn't have any plans on telling you this, but I've never actually drowned anyone before. You've been my first attempt."

You scoff at that. "I guess you're not a very good siren, then."

He stares at you, and you wonder for a split second if you've just made a fatal mistake by running your mouth, like you always do—but the edges of his lips quirk up in a strange smile. "That's not all we do, you know. We were the record-keepers of the ocean, back in the days before that fool Homer decided to only focus on our...occasional people-drowning habits. Once you become known for something, no one really cares what you used to do."

You blink at him. "Sorry, I...are you trying to make me feel bad for you? After you tried to drown me?"

His smile widens. "But I didn't drown you! I decided not to. Because I wanted to know what that was in your hand." He looks down at the apple bobbing in the water between the two of you. "Do you have anything else like this?"

You let out an incredulous laugh. "Why? Do you want to go through all the fruit in our fridge and take a single bite out of each one?"

He cocks his head slightly at you. "Why would I do that?"

Because it's what you just did, you want to yell at him—but you don't. Some semblance of common sense must be returning to you, now that you know you aren't in mortal danger.

He continues anyway. "I want to go back to our record-keeping ways. I like learning things. I've never spoken to a human before now—I've already learned so much. I know what an apple is. I know how easy it is to tell you to drown yourself."

You try to ignore the way your blood freezes cold for an instant at that last comment—and the way he gives you a knowing look after it leaves his lips. You think you may have a better understanding of what your situation is, now. "So you decided not to drown me because you wanted to know about the apple. You...you're only going to keep me alive if I keep bringing you things that you find interesting?"

But he shakes his head no. "You can go back up to the land now. I won't stop you. I was just suggesting that you'd think about doing me a favor, since I did one for you."

Deciding not to drown me isn't much of a favor—but you keep that to yourself. "You really wouldn't stop me if I went back up the dock? If I never set foot in the water again? Won't you...I don't know, get in trouble with the siren police or whoever you answer to?"

A bemused expression flashes across his face. "No, I don't answer to anyone. We used to travel in packs—and I think some still do, especially in the southern sects of the Pacific, but most of us are solitary, now. I do whatever I want."

“Must be nice," you reply before you can think to stop yourself.

He frowns a little at that. "What do you mean? You're the masters of the world as we know it, aren't you?" There may be a little edge of mocking at the end of that sentence, but neither of you comment on it.

Instead, you take one arm out of the water briefly to try to wave your words away, accidentally flicking a few drops of water on his face—but he doesn't even flinch. "Look—I shouldn't have said that,” you say.

"Who could possibly be telling you what to do?" he asks again. "I'm serious."

Now you do let a small laugh pass your lips. "You'd be surprised."

He just blinks. "Surprise me, then."

He did say he liked to learn. "Listen, I can't—" You cut off your own sentence when you see a light on the second story window flick on out of your peripheral vision. Shit. "I've got to go."

He casts his gaze upwards to the soft light emanating from the house. "I see," you hear him say as you plant your elbows on the edge of the dock, hauling your body back up to the wooden surface. Once you're out of the water, a sudden thought occurs to you—you never even asked the siren for his name.

Who cares? a voice in your head cries out. Your conscience, most likely—whatever scraps of common sense you have left. That thing was going to drown you. You don't need his name; you're never going to see him again.

Well—that you aren't entirely sure of, even if you may not be completely prepared to admit it. As much as you had apparently intrigued him, he had certainly kept your interest too. For crying out loud—he's a goddamn siren. How often did you get to have a sit-down conversation with a sea creature you had been perfectly convinced wasn't real an hour ago?

Even more intriguing, you think, was that air of freedom about him. I do whatever I want, he'd said. You can't imagine the last time anything like that left your mouth—or if anything like it ever had. You're drawn to that feeling of freedom—either out of jealousy or a desire to live vicariously through it, you aren't sure. But you do want to experience it again.

So you turn back around, the question of his name on the tip of your tongue—but it never gets any further. By the time you're looking back into the water below you, he's gone. Had you imagined the entire thing all along, you wonder for a brief instant?

But that thought shatters when you hear a splash to your right, at the very edge of the canal before it opens back up into the ocean, and you see the edge of a long, blue tail flicker in the moonlight before it disappears below the surface.

You let out a short laugh of disbelief at the sight. And the small smile that lingers on your lips—even as you hurry back towards the house, open the back door as quietly as possible, hurry back upstairs, throw your wet clothes in the bathroom, and jump back in your bed in a fresh pair of pajamas—doesn't fade away for quite some time.

Three days pass before you see him again.

You'd run out to the dock three nights in a row after everyone in the house had fallen asleep, peering into the water only to be met with the ripples of your own reflection staring back up at you. Disappointed, you had trudged back to the back porch and snuck back up to your room, lingering confusions about that damn siren swirling around in your head. You won't go check again tomorrow night. That entire meeting with him was apparently a one-time thing. It was a miracle that he'd let you live, anyway—a miracle that you aren't ever supposed to see again.

You still find yourself padding down to the dock on the fourth night—and this time, you aren't alone.

There's an apple sitting on the very last wooden plank on the end of the dock, water dripping off the edge and forming a small puddle around it. You almost let out a laugh at the sight, but it's swallowed by the yelp you accidentally let out when the siren's head emerges suddenly from beneath the surface. He stares at you, unblinking as he hauls his forearms onto the edge of the dock, propelling himself forward to look up at you.

"You're surprised," he says.

You take a breath to calm yourself before speaking. "You're observant."

He blinks once. Twice. "That's for you," he says, gesturing towards the singular fruit on the last plank of wood. "Since I ate the other one."

You look down at the apple, deciding you're safer not asking where he got this one—and then you look lower, peering down off the edge. The siren has pulled himself up to rest against the dock, which means he's only about halfway submerged into the water now. You see his arms, crossed on top of each other to support him resting on top of the dock. You see his chest, his abdomen, droplets of water still rolling down the toned muscles. And you swallow the gasp that threatens to escape you when you finally lock eyes on the dark blue tail that begins past his waist, swishing back and forth as it glistens with every beam of moonlight it reflects.

