Hi. My name's Nero. What's yours? [This is Nero. Nero is a merman. Or at least, he is sometimes. The boy has been granted with a spell that can temporarily give him legs so he can experience life above the surface. The question is: will he actually fit in...
The moment that dawn had begun its journey from the horizon, rising from the sea to crawl up into the cold, bleak winter sky, Nero was out the door.
He had tried to sleep. He had really tried. But the longer the night had crept on, dragging more and more with each hour, the worse he worried. The harder it became to relax. The water in the tub got colder, and the closeness in his chest wound tighter. The moment the sky began to pale, it had become unbearable, and Nero was outside as the first gulls cried.
Breathing heavily from the half-sprint to the shoreline, Nero searched, squinting as he peered up and down the beach—searching for a sign, anything that would have given him a clue as to where Trevor had disappeared to. His phone was going straight to voicemail. The bitter wind whipped around him, almost cutting the merman’s cheeks with granules of sand. Even if the tide had stayed low, there would have been no evidence of Trevor even being on the beach. No footprints, no trace.
Finding it harder to catch his breath with the worry sinking in around his chest like a two-tonne weight, Nero frantically looked around one more time, before beginning to walk.
“Trevor?” He called out, against the howling wind and the rushing of the waves. “Trevor…!?” No reply came. No sight, no sound. Just the cawing of the seagulls from overhead. Fighting the gust and wincing as it bit into his skin, cheeks going red and raw, Nero cried again. “Trevor!”
He didn’t know why calling for him seemed like the logical thing to do. He hadn’t slept—he was terrified and shaking and he didn’t even seem to have the capacity for enough breath to yell, but he did anyway. He screamed.
“Trevor!!”
He knew that this would happen one day. It’s why it freaked him out every time the stupid human was out wondering late. Every time. Every time he’d come home and Nero would be half-awake, curled up and staring at the door. Except this time, Trevor hadn’t come back.
“Trevor!!”
Trevor hadn’t come back with a bashful smile and some silly excuse.
“Trevor!”
No apologies for making him worry, or ways of making Nero stop being mad at him. No hugs.
“Trevor…!”
No looks.
“Trevor…”
Nothing.
Hot tears began to stream down his face and Nero tried not to crumple, chest aching and choking on the sand and the gales that pushed him back. His voice had become a whimper and he hated it, because he needed to keep going—what if he wasn’t far and just couldn’t hear him? Get it together, he hissed, pushing the heel of his hand into his eyes and shivering, breath catching in lungs that seemed too small.
“Trev…” His breath hitched again and Nero found it hard to see. The shaking got worse, and the harder he tried to wipe away the tears, the worse his vision came. His breath came out in useless, stupid, hideous sobbing noises, and he gasped, trying to gather the strength to shout again. “Tre…”
He couldn’t even choke out his name.
Legs that didn’t even feel like they were rightly his caved in and he crumpled on the cold, damp sand, feeling the fear that Trevor wasn’t ever coming back settle in around him like rocks. Nero never could understand what drowning felt like, but now, as he gasped and shuddered and silently screamed on the beach, he had an idea. To be weighed down and crushed, slowly—to be asphyxiated as everything is torn away from you, and you’re helpless—
“Stop it!” He hissed, pushing fists to his head as he was reminded of his siblings. “Stop it!” Another, his mother. “Stop!” His father. “Stop it!!” Trevor.
Each one, plucked up from memory and straight into his heart like blades made of ice. Each time he buckled, he sobbed, beaten down by the broken floodgates that was the fear—the anxiety—of losing everyone. Everything. His family, no—His family…
Whimpering, he felt hands grab his shoulders, but he couldn’t see. He couldn’t stop the images from coming, he couldn’t stop thinking about them, how every single one had slipped through his fingers, no…
“Nero, it’s okay…” He thought he was imagining it first. “It’s going to be okay, okay…?” He thought it was his mother. “Shh…”
Mariella wrapped her arms around him and rocked with him as he cried. He felt her stroke his hair and whisper calmly into his ear, sitting with him in the cool, wet sand that stuck between their fingers and clung to their skin. Desperate and unable to breathe, Nero grabbed at her, clinging to her arms as if they were life itself, unable to let her go, even if he wanted to. He latched onto her, sobbing and choking—not realising that he might have been holding a little too hard. He held onto her like a child being torn from its home. He held onto her because they were all that was left, and she was there, holding him, comforting him. Because Trevor was gone, he was gone, and he couldn’t stop thinking, stop crying, and everyone else was gone too…!
It wasn’t until she started singing that it all began to stop.
theartofmadeline
s-u-f-j-a-n-s-t-e-v-e-n-s
discoholicmusic
turnnoffyourmind
sugurugetos
origamiaround