If he knows the cause of your sudden amazement, he doesn't say anything about it. Instead, he speaks again. "I wasn't sure if you'd be back."

You manage to pull your eyes back up towards his. "I, um...I realized I never got your name the other night. I figured you didn't just go by 'siren.'"

He smirks. "No, I don't. But I've never had to say it out loud before, like this." He thinks about it for a moment. "Hongjoong."

Hongjoong. "Hongjoong," you repeat.

You aren't sure if it's the moonlight playing tricks on you, or if his cheeks really do twinge a shade pink at the repetition from your lips. "What's yours?"

Now it's your turn to smirk a little. "You won't, like...gain some kind of terrible power over me once you know my name, right?" You think you remember reading about the fae having that kind of ability in school, but that was ages ago. And at the time, you didn't think you'd ever need to remember information about creatures you were certain didn't exist.

The siren—Hongjoong—shakes his head. "Not that I know of. I can look into it in our historical records though, if you'd like."

You shake your head quickly. Probably better off not knowing.

But you do tell him your name, and he smiles too. "Pretty," he says, and you think you understand how someone like him could talk someone like you into walking off a boat—but the thought doesn't scare you the way it might have the other night. He's so beautiful, you're realizing—almost impossibly so. To hear him say he thinks you're pretty, or at least your name is, almost makes you want to laugh.

Hongjoong pulls you out of your thoughts when he taps the space on the dock next to the apple with one hand. "Well? Are you going to take it?"

Oh. "Oh!" you say, bending over to pick up the fruit. "Sure. Thank you for bringing this to me—" and then, before you can stop yourself from the most sudden and peculiar act of boldness in your entire life so far— "do you...I don't know, want anything in return for it?"

He seems taken aback by your proposition at first, but only a moment passes before that soft, self-assured grin appears across his features again. "What would you want to give me?"

Christ. Why did you say that? "Well—um..." You glance down at your shoes with wet sand still caked to the sides, the green charm on the end of one shoelace, the fraying ends of the jacket you'd hastily pulled over your shoulders before walking outside tonight, before you see—

You quickly work it off of your wrist and hand it over to him. "Here," you say, sitting down at the dock's edge and handing Hongjoong the bracelet you've been wearing since you came to your uncle's house this summer. "You can keep it."

Hongjoong takes the bracelet delicately from your outstretched hand. He peers at it in the moonlight. "What is it?"

"It's a bracelet," you explain. "You can just wear it on your wrist for decoration—it doesn't have to mean anything. This one, um...it was actually from my parents, but believe me—it doesn't mean anything," you finish, trying (and failing) not to let that all-too-familiar drip of malicious venom back into your voice at the mention of the people who raised you. Who bought you this bracelet—a week-late birthday gift from your mother who had missed it while she was on a 'girls trip' in Italy. And yet, you still turned out like this—

Hongjoong continues studying the bracelet, poring over each individual charm. If he notices your attitude about your parents, he doesn't say anything—but after that first conversation you'd had with him, you think he may understand what you mean anyway.

The silence is starting to make you drowsy, so you move to stand back up. "Look, Hongjoong, I'd better head back. It's late. Will I, um—" Why does he make you so nervous now? "Will I see—"

"What are you bringing next time?" Hongjoong interrupts.

You blink. "What?"

He taps the bracelet with one finger. "I'll bring something else the next time I see you, if you bring something too."

He had said he liked to learn. "Okay," you say. There's a sudden warmth in your chest at the thought of seeing him again, even despite the cool breeze suddenly drifting off from the sea. "When will you be back?"

Hongjoong tilts his head to one side, thinking. "The next half moon. It should be in a few nights. I'll need time to find something good for you," he says, grinning.

You can't fight the grin that tugs at your own lips. "I'll be here, then."

You think about how the first two weeks of your summer had dragged by. Every day had felt like an unending loop of babysitting your cousins while your uncle went to work, of making an effort to laugh at said uncle's intentionally not-funny jokes, of picking up groceries and running errands and getting lost in the monotony of the mundane—but the second half of your summer is the complete opposite.

Going out and meeting Hongjoong by the end of the dock goes from a once a week occurrence to a nightly routine. And it doesn't stop at just bringing each other different little trinkets and knick-knacks and snacks that you find—you and Hongjoong both discover that you're better conversationalists than you'd previously thought. The two of you find yourself talking for hours about anything you can think of; you learn that Hongjoong's family is several times larger than yours, and that sirens swim further south when the water gets cold in the winter ("the same as everything else in the sea with any sense," he points out). And you tell Hongjoong about you, about all the summers you spent here with your older siblings when you were all still children, about the nights you snuck out with them and went to the gas station for ice cream—both of you hanging on each other's every word.

You find yourself looking forward to seeing him all day. You're in far better spirits than you were at the beginning of the summer, your uncle teases on several occasions, but you can't find it in yourself to be bothered.

You probably could try to make it slightly less obvious, though. After nearly a month of spending almost all your nights with Hongjoong, you find yourself one midsummer day back on the pontoon boat with your cousins and uncle, looking for an island to go for a picnic on—just like you had been that day you'd first seen him. You still keep to yourself on the bow of the boat the same way you did at the beginning of the summer, but your thoughts are full of nothing but the siren, now. You'd found an unfinished scrapbook of you and your siblings from years ago in your uncle's garage last night, and you're practically beaming at the thought of showing it to Hongjoong tonight. You wonder if he'll be able to pick out which one is you in the photos if you don't tell him. Maybe you'll—

"There's something in the water!" one of your cousins cries out, pointing towards the right side of the boat.

You practically shoot out of your seat. "Where?" you ask, rushing over to her side of the boat.

She blinks up at you, caught off-guard by your sudden enthusiasm. "Um...right next to the boat." She points again with a shrug. "There was a face, but it's gone now. I swear I'm telling the truth."

You nod, giving her a knowing grin. "I believe you."

Her eyes widen, a smile growing across her own features. "You do?"

Your uncle laughs from the wheel of the boat behind you. "You mean your reflection, bub?"

Your cousin shakes her head quickly. "No, it wasn't. It was something else, I know it."

Your uncle looks back and forth between the two of you, landing his gaze firmly on you. "Well—if you see anything else, you just let me know. It's almost the end of the summer, you know," he points out. "I've kept you all under my watch this long—I don't want anything to happen to either of you."

The little girl next to you nods before going back to her seat with the rest of your cousins, but you stay planted at the side of the boat for a while with them.

It's almost the end of the summer, you know.

What's been wrong with you for the last several weeks? Befriending a siren, of all things—where did you think that was going to go? Did you think you'd get to pack him up in your suitcase with everything else and take him home? Stupid, you think—you've been completely, utterly stupid. It's the only explanation for it.

No—that isn't entirely true, either. You may have been foolish, thinking you could keep a friendship with a siren, but that wasn't the only place those feelings were coming from. You've been distracting yourself, you realize now. You're trying to run, still—from the very same thing that led you to stay with your uncle this summer for the first time in years.

Maybe you've had your fill of running. It may be time to try facing the thing you've been avoiding all summer before it's too late—which is how you find yourself alone in the kitchen later that night, holding on to your uncle's home phone with one hand while you read her number to yourself off of your own phone (you're fairly certain she won't answer if she recognizes your number on her caller ID).

You almost hesitate before punching in the last number to dial and sealing your fate, but your uncle's words float back to you again. It's almost the end of the summer. What do you have to lose now, anyway?

You finish dialing the number.

She picks up on the fourth ring. "Hello?" She sounds slightly out of breath, as if she'd ran to catch the phone before it stopped ringing. The thought gives you a momentary sense of hope—maybe she won't hang up on you immediately once she realizes who's calling.

You take a deep breath before answering. "Hi, Mom," you say, slowly. "It's me."

She's silent for a long, long time—but she doesn't hang up. "...Oh," is the first thing your mother says. "I thought this was your uncle calling." You hear her take a breath, hesitating on saying what you know she's about to say. "I guess that's why you called from his phone, huh?"

You know there's no point answering that. "Mom, I...I wanted to talk to you, since the summer's almost over. I thought we could possibly talk about, um...about me staying at home for a little bit before school starts—or maybe coming home during winter break."

There's another long period of silence—and like the fool you are, you allow yourself to hope, for a brief moment, that she won't say exactly what you've known she was going to say the minute you dialed her number. "Hmm...no, Y/N, I don't really think that's a good idea." Your heart sinks, but she continues to push the dagger (that you practically handed her by making this call) further into your chest. "You know what—it's not really a good time right now, anyway. I'll talk to you some other time, alright?"

"Listen, Mom, I'm—"

Click.

She's hung up.

You told yourself earlier you wouldn't cry if she did this (you knew she was going to). And yet—you still can't fight those tears brimming at the edge of your eyelids, threatening to spill over. As you try to blink them away, your gaze is drawn towards the back window—towards the head of blue hair you can just barely see at the end of the dock, waiting expectantly for you already.

God. You cannot talk to Hongjoong right now—but you can't just blow him off entirely, either. You'll make something up, tell him you've gotten sick and can't see him for a few days, and hope he'll just forget about you and find some other human to trade apples for bracelets with.

You pad as quickly as you can down the end of the beach to the dock, peering over the edge to see Hongjoong's dark eyes looking up at you. "I can't talk tonight," you say sharply. "I'm sorry."

Hongjoong frowns. "What's wrong? Did you forget to bring something? It's okay, you know. I don't mind just talking to you. If you want."

Of course that's what he's concerned about. "No," you say, somewhat shakily. "I just can't, alright?"

You move to turn around, but the siren is a step ahead of you like always. He lunges forward onto the dock, grabbing ahold of your ankle with a strength you hadn't known he'd had. You think, for a moment, that if he had really wanted to drown you that day—he could have. "That's not good enough," he replies firmly, but his gaze softens the minute he sees your face closer. "I want to know what's wrong. Please."

It doesn't take much pleading from him for you to succumb to his wishes, so you relent, turning back around and sitting down on the edge of the dock. Hongjoong props himself up with his forearms before pushing the rest of his body up onto the dock, sitting upright and facing the sea beside you, just like you—something he's never done before. Only the last few scales on the edge of his tail just barely brush the water. "Tell me," he asks again, gentler this time.

So you do.

"It's my mother," you tell him, slowly. "Both my parents, really—they planned out me and my brothers' lives from the moment we were born. We were all supposed to be doctors, or lawyers, or scientists—something to make a ridiculous amount of money for them, just like they did for their parents. It was the only way to make them proud. They sent us to private schools and paid for expensive tutoring for years to ensure it, and they only spoke to us when we did well. They didn't want children—they wanted trophies. Things they could show off to their friends who were just as selfish and conceited as them. And they got them with my brothers—they did exactly what they were supposed to. Graduated law school or got their doctorates or PhDs, and now do nothing except work and get filthy rich. I'm the last one to fulfill what my parents had planned out for us. But I guess things don't always work out the way you planned," you add, somewhat bitterly.

Hongjoong keeps his gaze fixed on you. "No," he says, as gently as the water lapping at your ankles. "They don't. And...you don't want to do what they want you to."

You nod. "That's right. I don't. I think I should get a choice in what I make of my life, not slaving away forever at something someone else picked out for me. To do something of my own volition. And I told them so—and they told me I'd be on my own, forever, because of it."

"What do you want, then?" he asks.

You feel tears brushing against the edges of your eyelashes again. "It doesn't matter," you say, trying to keep your voice as steady as you can. "I'm screwed as it is. I have enough money saved for this semester of college, but they've cut me off entirely. I tried to call and make an attempt to patch things up tonight, but she wouldn't even listen to me. I'll be coming here every other semester to work, save up for the next semester, and stay with my uncle. I'm extremely grateful to at least have him on my side, to have someone who will allow me to stay with them—but I don't know if I'll ever get to see my parents or my brothers again. And I knew that would happen," you admit, voice definitely shaking now.

"I knew that was the choice I was making when I told them I didn't want to just be a stupid trophy for them to display, that I wanted to make something worthwhile, that I deemed worthwhile with my life. I knew it wouldn't be easy and that I was taking the harder route, but I thought I'd be able to just cut ties with them. Go no contact, and all that, but it...it's hard, Hongjoong," you tell him, tears rolling down your cheeks. "So fucking hard. And it's so stupid. Even after all this, after she's told me she doesn't want anything to do with me, now that I've chosen to 'waste my life away' and she 'doesn't know who I am anymore—' I still care what she thinks of me, for some stupid reason. She's still my mother—God, what am I supposed to do?"

Hongjoong turns to you almost instantly, cupping your face in both hands, and the sudden touch alone almost makes your tears stop falling. "Nothing stops the flow of the sea," he says, quietly. You want to move your gaze, to move your head away so your eyes aren't locked onto Hongjoong's so intensely, but he keeps you there anyway. "You just have to keep moving through it. With it. I think it's the same with your mother. It won't immediately be better tomorrow, just like how the sea isn't immediately perfectly calm after a typhoon—but it will be better, eventually. A little bit every day, as the waves return back to their normal rolling patterns."

"You don't think it's stupid?" you ask, quietly. "That I'm still so desperate to hold on to my mother, even if she's practically already thrown me away?"

Hongjoong shrugs. "Nonsensical, maybe. But not stupid. I don't think there's anything stupid about reaching out for someone who's taken care of you. My family has always been spread across the oceans—no matter where I go, it seems, I can find someone. I think it would be a much harder life if I was told none of them wanted to see me ever again. I'd feel stranded. And I haven't lived the same life as you, so I don't know what the exact circumstances are like, but I don't think it's a stupid aspiration. Just slightly nonsensical—but I think I'm realizing that a lot of things you do—that humans do," he corrects, "are that way."

That makes you laugh, even as his words settle into your ears and you begin to feel a kind of lightness in your chest. His world is so different from yours, you think. You're almost jealous of it, in a way.

And still, when he says things will be easier, eventually—you believe him.

"What is it that you want with your life?" he asks.

You laugh a little again. "It's cliché."

Hongjoong doesn't hesitate. "How would I know what your clichés are?" His hands are still firmly cupped against your cheeks.

Now the smile that ghosts across your face is real. Genuine. "Art," you say, quietly—as if you're afraid of admitting the truth even to him. "I love drawing—always have. It's all I've ever wanted to do. It used to be my escape when I came here in the summers with my family; I'd sneak away from everyone and paint on the beach for hours until my uncle would call for dinner. I begged for paint sets as a kid for birthday presents—even stole a set of charcoal pencils from the art room in middle school once. The teacher let me keep them even after finding out," you add, laughing a little. You bare your soul to Hongjoong, the parts of you that you've tried to squash for years but have failed to completely erase—like charcoal marks on a piece of paper that just won't quite go away.

He seems to ponder this for a moment. "Could you draw me?"

You laugh, feeling like a dam of relief is beginning to break within within you. He knows what has practically been your deepest, darkest secret for your entire life, and he doesn't want to shun you forever for it. "You know, I've always heard that's the one thing you aren't supposed to ask an artist."

Hongjoong blinks. "I didn't know that." There's only a single beat of silence before he asks, "Can you draw me anyway?"

"It won't be very good," you say with a shrug, smirk still tugging at the corners of your mouth. "I've never been very good at portraits. Landscapes and still life are easier for me."

He moves one hand to wrap around your wrist. "Try anyway."

The tenderness of the action coupled with his words—blunt as always, but reassuring in a way you've never known from him, never known from anyone—is enough to cause tears to prickle at the corners of your eyes again.

This time, Hongjoong notices, moving his free hand up your cheek to gently brush them away before they ever have a chance to cascade past your lashes. You see him sniff once, then look back up at you—realization dawning on his face.

"Salt," Hongjoong whispers in awe. "There's a piece of the sea in you, too."

That dam inside you breaks.

You meet his eyes, dark as the bottom of the ocean—feel the cool grip of his hand wrapped around your wrist and his fingers resting gently on your cheek, and you feel the pull towards him like the magnetism of the Earth's core.

When your lips land on his, it doesn't surprise either of you. It's a chaste, careful kiss at first. Hongjoong takes only a moment to breathe, forehead touching yours so lightly you almost wouldn't know he was there, before pulling you back to him and pressing his lips against yours again.

You've never experienced anything like it before—the tenderness of his hands on your skin, the softness of his lips on yours, his warm breath skating across your jaw. It's like he's everywhere, taking over every sensation—but not at all like that first time he had met you and influenced your thoughts. You feel fully in control right now. You're the one who's let him in.

If this is what drowning feels like, you think, you'd never complain.

You taste salt on your lips when you wake in the morning, and the sensation immediately sends a flurry of butterflies through your chest. A smile tugs at your mouth before you can even think to hide it from yourself.

Had last night even been real? Hongjoong reassuring you, kissing you so gently that you thought you might melt right into the water below the two of you—God, how could it not have been real? You could never have dreamed something like it.

If your uncle and cousins notice your uncharacteristically chipper mood at breakfast, a stark contrast to your melancholy behavior at dinner the night before, they don't say anything—but your uncle does look surprised when you offer to help load the cooler and towels onto the boat for the day.

"I've enjoyed having you here for the summer," your uncle tells you later that afternoon, when you've dropped anchor on a nearby island and your cousins are eating their lunches peacefully—the only time of the day you find that they're quiet. "Reminded me of the old days, with your brothers. It's been good to have you here."

You smile at him. "I've enjoyed being here," you admit, even if he doesn't know all the reasons why. "Thank you for letting me stay the summer. I really, um...really appreciate knowing there's someone who has my back."

His eyes crinkle in a soft smile. "Listen, Y/N. I know it's hasn't been easy after what happened with your mother—I don't know the whole story, but I'm not old and senile enough yet to not know something's up. But you'll always have a place to stay here. I want you to know that."

Your heart jumps. "Thank you, Uncle," you say. "You've always gone out of your way to make this feel like home for me, and you did the same when my brothers were here too. I can never thank you enough for that. And I—"

He just waves your words away. "That's what family does, you know? I've always felt like a bit of a black sheep living out here—compared to my sister, anyway. She always had big plans for all of you. But I've wanted this to feel like a good place for you, and your brothers, and now your cousins too—no matter what. Even when you all would sneak out for late-night gas station runs back in the day...or whatever it is you're doing now," your uncle adds, pointedly.

Your stomach twists. "I've...been taking moonlit strolls. It's helped me relax, with everything going on."

He doesn't seem convinced, however. "Honey...you know, you can always—"

But he's interrupted by one of your cousins shouting. "Jay won't give me the binoculars back!"

Your uncle frowns. "Jay, let your sister have a turn. Only fair, you know."

Jay crosses his arms, tucking the binoculars under one elbow. "No way! Every time Bianca uses these, she keeps telling me she sees somebody staring at her in the water."

Bianca scowls, lunging for him. "And I did! Just because you didn't see him doesn't mean I didn't."

Him.

After what your uncle had just said about your moonlit strolls, you restrain yourself from running over to the edge of the boat immediately like the other day—but your eyes still scan over the water ahead of you hurriedly.

You can see your uncle's gaze flicker back to you out of the corner of your eye, hesitating for a moment too long, before turning his attention back to the twins. "You guys have seen more stuff on the horizon in the past month than I saw in twenty years on the sea," he quips, forcing a tight laugh. "Might need to get you kids back to living in the city soon if you're seeing this many things in the water—not everyone's made for the sea life," he adds.

The knot of worry tightens itself a little tighter in your gut, and not for the last time this summer.

You still smuggle your sketchbook down to the pier once night falls, slipping out the back door with it tucked securely under your arm.

Hongjoong, of course, is waiting expectantly for you, peering up at you from the edge of the dock. "Is that for drawing?" he asks, and you can hear the twinge of excitement in his voice.

Your heart does a little backflip in your chest. "Yes," you admit, a little more sheepishly than you'd meant to. "Do you know how you want to pose for it?"

He thinks for a moment. "Can I sit up here with you? I want to be close to you for it."

Oh—now there are serious acrobatics going on within your chest. "Sure," you say, grinning as you sit on the far edge and watch him scoot up to sit beside you, leaning on the support beam at the very edge of the dock.

You gaze at him for a moment after flipping open your sketchbook and finding an empty page. His tail practically shines in the darkness around the two of you, moonlight reflecting off of each dark blue scale. His torso looks practically sculpted by the gods—arms and chest full of just as much unearthly beauty as his face, jawline sharper than the tip of the pencil you're sketching him with.

Not for the first time, you think to yourself how beautiful he is.

Hongjoong's cheeks turn the fairest shade of pink as you continue to stare at him, but he doesn't say a word as you begin your initial sketch. You find it slightly difficult to get the right shape of the tail flicking against the edge of the water beneath you. "Can I ask you a question?" you say instead, putting down your pencil for a moment.

Hongjoong blinks. "You've asked me questions for weeks, now."

You laugh. "This is a different one. I...I think one of my cousins saw something in the water today. When we were on my uncle's pontoon boat. Any chance you might know something about that?"

His cheeks turn pinker than before, but he doesn't flinch. "I suppose I might."

You can't bite back a grin. "Are you...following me, Hongjoong?"

Hongjoong frowns a little. "I wouldn't call it that. I've...just been in the area. Keeping an eye on things. Not just you."

"Just at the same time as me."

"Right," he says, clearly relieved. "Exactly."

Your grin widens.

Hongjoong points at your sketchpad. "Are you finished with the drawing?"

You laugh a little, picking your pencil back up from beside you on the dock. "No, not even close. I've never drawn anything like you before—but I love a good challenge."

He seems somewhat pleased with this admission. "Will you show it to me once it's done?"

“Of course," you tell him, and he beams. That smile—God. You only hope you can put even a fraction of the way it makes you feel back onto the paper in your palms.

Your uncle corners you in the kitchen after breakfast the next morning. You feel yourself panicking inwardly at first, thinking he's going to continue pressing you on your "moonlit strolls" conversation from yesterday—but he just informs you that he's planning on a big seafood broil for dinner tomorrow night, as a send-off for the summer. And more importantly, he wants you to pick up a few pounds of shrimp from the seafood store in town today.

It's been a while since you ventured that far back into town—God, probably since the very first week of summer. And now your uncle is preparing a feast for the end of the season. You've never known time could pass you by this quickly.

That thought lingers as you ride your uncle's bike down the boardwalk and across the bridge, gradually making your way onto the mainland. You've put off thinking about what will happen once the summer comes to a close since that night you called your mother—but it's an inevitable fact that you'll have to leave, obviously sooner than you think. How can you even begin to bring that up to Hongjoong? Does he know, already, somehow? Will he be disappointed that he can't obtain any more knowledge from you and dip back into the sea, never to be seen again?

Your racing mind quiets somewhat when you realize you've made it to the seafood store—or shack, as it's always been affectionately known. You gaze for a moment at the neon sign outside, realizing that "THE CRAB SHACK" only has a few lights that actually work. "T E CR B S H C K" is what the sign displays now.

You remember that the lights didn't work when you were here years ago, either. The whole bottom row of neon was always out, meaning that the sign only read "T E CRB." You wonder if there's a meaning in that—that the sign was broken then and broken now, just showing it in different ways.

Or maybe it's just a neon sign for a seafood shack, and your suddenly gloomy mind is searching for meaning where there is none.

You roll your eyes at your own thoughts, park your bike, and make your way inside. The smell of seafood is nearly overpowering the minute you step through the door and doesn't fade for an instant, even after you've collected your pounds of shrimp in bags and make your way to the register in the very back. You wonder if the employee behind the counter even smells the seafood anymore, or if he's completely accustomed to it now.

He clears his throat awkwardly. Oh, God—how long have you been standing here? "Are you ready to check out?"

"Yes! Yes," you say hurriedly, laughing at yourself. "Sorry. In my own head this morning."

The cashier laughs good-naturedly in reply. "It happens." He looks down at the bags of shrimp after weighing and typing them in. "You visiting a friend here or something? That's quite a few pounds of shrimp—and I don't think I've seen you in here before."

You nod. "I'm staying with some family on the other side of the bridge. We're doing an end-of-summer broil tomorrow night."

He grins at you. "Can I come by if I only charge you for one of these?"

"If there's any leftovers," you reply coolly. "My cousins are pretty ravenous."

The cashier just laughs again, handing you the bags. "Fair enough. You have a good day, now."

"Same to you," you tell him absentmindedly—because you've noticed something in the open door behind the cashier. It's probably not meant to always be open, as it leads to a boardwalk out to the sea. Another Crab Shack employee is lining up a few crates of stock not yet loaded into the store. A couple canisters of fruit, three or four crates of sodas—and at the very end of the boardwalk, you think you might just see a head of blue hair peeking out of the water.

Shit.

You wonder as you quickly make your way out of the store, as you duck under the Sea You Later! sign at the exit, as you pedal the whole ride back over the bridge and back onto your uncle's property—a trick of the light, maybe? (When has that ever been the case this summer?) Will Hongjoong even say anything about it tonight, if it was him?

He does, of course. When evening falls and you make your way down to the dock, you haven't even taken your pencils out of your drawing bag before Hongjoong is pulling himself up beside you, gazing at you intently.

"What was so funny?" he asks, in a tone so innocent you almost think he's being genuine. "I want to know."

You make an exasperated face. "I don't know what you're talking about, Hongjoong."

"The man in the store today," he answers plainly. "In the apron. You laughed at something he said."

"Nothing," you say. "I was being polite—I promise. He was the one trying to make jokes about inviting himself over. Not nearly as funny as he thought he was."

He isn't quite satisfied with that. "Did you know him before?"

"No," you tell him. "I was just in there getting shrimp for my uncle to cook tomorrow."

Hongjoong frowns. "I could've gotten you shrimp. There's plenty around that cove near the bridge."

You laugh. "I appreciate the offer—but where would I have told my uncle several pounds of live shrimp came from?"

He frowns, thinking for a moment. "The apron man wasn't too bright, I think," Hongjoong says. "I saw him come out onto the boardwalk not too long after you left—almost fell over trying to help the other apron man pick up those boxes."

His words hang in the air for a beat. Then two. "What would you have done if he had?" you ask, partially teasing and partially serious. "Drown him?"

Hongjoong ponders that. "I'm not sure. Maybe."

"For what? Talking to me?" you ask, somewhat incredulously. "What were you doing watching me in the middle of the day, anyway? Just 'in the area' again?"

He crosses his arms indignantly. "I didn't plan to. I heard your laugh when I came up for air, so I wanted to know what was funny." He seems to pause on that for a moment. "You're almost a siren yourself, in that way."

Now that makes your heart stop—maybe more than he had intended it to. You have to hide the smile that threatens to creep up the edges of your mouth. "So you really aren't going to drown that poor cashier? Or me, for talking to him?" you ask, still only partially teasingly.

Hongjoong's face softens slightly at that. "I don't think I ever really intended to. Not from the moment I saw you."

You wonder, for a split second, if he can hear your heart thundering in your chest—if he has any idea what kind of effect he has on you, siren abilities or not.

He seems to have an idea of your thoughts, either way—because he reaches for your hand, intertwining it with his. "I want to show you something."

You stare at him for an instant too long. "Where?" you ask, nervous laughter accidentally escaping you. "In the water?"

He nods, as if that should have been obvious. "Of course."

You give him a look. "Hongjoong—I don't know how far this is, but you know I'm not nearly as good at holding my breath as you are."

Hongjoong laughs a little at that—that bright, airy, musical laugh that almost instantly sets you at ease, reminding whatever sane parts of you are left that he's still a siren. "Don't worry," he says plainly. "I'll make sure you can breathe."

Just as always, there's no malice in his tone, no hint of a hidden plot behind his eyes, although you wonder if you would even know if there was, skillful siren that he is. Regardless, you squeeze his hand in yours and let him lead you off the dock and beneath the waves, taking one last gasping breath before your head slips underneath.

Hongjoong keeps your hand in his, tail swishing as he leads the two of you further beneath the surface—the scales across it continue to reflect moonlight as brightly as if you were still above the water, giving you just as much visibility in the dark water as if you had a flashlight with you.

What's a flashlight?

You nearly let out a yelp before you remember the two of you are underwater. That was Hongjoong's voice, no doubt about it—and it was in your head.

You can talk to me this way too, you know.

It's like he's invaded your head—his thoughts are suddenly yours. Can you always hear my thoughts? you wonder. If that's been the case all along—

But you can just barely see Hongjoong shake his head in front of you through the darkness. No, you hear him say. Only when we're here, like this. Do you need air?

God, you definitely, definitely do—the shock of Hongjoong's voice in your mind had completely distracted you for a brief moment from the lack of air in your lungs. It's nothing at all, though, compared to the shock you feel when Hongjoong cups your cheeks between his hands and presses his mouth to yours.

He's kissing you.

No—he's not, you realize suddenly. He's breathing into you, pushing air down your lungs and filling them up until you feel like you can breathe again, despite being completely submerged beneath the water.

Hongjoong pulls away after a moment. Good? he asks.

You nod—you're slightly embarrassed now, especially now that you know he could hear your confusion in your head.

And especially considering the smirk you can see on his lips right before he turns back around to push the two of you further through the water. He's well aware of the confusion he's caused.

Hongjoong only has to give you air two more times before you finally arrive at what he had wanted to show you—and it nearly takes your breath away once more.

It's a shipwreck. A massive one, sitting completely undisturbed at the bottom of the bay. The ship has three broken masts, some of the sails slightly submerged in the sand with several of the cannon openings peeking out at you, which you know can mean only one thing.

This ship is hundreds of years old. One that had clearly gone down in a fight.

Hongjoong beams at you taking in the scene. My cousins did this, you hear him say, and you nearly laugh at the clear pride in that declaration.

You think about your own cousins, playing pirates on the beach while they throw buckets of water at each other, stomping over sandcastles and leaving childlike destruction in their wake. Yeah? you finally ask. Sounds like something my cousins would do.

Hongjoong stares at you thoughtfully for a long time after that—you wonder, for a brief moment, if you shouldn't have compared your family to his in this way. You're just about to formulate a thought to apologize when you feel his lips on yours again, one hand on the back of your head while the other cups your cheek gently.

You stare at him, confused once more when he pulls back. I didn't need air, you tell him, eyebrows knit together in confusion.

He stares right back. I know.

Hongjoong waits to see the realization on your face before he touches you again, clasping your chin between two fingers gingerly. He's giving you a chance to push him away, if that's what you want.

It isn't.

You hold his face in your hands when you press your lips to his this time, and you can practically feel the relief emanating from him in your own mind. He wraps one arm around your waist and the other around your shoulders, holding you as close to him as he can. Everything else—all your fearful thoughts about the end of the summer from today, your suspicions about your uncle, your constant stress about your mother—all fades away past the point of existence, and in that moment, there is nothing but you and Hongjoong at the bottom of the ocean.

"Sure you don't want to go out on the boat today?" your uncle asks the next morning. "It's your last chance for this summer."

But you shake your head again. "I got pretty sunburned across my back yesterday," you fib. "I'll watch the house here until you all get back. Do you need me to run any errands for you while you're gone?"

He doesn't quite stop himself from narrowing his eyes at you. You've been out in the sun enough times this summer that the half hour you spent in the backyard watching your cousins' impromptu performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream yesterday shouldn't have burned you at all. And you know he's fully aware of this. "...Don't know how many times I've told you kids to wear sunscreen," he says after a moment. "And reapply."

"I know," you wince. "I'm sorry. I'll put some lotion on it after breakfast."

"There's some in the closet upstairs with aloe," he informs you. "That usually speeds up the healing process for me."

"Good to know," you tell him. In truth, the only thing you plan to do while everyone is out of the house is work on your drawing of Hongjoong. You've solidified the outline, gone over it with an ink pen, but you're still trying to decide how to place the shading. You want to show the finished product to Hongjoong tonight—your last night of summer. You've put off that dreaded conversation with him until the very last minute—but you know you two will have to talk about what happens two nights from now when you're across the country, moving into your dorm room for your first night at college.

At least—you think you will be. There's a mad fantasy, of course, of staying here, of sneaking out to see Hongjoong every night for as long as you can, of running away with him somehow to some island where no one will ever bother the two of you—but it's just that, a fantasy, and you know it. Even if the entire summer has felt like a fantasy in its own way.

You don't know how that conversation will go tonight. But you want to at least be able to give this piece to him, regardless of what happens.

You're hunched over your sketchpad for hours, messing with the combination of paints for your watercolors until they're just right (or at least as satisfactory as you can get them). The scales on his tail are the hardest—you want so badly to show how ethereal they look with the moonlight reflecting off them, making him look like he's glowing from the waist down. You lay down a base color first and paint over it with different shades of blue and green, creating several different layers until you're pleased with the color's result.

Your work on the contours of his face and torso comes much easier, and the full painting is almost completely dry by the time you're heading back outside, moon high in the sky to greet you as you step onto the dock.

Hongjoong is waiting for you too, forearms resting at the edge of the pier. You roll the painting into a cylinder shape as you walk down to meet him, but you know he knows exactly what it is.

He grins. "I've been thinking about this all day," he admits, immediately, and you feel an entire enclosure of butterflies fluttering through your chest at the statement.

But you steel yourself. Take a breath. "Before I show it to you," you say, "I want to talk."

Hongjoong nods. "The end of the summer. Right?"

You raise one eyebrow at him. "How'd you know?"

"I heard you talking about it. With your uncle, that first time that your cousin spotted me from the boat." He grins a little at the recollection. "I heard him say there wasn't long until the end of summer, when you'd be leaving, so—I imagined this conversation would happen soon."

You exhale, slightly relieved. At least you wouldn't have to break the news of your sudden departure to him. "And how did you imagine this conversation?"

He takes a breath now. "I know I can't ask you to stay here. That's not fair to what you want—to the choices you've made with your own family for being able to make your own life. But I was thinking—"

"Y/N!" You hear a voice cry out from behind you.

You'd recognize the sound of your uncle anywhere—and you feel your blood practically freeze over in your veins. "Get back here. Now!"

You turn around quickly, trying to block the view of Hongjoong from your uncle—but it's too late. And as you turn to face him, you see that he's come prepared for this exact situation—a shotgun raised to his shoulder now, eyes peering down the barrel pointed at you, and a long fishing spear beside him on the dock.

"Uncle," you say, as calmly as you can. "Put that down. Please."

"Get back here, Y/N," he says, voice trembling with barely contained rage. "Get away from that thing right this minute and get out of my way."

You take a shaky breath. "Uncle, please let me explain. He's—"

"I know exactly what that is!" your uncle spits, pulling back the safety on the shotgun with a loud click. "A goddamn monster. You have no idea what those things do," he says, voice cracking. "I've seen men—good men, my friends taken from me, by its kind. Yanked right off our ship's railing and into their waiting mouths. It's nothing but a bloodthirsty animal that—"

"Stop!" you interrupt him with a shout, surprising yourself with the tenacity in your voice. You feel Hongjoong's hand wrap around your ankle, probably trying to tell you to stop—but you can't. You won't. "He's not a single thing like that. His name is Hongjoong. He's never even drowned anyone, let anyone killed and eaten anyone, Uncle. You have—"

"It's got you under it's spell," your uncle says, horrified. "Oh, my poor Y/N. I'll kill this nasty beast and free you from this trap."

You practically scream the next time you open your mouth. "No! You can't!" There's tears streaming down your face now, and the intensity of your emotions must be a surprise to your uncle, if the look of shock on his face is anything to go by. "Uncle—I'm begging you," you plead, sobbing. "I'll do anything. Please, please don't hurt him. He's my friend."

Something strange flickers over your uncle's features. He drops the barrel ever so slightly from being pointed at you. "Your friend, huh?"

You nod as you choke back another sob. "I love him." It's the first time you've admitted it—to yourself, let alone out loud—but you know it's the truth. Has been for longer than you've been aware, most likely.

That admission causes your uncle to drop the barrel entirely, holding the shotgun down in one hand and letting his other arm rest at his side. "My Y/N," he says, after a moment with a sigh.

"I've always wanted the best for you. I lived with your mother for eighteen years growing up, up until she met your father and had you and your brothers. I know how...how demanding she can be," he says with a laugh, one you don't reciprocate. "I know her tendencies all too well. She's my sister, and she'll always be my sister—but that doesn't mean I think she's a good person. I've tried to show you that there's a different path in life. That you don't have to do things her way. This...isn't what I thought you'd do," he says, laughing emptily again. "But I would never want to do anything that would hurt you on any level close to what I know she's caused you."

Your uncle swallows. Takes a breath. "I swore an oath," he says, steadier now. "In the navy. When I see anything like this, when any of us do—I'm honor-bound to report it. The local unit will be over here in under half an hour. Maybe even sooner."

You feel yourself holding your breath.

"So," he says, sighing as he meets your gaze down the dock. "You two...had just better not be here by the time they show up."

Before you can say anything in response—or perhaps before he can change his mind, your uncle turns on his heel and walks back towards the house.

You turn back around to face Hongjoong, sinking to your knees—and the minute you do, you feel tears streaming back down your face again.

He immediately pushes himself up onto the dock, grabbing hold of your face and brushing away the tears the instant they fall. "Y/N," he whispers. "You didn't have to do that. I...I love you. I would've gladly taken a bullet from your uncle if it meant you'd be safe."

Your eyes well with tears again, a shaky laugh leaving you. "Shit," you whisper back. "I don't—I don't know what to do, I just...just wanted to show you this stupid drawing," you say, laughing shakily. "And now I've ruined both of our lives. I'll never see you again."

"No. You haven't," Hongjoong says firmly, squeezing your cheeks in his hands.

You grab hold of his wrists. "Hongjoong—you have to get out of here. You...you said you have family everywhere, right? Go anywhere else. Please."

"No," Hongjoong says suddenly, straightening up the instant your hands wrap around his wrists. "Where did you say that school you were going to for your art was?"

You tell him. "It's on the coast, but it's not nearly as close to the sea as we are here, I—"

He interrupts you again. "I'll find you."

You let out an unbelieving laugh. "Hongjoong, there's no way—"

"I'll find you," he repeats, hands still cupping your face firmly. "On the name of the full moon that night you found me—on that stupid apple that led me to you. I'll find you. And then, you can let me see that drawing."

He leans forward, his lips pressing against yours in a messy kiss—all teeth and salty tears and hands squeezing too tight, or maybe not tight enough—before he lets go of you, pushing himself off the dock and into the water. You see one flick of his tail before he descends deep beneath the surface, and it's not long at all as you sit there, chest heaving and cheeks stained, before the waves are gone and the sea stills, and it's like Hongjoong was never there at all.

Fall semester has left you busier than you could have ever dreamed. You've never done this many sketches in a week, never tried this many different techniques at once, never spent this many all-nighters on a single project—but you'd be lying if you said you weren't still enjoying every second of it.

Your job keeps you plenty busy, too—your roommate had been kind enough to put in a good word at the campus library and gotten you a job in the coffee shop on the first floor. You're taking as many shifts as you can, but the pay isn't bad, all things considered. You may not have to take a semester off after all.

But the diving club keeps you almost busier than both your work and assignments combined. You've already logged more hours than any of the other freshman, and some of the upperclassmen, too. If the club captain has noticed how you're always late packing up after a dive, she hasn't reprimanded you. Maybe she's noticed the unique shells you seem to always come back with, or the skip in your step as you pack up your scuba gear, rolling a shiny bracelet over your wrist—or maybe she's noticed something else, entirely.

After all—last summer, you had been so sure that there was nothing like Hongjoong living below the water's surface. Of course, that didn't mean other people didn't already believe otherwise.

a/n: happy holidays !! i hope everyone is staying warm and healthy and having a lovely week so far <3

and finally…this title escapes my wip list 😭 y’all. i have been working on this on and off since late 2021—sometimes you can have an idea, have absolutely no inspo to write past halfway through, and then write 5k in one night. 💀 no such thing as a perfect project ofc but i do hope you enjoyed this oneshot! feedback is always welcome through reblogs, comments, and messages 🫶🫶 thank you sm for reading!

taglist: @petrichor-han @kangroo-chan @ot7lonelylover @lilacdreams-00 @mainexiii @awkwardnesshabitat @lotus-dly @elizabeth11moreno @nerdysl-t @seung-scrittore @fireheaurt

#hongjoong x reader #kim hongjoong x reader #ateez oneshot #ateez x reader #ateez fluff #ateez angst #hongjoong fic #hongjoong fluff #hongjoong angst #hongjoong x gender neutral reader #hongjoong oneshot #ateez fic #beck writes ✍️

259 notes · View notes